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Attitude toward Russian in Europe | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Bjorn Diglot Senior Member Norway Joined 4859 days ago 244 posts - 286 votes  Speaks: Norwegian*, English Studies: German, French | Message 57 of 128 06 December 2011 at 1:35am | IP Logged | |||||
I agree. In fact it seems easy to get some practise in Russian wherever you go. My impression is that there are many Russian (speaking) taking vacation in many countries. This year I seen a lot of Russians in Egypt, Greece, Turkey,Vietnam and Thailand. So if you stay in a hotel with only Russians or laying on beach surronded with Russians. That I will call real immersion:-) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6588 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 59 of 128 06 December 2011 at 3:31am | IP Logged | |||||
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wow i'm surprised visas are such an issue. but yeah i can imagine how easy it is to be spoilt:) i myself am spoilt compared to many fellow Russians, as I got my first EU multivisa this year - after applying for two single-visit ones:D even if it still requires too much money and i can't just go on a whim, I still love the idea that I could easily go to Europe, like, tomorrow :D
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| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 7147 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 60 of 128 06 December 2011 at 3:52am | IP Logged | |||||
This sounds a lot like how I was before Couchsurfing when I met foreigners in the hostel. It's not quite the same to meet people who are vacation like you are and who are also in a new place like you are. I've found it much more enlightening to meet people on their home turf (and practice "language banditry" :-P) when they're not on vacation. When I was in Estonia, my friend showed me an Estonian cartoon which I wouldn't have even stumbled upon and took me to his favorite bar and talk politics, life in the Soviet Union and Estonian art (he was a graphic designer) - all the while I got to practice my limited Estonian. He also introduced me to some of his friends and a few dishes from Estonian cuisine. That's a helluva lot more enriching than if I were to have met him when we were both on vacation in some resort. It more likely would have been centered on just going to parties with other guests and talking about ourselves while getting smashed. I probably wouldn't be the wiser about the target language's culture (apart from generalizing that such-and-such culture is full of hedonistic spendthrifts, perhaps). At my age, that kind of experience or immersion isn't really for me. If I were looking for places to immerse myself for Russian, I'd pick Russia every time (unless it would be somewhere patently unsafe or sub-optimal for practice). Doing it anywhere else wouldn't really cut it. Perhaps this would sound shocking or even racist, but if a Russian student would want to do immersion for English, how would he/she feel if his/her choice were limited to Singapore, Hong Kong or India for English immersion? (it'd be totally different if this student would want go to such places). Would saying something like, "Well, they're full of native speakers of English aren't they?" be acceptable? I'm looking for a bit of a "back-story" (for lack of a better word) for my target language and for me and others, Russia provides the best "back-story" for Russian. Edited by Chung on 06 December 2011 at 4:26am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 7147 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 61 of 128 06 December 2011 at 4:03am | IP Logged | |||||
Unfortunately, I'm not in Norway. For the American, the Russian embassy states that it wants a money order - no mention of online banking. Lucky us. See below:
If the Norwegians have it easier (and I could understand Solfrid Cristin's points no matter how much work the agency does as you put it - that cost though is pretty high (3000 NOK is roughly $500 US), then that's great. However forking out $500 just to get the required documentation is pretty high (especially in these days of budget airlines)). 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Марк Senior Member Russian Federation Joined 5047 days ago 2096 posts - 2972 votes Speaks: Russian* | Message 62 of 128 06 December 2011 at 8:16am | IP Logged | |||||
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"Arabic, English, French, Spanish have gone far beyond being identifiable with
"originating" ethnic group even though they were spread by occupation, colonization, decree or immigration (but further in the past)" Really? English was introduced in the rural Ireland during the last 150 years (the process stopped in the second half of the 20 century) Most part of the United States was colonized by English speaking people in the last two centuries. While Belorussians have always spoken the same language that the Western Russia. Not to mention that the languages are mutually intelligible. Narva is actually the same city as Russian Ivangorod devided by the border. Many parts of Russia have been recently colonized by Russians. Russsian culture is ubiqitous in all the Russian speaking parts of the Soviet Union. People read the same books as in Russia, watch the same films, listen to the same songs. Unlike the languages you mentioned Russian is very uniform. Russian spoken in Moscow, Minsk, Sevastopol, Almaty is the same language without noticeble difference. In Moscow there are lots of immigrants who are not native Russian speakers or even don't know Russian well. English is not so ubiquitous in Russia for example. We hear English songs and see inscriptions, but we don't have to speak it. I haven't spoken English for years. Edited by Марк on 06 December 2011 at 9:18am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Ari Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 6573 days ago 2314 posts - 5695 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese Studies: Czech, Latin, German | Message 63 of 128 06 December 2011 at 9:31am | IP Logged | |||||
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With regards to language learning popularity, what's important isn't the real situation but the percieved one. Russian is percieved as very closely connected to Russia. I don't think the visa situation is very important to most prospective learners. China also requires visa, but Mandarin is more and more popular, due to percieved economic benefit. Russia will have to do some PR work in order to convince more people to learn Russian. This regardless of the actual situation in Russia.
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| Volte Tetraglot Senior Member Switzerland Joined 6430 days ago 4474 posts - 6726 votes Speaks: English*, Esperanto, German, Italian Studies: French, Finnish, Mandarin, Japanese | Message 64 of 128 06 December 2011 at 9:47am | IP Logged | |||||
Almost. There are quite a number of languages I care about and like quite a lot; Russian is one of them. Prioritizing them is always a juggling act. However, what's happened in practice is that I've travelled a lot these last few years, and the languages I've spent the most time on and improved most in are the ones where I've spent a fair amount of time where they're spoken: Esperanto and German. Beyond that, my Polish is better than, say, my Persian: and I think a non-trivial factor in this is that I've actually spent time in Poland and see it as a place I can pop over to whenever I feel like it. Hanging out with Iranian students locally just isn't the same. If I decided to focus on Russia, the visas probably wouldn't be a huge issue, if they went fairly smoothly. However, given that I literally have more languages and cultures to explore than I can do in a lifetime, even a fairly small hassle of this sort is enough to make a country tumble down far enough on my list of priorities that I'm unlikely to visit it - and to put a dent in my related language studies, to boot. I've wanted to see Moscow for years. But I've still never been to Scandinavia, or Spain, or the vast majority of countries in South America, Africa, or Asia... and I actively prefer those that minimize the hassle for showing up for a short-term visit. I'll keep learning Russian, and I expect I'll visit Ukraine again at some point, but for the moment, I'm not visiting Russia - and if the political situation changed so that I would not need a visa to do so, I'd probably take the next train to Moscow. Edited by Volte on 06 December 2011 at 9:48am 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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