About

Who I am

My name is Alexander. I'm a software engineer. I build high-load systems for a living, the kind of stuff that handles millions of requests. I'm reasonably good at that.

Then I moved to the UK.

The problem

Turned out I couldn't order coffee without being frustrated. Said something wrong, didn't say something I wanted to say, said too much, said too little. Ugh..

At the beginning, when you're learning a new language, everything is painfully slow. You're thinking on each word. You need time to put together a simple sentence. And the worst isn't the grammar at all, it's watching someone wait for you to get your sentence done. That polite expression. That patience. It's crushing.

What I tried

• Duolingo
  Fun game, zero knowledge, zero confidence.
• Preply
  Schedule, tutors, timing, unused lessons are lost. I kept missing lessons or showing up unprepared. 40 minutes for nothing.
• Group courses
  Everyone speaks at your level or lower, so your progress is questionable.
• Private teachers
  Great, if you can afford them. I couldn't.

What actually works

So I started learning on my own. Reading, writing, listening, watching. Trying different things. Turned my whole environment into English. Stopped using my native language at all.

And eventually I landed on one simple idea: you have to produce language, not just consume it. Writing is good, but speaking is something. You have to push thoughts out of your head into a new language. That's what builds you.

Why everything else sucks

Google Translate and DeepL are slow, context-blind, and I don't really appreciate leaving a permanent trail of everything I've ever looked up out there. Every word you search, saved somewhere, tied to you. You'll find it later on YouTube, Pinterest, Amazon.

Words have more than one meaning. No slang. Pronunciation sounds like a robot reading terms and conditions. You look something up and still don't know if it's a word your grandmother would have used in 1987 or something you'd actually say on the street.

AI chat tools hallucinate long essays when you ask a simple question and have no voice to briefly play how it sounds.

What I built

Look up any word or phrase, 120+ languages, multiple meanings, real examples, human-quality pronunciation, synonyms, and usage context. Knowing a word is one thing. Knowing how and where to use it, that's what actually matters most.

Exercise Match words to definitions, definitions to words. Simple. Repetition is the key.

Practice Chat or talk in any language, any context you choose, at your own pace. No timer counting down, no disappointed face waiting. An AI that adjusts to your level and actually encourages you rather than overwhelming you with rules. After the conversation, you get blunt, useful feedback, what worked, what didn't, advice you could use next time.

And you can actually talk. Voice. Real conversation. I spent quite a while getting this right.

Privacy

The whole thing is built as your private room where you can mess up as far as you want. Be aggressive. Be polite. Be curious. Doesn't matter. Explore your new language. And then delete it. It's not Google.