Langauges

[KittywifaMohawk]

Well I would like to know what type of foreign languages The Escapist knows. Post the foreign language you know, and what country you're from so we don't think you're cheating. =P And give us an example sentence or something. And let us guess it =P

Oh and if you know more then one, please do tell.


For me? I know very little, but I know some Japanese(taking it in school.) I'm from America.

And you all should know this sentence if you know Japanese.

Watashi no namae wa ALEX desu.
Or Anata no namae wa desu ka.

And for the one's who know it somewhat fluently.

Baka wa nani o hanashimasu ka.

 

[sneakypenguin]

I can speak English and not a lick of spanish though i've taken 4 years of it. I also understand redneck haha

 

[ThePoodonkis]

I used to know German, but forgot much of it.
I'm learning Spanish in school.
And I speak American-English.

 

[Noamuth]

I know the tiniest bits and pieces of other languages, but that's it.

"I only speak two languages, English and bad English."

 

[Jamanticus]

I suppose I'll put a bit of dead language trivia in here:

I know quite a bit of Latin (long time since I've used it, though), I won't tell what country I'm from, since it doesn't matter with Latin, but here's a sentence:

Mihi, mihi omnes sunt!


See if you can guess what that means...


....And those sentences that Evil Raven posted lead me to believe that the first two have something to do with the poster's name... But I don't speak Japanese, so I'm probably wrong.

EDIT: And, no, I don't know any other foreign languages...Apart from a smidgen of German, thanks to my mom... Maybe I'll post a sentence in German in my next post.....

 

[Earthbound]

I'm going to jump on the now-forming line of people that are sorta fluent in Spanish. After taking three years of Spanish in school, (currently ongoing) I came to appreciate just how godawful hard it must be for someone to learn English as a second language.

?Qué me comprendes?

 

[KittywifaMohawk]

I suppose I'll put a bit of dead language trivia in here:

I know quite a bit of Latin (long time since I've used it, though), I won't tell what country I'm from, since it doesn't matter with Latin, but here's a sentence:

Mihi, mihi omnes sunt!


See if you can guess what that means...


....And those sentences that Evil Raven posted lead me to believe that the first two have something to do with the poster's name... But I don't speak Japanese, so I'm probably wrong.

I'm not even going to try and guess what that means, I am completely lost on that. I do not know any Latin what so ever, I want to learn though.

And yea, the first sentence has to do with mine. The other doesn't though, but it deals with names.

 

[TheBluesader]

I've made up about a dozen languages in the course of my short life. But I'm not fluent in any of them.

There's only one thing sadder than spending time making up a language instead of learning a real one, and that's not even being fluent in it. And the only thing sadder than THAT is repeating the process a dozen times.

I can remember a phrase from the oldest one: "Mannenen bat Ie [pronounced "Ee-uh"]," which means "the lord with his wife," or "the King of Gods with the Goddess of Love," depending on context.

And now that I've just posted this, I'm going to go sit in the closet to veil my shame.

 

[KittywifaMohawk]

I've made up about a dozen languages in the course of my short life. But I'm not fluent in any of them.

There's only one thing sadder than spending time making up a language instead of learning a real one, and that's not even being fluent in it. And the only thing sadder than THAT is repeating the process a dozen times.

I can remember a phrase from the oldest one: "Mannenen bat Ie [pronounced "Ee-uh"]," which means "the lord with his wife," or "the King of Gods with the Goddess of Love," depending on context.

And now that I've just posted this, I'm going to go sit in the closet to veil my shame.

Don't worry about it mate =P I know how you feel. It's hard to stick to a language to get fluent in it. I'm know where near fluent in Japanese. And this is the first language I've taken for over a year, out of like 12 different tries(I took spanish for 7 years and I don't remember a thing >.<)

 

[Zaleznikel]

Well, after my elementary school required Spanish starting in 4th grade, (USA, by the way), I continued it, taking a couple years off for latin. Currently, I'm in my 8th year of Spanish, and last year I spent two months in Spain, living with a host family, taking spanish and guitar lessons in all spanish and spanish lit, history and ceramics in english. Being immersed in the language really helps the learning process a ton. I can't really think of any lines to say though.

I also tried to start German this year with an online program sponsored by my local library, but it was so badly organized that I just couldn't do it

 

[TheBluesader]

Don't worry about it mate =P I know how you feel. It's hard to stick to a language to get fluent in it. I'm know where near fluent in Japanese. And this is the first language I've taken for over a year, out of like 12 different tries(I took spanish for 7 years and I don't remember a thing >.<)

Lol. Except that in this case I can't even stick to "studying" crap I was filling notebooks with when I was supposed to be paying attention to professors for college credit. Chief amongst them, Spanish professors.

To be honest, I must have picked up quite a bit by osmosis. I can usually figure out what someone is saying in Spanish, even if it takes a few hours and I'm too nervous about being wrong to reply to them with anything.

But I usually know when I'm being made fun of, at any rate. And that's what counts, right?

 

[Geoffrey42]

Je parle un peu de français, mais c'est mal que je ne parle pas plus après beaucoup ans d'étudier, et un semestre à Paris.

I also speak English pretty well. Much better than my French, at least. Probably because I'm from the US.

In what language is "Langauges" a word? Google was pretty much at a loss, though this thread managed to come up as result #8! That's an achievement, right?

 

[The Iron Ninja]

Anata no namae wa desu ka.

Boku no namae wa tetsu ninja desu. ("tetsu" being "metal", I forget what the word for "Iron" is)

Country: New Zealand

I learned Japanese back in college (high school for all you fellows of the American persuasion) but I've forgotten pretty much everything.

Asides from that I know a minuscule amount of Maori (language of the similarly named Maori, the indigenous people of New Zealand) as it's become somewhat mandatory for the language to be a part of everything in my country now (Be it Parliament, National Holidays, Christmas carols, Awarding of Victoria Crosses, Things we do in the UN, you name it, for whatever reason, Maori language and culture will for some unknown reason be included) Which gets rather tiring very quickly.

 

[BlazeTheVampire]

Well I would like to know what type of foreign languages The Escapist knows. Post the foreign language you know, and what country you're from so we don't think you're cheating. =P And give us an example sentence or something. And let us guess it =P

Oh and if you know more then one, please do tell.


For me? I know very little, but I know some Japanese(taking it in school.) I'm from America.

And you all should know this sentence if you know Japanese.

Watashi no namae wa ALEX desu.
Or Anata no namae wa desu ka.

And for the one's who know it somewhat fluently.

Baka wa nani o hanashimasu ka.

Watashi no namae wa Lauren desu. Ni nen de nihongo no clasu ga arimashita.

Also, three years Latin, 2 years Spanish, and one of Chinese.

 

[Saskwach]

Currently learning French and planning a trip sometime in the distant future. For those curious roughly how much I know, I shall attempt to decipher Geoffrey 42's little sentence first with my own head, then with an internet translator.

Je parle un peu de français, mais c'est mal que je ne parle pas plus après beaucoup ans d'étudier, et un semestre à Paris.

I speak a little (of) French...(and already I need to translate word for word because the sense of it is defying me): but it is (wrong?) what I don't speak more after many years of study, and one semester in Paris.
There's a fair bit of confusion in that middle there but I'm guessing that's just French grammar defying a word-for-word translation. The basic meaning is (I think): but I haven't spoken it very much since school, and one semester...
Unless Geoffrey was saying he shouldn't have stopped speaking it - in which case 'mal' would make sense...kinda.
Conclusion: It took me several minutes to have a working theory of what a written sentence meant. It's safe to say fluency is far off.

Now for the translator:
I speak a bit about French, but it is wrong that I do not speak more after a lot years to be studying, and a semester in Paris.

...
That makes much more sense.

 

[Hawgh]

more or less fluent in english, I've been told that I have a walisian accent.
Which is strange, considering that I'm danish.

I can understand & speak the other skandinavian languages on a so-so basis.

I speak a little german, but whenever I try to improve my grammar, it bends me over backwards.
Lastly, I know a little french, roughly enough to tell people to fetch me someone who speaks english.

 

[Saskwach]

I can understand & speak the other skandinavian languages on a so-so basis.

My linguistics unit says that's because the scandinavian 'languages' are still close enough linguistically that they might even pass as 'dialects'. Of course, a language is a dialect with an army and a navy, so...

 

[Hawgh]

I can understand & speak the other skandinavian languages on a so-so basis.

My linguistics unit says that's because the scandinavian 'languages' are still close enough linguistically that they might even pass as 'dialects'. Of course, a language is a dialect with an army and a navy, so...

pretty much, yeah.

 

[TheIceface]

Hmmmm, being an English teacher Ex-English teacher in a foreign country, I should probably know a bit more than I do.

-I speak fluent and colorful American.
-A decent amount of English/Australian/Canadian.
-A decent amount of Mexican, and as follows a moderate amount of Spanish and Italian. (I can communicate, although I don't always use the correct words.)
-Enough Mandarin Chinese to cuss someone out, or bargain for a good price on something. (I can't read or write more than 5 words, but I can say a mouthful or two)
-The tiniest pinch of German.
-A decent understanding of Greek and Latin base words and derivatives.

 

[zirnitra]

well, I was forced into doing French for 7 years and from that time this is what I learnt a bus is un autobus or something along those lines. to be fair I never had a chance learning French from a 75 year old vietmaneise woman who was hit by a shell and went in a coma and when she awake the only language she could speak French and then re-learnt English and German but not any of the Asian languages she originally knew..well that's what she claimed, when not shouting and poking me.

I did Latin for a year I enjoyed that, I am particularly skilled in long division and other maths in Roman numerals.