Traveling is one of this most exciting things you can do in life, and from my point of view, even more than this! To prepare for a trip there are many things you should do, but in this article I am going to focus on the potential visitor to Europe and Japan, specifically on somebody willing to visit Spain, France, Germany or Japan.

As you may know, the level of English in Europe can be pretty good in some countries but it needs a lot of improvement in some others. Spain and Italy leading the way, followed by Germany and France are 4 of the countries where, probably due to the power of their native language or simply because the educational system has failed in integrating a good plan for foreign languages, there is simply a lot of people not able to speak English.

The problem, far from being only a communication problem (innovative and funny signs can be useful to take that problem away... or to make it even worse!), this is a problem of cultural immersion. Visiting a country is not going to a new cool place, looking at some big and old buildings and taking the plane back home. An adventure to the outside should really be a way to discover a new place and get to know how the people living there is, gaining insight on how culture affects the way they do so and, in the end, having something else that some pictures with your funny face smiling in front to show to your friends and make them become jealous.

One of the main problems that can avoid this from happening is the language barrier. Once you know the language of a country, you get to know the people. Language is expression, is the way they express themselves, and if you understand it you get to know what has made this people communicate in this particular way. I find this thing a great deal you get from traveling. Unfortunately, many times I have not been able to follow my own recommendations and I still regret it and consider it as mistakes from my past.

But we no longer have an excuse. The answer is interactive language courses, and nowadays many companies are not only selling dictionaries and "Learn that language in 10 days" books, but they also are creating computer-based learning methods, in which the user experiments more and more interactivity with the learning process, up to a point where it can, at least in some part, replace the role that a teacher would develop.

The variety to select from is really wide, but after my experience with the German course of one of those companies, I think it is good to give it a try. They offer a variety of interactive courses: German, French, Spanish and even Japanese! Their software is based in a high degree of interactivity, going from conversational skills you can practice with the computer, to hundreds of pages with grammatic explanations, games, videos, links to free downloads, and a level that begins with the most basic concepts to some advanced skills, in a way that it can be useful for almost any level between beginner and high-intermediate.

To be very sincere, they say you can use this method and learn the language in 3 months. That is a reference but I would not like to say this is a fact. It really depends all on you and how much time you have to learn that language and how many hours can you spend a day on it. For my trip to Germany I was a bit on a hurry, I followed the method for 2 months and I went there. I was not an expert I admit, but I could catch some expressions and even I was able to keep some basic conversations.

For the French, Spanish and Japanese courses, I haven't had the opportunity to deal with them, as I already know French and Spanish and I am not planning to go to Japan... still! But provided the experience with the German course, I imagine you can expect more or less the same result.