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Which languages can you be guided in? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5146 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes  Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 1 of 17 23 November 2011 at 1:51pm | IP Logged | ||
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As always, I appologize for the weird title, but the background for my question is this: I have just been on a one week guided bus tour through Turkey, where all the guiding was in English, and although the participants represented a cross section of the Norwegian society in terms of age and educational level, that was no problem. We also often get Swedish and Danish guides, due to the simlilarities of the languages. This works fine, except for the fact that Danish guides always drive me up the wall with their firm belief that in order for Norwegians to understand them, they should insert Swedish words, which in reality makes it harder for us to understand them. Swedish pronounced by a Dane, is not for the faint of heart.
So my question is: Which foreign languages could a randomly chosen group of your countrymen be guided in? I assume that all three Scandinavian countries plus the Netherlands could have it in English, that the Slovaks could have it in Czech, and the Ukrainians in Russian, and possibly the Cantonese in Mandarin - but how about the rest of you? Which languages could a a group of your countrymen be guided in, and which could you personally be guided in? In my case, in addition to those already mentioned, I have been guided several times in French and Spanish, and I suppose that in a pinch I could have been guided in German and Italian, though if everyone else were native speakers, and the guiding was at fast, native speed, I might end up with a head ache for the last two ones :-) 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
 Fasulye Heptaglot Winner TAC 2012 Moderator Germany fasulyespolyglotblog Joined 5659 days ago 5460 posts - 6006 votes 1 sounds Speaks: German*, DutchC1, EnglishB2, French, Italian, Spanish, Esperanto Studies: Latin, Danish, Norwegian, Turkish Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 17 23 November 2011 at 2:06pm | IP Logged | ||
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Groups of German tourists are normally guided in German in foreign countries and where that is not possible they are guided in English.
I can't travel, so for me it is a hypothetical question, but I would enjoy a tourist guide talking in: - German - English - Dutch - Italian - Spanish - French - Esperanto but with a guide speaking native Danish I would probably only understand 5 % of what he / she says. By the way, the VHS offers a guided visit to the city of Aachen with a visit of the German Christmas market and a meal with the group in a Spanish restaurant - all conducted in Spanish(!). Such an all-in-Spanish language event would be excellent speaking and listening practise for me, but it's a bit too expensive, so I have to renounce this offer. Fasulye Edited by Fasulye on 23 November 2011 at 2:08pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Alexander86 Tetraglot Senior Member United Kingdom alanguagediary.blogs Joined 4793 days ago 224 posts - 323 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, German, Catalan Studies: Swedish | Message 3 of 17 23 November 2011 at 2:22pm | IP Logged | ||
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Being from the UK I have to say English or er...
So on to me personally: I can be guided in English and Spanish without any problems, Catalan too although my understanding would be 75-80% instead of 90-100% as in the previous languages. Then German, I went on a boat tour in Hamburg in German where I had to translate for my Fiancée... he he he. I couldn't tell her much! 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Ari Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 6394 days ago 2314 posts - 5695 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese Studies: Czech, Latin, German | Message 4 of 17 23 November 2011 at 2:44pm | IP Logged | ||
That'd work for mainland Cantonese, but overseas Canto speakers and Hong Kongers (and I'm guessing Macauers) cannot be assumed to understand Mandarin, at least not those born in the 80's or earlier (my girlfriend speaks passable but not good Mandarin, and some of her friends have trouble holding a conversation in it). Disneyland Hong Kong has tours in English, Cantonese and Mandarin. Also, older mailand Cantos (60+ years) will sometimes have problems, though most can understand it even if they can't speak it. EDIT: I'm also guessing most Portugese speakers (at least those in Brazil and Porugal) have a decent understanding of Spanish? Not that they're mutually intelligible, but similarities combined with large exposure? I'd venture they can understand Spanish a lot better than most Spanish speakers could understand Portugese. Edited by Ari on 23 November 2011 at 2:47pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6515 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 5 of 17 23 November 2011 at 3:50pm | IP Logged | ||
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I mostly get impatient and stop listening after aprox. 2 minutes and 23 seconds so the language doesn't really mean much. However for the record I have been guided in Danish, Norwegian, Swedish, English, 'mild' Scots, German, French, Portuguese, Spanish, Catalan, Italian, Romanian and Hungarian (which I didn't understand).
2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5146 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 6 of 17 23 November 2011 at 5:21pm | IP Logged | ||
I have guided multitudes of Brazilian groups in Spanish, so I can confirm that. It was always the same story: I would start the guiding saying: "Welcome to Oslo, I hope you understand me because I do not understand you". They would all laugh, and a minute and a half later they would start to speak to me in Portuguese. Which I was not kidding when I said that I didn't understand... 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| outcast Bilingual Heptaglot Senior Member China Joined 4761 days ago 869 posts - 1364 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English*, German, Italian, French, Portuguese, Mandarin Studies: Korean | Message 7 of 17 23 November 2011 at 5:27pm | IP Logged | ||
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First hand account:
I was on tours of Europe in 2004 and 2005 with my family. The tour groups on both occasions were 90% Argentines and Brazilians (seemingly typical mix for South American tourist presence everywhere), with a scatter or Mexicans. The company was based in Spain. The Brazilians in the end had few problems understanding, though it would not be infrequent that they would ask the guide to repeat what he/she had said. At the beginning of the trips themselves, the Brazilians would complain to each other and had to request verbally to the guide a slower rate of speech. Most Brazilians study "Argentine" Spanish, so the Castillian accent was probably slightly difficult for the first day or two. As for the average person in Argentina, sadly Spanish is about the only thing they would understand with certainty. Some do know English, Portuguese and in lesser fashion French and German, but the honest truth is most in Argentina are monolingual in spite of what some Argentines may claim about the ''education'' level of the country, which is pretty poor because secondary education is a joke these days. Generally, it is obvious that people from the New World are far less likely to know more than one language, for two reasons I suspect: a) the languages they speak (English, Spanish) are major and many others speak them as L2 b) some countries are so large that even if you drove for days, you remain in your country, and same language and TV. In Europe, and perhaps in Asia, there are many smaller language zones so it's more likely people speak by nature more than one, which makes it easier to learn others. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Humdereel Octoglot Groupie United States Joined 4790 days ago 90 posts - 349 votes Speaks: English, Spanish*, Arabic (Levantine), Arabic (Egyptian), Arabic (Written), Turkish, Persian, Urdu Studies: Russian | Message 8 of 17 23 November 2011 at 6:22pm | IP Logged | ||
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Interesting topic.
I don't get to travel as much as I used to but I feel quite comfortable with the following when being guided: -Arabic (especially the Egyptian and Levantine dialects, though I also feel comfortable with others); I spent about 5 months in Egypt for my first visit, mainly to improve my Arabic skills, and when I visited 18 months later, I remember being off-the-beaten path and could understand almost everything the guide said; I studied in Syria and when I moved onto Jordan, the case was similar. Typically, you can find English-speaking guides, but I always liked them to use Arabic. :P -Spanish -Persian, hypothetically speaking, since whenever my friends are telling me about their traditions and whatnot I have a general understanding. However, I could use more practice. -Turkish -- I had minimal trouble when I visited Turkey in 2008 As for the Spanish and Portuguese case, I would agree with what has been stated earlier. I'm a native Spanish speaker and I had trouble with Portuguese for the first few days of it, without any previous exposure, and it took me a little longer to get used to more complex conversations. On the other hand, I would speak Spanish to my Brazilian friend and he understood much of what I said after a few minutes. My friend from Portugal, however, was another story. If I have written Portuguese in front of me to accompany the speaking, it is much easier, but as far as solely speaking and listening, it isn't as simple. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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