If you could instantly be fluent in another language....

Hi,

I'd pick Chinese, all dialects at once, since this is purly fantasy

China is such an interesting country of opposites and I would love to spend a few months travelling there and being able to talk to people and ask them about their lives and oppinions.

Yes, definately chinese



regards,

Christine

My brother can speak German. I have a goddaughter that is fluent in Japanese.

Originally Posted by MonaxLisa

I think I'd pick Russian because it's said to be so difficult to learn and I'd like to go to Russia one day! Otherwise I'd pick Italian, but I know if I put my mind to it I can learn it so I might as well pick the tricky one

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Nah, it's not that hard. The cyrillic alphabet looks intimidating, but you can learn the 33 symbols and pronunciation rules in a couple of weeks. After that, you'll just make stupid mistakes like writing the Russian 'p' ('r' sound) instead of their letter with the 'p' sound.

From what I remember, there are 4 difficulties of languages for English speakers to learn. Level 1 (easiest) is the Romance languages (Spanish, French, etc.), level 2 is languages like Finnish and German, level 3 is Cyrillic and arabic languages, and level 4 is the Asiatic languages like Japanese and Chinese.

I have heard that Polish is extremely hard for English speakers to learn how to pronounce correctly. There are two women from Poland where I work and I have heard them speaking to each other in Polish and it does seem like it would be hard to get the pronunciation correct.

Korean because I watch a lot of Korean dramas subtitled. Then maybe Mandarin Chinese-- it's totally different from Cantonese which is what I can speak. My mom's always bugged me to learn Mandarin but I want to learn Korean more so I can watch my shows.

German, no doubt. I'm into genealogy and have copies of all sorts of church records from Germany, and I can't read them! The only thing I can decipher is DH's family's last name. Frustrating!!!

I'm fluent in English and Spanish. I wouln't mind learning how to speak Italian, I think that'd be cool.

It would definitely be Japanese. Also French because it is our second language and while I used to be fluent in it, I've pretty much forgotten how to speak it, though I can understand enough to figure out what someone is saying. But without the ability to reply, I have to resort to Babel Fish and print out a response to give to the person Sometimes it works, sometimes not.

No doubt about it I wish I was fluent in Spanish. I am months away from starting my career as a counselor and it would open up so many doors to me that I could write my own ticket.

Second choice would be Slovak so that I could go to the Slovak republic & talk to all my relatives.

Arabic, because it's the lingua franca of my faith, and the husband's first language.

I'm absolutely horrid at languages. At first, I thought it was just because I hadn't found the right one. So, I took spanish, russian, french and arabic at different points during my schooling. Guess how many I speak? Ah, yeah, none. Nah, it's just me, I don't put the effort that's needed to learn a new language. One of these days, I'll get arabic down God willing.

Knowing Arabic can make people lots of money these days...
But- if I'd have to go with French. My goal in life is to be fluent in 5 languages. I'm already fluent in 3, learning 1 and I just need 1 more and that 1 more will be French.
I learned some Japanese- I did Japanese 1 and 2 at my high school but I'm just not into it anymore. It's too hard lol. I guess it's just so different from the languages I know- Spanish, English, Bulgarian and Russian so Japanese was something entirely new and I wasn't all that good at it.

Originally Posted by ut0pia

Knowing Arabic can make people lots of money these days...

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You would think, but the only arabic related job offers the husband has had are for translator positions in Iraq. They pay well, ~$200,000, but yeah, getting shot at all the time? Not so much.

Hungarian. It's a really tough language, but some day I've just got to learn it, as we spend time in Hungary every year.

Originally Posted by rahma

You would think, but the only arabic related job offers the husband has had are for translator positions in Iraq. They pay well, ~$200,000, but yeah, getting shot at all the time? Not so much.

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I dunno but all of my friends who are studying international affairs have minors in arabic, the arabic classes in my university are always full and it's near impossible to get into them!

I'm already fluent in German, so I think my next choice would be Italian. I love the sound of it. I'd also like to learn Dutch because my father's family came from Holland 200+ years ago and I think it would be fun to be able to do genealogical research there.

I'd love to be fluent in Spanish and sign language.

Originally Posted by GoldyCat

I'm already fluent in German, so I think my next choice would be Italian. I love the sound of it. I'd also like to learn Dutch because my father's family came from Holland 200+ years ago and I think it would be fun to be able to do genealogical research there.

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Have you peeked at the English thread? If you happen to find spelling and grammar rules a bother at all Dutch would be a pain in the butt. It doesn't help that they've changed some not too long ago. (My Dutch friends complain) Other than that it doesn't look too difficult to learn. I've had friends link to pages in Dutch and I was able to grasp enough of it to figure out what the articles are about.

I know some Italian but would like to learn the rest of it. I'd also like to learn German.

Originally Posted by strange_wings

Have you peeked at the English thread? If you happen to find spelling and grammar rules a bother at all Dutch would be a pain in the butt. It doesn't help that they've changed some not too long ago. (My Dutch friends complain) Other than that it doesn't look too difficult to learn. I've had friends link to pages in Dutch and I was able to grasp enough of it to figure out what the articles are about.

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I've actually been accused of belonging to the grammar police at times. Incorrect grammar and incorrect word usage make me just a little crazy (maybe that should be "crazier" ). I've studied German, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. Part of the fun is learning how the language works and how the grammar is different from English. As far as Dutch goes, I'd like to be able to pronounce the words properly as well as read it.

Japanese, no practical reason other than watching my favorite animes as they were intended.