I’ve actually heard about a Russian speaker of Cymraeg who went to Cardiff to have some practice and was terribly disappointed when he heard no Cymraeg at all, all the time he was there.
Well speaking for myself, I wouldn’t have taken the plunge if there was a high initial cost barrier, but now that I’m here…
Yes, I’ll check out Skype possibilities through the forum sometime soon, thanks! I also may be able to make it to a local meetup eventually, to my great surprise (though not until November, apparently). Thanks!
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- Croeso
- You will have noticed : a) that most of use write very little in Welsh and b) that the subjects of a thread tend to change with extreme rapidity
Please accept llongyfarchiadau o fi for your incredible progress. At this rate, you will run out of languages to learn!!
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If you ever need a partner, I’d be happy to have a skype conversation:)
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I think Aran’s aim with this course is to see how much a human brain can take before it short circuits, to be honest! But I’ve actually started to like the feeling of my synapses frying, I must admit! 
I’ve found a similar thing you, actually. When I do a lesson and a certain pattern or word doesn’t seem to stick, I often find its fixed itself in subsequent lessons.
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@stella, the TV series you’re referring to was called “No Béarla,” and it’s available on Youtube currently.
@JustinandEirwen, I’ve done some kind of serious study in maybe a dozen, and played around with about a dozen more, over the past 30 years or so. Currently I could hold at least a halting conversation on most random topics in at least 5 or so: English (mother tongue), German (lived in Germany as a child for a few years), French (studied on my own since mid-2011), Esperanto (world’s easiest full-featured language to learn and speak, used Duolingo), and Irish (studied obsessively with Duolingo and other materials for 6 months earlier this year-at least 200 hours invested).
Now to see about adding Welsh to that list…
Thanks for all the comments and kind words, everyone! I expected maybe some responses, but not quite as much as that!
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Ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo, if you would know how much I forget every day … The most experienced I am with “how to say this?”, “I can’t say this!”, “O, boy … I forgot!” … and constant typing and searching of words I want to use as I’d like to say so much but I just don’t find the words. I could say that I can say even more in Italian, which I didn’t speak already for 20 years, then I can in Cymraeg which I’m constantly learning for about 3 (or even a bit more) years now.
Well, such is the truth unfortunately. Then I’m away from home for almost all of the day so I constantly miss to get on Skype at all. But that’s life …
Yah. I’m at work and despite sun outside my day is one of those I’d rather finish just right now or at least go home so I could do what I pelase to do (writing on here secretly right now) so excuse me if I put words wrong. I missspell more or less frequently on secondly basis so you probably don’t notice missspells anymore. - hehe
Diolch. this RWC makes me a bit dizzy and hardly get in accordance with the time, myself and everything. I’ll “return” in a time …
Oh if they were in place when I started. I might many things do differently. But now @aran gives me gudance in “my topic” and I keep going according to the plan …
The most number of lessons I did a day it was 3 or 4 …
Well, the fact is that you have to “get” people on first and with high price this wouldn’t likely happen, don’t you agree? We, who are on here already, know the value though but potential learners who didn’t try it yet would be teared off if the price would be too high no matter what valuable this course is.
Oooo, then, before it comes into place, @aran will surely give something new out so @geoffreywilliamson can carry on. 
OK. now this is all of my “chat abilities” for now … Back to work I must …
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Yes, that was the place where I found it. There’s also a nice but sad short film about a Chinese boy coming to Ireland speaking only Irish and no English and finding out that people don’t understand him. It’s called “Yu Ming is ainm dom”. Maybe somebody here likes Irish and would be interested in it too…
So you speak Irish, Geoffrey? That’s amazing, it’s the most difficult language I’ve ever come across! Which dialect are you learning?
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I do that in English, let alone Welsh! And it’s ok if you don’t have the time, but the offer’s there if you ever do!
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[chokes, spits coffee over keyboard, takes screenshot]… 
What a fantastic achievement, Geoffrey! Huge congratulations… 
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I’ll take it at one point …
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Hi Geoffrey,
That’s really interesting. I’m on a mission to be able to communicate in 8 languages and try to keep them current during the year. There’s a way to go yet to do that. We live on the French/Italian border so that keeps us current in French and Italian. Eirwen’s native language is Welsh which I’m learning via SSiW. My first language is English.
It’sa challenge weaving Spanish into our daily life here so it may be that we have to read and watch films in Spanish until we find a Spanish speaking local friend or spend a few weeks a year in say Spain (which may be practical being retired).
We are surrounded by quite a few German speakers and Austria is not such a difficult drive away so I’m putting some effort into going up the learning curve in German.
One further challenge is to be conversational in Hebrew before the year is out and to learn Russian as opportunity presents itself. I have a chance to teach tennis to a young Russian boy and his Grandmother has challenged me to do battle with her over the merits of Polish versus Russian vodka!! So flowing from all that should at least be some simple Russian conversation.
So, I’m reaching my natural limit if the goal is to use all these languages through the year.
However, I’m starting to believe Aran when he says you can learn a language and then bring it into use at will with the use of an intensive refresher dialogue. I suggested a 3 hour refresher might do the trick but Aran scorns me when I say that and says that that is enough time to learn a whole language!! So I think we have agreed to compromise on one hour as the length of refresher dialogue that is needed to do the job.
So if I survive this year’s attempt at learning languages it is interesting to dream of Thai, Croatian, Ethiopian and Swahili but the realistic side of me is warning me that this is highly unlikely to happen.
And Eirwen is telling me my time would be better spent improving my Welsh!!
Justin
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@stella, you know, I’m still not sure which dialect, I have to confess. The Duolingo course teaches using the Official Standard (in theory), and I’m also using “Learning Irish” (Connacht), but my favorite radio and TV programs are all generally full of Munster Irish. My only conversation partner so far has shaky school-Irish. So in sum, definitely not Donegal Irish.
@JustinandEirwen, working toward 8? Are you active on any of the polyglot forums, perchance? Going to the polyglot conference in New York this October? Let me know if you need help with Hebrew (or German, of course), and I’d be interested as to how you’re learning.
@aran, dw i ddim yn gwybod sut i ddweud rhywbeth yn Gymraeg hyd yn hyn: in Irish it would be “buíochas ó croí libh,” or loosely in English, “heart-felt gratitude to you (pl.).”
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Plenty of options there, but we’d very commonly go for ‘diolch o galon’ - calon is heart…
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Diolch for the answer:) I’m supposed to be learning Munster Irish(it’s the only course available in Russian, and it’s nice to learn something through the medium of my native language, for a change). But, I fear, in the end it will be an explosive mixture of Munster, Ulster and Caighdeán Oifigiúil. How do you find Irish, compared to Welsh, in terms of difficulty?
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Just curiousity: Any Slovene (not Slovak, mind) involved?
@tatjana, no Slovene so far. Plenty of Russian, a little Polish, and no other Slavic languages so far.
@stella, it’s hard to compare right now. Both are very different from my native language or any I’d studied previously, but also heavily influenced by English for obvious reasons. Also, so far I don’t really have a sense yet for “how deep the rabbit-hole goes” with Welsh (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7W2I9FGF9U), because I haven’t attacked the full spectrum of grammar and usage yet. I have a sense though that Welsh may be a little easier. Allowing for the fact that SSiW is specially designed to help English speakers get going from zero, it still seems like the grammar of spoken Welsh may be more similar to English. The rampant irregularities of written Irish and the proliferation of silent letters pose great difficulties as well. But knowing Irish definitely helped with getting used to Welsh, so maybe if I learned them in the other order I’d feel differently.
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So, you speak Russian as well? Amazing:) It’s a great inspiration for me, because I’m not sure I would’ve mastered it, if it weren’t my mother-tongue. @aran has mentioned something about doing an SSiRussian at some point, and perhaps involving me in it, and there are some people on this forum who are willing to give it a go.
Unfortunately, that’s what made me abandon the idea of learning the language some time ago. (Together with the lack of a speaking partner - the Irish people I know don’t speak it) I’m slowly beginning to learn now , but I have to say that it seems to be much more difficult than Welsh. Though I like the way mutations are marked, it’s a bit easier to figure out what is mutated and what is not than in Welsh.
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Croeso to this great forum, a llongyfarchiadau! I’m completely floored that you finished Level 1 and can write, too, in 11 days! You are definitely a poster child for Aran’s High Intensity method
(Dw i’n dod o America, hefyd.)
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