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 Language Learning Forum : Cultural Experiences in Foreign Languages |  | |
| andee Tetraglot Senior Member Japan Joined 7077 days ago 681 posts - 724 votes  3 sounds Speaks: English*, German, Korean, French | Message 9 of 54 04 August 2005 at 4:44am | IP Logged | |||||
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Exactly right Farley. Most of the people that say they speak a language aren't far past the 'hello' and 'thank you' stage.
I would also hazard that most of you on this forum are reluctant to actually say which languages you "speak" when asked. I know I always say that I just speak English whenever I'm asked - because until I consider myself absolutely fluent in a language I don't think that I can "speak" it. Edited by andee on 25 May 2009 at 4:20am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Raistlin Majere Trilingual Hexaglot Senior Member Spain uciprotour-cycling.c Joined 7152 days ago 455 posts - 424 votes 7 sounds Speaks: English*, Spanish*, Catalan*, FrenchA1, Italian, German Studies: Swedish | Message 10 of 54 04 August 2005 at 7:21am | IP Logged | |||||
I agree completely.
Exactly. And then you can have some fun pretending you believe them and asking them to translate something for you. ;) Edited by Raistlin Majere on 04 August 2005 at 7:31am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| vincenthychow Tetraglot Senior Member Hong Kong Joined 7104 days ago 136 posts - 145 votes Speaks: Cantonese, English, GermanB1, Japanese Studies: French | Message 11 of 54 04 August 2005 at 8:18am | IP Logged | |||||
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Learn a few phrases to answer him next time. It is absolutely easy as long as you don't bother about writing it. I agree with Brat that as long as you don't think about writing it, Japanese is easy.
Or, next time, answer him in any other languages that you can speak, say, Korean. If he don't know much about Japanese or Korean, it can be difficult to distinguish sopken Japanese and Korean in short phrases. Then he may get shocked. Also, Korean is much more diffiucult than Japanese, isn't it worth much showing off? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| jmlgws Senior Member Canada Joined 7102 days ago 102 posts - 104 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Spanish, Mandarin | Message 12 of 54 04 August 2005 at 9:16am | IP Logged | |||||
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I guess I don't understand why there is so much focus on "getting back" at said person. I would ask this person more questions about Japanese. Either they can answer, in which case you learn something, or they can't, in which case they shall likely not say anything more about Japanese. However, it seems to me to be way too small of a thing to think about "revenge".
1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| victor Tetraglot Moderator United States Joined 7318 days ago 1098 posts - 1056 votes 6 sounds Speaks: Cantonese*, English, FrenchC1, Mandarin Studies: Spanish Personal Language Map | Message 13 of 54 04 August 2005 at 2:56pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I have friends who claim that they speak "English, French, German, Spanish, and a bit of Italian and Japanese" or something of that sort. They often offer their "expertise" in those foreign languages. It's so easy to tell how much they actually know, usually at the "Hello/Goodbye" level.
It actually makes yourself feel "smugger" by not saying to his face how much you know. Sure, it's fun once or twice, at least to strangers, but it really makes them lose their confidence if you in their face. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| administrator Hexaglot Forum Admin Switzerland FXcuisine.com Joined 7376 days ago 3094 posts - 2987 votes 12 sounds Speaks: French*, EnglishC2, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian Personal Language Map | Message 14 of 54 04 August 2005 at 3:54pm | IP Logged | |||||
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It seems to me that it is only in North America that you can find people who would boast about "speaking a language" when they actually know only a few words. In Europe they would be a refreshing type of morons since the chance they face a native speaker of the language is much higher. I once knew a man (from the US) who made a point of making small talk in a couple languages, taking all sorts of mysterious expressions to suggest there was more to his linguistic skills than met the eye. It was such a naive and stupid way of being pretentious that all you needed to do was converse with him at natural speed in the language he tried on you and he would dissolve himself in shame.
Although it was not entirely clear from the initial post of this thread if the person was highly pretentious, I would definitely understand the desire of the poster to teach the show-off a lesson. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| delectric Diglot Senior Member China Joined 7181 days ago 608 posts - 733 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin Studies: German | Message 15 of 54 04 August 2005 at 4:49pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I think also in England people also make pretentious remarks about languages.
I recently translated some fairly basic Chinese, for a colleague, after telling her my Chinese was at a basic level (this is true). However, she was so impressed, the word soon spread that I was fluent. Merely because I was able to hold a simple, child like, conversation. However, she didn't understand a word and couldn't tell my tones and grammar were all wrong. Also, the Chinese guy was fairly patient so hence her assumption that I was fuent and just being modest. I felt proud to impress my boss, and I still tell her my level is low (truth). No doubt she will believe me when next time I am out of my depth. The truth of the matter is many, English, people with an elementary level in a language will claim to be fluent, in the full knowledge that they will never be tested by the monolingual masses. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Giordano Bilingual Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 7174 days ago 213 posts - 218 votes 3 sounds Speaks: English*, Italian*, French Studies: Cantonese, Greek | Message 16 of 54 04 August 2005 at 7:06pm | IP Logged | |||||
Well at least they're being smart about it (they can reasonably assume they won't be meeting people who actually speak Japanese/Mandarin/Indonesian/etc...). It seems that every European "knows" English. In fact, it sometimes seems like everyone in the World "speaks" English. An anecdote from my uncle's two months in Italy: In Ancona, there was a sign saying "Hamburgers- We Speak English". Not having spoken English for about three weeks, and being quite famished, he decided to check it out. He reached the front of the line. The man behind the counter asks him: "E che vorebbe?" "What would you like?" My uncle responds by asking: "Ma chi e' chi parla inglese qua?" Who is it who speaks English here? Man behind the counter: "Sono IO!", thumping his chest proudly. "It's ME!" So, not being a moron, my uncle orders in Italian. When it came time to pay, the man flipped the price list over from the English side to the Italian side. The prices were about half of what the American and British tourists pay. So, a dual lesson. Firstly, not so many people really 'speak' a foreign language at all, and secondly, you always get treated better when you speak someone's language (I refer you to the idiom "Now you're talking my language!"). Bonus: Italians will do anything to screw you out of as much money as possible. ;) Edited by Giordano on 04 August 2005 at 7:10pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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