I am going to learn German this year. I already have a plan, and a good one, but I don't have the resources I need. The most useful resource is interaction. You don't quite need immersion, to speak a language comfortably, but you do need interaction with people who speak the language. You don't have to order your pizza in another language, and everything else also, but those would be forms of interaction you could use.

Now, the Occulus rift is a virtual reality device. This means it places a real person into a virtual world. But the more useful type of technology is augmented reality. Augmented reality projects virtual things into the real world.

Even better would be a merger of the two. And I think a merger of the two would be something similar to a hologram.

At that point, you could have virtual interaction in 3d space with a real live person in another country.

I think augmented reality is going to get bigger, at least I think it should. But virtual reality needs to be paired with it. Perhaps you can hack the Occulus to do this?

immersed = enriched environment + purpose

An enriched environment means if you do anything, getting up in the morning for example, you can't do it without encountering something new. If you get up in the morning hearing neighbors yelling in Italian then your purpose becomes understanding Italian well enough to know the difference between 'everyone run, there's a fire' and 'I wish I never fell in love with you' so you know which of the two is ok to go back to sleep during.

Make-believing you're somewhere else a little bit every day won't achieve this, because your brain can stop working and reject any new information when it loses interest. If you are forced to wear it every waking moment that you aren't simply sleeping, maybe there's not a big difference.

I like this idea a lot. I have the Oculus and when I open a simulation I am definitely tricked into believing that I am wherever I materialize. So theoretically there would be absolutely no difference between being in a foreign country and being in a "Virtual China", granted you can make the simulation realistic enough. It would actually, in theory, be more efficient to do it this way (with the Oculus) because the simulation could work with you, slowing down, repeating words, phrases, gestures, etc.

Genius.