garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5209 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish
| Message 9 of 14 04 August 2014 at 11:33am | IP Logged |
For me it's an easy choice; I suppose I'd be a bad parent! ;) In the last six years or so I've had lots of Italian friends, dated a few Italians, lived with an Italian, and visited Italy several times. So hearing the language has been part of my life since long before I started actively learning it, and when I did start to develop an interest in French and in languages in general, Italian became the obvious choice for the next one.
A language needs to have a part in my life for me to want to study it, and I suppose Italian has the biggest one. Spanish has also been a consistent feature in my social life for a while, although to a lesser extent, and I dropped French because I had no personal reasons to use it.
EDIT: Just noticed I didn't answer the other question... Do I speak it? Yes, but nowhere near as well as I'd like to!
Edited by garyb on 05 August 2014 at 10:43am
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Xenops Senior Member United States thexenops.deviantart Joined 3827 days ago 112 posts - 158 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Japanese
| Message 10 of 14 04 August 2014 at 12:35pm | IP Logged |
This might become a list of "all the languages I find cool and and in an ideal world I'd become fluent in every one" list. :P
Irish--I've listened to Celtic music for several years now, and I find the sounds of the language cool. I also like to puzzle over the spelling: how does THAT spelling equate to that sound?
French--I find spoken or sung French to have a relaxing quality. It sounds like cooing to me.
German--In American movies set in during WWII, whenever you hear German spoken it sounds harsh and nasty. Then when I visited Guatemala, I got to know a couple of girls that came from their home country to volunteer. I heard them speak a soft, lilting language, and I asked what it was, and they were speaking German!
Ancient Greek--how can you read the Iliad or the Odyssey with (anglicized or literally translated) names of people and places and not feel intrigued.
Japanese--because it is.
Currently Spanish and Italian are not my favorites, but I'm falling in love with them as I study them more and find related native materials. :)
P.S. I actually don't have time to list all the languages I find cool.
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Medulin Tetraglot Senior Member Croatia Joined 4670 days ago 1199 posts - 2192 votes Speaks: Croatian*, English, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Norwegian, Hindi, Nepali
| Message 11 of 14 05 August 2014 at 12:13am | IP Logged |
Brazilian Portuguese is my favorite,
and yes, I speak it, maybe even better than my native language.
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Stolan Senior Member United States Joined 4034 days ago 274 posts - 368 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Thai, Lowland Scots Studies: Arabic (classical), Cantonese
| Message 12 of 14 05 August 2014 at 7:08pm | IP Logged |
Ancient Languages that are my favorites:
Sanskrit: Unlike its contemporaries and their descendants, Sanskrit is not so misshapen nor poorly formed.
Sanskrit is complex yet not redundant nor confused in its methods.
Classical Chinese:
I am trying to teach myself some classical Chinese, but going beyond that, I hope to see if I can figure out the
vernacular of the time somehow. The language was obviously well formed.
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hribecek Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5351 days ago 1243 posts - 1458 votes Speaks: English*, Czech, Spanish Studies: Italian, Polish, Slovak, Hungarian, Toki Pona, Russian
| Message 13 of 14 06 August 2014 at 7:42pm | IP Logged |
Hungarian for me too. I can't speak it very well - A2/B1 and generally only speak it to
myself, but I love the sound of it, love the feel of it in my mouth and even the grammar
somehow feels like it fits me. Maybe my love of Hungarian food also has an impact on my
feelings for the language.
Having said that, if I could only choose to keep one of my languages then I'd have to
choose Czech due to the huge amount of work I've put into it and the experiences I've had
in it (I also love it).
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Enrico Diglot Senior Member Russian Federation Joined 3747 days ago 162 posts - 207 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: Italian, Spanish, French
| Message 14 of 14 31 August 2014 at 3:14am | IP Logged |
My favourite languages are English, Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese. I'm learning English and Italian and
thinking to take on board either French or Spanish. Also I have some interest in Mandarin, Japanese and Arabic but I
do not think I have so much time to learn and retain so many languages without serious damage to other areas of
life :-)
Edited by Enrico on 31 August 2014 at 3:16am
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