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Posts: 3463
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA
RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Leñador)
The answer may fluctuate. Eight years ago we went to Spain. It had been many years since I spent much time in a Spanish speaking country. Driving from Jerez to Granada, Larisa had the radio on. Though I had been handling tourist stuff for a few days, I couldn't keep up with the radio announcer, who was speaking pretty much castellano.
I thought, "Well, that's it. Lack of practice for years, and age, Spanish is gone."
Suddenly, like throwing a switch, everything the announcer said was perfectly clear. When we got to Granada I conversed with the university student who was minding the small hotel while the owner ran errands. When we got to the room, Larisa remarked, "You really can speak Spanish."
A couple of years later I visited my college room mate, who has lived in Munich since 1964. We ate dinner, breakfast the next day, walked around the city center. I could read signs, understand a few words here and there. He said, "Let's hire a taxi and ride around a little more of the town."
The driver was friendly, apparently used to tourists, and gave a running commentary of the sights as we drove. At first I just caught a word here and there, not having used German to any extent for more than 40 years. But gradually I picked up more words, then the curtain was lifted. By the end of the hour and a half taxi ride I was conversing intelligibly and fairly fluently.
Assuming it would be no problem to me, a Javanese friend wrote to me in Bahasa Indonesia, the Malay dialect that is the official language of Indonesia, though he speaks English, Spanish, Russian and five Indonesian languages fluently. I had to work through his letters laboriously with a dictionary at hand. But back in Indonesia for a few days, I would not say I was fluent, but I could get along with daily stuff fairly effectively.
In grad school I shared an office with a lovely Brazilian girl. She spoke Portuguese and Romanian, neither of which I could make out very well. But she showed me that if she spoke Portuguese very slowly, and I did the same in Spanish, we could communicate clearly. In a few months she was effective in English, and fluent in Spanish, with a mere wisp of accent.
So when I went to Brazil I thought, "No problem. I'll just speak Spanish slowly, as Catarina showed me." Didn't work. As soon as Spanish words came out, people's eyes clouded over, their faces said, "Foreign language. Don't understand."
So on the next trip I altered my tactics. I learned a little Portuguese, enough to get a conversation started. Then I would very gradually transition to Spanish, slowly and carefully enunciated. Worked about 80% of the time.
Working in France a fair amount, I learned enough French to get through a fair amount of daily stuff. The problem there was people would assume I was fluent and launch into rapid fire monologues which were totally incomprehensible to me.
Some times I even have trouble with English. Spending several days in rural Norfolk four years ago, photographing some 15th century paintings on the altar rail of a church, I stayed at a small rural hotel. The staff were young people in their twenties, educated and well spoken. But one morning at breakfast I was offered "More taste?" It took three repetitions for me to figure out the subject was "toast," pronounced with the ongoing vowel shift. I read recently that the same vowel shift is taking place in the northern midwest of the USA.
RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Leñador)
Does Klingon or Sindarin count?
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RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Leñador)
quote:
The answer may fluctuate.
For sake of poll I'm gunna say right now actively.
quote:
But she showed me that if she spoke Portuguese very slowly, and I did the same in Spanish, we could communicate clearly.
I had a Brazilian girlfriend for a bit and that's how we communicated. Biggest misunderstanding is her word for run is the mexican F word so the first time she said she ran a lot at work I nearly lost my lunch. Super funny when we figured it out.
quote:
Some times I even have trouble with English.
My girlfriend needs subtitles for almost anything Brittish we watch, it's pretty funny.
RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Leñador)
quote:
Nope, I'm not even gunna count Esperanto for that matter! lol
aaaawwww maaaaaan! Where's the pouting emoticon?
_____________________________
"Anything you do can be fixed. What you cannot fix is the perfection of a blank page. What you cannot fix is that pristine, unsullied whiteness of a screen or a page with nothing on it—because there’s nothing there to fix."
RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Leñador)
Three currently, with rudimentary (but really just rudimentary) comprehension still given of two others.
All languages taken into account (including those on native level and beyond, as well as those on early entry level) that I ever dealt with, it amounts to 7 languages.
RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Leñador)
quote:
My girlfriend needs subtitles for almost anything Brittish we watch, it's pretty funny.
English isn't my native language but I understand the scottish accent without trouble. I find it amusing when people on youtube complain that they can't understand a thing if it has a scottish accent.
RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Leñador)
quote:
Is it really that hard?
Thats cus scottish is the portuguese of english. jk
Yeah I never had a problem. Whats weird is she wants subtitles for brittish shows but her good friend married a scottish guy and she understands him fine...........
RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Ruphus)
Got it. So like a higher register? What I've found is that many people have their own linguistic subset within their field of specialty. Even people in marketing speak in a way that isn't necessarily understandable to an outsider, no matter how litterate he may be. And so with all fields of expertise. Oddly enough, when you're a foreigner learning a language, you often learn the higher registers better than the more colloquial ones. Though I don't really speak it, I understand Goethe better than a cab driver in Köln.
_____________________________
"Anything you do can be fixed. What you cannot fix is the perfection of a blank page. What you cannot fix is that pristine, unsullied whiteness of a screen or a page with nothing on it—because there’s nothing there to fix."
RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Leñador)
quote:
What I've found is that many people have their own linguistic subset within their field of specialty.
That's true, when I'm talking to structural engineers at work my bookkeeper says it sounds like a different language. Flamenco in english too though. "You fell out of compas in the second tercio of the letra, lets skip the silencio and start at the subida back into the letra." Even if you knew english and spanish, without some flamenco knowledge that wouldn't make a whole lot of sense.
RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Leñador)
quote:
Flamenco in english
Flamenglish
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"Anything you do can be fixed. What you cannot fix is the perfection of a blank page. What you cannot fix is that pristine, unsullied whiteness of a screen or a page with nothing on it—because there’s nothing there to fix."
Posts: 3472
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Leñador)
English, Malay, Indonesian, Spanish, and German.
Bill
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RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Leñador)
Asian/tonal languages are IMPOSSIBLE!! My girlfriend tries to teach me Vietnamese all the time and I feel like I say something the same 3 times in a row and she says "no, only the second one was right." "What??? I said it exactly the same all 3 times!!" Cheers to anyone who can pick up an asian language. I'm gunna keep trying but I'm light years off.
RE: How many languages do you speak?? (in reply to Sr. Martins)
quote:
ORIGINAL: Sr. Martins
quote:
My girlfriend needs subtitles for almost anything Brittish we watch, it's pretty funny.
English isn't my native language but I understand the scottish accent without trouble. I find it amusing when people on youtube complain that they can't understand a thing if it has a scottish accent.
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