As an alternative, use Text::CSV or Text::CSV_XS and read the whole file in one go:

use Text::CSV_XS;
open my $fh, "<", $file or die "$file: $!";
my $csv = Text::CSV_XS->new ({ auto_diag => 1, binary => 1, sep_char =
+> "|" });
$csv->column_names (qw( lastname firstname country language ));
my $info = $csv->getline_hr_all ($fh);
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With your data looking like

Wall|Larry|USA|English
Walker|Johnny|Scotland|Scottish
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$info (an arrayref: a pointer to a list of hashes) would look like:

[
    {   country          => 'USA',
        firstname        => 'Larry',
        language         => 'English',
        lastname         => 'Wall'
        },
    {   country          => 'Scotland',
        firstname        => 'Johnny',
        language         => 'Scottish',
        lastname         => 'Walker'
        }
    ]
[download]