I Wonder, Besides English, Do You Speak Another Language?

[jon_e]

english, spanish, and porto-espanol, lots of brazilian friends, and from living in miami for so long i've also picked up some cuban. I can almost speak argentian spanish as well. always interesting if asked if you speak spanish, because it's different depending on the person and where they are from.

example: "pi-char" (originally pitching a baseball) used to descibe a pitch in cuabn. Colombian translation - Pi-char: the act of making love.

 

[GERARDO]

And "pichar" in Monterrey (México) means when you pay someone's bills and it's related to baseball too....example: You are in a restaurant and you pay your friend's meal.

Yo le "piché" (pichar) la comida a mi amigo...ó, Mi amigo me "bateó" (batear) la comida....

Simple as that!

 

[mingcat9]

I english is my native language. I know a little spanish and a lot of french. I want to learn a little italian as well. so far I'm only fluent in english.

 

[tyler_derden]

Some Japanese. Not quite fluent, and I can't read a lot of Kanji, but I can trash talk in a bar with the best of 'em!

TD

 

[mingcat9]

Some Japanese. Not quite fluent, and I can't read a lot of Kanji, but I can trash talk in a bar with the best of 'em!

TD

my school actually offers japanese. they market it to those who want to go into business. but, it's much more fun to be able to swear in 5 languages!

 

[tyler_derden]

my school actually offers japanese. they market it to those who want to go into business. but, it's much more fun to be able to swear in 5 languages!

Even better than swearing is learning to speak like a Yakuza or Samurai. They both speak "special" Japanese. You can learn them from movies, or if you're out drinking with the guys from work, they'll be happy to teach you a few choice phrases that are often quite useful.

Yakuza generally speak the Osaka dialect, but they also have a way of speaking that is a little different from the average Joe on the street in Osaka. Just the sound of an overheard conversation including some yakuza- speak is enough to strike terror into the heart of anyone from Tokyo.

In Japan men and women speak quite differently and use different vocabulary. Schools usually teach a very polite form of the Tokyo dialect. Since foreigners usually learn to speak Japanese from Japanese women they have a tendency to speak like Japanese women. People will sometimes joke (if you are male) that you sound like a homosexual. Your male drinking buddies will be pleased to teach you how to speak like a "real man".

There are some old sayings (kotowaza) in Japan that people particularly enjoy hearing from the mouths of foreigners and if learned well (including appropriate times to say them) will get many drinks bought for you. Many of the best are used in samurai movies (especially Toshiro Mifune films), so start watching a lot of them. Here's one phrase to get you started: "baka wa shinna nakuya naoranai" which means something like "even death does not cure stupidity". There are several others along the same lines- "there is no medicine for stupidity", "the only medicine for stupidity is death", etc.

kore kara gambatte ne!

TD

 

[effisk]

I'm French,

I speak English almost fluently, I used to speak German fluently (I still understand it very well, but I have trouble speaking without making any mistakes)
and I am now learning Spanish and Italian (which is fairly easy for a French - they're both latin languages).

I also know quite a few useful phrases/sentences/etc. in various languages...

राम राम

 

[effisk]

I speak English and a little Euskara

Euskara pixka bat banio ez dakit

How did you get to learn that language ???

 

[KMKS]

I'm a native english speaker (from U.S.) I am conversant in spanish and italian and can get by in portuguese. I've also studied japanese and latin, but would never be able to communicate in either now.

 

[plainjim]

Because this is an international forum, and because some of us dream of going to do road or MTB biking in another foreing country, I want to ask you if some of you speak more than one language...

Sadly, no; I only speak English (although I do that with both virtuosity and gusto). I remember one of my first-generation Italian coworkers (i.e., his parents were immigrants), who couldn't believe that so many well-educated Americans spoke only one language. He said, "We refer to a person who speaks two languages as bilingual, and a person who speaks many languages is a polyglot. But the person who speaks only one language is an American."

 

[Dellphinus]

Yo sí. Me gusta estudiar los idomas, y castellano era el primero que aprendí (después del inglés). Estudié formalmente el italiano, e informalmente he estudiado el ruso, el tagalog, y hasta el euskaraz.

This may come in handy because if Bush gets re-elected I might have to emmigrate!

Aber, wenn Kerry gewählt wird, müssen Sie Arabisch sprechen!
Ich spreche deutsches wenig, aber nicht sehr gut.

 

[Phil.Mx]

First Spanish and then English

 

[oznation]

Native English speaker. I also speak Japanese and basic French.

native is english i can speak some french spanish and a little german right now im working on russian.

 

[Binge]

English native
Some spanish (lived in L.A. for 10 years)
Minored in Japanese 12 years ago... a bit surprised/impressed to see so many American nihongo speakers.
Various programming languages

While I'm a big Mifune fan, my favorite saying still has to be from first-semester Japanese:
"Honto ni, zuibun chiisai jissho desu ne?!"
which means:
Yes, this is an extremely small dictionary, isn't it?

It's all in how you say it - it sounds especially impressive to gaijin when said in a Mifune-like, stern, samurai tone.

 

[Cho]

It's sad to find out that I am the only one whose native language is Chinese...
(Actually,I am from Taiwan, a small and "trouble-making" island beneath Mainland China.)
And what still sadder is that people on the island don't get much outdoor exercise.....
台灣人要多運動啦.....

Because this is an international forum, and because some of us dream of going to do road or MTB biking in another foreing country, I want to ask you if some of you speak more than one language.

My mother tongue is spanish, I write and speak english (I think so ) and now I'm learning french and I think I'm doing pretty good. In the future I want to learn Italian..... or maybe German.

Well, let's hear your answers

 

[less'go]

At the beginning of the summer, we had the pleasure of teaching my son's best friend, who is Taiwanese-French, how to ride a bike! He speaks Chinese and French fluently. After learning to ride with us, he spent his summer vacation riding around with his grandfather in Taiwan. I know it's not quite the same as an actual Chinese speaker.

I speak English, obviously, French fluently, and can babble in Spanish and understand pretty well. Latest language learning experience is German, and have a recently developed interest in Turkish (which resembles no language I have ever heard before, I'm just trying to get a grasp on it).

So there

It's sad to find out that I am the only one whose native language is Chinese...
(Actually,I am from Taiwan, a small and "trouble-making" island beneath Mainland China.)
And what still sadder is that people on the island don't get much outdoor exercise.....
????????.....

 

[bhasu]

Because this is an international forum, and because some of us dream of going to do road or MTB biking in another foreing country, I want to ask you if some of you speak more than one language.

My mother tongue is spanish, I write and speak english (I think so ) and now I'm learning french and I think I'm doing pretty good. In the future I want to learn Italian..... or maybe German.

Well, let's hear your answers

I am a native Nepali living in the United States. While my mother tongue is Nepali, I speak very good English, and semi-fluent Hindi, and speak and understand some Urdu.

 

[mgagnonlv]

I am a native Nepali living in the United States. While my mother tongue is Nepali, I speak very good English, and semi-fluent Hindi, and speak and understand some Urdu.

Intéressant.

Ma langue maternelle est le français.
I get around almost as well in English as in French, which is my mother tongue.
Yo hablo un poco de español, pero no hay muchos amigos que se hablán español.

 

[joule]

Because this is an international forum, and because some of us dream of going to do road or MTB biking in another foreing country, I want to ask you if some of you speak more than one language.

My mother tongue is spanish, I write and speak english (I think so ) and now I'm learning french and I think I'm doing pretty good. In the future I want to learn Italian..... or maybe German.

Well, let's hear your answers

Ummm I'm an American so you know what that means *grin*

Does FORTRAN, C, C++, Pascal, PL/1, Ada, Assembly (various) count?! lol

 

[*Alice]

English, French and Mandarin