Gentlemen,
How many of you listen to you iPods or other MP3-type players in the car (passenger only
), waiting for the wife to finish shopping, sipping your latte over at Waller Hall
, etc...
If I may make a suggestion, burn those language CDs (DLI / Living Language / In-Flight, Language/30 / Berlitz / Pimsleur / Instant Immersion / you get the picture) to MP3 format. Takes up little room on the player, and it is always available - plus you can label the tracks so you know what you are about to hear e.g., Greetings and Salutations, Numbers and Counting, etc...
I personally would not recommend it for when you are working out, but helps to kill a few hours on the flight from SEA to NRT / BKK / CMB or parts otherwise.
There is one company out there that markets a program specifically for the iPod Mandarin, Japanese, Korean, and Cantonese - but good luck finding other non-business oriented / CENTCOM languages.
Realize that this has also been brought up in other posts, but thought it worth reiterating the info.
Also, check out "odd places" like other have suggested - I managed to work my Bahasa Indonesia at a Thai restaurant in Tampa, FL during a TDY...go figure. What better way to practice than to use it / listen for it - which is how I was able to strike up the conversation with the waiter, they fell over themselves to work with me on my Bahasa Indonesia. Another place is the yahoo chat rooms - get a throw away account, and just observe for a while - you learn a lot of the colloquilisms / "bar (insert name of target language)", and the current trends in that country (to a much lesser extent, but helps you to establish rapport - who would have thought that a P-Pop version of Tom Jones' "Sex Bomb" would be popular in the Philippines...)
Just my humble $0.02
V/R,
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