# Language



## drpraetorus (Aug 9, 2012)

Is there a language that you wish you could speak but don't? I am trying to work on welsh that I studied 20 years ago. I would love to speak Irish, but there are fewer Irish speaker/teachers here than Welsh, and they are pretty few. I have tried German, Russian and Latin as well. It seems that Russian has too few vowels and French has too many. Maybe they could get together and trade vowels and consonents.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

I want to speak Macedonian. The only thing I can say is zdravo (hello) or in Cyrillic, здраво.


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

drpraetorus said:


> Is there a language that you wish you could speak but don't? I am trying to work on welsh that I studied 20 years ago. I would love to speak Irish, but there are fewer Irish speaker/teachers here than Welsh, and they are pretty few. I have tried German, Russian and Latin as well. It seems that Russian has too few vowels and French has too many. Maybe they could get together and trade vowels and consonents.


French has too many silent letters. "Que est-ce" is pronounces "kess."


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

I would love to learn Swedish and Finnish someday, just because they both sound beautiful. But before that I would love to learn *never * to make an idiot of myself when I am speaking German.


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

Probably Russian - I have an interest in Russian/Soviet history so being able to speak the language would be a nice tie-in. I can just about read printed Cyrillic but that's only as far as I've gone. The only phrase I know is 'ya ne govoryu po-Rosski' ('I can't speak Russian'). On the whole us Brits are not exactly renowned for our polyglottal tendencies due to the traditional lack of emphasis on modern languages within the educational curriculum and being spoilt by so many other nations either speaking English or having English as a second tongue. One Dutch acquaintance of mine said he was fluent in English and (to a lesser extent) French by the time he was in his early teens.


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## kv466 (May 18, 2011)

Lithuanian


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Navajo!!!!!


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

Mandarin......


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

Vietnamese, so I could converse with my girlfriend in her native tongue. But there's just no way I can get my facial muscles and tongue to speak it properly.


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

starthrower said:


> Vietnamese, so I could converse with my girlfriend in her native tongue.


Mail-order bride, eh?


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## Lunasong (Mar 15, 2011)

I took both French and Japanese in language classes and wish I had kept up as about all I've retained is certain words/phrases and a knowledge of the basic structure.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

French, I think. I studied french in highschool, but I'm very rusty right now... well, I have never been very fluent anyway.


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## MaestroViolinist (May 22, 2012)

Grade six I did a whole year of French. Grade seven I did half a year of German and half a year of Chinese (and never again...). Grade eight a whole year of German, and I'm still doing it this year.


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## Chrythes (Oct 13, 2011)

Yes, Mandarin might be interesting, or any other tonal language. I wonder if musicians have less difficulties learning these languages?

I'd also like to learn French or German.


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## Ukko (Jun 4, 2010)

Spanish. It's a beautiful language when spoken at a moderate pace, and the 'turns of phrase' often throw a different slant on things from English. I have attempted to learn a couple times, but the old brain refuses to retain meanings. I get a lesson down pat one day, and two days later it's gibberish.


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## regressivetransphobe (May 16, 2011)

I'm not proud of my ignorance, but some of my most interesting chats in unfamiliar places were in caveman language. (Hand gestures, pointing, drawing, copying things down on paper, finding the person in the room who speaks the best English to interpret, etc.)


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> I want to speak Macedonian. The only thing I can say is zdravo (hello) or in Cyrillic, здраво.


Do you mean Greek. :devil:


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## Delicious Manager (Jul 16, 2008)

I have a very keen interest in languages and linguistics. I speak French, German and Russian (a tiny bit) and have smatterings of several more. I am fascinated by the way languages are related (or not) and the way some closely-related languages can be, to various extents, mutually intelligible (but sometimes not in both directions!).

I have always had an interest in learning Hungarian, simply because it is not an Indo-European language and would present me with some new and interesting challenges.


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## pierrot (Mar 26, 2012)

I've tried to learn Swedish once, but I gave up for lack of time.


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## jani (Jun 15, 2012)

pierrot said:


> I've tried to learn Swedish once, but I gave up for lack of time.


I studied Swedish for 6 years, i had to.
Because i never used it anywhere i forgot 99% of it.


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## pierrot (Mar 26, 2012)

I stopped on the very basic of the language. It was more for curiosity than anything else.


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## cwarchc (Apr 28, 2012)

nie mogę mówić polskich
My father was Polish, he tried when we we young, but he didn't persist
I wish he had, it would have been a link to him now he's gone


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

aleazk said:


> Do you mean Greek. :devil:


racist little.............


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## Philip (Mar 22, 2011)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> French has too many silent letters. "Que est-ce" is pronounces "kess."


* « _Qu'est-ce_ »


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Philip said:


> * « _Qu'est-ce_ »


Thank you Philip. What happened to your avatar?


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## Philip (Mar 22, 2011)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> Thank you Philip. What happened to your avatar?


i suppressed it


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Philip said:


> i suppressed it


Oh the poor thing. 

You should get a new one, I hear they're rather cheap today.


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## Philip (Mar 22, 2011)

i like *regressivetransphobe's*


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Philip said:


> i like *regressivetransphobe's*


Well take it.


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## superhorn (Mar 23, 2010)

Macedonian is actually very similar to Bulgarian , and in fact, many Bulgarians consider it to be just a dialect of their own language .
I'd like to learn what is probably the weirdest-sounding and difficult to pronounce language there is -Circassian, native to the Black sea region of the western Caucasus . I've heard examples of it on youtube, and it sounds more like Klingon than a human language 
It's full of hissing,rasping, gurgling, whistling and buzzing sounds ; the native speakers sound like they're talking with their mouths full of food !


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## Cnote11 (Jul 17, 2010)

ComposerOfAvantGarde said:


> French has too many silent letters. "Que est-ce" is pronounces "kess."


One thing about French that sort of bothers me is the speed with liaisons and trying to pick apart words since sometimes they blur them together, and picking out direct/indirect pronouns from a sentence. There are a lot of similar sounding words that are completely different, like meme and m'aime.

Seriously, this is why I love Japanese. There is none of this ambiguity in Japanese EVER.


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## Philip (Mar 22, 2011)

I had to take an English "second language" test the other day, too easy...


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde (Dec 2, 2011)

Cnote11 said:


> One thing about French that sort of bothers me is the speed with liaisons and trying to pick apart words since sometimes they blur them together, and picking out direct/indirect pronouns from a sentence. There are a lot of similar sounding words that are completely different, like meme and m'aime.
> 
> Seriously, this is why I love Japanese. There is none of this ambiguity in Japanese EVER.


I've wanted to learn Japanese since last year. Japanese is a beautiful language even to listen to.


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## Ravndal (Jun 8, 2012)

German/French/Italian/Japanese

Would have been practical...


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## SiegendesLicht (Mar 4, 2012)

Just found this picture and was not sure where to post it:









It says "Floor polishing machine rental" in German - all in a single word! Isn't that an amazing language?


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## Sonata (Aug 7, 2010)

I took a sign language course in college and it was fascinating. Difficult for me, especially receptively, but a lot of fun. My husband worked as a tae kwon do instructor for about six years previously and we were in a multicultural area, so he learned a fair bit of Korean, Japanese, and even a little Russian. But I'm finally learning the language of music which I've wanted to do for years!


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## Krummhorn (Feb 18, 2007)

I took two years of German (graduation required learning a foreign language) in high school, so I can pick out most of it and make some sense - but I cannot speak it anymore, except for the numbers (eins, zwei, drei, etc). 

I would like to learn Danish though. But overall, my most favorite language is Latin. It's a shame it became a 'dead language', but fortunately still exists in music and Gregorian chant.

Kh ♫


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

I'll see your Fussbodenschleiffmaschinenverleih, and raise you Erdoeldestillationsrueckstaendeforschungszentrum (research centre for oil residues).


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

Compared to strine I guess English is ok but only just


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## OboeKnight (Jan 25, 2013)

Finnish, because when Tarja Turunen sings in Finnish...its incredible. Also Russian and (better) at Deutsch.


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## deggial (Jan 20, 2013)

^ which reminds me, her English prononciation is very funny  (Wishmaster lyric spoofs on u-tube).

it's Swedish for me. Just sounds pretty. I'm in the process of teaching myself Italian via opera, which will probably make me sound quite funny to a contemporary speaker  let alone the obstacle of foreign singers' attempts at it...


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## Head_case (Feb 5, 2010)

I wish I'd learnt Esperanto. That way it would complement the Latin I still speak


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## OboeKnight (Jan 25, 2013)

deggial said:


> ^ which reminds me, her English prononciation is very funny  (Wishmaster lyric spoofs on u-tube).
> 
> it's Swedish for me. Just sounds pretty. I'm in the process of teaching myself Italian via opera, which will probably make me sound quite funny to a contemporary speaker  let alone the obstacle of foreign singers' attempts at it...


....in me the Fishmaster lol


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## superhorn (Mar 23, 2010)

George W. Bush is still struggling to learn how to speak English !










:lol: :lol: :lol:


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## Tristan (Jan 5, 2013)

Well, I know Latin well, but I don't know how to speak it. But that's because I've learned it in order to read it and translate it, not to speak it. 

I wish I could speak Italian, though. My dad speaks it fluently; I wish he had spoken it to me as a kid...


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

What language is this ??

So a sits in Bar 10 wae ma paper after a 10 hour shift startin at 1pm. Pint a Perona please. ...Demolishes that then orders a pint a Tinints wae a dash a lime, just tae get back tae ma roots. 

Stroppy wee fat cow pours it as if it's a burden of hell and a gie her the dosh. Gets the change and looks back down at the paper, readin aboot Sean Fallon RIP. 

Goes tae take a swig and notices the pint's flat as and looks like appletize. Not a head in sight. Polite as you like - 

"Excuse me can a get a wee head on ma pint please?"

"There was a head in it when a gave you it"

Off the oompa loompa storms, leavin me lik a spare rick. Just left it sittin, stared repeatedly whilst she whispered tae the boy ahint the bar, until she was forced tae come back........

"Listen aw a asked was fur a head on ma pint as it's quite flat"

"It does llok flat but how do I know you've not took a drink out of it when I turned my back?"

Veins come tae the surface ay ma noggin.....

"Are you fakin serious?"

"You're getting quite aggressive" 

"Listen hen, av had wan pint and a long day, ye hink am some sorta tramp that sips the heids aff pints in pubs wae nae CCTV. How much you want fur the heid?" 

"You're not getting a head on it"

"damn me, this is absolutely bizarre, is the manager in?"

"I am the manager" (lies fae the wee fat pig)

About tae wreck the camp a composed masel, scrunched a fiver fae ma wallet, chucked it, big fake smile n says.......

"Here get yersel another pizza, keep that wee kite tapt up " 

BOOT............that's me chilled


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

Hmmm....I'm guessing this is working-class Weegie seeing Sean Fallon was an ex-Celtic FC footballer? What threw me was the 'damn me' bit - seems rather mild for Glasgow!


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

elgars ghost said:


> Hmmm....I'm guessing this is working-class Weegie seeing Sean Fallon was an ex-Celtic FC footballer? What threw me was the 'damn me' bit - seems rather mild for Glasgow!


I tamed that bit, well picked - guess that wasn't too hard to guess


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