aquablue Senior Member United States Joined 6383 days ago 150 posts - 172 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, Mandarin
| Message 49 of 55 25 July 2011 at 4:30am | IP Logged |
I love the Virgin Islands BTW, great place. I also like Pirate history. I've been to
St. Thomas and St. Croix. Are you in tourism or something similar, or just residing
there?
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SamD Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6660 days ago 823 posts - 987 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French Studies: Portuguese, Norwegian
| Message 50 of 55 25 July 2011 at 6:02pm | IP Logged |
aquablue wrote:
I wonder how much Mexico's crime wave has deterred Americans from studying Spanish
there. |
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Probably not all that much. Spanish still has a reputation for being a comparatively easy language, and that is a motivator for a significant number of students.
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akprocks Senior Member United States Joined 5287 days ago 178 posts - 258 votes Speaks: English* Studies: German
| Message 51 of 55 25 July 2011 at 7:20pm | IP Logged |
I think it all comes down to a certain commodity, oil. Venezuela is the leading producer of oil in South America, and I predict that within 40 years it will be the leading Latin American superpower. Not Mexico.
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ScottScheule Diglot Senior Member United States scheule.blogspot.com Joined 5229 days ago 645 posts - 1176 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Latin, Hungarian, Biblical Hebrew, Old English, Russian, Swedish, German, Italian, French
| Message 52 of 55 25 July 2011 at 8:01pm | IP Logged |
espejismo wrote:
This is kind of like the advantage the Germans have in studying Turkish, except that Spanish and Portuguese are so much more linguistically related.
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Is the implication here that German and Turkish are linguistically related?
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aquablue Senior Member United States Joined 6383 days ago 150 posts - 172 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, Mandarin
| Message 53 of 55 25 July 2011 at 8:10pm | IP Logged |
Does Venezuela really have that much oil that it could somehow overtake Mexico in GDP to
become a superpower?
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iguanamon Pentaglot Senior Member Virgin Islands Speaks: Ladino Joined 5263 days ago 2241 posts - 6731 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese, Haitian Creole, Creole (French)
| Message 54 of 55 25 July 2011 at 9:08pm | IP Logged |
Yep, OPEC figures place Venezuela ahead of Saudi Arabia in proven reserves for 2010:
Venezuela Barrels Ahead.
Latin America's economic prospects do not depend upon fossil fuel. Chile has one of the most vibrant economies in Latin America today and very little oil production.
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nway Senior Member United States youtube.com/user/Vic Joined 5416 days ago 574 posts - 1707 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Mandarin, Japanese, Korean
| Message 55 of 55 26 July 2011 at 3:52am | IP Logged |
ScottScheule wrote:
espejismo wrote:
This is kind of like the advantage the Germans have in studying Turkish, except that Spanish and Portuguese are so much more linguistically related. |
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Is the implication here that German and Turkish are linguistically related? |
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Well, "so much more" can still apply to zero, so I'm guessing not.
akprocks wrote:
I think it all comes down to a certain commodity, oil. Venezuela is the leading producer of oil in South America, and I predict that within 40 years it will be the leading Latin American superpower. Not Mexico. |
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Oil hasn't exactly worked wonders for the economies of Russia, Iran, and the Arab world.
There's always the chance that Venezuela could become the next Norway, but to call that unlikely would be an understatement.
Edited by nway on 26 July 2011 at 3:53am
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