I think Aran believes we can learn more than 10. I’m a little more conservative in that I need to make a language live by planning a regular activity around it.
So even though curiosity pushes in the direction Aran says is possible I suspect with a couple more (say Russian and Arabic or an oriental language) I will be approaching my practical threshold.
Having said that if Aran produces ‘‘dialogues’’ that prod the memory it is exciting to think that a ‘‘latent’’ language can be rapidly brought back into play.
@rickyfreeman When I got started learning Welsh, I got some books in the Stori Sydyn series by Manon Steffan Ros. The language level is not too difficult for learners, and I find it really spurs you on. I learned a lot from them and they were enjoyable stories. You could try Hunllef - it might be available on Amazon (I had it posted to me by a friend in Wales).
Now I’m a bit sorry @JustinandEirwen you didn’t somehow “find your way” to Slovenia. Some bits of Slovene wouldn’t hurt to know since you live in Italy despite it’s not very near to Slovene borders though. However, Austria is so near to Slovenia one can easily stumble upon our little country one day … Many do, get “in love” with it (according to many blogs from travelers I’ve read) and eventually return or even stay.
Umm … well … but there are no particular hopes Slovene would be seen on SSi list quite soon as I’m getting from several topics some kind of feedback it is not too (if at all) high on anybody’s list. …
Well I would like to learn it. If only I had
(a) more hours in the day
(b) plenty of money to finance all my projects
I would love to learn Slovene properly, other than the few words and phrases I have picked up. The history, the archaic features such as duality that still remain, and so on. Must be fascinating. Admittedly, I have yet to find a language that I am not interested in! But anyway, I can’t be the only one. If I am interested, there will be others.
It seams so, just as it seams I’m the only learner of Cymraeg in my country… Our people wanting to learn so many languages (we even in school have to learn 2 or 3) seam not to be even a bit interested in “little” languages, that’s what irritates me quite a lot.
Well, I’ve noticed myself that if you learn a language to a certain degree of fluency, then even if you don’t practice it a lot, it doesn’t return to the zero level (though you may forget some complicated words and maybe your grammar and collocations become a bit sloppy, but still). But I agree with you - when I learn a language I feel that I need to keep it “alive” by at least reading in it occasionally! And it requires a lot of time…
I hope you all realise that those of us living in the British Isles are raised to think it brilliant to know a few words of any language but our mother tongue!! When I was in school, you only learned ‘another’ language if you went to Grammar School and only learned more if you showed great aptitude for that one!! Unless you travelled widely, you were unlikely to actually speak even that language other than “Parlez vous Anglais?”!!!
Oh, there’s “hvala” from many tourists when you direct them to where they want to go so you see, it’s not only “Parlez vous Anglais?” thingy … but yes, first question is always “Do you speak English?” “Yes, of course!” is almost always a reply back and then conversation flows futher in English. But, well, even Germans or Italians don’t ask “Sprechen Sie Deutsch?” “Parli Italiano?” English is al people speak no matter what nationality so you often don’t even get a chance to “offer” your knowledge of any other language unless you just answer “ne”. Then or that perticular person goes away or start to blurt out whatever in whatever language they can even a bit of Slovene or Croatian if neccessary …
I begin to realise why buffet car stewards, taxi drivers etc. jumped to conclusions that I was Belgian or even French because I automatically tried French if it seemed likely to be relevant.
Ahh, well, but you at least could use the language. But I know someties it’s not too pleasant thing if people think you’re something different then nationality you really are.
No, I didn’t mind at all!! I was flattered!! The one thing I didn’t like was to be called English!!! That people thought my French was good enough to be Belgian or from some far off part of France, well, I positively glowed with delight!!!
Just filling in the gaps left when your internet went down - Welsh people are brilliant linguists, handsome, beautiful, intelligent, gifted musicians and artists etc …
