How many languages do you speak ...

[Darya Akbari]

This 22 years old German student speaks 35

Originally posted by Spiegel Magazine

Altpersisch, Avestisch, Pahlavi, Baktrisch, Sogdisch, Sakisch, Pashto, Parachi, Ormuri, Wakhi, Yaghnobi, Sanglichi, Ishkahmi, Ossetisch, Yidgha-Munji, Urdu, Hindi, Farsi, Panjabi, Sindhi, Kurmandschi-Kurdisch, Baluchi, Sanskrit, Pali, Gandhari, Latein, Griechisch, Altirisch, Mittelkymrisch, Gotisch, Usbekisch, Aram�isch, Arabisch, Franz�sisch, Englisch

[ November 09, 2007: Message edited by: Darya Akbari ]

[Pradeep bhatt]

5

[Sandip Sankeshwar]

4
Kannada,english,Hindi,little bit Marathi.

[Dick Summerfield]

I'm genuinely impressed but I can't help wondering how often he speaks them and with whom?
I regularly speak English and Dutch (like every day). I can get by in broken French and German when needed and I can read my way through Italian, Swedish and Welsh (very useful that last one ) oh, and I'm currently learning to write Java in the Cattle Drive.

(The Afghan to Russian dictionary in the picture sets the scene well! Wonder what all those other books are about?)

P.S. This is my 30th. post - wonder if I'm now a RanchHand (Nope!)
[ November 09, 2007: Message edited by: Dick Summerfield ]

[Oggi Olli]

On a scale 1-10

Norwegian (8), English (6), Swedish(5, 10 when drunk), Danish(2), German(4)

[Peter Rooke]

Just Geordie (bit like English).

Would like to learn Cockney Rhyming Slang.
[ November 09, 2007: Message edited by: Peter Rooke ]

[Marc Peabody]

Englisch?

Maybe he can speak 35, but his spelling is atrocious!

[Darya Akbari]

Originally posted by Marc Peabody:
Englisch?

Maybe he can speak 35, but his spelling is atrocious!

.

I was bit lazy to translate all these 35 languages into English.

[Frank Silbermann]

I wonder if he's a descendent of the poet Heinriche Heine?

[Chris Baron]

Interesting but rather unlikely. Heine didn't have children. And Heine is the 317th common name in Germany. Wich is higher than average frequency referring to this source.
cb

[Arvind Mahendra]

Absolutely amazing.

[Arvind Mahendra]

Sure. But can he also double as a search engine? My translator can. Hah!

[Ernest Friedman-Hill]

I can't really speak any.

[Bear Bibeault]

Jsdfghs sadg se sdsjg a asytr lsksa asdgsd!

[Burkhard Hassel]

Bear, just pouring lemonade over the keyboard before typing does not count.

There was also this man who spent two years to learn the language of the birds. At the end he was totally disappointed because they only talked about wingspans and aerodynamics.


(From the hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy)

Bu.

[Bear Bibeault]

Originally posted by Burkhard Hassel:
Bear, just pouring lemonade over the keyboard before typing does not count.

Oh yeah, well, asjkdhas dsf rtiuuy asdgs asertter!

[Burkhard Hassel]

Originally posted by Bear Bibeault:
asjkdhas dsf rtiuuy asdgs asertter!

I trrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrried italllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllso, but didddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddn'''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''t work in my case.........................

[Pat Farrell]

lets see, English(american), geek, some long forgotten college French.

Watfor, Fortran, Algol 60, Snobol, Spitball, ratfor, flecs, Fortran 77, watfive, cobol-10, cobol-68(?), macro-10, macro-20, bliss-10, bliss 16, bliss-32, bliss36, C, C++, Smalltalk, Java, lua

probably others.

[Christophe Verré]

French, English, Japanese, and a bit of Chinese now. Forgot almost all German I've learned at school. That a pity, cause I like that language too.

Welsh

May I ask why ? I've read a bit about it when I was living there (and forgot everything). It's really difficult. I remember all Welsh students in the class had a good laugh once when an English teacher tried to say Cymru (Wales in welsh), with a totally messy pronounciation

[Chris Baron]

His focus is obviously the core of what is to believed the origin of the Indo-European language family. With Arabian as exception that proves the rule.
[ November 09, 2007: Message edited by: Chris Baron ]

[Darya Akbari]

Originally posted by Chris Baron:
His focus is obviously the core of what is to believed the origin of the Indo-European language family. With Arabian as exception that proves the rule.

[ November 09, 2007: Message edited by: Chris Baron ]

Yes I saw that also, but don't think if you can speak one of them you can them all. They are still hell different from each other.

However there is lot of synergy when learning languages. I speak 3 languages (German, English, Farsi) and am now in the middle of learning French. While learning French I recognize more and more words that I already used in my other three languages.

I don't know when French became part of German and English but with Farsi it was a cultural revolution 100 years ago when the regime opened its doors for the western world and called the then French government to modernize their school system.

It's also the other way around, in French (at least in France) they say kindergarten and handball, obviously taken from German and English.

The link to that 22 years old student is here (in German).

[Chris Baron]

Originally posted by Darya Akbari:
I don't know when French became part of German and English...

French was the language of the aristocracy all over europe.

But the most similarities you spot are Roman words. Latin was the language of church and science for centuries, if not milleniums. The shift from Latin to English for academic publications isn't long ago. Latin is the key to almost all european languages. And even though it's not spoken actively anywhere (exept maybe The Vatican) it's still taught at schools.

cb
[ November 10, 2007: Message edited by: Chris Baron ]

[Pat Farrell]

Originally posted by Darya Akbari:

I don't know when French became part of German and English

Its all war. When the Normans (French) invaded and conquered England in 1066 or so, the kings and big guys were all French. The French and Germans have been fighting over Alsace Lorraine forever, long before there was a Germany or a France.

[Roy Cinco]

And the Normans (Norsemen) orginally came from Scandinavia.

I know about three words of Farsi. I used to say I know one word (*) of Polish, but actually I also know "I don't know" so I guess that makes four!

Ich hab' mein Deutsch vergessen. Hablo un poco Espa�ol tambien. And some 台山話 . English too!

(*) osiem (eight)

[Jim Yingst]

[Roy]: I also know "I don't know"

And suddenly Roy disappeared in a puff of logic, a victim of paradox.

[Darya Akbari]

Roy, what are these three Farsi words you know?

[Roy Cinco]

And suddenly Roy disappeared in a puff of logic, a victim of paradox.

The first step in knowledge is knowing what you don't know!

- Socrates (paraphrased; I didn't hear it from him directly )

(And the next time you're in Poland, say "Ja nie wiem" a lot and smile)

[Roy Cinco]

Originally posted by Darya Akbari:

Roy, what are these three Farsi words you know?

Shah (king), shir (lion), barg (leaf)

Very random, I know! I could also use a verb or two!

Now that I think about it, I also know "Marg bar Omrica" but that one I don't to say or hear...

And I don't know if "shahanshah" counts as another word.

[Darya Akbari]

Wow, very good . Forget that Marg ... thing, this is a very childish nonsense slogan, prayed by the current Iranian regime.

[Christophe Verré]

in French (at least in France) they say kindergarten and handball,

I don't want to start a polemic, but I've never heard of kindergarten in France.

[Darya Akbari]

I'll check that with my French teacher, but I think you're right

[Darya Akbari]

Originally posted by Dick Summerfield:
The Afghan to Russian dictionary in the picture sets the scene well! Wonder what all those other books are about?

Dick, how do you know that the picture shows a Afghan-Russian Dictionary .

[Chris Baron]

Originally posted by Roy Cinco:
Shah (king)

That's a classic example for the indo-european languages.
Radja, Shah, Czar, Caesar and Kaiser have all the same meaning and it takes little fantasy to find the similarity.

[Arvind Mahendra]

35 different languages. 35 different ways to comprehend, experience and appreciate emotions, thoughts etc. That must make him the most sensitive guy on Earth crying at the sight of a sunset and all.

[Darya Akbari]

Originally posted by Chris Baron:
That's a classic example for the indo-european languages.
Radja, Shah, Czar, Caesar and Kaiser have all the same meaning and it takes little fantasy to find the similarity.

There are many others :

Door (English)
T�r (German)
Dar (Farsi)

Mother
Mutter
Maadar

Brother
Bruder
Baradar

Daughter
Tochter
Dokhtar

...

[Jim Yingst]

[Darya]: Dick, how do you know that the picture shows a Afghan-Russian Dictionary .

I'm not Dick, but we can see that cover pretty clearly, and it's fairly obvious that the two scripts are Arabic and Cyrillic. I know almost nothing about the former script, but Cyrillic takes a lot of letters from Greek (St. Cyril having been Greek) and I recognize many Greek letters from math/science/engineering courses, where they are used to represent many different things. Using that, I can see that the first word begins with alpha-phi-gamma-alpha, which looks like afga-. The second word is less obvious from Greek, but it begins with rho (R), and if you'd ever seen Soviet stamps or currency you may recognize the word. The two C's in the middle function as two S's. And how many countries are there with names like R_SS__ that use the Cyrillic alphabet? Anyway, this is just another minor example of how knowing something about one language can help in understanding another. Thirty-five languages is still pretty darn impressive of course.
[ November 12, 2007: Message edited by: Jim Yingst ]

[Jim Yingst]

[Chris]: That's a classic example for the indo-european languages.
Radja, Shah, Czar, Caesar and Kaiser have all the same meaning and it takes little fantasy to find the similarity.

I think you've mixed up two different examples. Raja (with various spellings) and shah come from the same root. But Tsar, Czar, and Kaiser all come from Caesar, which was a family name long before Augustus became emperor. There are various theories as to where the name came from, but there's no reason to think it had anything to do with the raja/shah root.
[ November 12, 2007: Message edited by: Jim Yingst ]

[Darya Akbari]

Originally posted by Jim Yingst:
I know almost nothing about the former script, but Cyrillic takes a lot of letters from Greek (St. Cyril having been Greek) and I recognize many Greek letters from math/science/engineering courses, where they are used to represent many different things. Using that, I can see that the first word begins with alpha-phi-gamma-alpha, which looks like afga-. The second word is less obvious from Greek, but it begins with rho (R), and if you'd ever seen Soviet stamps or currency you may recognize the word. The two C's in the middle function as two S's. And how many countries are there with names like R_SS__ that use the Cyrillic alphabet? Anyway, this is just another minor example of how knowing something about one language can help in understanding another. Thirty-five languages is still pretty darn impressive of course.

Perfect

Well let me translate the Arabic script for you :

Pashto
Russian
Dictionary

[John Smith]

That is indeed an Afghan-Russian dictionary on the shelf. So, how come Russian is not listed among the 35 languages? Even more interesting, how come German is not in the list? I mean, this guy lives and studies in Bonn, Germany, right? Something doesn't add up here.

[Jim Yingst]

[John]: That is indeed an Afghan-Russian dictionary on the shelf. So, how come Russian is not listed among the 35 languages?

Probably because that's not his book. He's in a library.
[ November 12, 2007: Message edited by: Jim Yingst ]