How do you feel about calling yourself "fluent"?

Do you feel comfortable calling yourself "fluent" in English?

I started thinking about this topic recently when I was telling someone about my experiences living in Japan. She asked whether I'm fluent in Japanese, and I started to give my usual complicated answer.

I'm never sure what to say. On one hand, I have no problem getting by completely in Japanese. I can ask for the things I need, share my opinions, enjoy TV shows, and read signs. On the other hand, there are a lot of ideas that I can't express. There are a lot of topics of conversation that I can't follow along with well. And I can't put a sentence together nearly as well as I used to when I was using it every day.

When people ask me "Are you fluent in Japanese?" I usually explain a lot of what I've just described. I don't think it's true to say "No, I'm not fluent" but I also don't feel like I can confidently proclaim fluency.

When someone asks whether you're fluent in English, what do you say? Do you tend to overplay or underplay your abilities? Answer in the comments!

 

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