ENGLISH is the lingua franca

[fork me]

I recommend rural Greece for the ultimate experience. Not only can't you speak the language, you suddenly find yourself illiterate.

Even that's changing. In rural Cyprus, most of the adults don't speak English, but most of their kids do.

 

[User removed 4]

I hate to admit it, but you are spot on here. We don't because we don't HAVE to, even if we want to the incentive just isn;t there to the same extent.

Dont want to be argumentative , ( when we've finally agreed on something !!) but have you never considered learning greek ? i think if i was to live in a foreign country for any length of time i'd try , even if , as you seem to be able to, I could get by without it.

 

[fork me]

Dont want to be argumentative , ( when we've finally agreed on something !!) but have you never considered learning greek ? i think if i was to live in a foreign country for any length of time i'd try , even if , as you seem to be able to, I could get by without it.

Yes, until recently I was paying for lessons. I gave up because I just wasn't getting anywhere. I'll probably try again with a different tutor. If that doesn;t work, I'll know it's down to me that I'm not learning.

I know a few basic things, I can say hello, order in a bar and call someone a wanker in Greek. My understanding is better than my speaking, quite often I'll be in a shop, they'll ask me a question in Greek (not realising I'm English) and I'll answer in English. Basically, I just about understand enough to get the general gist of the question even though I couldn't translate in a word by word basis. I'm also getting better at being able to understand simple notices in written Greek.

 

[User removed 4]

Yes, until recently I was paying for lessons. I gave up because I just wasn't getting anywhere. I'll probably try again with a different tutor. If that doesn;t work, I'll know it's down to me that I'm not learning.

I know a few basic things, I can say hello, order in a bar and call someone a wanker in Greek. My understanding is better than my speaking, quite often I'll be in a shop, they'll ask me a question in Greek (not realising I'm English) and I'll answer in English. Basically, I just about understand enough to get the general gist of the question even though I couldn't translate in a word by word basis. I'm also getting better at being able to understand simple notices in written Greek.

i should imagine that the cyrillic?? alphabet is a major obstacle.

 

[drew]

I get a little bored with the pretentious views that everyone in the UK who doesn't learn a foreign language is a lout and lazy. Why learn French if you end up working in a country that doesn't speak it or the same with Greek, Portugese or any other language. If you think there is a language to learn that will be useful in the future then it is probably Mandarin or Cantonese. English is widely spoken because of our colonisation and history of trading. If you trade with 10 different countries, you are unlikely to learn 10 different languages, and remember a couple of hundred years ago there each language probably had numerous dialects within it. Yes there was probably a sense of arrogance at the time but now English is probably accepted as the international business language and is mandated as the international language of the aviation. As someone pointed out, French is the language of post, eg Par Avion, but how relevant is that in the 21st century.

As for the comment that you must know the language to know the culture, what a load of crap.

 

[philsussex]

Rwanda understood the futility of the French language:

Gwynne Dyer: Rwanda abandons French language | Vancouver, Canada | Straight.com