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Getting people not to speak English | ||
Tags: Language Banditry | Convincing native speakers | Immersion | Swedish | Learning Technique/Method | Accent | English | German | French | Spanish | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| slymie Tetraglot Groupie China Joined 5017 days ago 81 posts - 154 votes  Speaks: English, Macedonian Studies: French, Mandarin, Greek Studies: Shanghainese, Uyghur, Russian | Message 153 of 169 14 December 2010 at 11:11pm | IP Logged | |||||
thanks :) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Pantherus Newbie Australia Joined 4891 days ago 13 posts - 15 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Korean | Message 154 of 169 15 December 2010 at 6:10am | IP Logged | |||||
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I'm doing a homestay in Japan sometime soon, and I think if I go to restaurants and they try to speak English, I'll just say in Japanese, "Oh, sorry. I can't speak English. I was born in Lithuana (because not many Japanese people would speak Lithuanian)." Of course, during homestay I'll strike some sort of deal where we speak English for one day, and Japanese the next and keep alternating.
It's quite decietful, but sometimes necessary if you really want to learn the language. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| mr_chinnery Senior Member England Joined 5546 days ago 202 posts - 297 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 155 of 169 15 December 2010 at 3:34pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Why not just let them speak English and you reply in their language? Or start speaking
exclusively through Shakespearean quotations? That might throw them :D 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| William Camden Hexaglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6061 days ago 1936 posts - 2333 votes Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Russian, Turkish, French | Message 156 of 169 15 December 2010 at 4:39pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I have occasionally spoken to Turkish-speaking people in Turkish and they reply in English, and the conversation continues like that. A rather surreal exchange of languages.
1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Martien Heptaglot Senior Member Netherlands martienvanwanrooij.n Joined 6894 days ago 134 posts - 148 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, German, Spanish, Turkish, Italian, French Studies: Portuguese, Serbo-Croatian, Latin, Swedish, Arabic (Written) | Message 157 of 169 15 December 2010 at 5:31pm | IP Logged | |||||
Well I am Dutch but since I learned English only at grammar school and learned Turkish both through self study and in practice with immigrants more than 35 years for me it is easy: if I would go to Turkey I would just say them that I do speak some English but that my Turkish is better. I would easily say "belki biraz tuhafiniza gidiyor fakat Hollandali oldugum halde, benim Turkcem benim Ingilizcemden iyi, onun icin Turkce konusmayi tercih ediyorum" = it might sound strange to you but although I am Dutch my Turkish is better than my English, so I prefer to speak Turkish. It could happen that people that have stayed in Holland for a while would show of their Dutch but if they are going to far in their pride I would gently convince them that Turkish is a better choice for communication. As you see I wrote: if I would go to Turkey and you might wonder why I didn't. Well I had some experiences in Spain years ago, my Spanish is still better than my Turkish and I became so frustrated of getting answers in bad English just because of a very light foreign accents that I decided not to go to Spain any more and I don't feel like getting a similar experience in Turkey. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5170 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 158 of 169 15 December 2010 at 5:44pm | IP Logged | |||||
Whenever I've explained my interest for learning the language, the people and the culture of the country, I've had nothing but support. But be consistent -- if you use English at any moment, you can expect them to use English too (because you taught them to).
Why would you want to speak English every other day? Aren't you cutting your practice time by 50%? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| hrhenry Octoglot Senior Member United States languagehopper.blogs Joined 4919 days ago 1871 posts - 3642 votes Speaks: English*, SpanishC2, ItalianC2, Norwegian, Catalan, Galician, Turkish, Portuguese Studies: Polish, Indonesian, Ojibwe | Message 159 of 169 15 December 2010 at 6:20pm | IP Logged | |||||
So you get some people trying to practice their English with you. Is it really bad enough to keep you from visiting the country? Seems to be throwing the baby out with the bathwater to me. At some point, you're bound to get someone who is willing to speak to you in their native language. It may take some patience, though. R. == 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Martien Heptaglot Senior Member Netherlands martienvanwanrooij.n Joined 6894 days ago 134 posts - 148 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, German, Spanish, Turkish, Italian, French Studies: Portuguese, Serbo-Croatian, Latin, Swedish, Arabic (Written) | Message 160 of 169 15 December 2010 at 6:32pm | IP Logged | |||||
Ok I realise I could be overreacting a little bit but I have never been very keen at travelling, the only reason to travel were my language skills and nowadays there are still some Turkish and Spanish immigrants in the Netherlands who are willing to speak their language with me, there is msn, there is facebook, a lot of tv stations so I still can enjoy my language skills without the unconfortableness of traveling.. As I said it can sound weird but it's just how I feel about it. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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