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bout 70 people are gathered in a room divided into groups. Once the discussion starts, each group speaks in a different language: Mandarin, English, Spanish, French and Italian, to name just a few.

Vivian, 18, is a member of the Jakarta Polyglot community.

Born in Singkawang, West Kalimantan, Vivian, who is of Chinese decent, speaks Hakka, a Chinese dialect from Guangdong province in South China, as well as Indonesian in her daily life.

“I have many Malay and Dayak friends back in my hometown, so I have developed an interest in languages since I was a kid,” she said.

She started learning English and Mandarin in fourth grade, however, she said her English class was not good so she wasn’t able to master it.

It was not until she joined a Korean Pop fan group on Facebook that she started to hone her English skills, even though at first she used Google Translate most of the time.

Later on, when she was in junior high school, a Facebook friend from Argentina added her to an international polyglot group, where she actively practiced her English.

After moving to Jakarta a year ago, Vivian began to earn a living by teaching Mandarin.

Currently, she is investing her time and efforts in learning Korean, Japanese and Spanish which she can understand but cannot speak. She joined the Jakarta Polyglot community to polish her language skills.

She said that being a polyglot had made her more tolerant because she tried to understand cultural differences. “Language is a part of culture, and I learn culture while learning language,” she said.

According to the Jakarta Polyglot regional coordinator, Fajar Triperdana, the polyglot community was first established in 2010 in Yogyakarta. However, when the founders went to study abroad, the community became inactive until the Jakarta Polyglot community started to operate in 2013.

The polyglot community has an open membership system and currently has almost 16,000 members across the archipelago. The multilingual club exists in Banda Aceh; Medan in North Sumatra; Bandung in West Java; Semarang in Central Java; Yogyakarta; Surabaya and Malang in East Java; Denpasar in Bali; and Mataram in West Nusa Tenggara.

The community holds regular meetings, including Polyglot Jakarta that holds a three-hour gathering once a month.

At each gathering, different discussion topics are raised such as Valentine’s Day, World Ocean Day and strange habits, to name a few.

The participants are grouped based on the language that they have mastered or would like to practice. A coordinator is assigned to lead the discussion and make sure everyone gets a chance to express their opinion.

Arvin Tehupuring said that the Jakarta Polyglot community had been helping him to improve his language skills. He found out about the community from his good friend who joined the group on Facebook.

“I speak Dutch, English, French and a little German. I would lose my language skills if I didn’t practice,” the 38-year-old English teacher told The Jakarta Post over the weekend.

He said he got his passion for languages from his mother who could speak English and German, as well as Sundanese and Javanese.

He was exposed to multilingualism from childhood. His parents and grandparents spoke Dutch, and at senior high school in Singapore he had to speak English.

According to Arvin, becoming a polyglot has helped him to socialize with people of different cultural backgrounds. The Ambonese man, who loves traveling, said that being a polyglot had made him more open-minded.

In the future, Arvin hopes to learn Italian, Spanish and German. He considers language skills to be a long-term asset, both personally and professionally. (dra)