What languages do you speak?

Because my DH and his family are Turkish and we've traveled to Turkey several times, I have decided to take Turkish lessons. I am currently enrolled in a class as well as using the Rosetta Stone software. I love it!

What other languages besides English do you speak?
How did you learn them?

[Michele]

Russ can get by with his Spanish both in dealing with patients and in a Spanish-speaking country. My French is definitely much weaker...though I think it would come back easier if I had a place to use it. We both took classes in high school. He also took a medical Spanish class. We have the Rosetta Stone for French, but since Daegan came early we haven't touched it in a while. My mom is French and so I did hear it a lot as a child, but she never "taught" us. I should practice with her...

[migirl]

I'm first-generation Korean-American, so my first language was Korean. (Apparently I learned English by watching "Sesame Street". ) I'm definitely rusty now, but can understand most everything that's said to me (my mom still speaks to me in Korean), but would have a hard time speaking it. I could probably do it, but it would require a lot of thought and effort.

I took Spanish in high school and know some very elementary words and phrases.

Mother tongue English
Fluent in Italian

DH is Italian and we live in Italy, so I have to speak Italian. He speaks English as well but we use Italian as our relationship language. The ILs only speak Italian.

I also studied French and Spanish.

Pathetic to admit that I can only speak English fluently...I can understand French, but cannot write or reply in French.....Would LOVE to learn Italian and that was my first vote for fellowship, but SO can't speak it and we were unsure about him operating in an Italian OR, do they speak English or Italian or a combination?

[Stella]

Southern English

Intermediate Spanish
Currently learning Italian and French in that evasive "spare time."

[DCJenn]

I took French from sixth grade through sophomore year of college- and I remember none of it. OK, that's not entirely true, I can eavesdrop a conversation on the street if I want to.

I had a French room-mate in grad school and after a couple glasses of wine my FRench got much better as did her English. (and damned if she didn't make the greatest chocolate mousse in the universe)

My husband is one of those people who can pick up languages in a snap. To go to Russia, I had prepared by listening to dvds and practicing, etc. and I got nowhere. While in the hotel, Rick picked up my Russian for idiots book, sounded out all of the Cyrillic letters, figured out pronounciation of words and in four hours was ordering our lunch in Russian. (that's when we discovered that if you order your beer in Russian, you pay Russian prices, not Rich American Tourist prices)

Apparently when he enlisted back in the day his ASVAB score was unbelievable for languages and his recruiter really wanted him to go into languages but nope, dummy decided to jump out of airplanes instead.

Jenn

[PrincessFiona]

german and english

I lived in germany as a child and went to a german elementary school for 3rd grade, where I became fluent...then I went back as exchange student.

DH and I met in germany and initially our relationship language was german....now it's a mixture....

kris

English.

I can understand enough Gujarati to keep my IL's on their toes, and enough Spanish to function very nicely around Southern California .

[KCwife]

English. Some French.

Dh- English, fluent in Spanish. Some Tagalog.

We are both fluent in pig latin - we used to speak in front of the kids in pig latin... but they picked it up and can now understand what we say.

[SuzySunshine]

Just english, I tried foreign languages and just couldn't pick them up as an adult. I will start my children much earlier.

DH knows enough spanish to converse with patients if needed. In med school he needed this a lot, here they have translators in every language imaginable so he rarely uses it.

[houseelf]

English and intermediate Spanish. I would looooove to take some more classes because I'm getting rusty.

Oh and pig latin too.

Kelly

I took French classes through high school and college and, wow, talk about use it or lose it. I've lost most of it. I can pick up bits and pieces of French and get the gist of reading something if it isn't too complicated.

I'd say I am (well, was ) able to get by travelling on French and Italian but will substitute one for the other if flustered. That is on my long term to-do list -- to get a some of that back, esp Italian.

Both SO and I speak English as first lanuage, I can also speak Irish (gaeilge) because My school was all through Irish, SO can speak german. I took french for 8 years, I would say I can by....by saying Parlez-vous anglais? I don't even know if thats spelt right!! I had a french tutor at home to get my through exams....he was way more follically challenged by the end of the year!

[MissCrabette]

I am Romanian so naturally I speak fluent Romanian. English is my second language. Many years ago I spoke German but I've since forgotten it all. When I moved to the US I started learning Spanish and I can understand 90% of what native Spanish speakers say, but I'm not entirely comfortable speaking it. I guess I could get by if I absolutely had to.