Torn

[eveofdstruction]

I'm planning to do the online Rosetta Stone, and I cannot decide which language. Rhiannon has a little Spanish, and Ramon has some Portuguese and is doing the Spanish Rosetta Stone at work[1], so Spanish could be a family thing. I've never been terribly interested in learning Spanish on its own merits though. I studied German in high school and

Comments

[angldst]

well, if you can write (instant message, etc) in German, you have uh, 3 ppl to talk with. Don't remember if you saw me at C15, speaking my fractured version of German, but it did occur several times over the course of the weekend.

<3

-d

[brynfreya]

Ugh, I so feel this!

I feel like I should go back to French, since I've paid (am paying) a butt-load for an otherwise useless degree.

I feel like I should do Spanish, just because it could be useful, considering where we live.

I WANT to learn Icelandic (since it's the closest living language to Old Norse, nerd-gasm!), German (just 'cos it's cool), and Irish. Alas and alack, I can't imagine any of those being useful, ever. Well, useful for me, anyways. Le sigh.

[kest]

where would you most like to travel? Portuguese is next on my own personal list because I'd like to go to Brazil someday, so that's motivating. I also want to learn some Dutch, because I have a good friend in Belgium and that's mostly what they speak there.

I'm also totally up for online language practicing - all the languages I know smatterings of could use improvement. I took Latin in school, which is useful for picking up other Romance languages, but not so useful for, you know, actually talking to people.

[eveofdstruction]

Actually, my desire to study language has nothing at all to do with travel.

[kest]

well, no, mine doesn't either, really. (let me tell you about the time I tried to learn welsh....) It's just a potentially useful additional factor for decision making and staying motivated. :)

[lil_m_moses]

Spanish is far more likely to be useful than Portuguese. Knowing Spanish will help you be able to read Portuguese and Italian (and French and other romance languages, to a lesser extent). I know only a smattering of Spanish and can at least get the gist of written Portuguese and Italian too. Spoken Portuguese is a weird beast in my very very tiny exposure to it. Looks like Spanish, sounds a little like Russian. IMO, French has entirely too few spoken consonants to be a worthwhile language in its own right. ;) That said, it's the most widely-spoken language in the world (possibly second to Chinese), so it could be fairly useful

[eveofdstruction]

My current thought is that we will probably, at some point, invest in the actual Rosetta Stone disks in Spanish for Rhiannon to use as well, so maybe I should do German for myself online and wait until then for Spanish. I have trouble justifying expense just for fun though. Well, at least at time other than Convergence. :)

fy bloody i

[shimmerdance]

Convergence is not just "fun" for you. it is something between life support, intensive therapy, and family reunion as far as I can tell.

[the_siobhan]

I've been trying to learn German forever and could use a poke from somebody else who speaks it/is learning it. If that has any influence on your decision.

[eveofdstruction]

If only so many cool ppl weren't offering to work on so many different languages with me. You do get an automatic boost in the rankings though.

[the_siobhan]

I should probably warn you that I'm not the most reliable person who's offering - which is why I'd need you to poke me. :-p