Thanks for your detailed response!

I don’t think living in the country is the only way to truly learn a language anymore. It definitely used to be, before the internet allowed us to immerse ourselves in a language from the comfort of home. I never lived in an English-speaking country and yet it’s my best language by far (maybe even more than my native language, French).

I agree, however, that a language is much more than just words and grammar. It’s a combination of so much more and learning to breathe the language naturally is the best way to become good.

Then again, it also depends on the goals you have for learning a language. Some people only want to know how to express themselves in basic terms, which is also fine. I hope to reach a native-like level in Japanese one day but I’m fine with my high-intermediate level of Spanish for example.