So who's made an effort ...

In article ,
Martin wrote:

I can figure out a little of the Scandinavian languages between my German
and study of their ancestor Old Norse, but it seems most Scandinavians
speak really good English.

Most speak and write better English than those born in England :-)

When they show some big European soccer matches in the US, like the
World Cup, Euro Cup or the Champions League, they have on a guy who may
be Scottish who is very hard to follow for Americans.

ANd then they have on a former German soccer player and though there is
a slight accent, he's easier to follow.

Also think that Arsene Wenger of Arsenal speaks English more eloquently
than Ferguson, the Man. U manager. Funny too, because my understanding
is that Wenger barely spoke English when he first took over Arsenal.

In article ,
(David Horne) wrote:

poldy wrote:

to learn the language of the countries they visit?

I've been to Italy almost a dozen times but haven't learned anything
beyond a few phrases.

I'm OK at those languages I learned at school/college (e.g. French,
German, Italian) and speak Spanish with my partner, but I admit to going
to many countries where I haven't bothered to learn the most basic
phrases. I haven't encountered terrible problems so far, I have to say.

I traveled a lot to France years ago, because I'd studied French in
college.

But now, I go to Italy and Spain a lot more.

On Fri, 12 Apr 2013 13:19:09 +0000 (UTC), Erilar wrote in post :
:

I can figure out a little of the Scandinavian languages between my German
and study of their ancestor Old Norse, but it seems most Scandinavians
speak really good English.

But if you can speak a few words, they love you!


--
Tim C. Linz, Austria.

On 04/13/2013 12:25 AM, Király wrote:
David Horne wrote:
Assuming the waiter is Hungarian, the waiter might understand a Finn
speaking Finnish :-) There are similarities between the languages.

I believe they're mutually unintelligible (for practical purposes)
despite being part of the same group...

Hungarian and Finnish are distantly related and the degree of
similarity between them is very small; comparable to that between
English and Russian or Hindi.


Some Hungarian colleagues once taught me to count from one to ten in
Hungarian, but after the tenth beer, the next day I had forgotten
everything.

On 04/13/2013 12:14 AM, Király wrote:
poldy wrote:
to learn the language of the countries they visit?

I married a Hungarian and have made great effort in trying to learn some
of the language for when we visit. It is quite difficult but I can get
by with the basics, and since I have a keen ear for pronunciation, I'm
told that what I can speak is nearly accentless.

All the guidebooks say that Hungarians tend to be impressed with
tourists who speak it, owing to the fact that few attempt it. But that
hasn't been my experience. I find that people I meet tend to get
annoyed with me when I don't understand when they speak back to me.

I suspect that when I speak Hungarian with no accent I get mistaken for
a native simpleton rather than a foreign tourist. Maybe I'll work on
worstening my pronunciation and see if that makes a difference.

My English accent and grammatical errors give me away instantly even
after living half my life in Germany. On good days, they think I'm
Dutch. As a Polish taxi driver said to me in Hamburg, life is too short
to learn German.

On 04/12/2013 08:44 AM, David Horne wrote:
poldy wrote:

to learn the language of the countries they visit?

I've been to Italy almost a dozen times but haven't learned anything
beyond a few phrases.

I'm OK at those languages I learned at school/college (e.g. French,
German, Italian) and speak Spanish with my partner, but I admit to going
to many countries where I haven't bothered to learn the most basic
phrases. I haven't encountered terrible problems so far, I have to say.

I would like to learn Arabic at the moment, as I do like to visit Arabic
speaking countries and wonder if the experience wouldn't be enhanced by
a little understanding of the language...

David

I picked up a few words in the Gulf, although in Dubai the chances of
actually meeting a local are small. Things like "shukran" are good, but
there are a few traps. "Keef haalik" and "keef haalak" both mean "how
are you", but you use one talking to a man and the other to a woman.
Now, if I could only remember which is which.

Tom P:

My English accent and grammatical errors give me away instantly even
after living half my life in Germany. On good days, they think I'm
Dutch.

Ouch!
Oh, great...
;-)

As a Polish taxi driver said to me in Hamburg, life is too
short to learn German.

Living and working in Germany, I'm told that my German is pretty
fluent. They don't think I'm Dutch until after the first, oh, three and
a half minutes.

However, the local dialect ('Grafschafter Platt'), notably one that
they believe to be "very similar to Dutch", is giving me headaches. I
simply don't get the hang of it.
The problem: it's spoken all over the place in our small village.

--
Erick

On 04/11/2013 06:19 PM, poldy wrote:
to learn the language of the countries they visit?

I've been to Italy almost a dozen times but haven't learned anything
beyond a few phrases.

It does seem gradually there's more and more Italians who speak English
though.


I know there are language schools and such but there are other things
I'd rather do than go to class. Definitely not a slow traveler.

Maybe typical American arrogance, to expect others to cater to them,
including learning English -- though arguably, Southern Europeans would
do well to learn English to enhance their marketability in various
professions (not limited to tourism trades).

I started learning Spanish at a rather late age, and although I now can
communicate reasonably well, I can only say, the best time to learn
languages is when you are young. Speaking a language certainly makes a
huge difference in the kind of interactions you can have, even in a
purely tourist setting.

Martin wrote:

On Mon, 15 Apr 2013 11:47:39 +0200, Tom P wrote:

On 04/13/2013 12:25 AM, Király wrote:
David Horne wrote:
Assuming the waiter is Hungarian, the waiter might understand a Finn
speaking Finnish :-) There are similarities between the languages.

I believe they're mutually unintelligible (for practical purposes)
despite being part of the same group...

Hungarian and Finnish are distantly related and the degree of
similarity between them is very small; comparable to that between
English and Russian or Hindi.


Some Hungarian colleagues once taught me to count from one to ten in
Hungarian, but after the tenth beer, the next day I had forgotten
everything.

I learnt to count in German in a biergarten.

Eins, zwei, drei, Becks vier, hic....

D

--
(*) of the royal duchy of city south and deansgate
www.davidhorne.net (email address on website)
"[Do you think the world learned anything from the first
world war?] No. They never learn." -Harry Patch (1898-2009)

On Thu, 11 Apr 2013 09:19:53 -0700, poldy wrote in post :
news
to learn the language of the countries they visit?

For a 2 week holiday in Norway I took 10 private lessons with my travelling
partners. Was interesting and I thought quite easy to learn the basics. We
didn't need it much, but it was nice when we did, as nearly everyone made
the effort to try and understand us. Somehow I felt more at home there than
I would have done had I not try to learn a bit. (I found the Norwegians to
be extremely friendly and welcoming anyway). Staying in a small B&B where
the landlady only spoke Nynorsk was a laugh. I even got by for a day in
Denmark, and it helped in Sweden too - at least understanding signs etc.

Then a beginners course in Italian at evening classes (it was full of women
and we spent most of the time translating Italian pop song lyrics. Learnt
enough to ask for a room and probably understand the answer.

--
Tim C. Linz, Austria.