Foreign Languages Thread :D

[Martin]

As far as I know, it doesn't mean anything.

[Jek Jek Roo]

As far as I know, it doesn't mean anything.

Oh well, at least it sounds funny.

[Martin]

Their fleet also consists of roflcopters.

[Bjossi]

Their pets are lolcats.

[BTGBullseye]

I can't wait until Rosetta Stone comes out with a Klingon version... That's the language I want to learn the most.

[HLPrincess]

Well you don't have one so he can't really be right, but aaaaanyway...

 

From the thread Civil Protection: Double Feature:

 

hMM.. We are going offtop but it seems the newest post is more important anyways! Well, yeah as far as I remeber, Polish is one of the most difficult languages.

and if you use just the basic form of a noun, it sounds just silly, or like a foreigner striving to speak Polish Well, what can I say. It's an honour to do voice acting for Ross. Especially in my own language

 

When foreign people speak decent but "skewed" Icelandic (incorrect use of noun forms, noun genders, verb forms, etc.) it doesn't really sound so silly to me, I just think it is cool that someone actually succeeded in learning it well enough to keep a solid conversation going. At least in Icelandic your use of these elements of the language doesn't really matter, native speakers will understand your sentences just as much if the nouns have incorrect forms in their respective contexts.

 

 

Well, if you use basic nouns in Polish, everybody can understand you but it still sounds a bit silly, I mean a bit primitive, like you were a caveman We have even a gramatically incorrect sentence we use in Poland to describe or comment people making some obvious mistakes in Polish, either foreigners or Poles, but it's mostly just a joke.

 

"Polska język, trudna język!"

 

And I still admire any foreigner tyring to speak Polish especially if they speak correctly most of the time. I don't know myself if I'd would learn it if I was born in some other country. Looking at the complexity of it now, it's freaking amazing I can use it without thinking! I really admire foreigners using noun declension (online dictionary said so) in a proper way

 

IT MEANS THAT IN POLAND EVERY THING HAS REALLY 7 FORMS OF BEING! AND IN ENGLISH IS JUST ONE! IN SOME METAPHYSICAL SENSE. THAT MAY MEAN MY MIND IS MORE FLEXIBLE IN SOME WAYS THAN NATIVE ENGLISH SPEAKERS MUHHAHHHHHAAA!!!! i mean, reallyy it's interesting how it changes perception!

[Kirkreng]

Quite frankly, I'd think the world would be better off if there is just 1 universal language.

[BTGBullseye]

Quite frankly, I'd think the world would be better off if there is just 1 universal language.

Yes, preferably Klingon.

[Axeldeath]

Quite frankly, I'd think the world would be better off if there is just 1 universal language.

 

Esperanto.

[Jek Jek Roo]

I feel a huge respect for non polish people that speaks this lagnguage. I really do.

 

Anyway... I can't understand that in German you have the past Perfect and Imperfect. The first one you use mostly in speaking and the second one in writing stories ect. Perfect is when you say: Ich bin ins Krankenhaus gegangen oder sie hat sein violin verloren. I've got this at school. Und das Imperfect ist wenn schribst du: Ich war, du schlief, sie solltet, richtig?

[Lord Sinister]

For those of you who speak/type in a language different to your native language, do you ever have to resort to something like Google Translate to find the right word/phrase to say, or to find out what the person you are talking to is saying? Or do you not talk to anyone in another language until you're confident? I should say at this point that I don't have really have anyone to practice German with as I know don't know much and it would be pretty embarrassing to make mistakes. In fact I feel I would be disrespectful in some way (making a mistake trying to talk in another's language), as silly as that sounds. >-

[Estophelen]

Kmotře Petře nepřepepřte toho vepře *grins*

 

But I still prefer english over my maternal language. I'm not much of a patriot.

[Kirkreng]

Patriotism is stupid.

[Martin]

For those of you who speak/type in a language different to your native language, do you ever have to resort to something like Google Translate to find the right word/phrase to say, or to find out what the person you are talking to is saying? Or do you not talk to anyone in another language until you're confident? I should say at this point that I don't have really have anyone to practice German with as I know don't know much and it would be pretty embarrassing to make mistakes. In fact I feel I would be disrespectful in some way (making a mistake trying to talk in another's language), as silly as that sounds. >-<

I tend to use Google Translate or just Google to double check whatever I'm writing so I don't sound too stupid amongst all these intelligent people.

 

I don't think making mistakes is disrespectful. As long as people understand you they should be satisfied. In German though it is disrespectful to use the singular second person when talking to a complete stranger. Like "Was heißt du?" is disrespectful but "Was heißen Sie?" isn't.

[Estophelen]

I would love to speak German, but I'm too bloody damn lazy to learn any language. Ahhh, Germany...

[Kirkreng]

Like "Was heißt du?" is disrespectful but "Was heißen Sie?" isn't.

I actually like duzing people. Calling them Sie makes me sounds so distant and if I'm talking to someone I don't really want to know or something. It's why I also prefer to call my teachers by their first names even though very few allow it.

[Jek Jek Roo]

For those of you who speak/type in a language different to your native language, do you ever have to resort to something like Google Translate to find the right word/phrase to say, or to find out what the person you are talking to is saying? Or do you not talk to anyone in another language until you're confident? I should say at this point that I don't have really have anyone to practice German with as I know don't know much and it would be pretty embarrassing to make mistakes. In fact I feel I would be disrespectful in some way (making a mistake trying to talk in another's language), as silly as that sounds. >-<

I tend to use Google Translate or just Google to double check whatever I'm writing so I don't sound too stupid amongst all these intelligent people.

 

I don't think making mistakes is disrespectful. As long as people understand you they should be satisfied. In German though it is disrespectful to use the singular second person when talking to a complete stranger. Like "Was heißt du?" is disrespectful but "Was heißen Sie?" isn't.

 

I really stop worried about that, really.

[The Giant Napkin]

For those of you who speak/type in a language different to your native language, do you ever have to resort to something like Google Translate to find the right word/phrase to say, or to find out what the person you are talking to is saying? Or do you not talk to anyone in another language until you're confident? I should say at this point that I don't have really have anyone to practice German with as I know don't know much and it would be pretty embarrassing to make mistakes. In fact I feel I would be disrespectful in some way (making a mistake trying to talk in another's language), as silly as that sounds. >-<

 

Well, it's a familiar problem, but I think most people wouldn't be offended if a foreigner made any mistakes in their language. What for me is a bigger issue is that I tend to want to correct mistakes, because I'm a real smartass : P. Now, I like to think that I'd be happy to be corrected, as that is necessary to learn any language, but I can see how continuously being corrected could be annoying. So I don't grammarnazi as often as I'd like.

 

As for your first point, I tend to use dictionaries (online, too) but not Google Translate because it's usually unreliable to the point where it often hypercorrects people. I have had to write several presentations with classmates that just used GT... you know, when they make mistakes themselves, I can usually correct many of them or at least understand what they're trying to say and think of an easier way to say it. Not so with GT.

 

(Und Martin, ich hatte mich entschieden nicht alle Fehler die man hier macht zu korrigieren (needed a dictionary for that word), aber weil du sagst, dass du Google Translate gebrauchst, aber trotzdem 'Was heißt du?' schreibst, wollte ich gerne sagen, dass obwohl ein Deutscher dich verstehen würde, er selbst 'Wie heißen Sie?' gesagt hätte. Entschuldigung für das Grammatiknazien : P)

 

/Wall of text

 

EDIT: Kirkreng, feel free to grammarnazi me in turn... I mean, I should leave the grammarnaziing of German to those who can actually speak it. But I felt compelled to do it just because of my Google Translating friends that have given me a trauma for life... (also, I think I may hold the record for the most use of the verb 'to grammarnazi' in a single post on this forum. I shouldn't be proud of that...)

 

(Also, I will soon hold the record for longest post if I don't stop this soon)

[Jek Jek Roo]

I think this is pretty accurate:

 

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[Kirkreng]

I guess this fits here:

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