# Bad Language



## Ed on Toast (Apr 17, 2018)

Yes, as another one of my returement 'Bucket List' I decided to learn to speak a foriegn language. 'Bad' is the best word I can find to describe my first words on this journey.

BUT although I have started a little Spanish, I have in mind I might like to learn Portuguise.

So my simple question to my learned friends is:

On as many levels as you care to comment on, cultural, cuisine, socialising, internal travel, festivals, cost of living, accessibility by air from UK, welcome, petiscos v tapas, ease of integration, financial, ease of learning language, visiting on wheels, staying longer term, etc, etc, etc....  I am sure the list goes on.

So, I am guessing a thread, not about Spainish or Portuguise experiences in isolation but about comparing Spanish and Portuguise in whatever area you have experiences of. 


I look forward to reading your comparatives 

:dance:


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## n brown (Apr 17, 2018)

slightly off piste, but my experience with learning languages is as follows
the best way to learn is to live and work in an environment where only that language is spoken 
the more  familiar and easy -to- mimic the accent is , the easier to learn the language, speaking with that accent is vital
Portuguese and Spanish might have a lot of similar looking words , but the languages are less similar than French and English , but the Spanish accent is a lot easier to copy than the Portuguese , and the French is easiest of all, plus there are thousands of French words spelt the same way as English and just pronounced with a French accent 
imo , learn French


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## SimonM (Apr 17, 2018)

I can't speak either Spanish or Portuguese but am a little passable in French and German. However, I was in Portugal last year, and when I spoke with a young assistant in a shop she spoke exceptional English. On apologising for not knowing any Portuguese she said to not worry as no other country does either. I said what about Brazil and she said it's a different version. 

My advice without any other detail to back it up is to consider Spanish as that can be useful in more countries.


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## runnach (Apr 17, 2018)

I would go Spanish in context of useful in the States and South America. Portuguese of limited value 

Fluency I was told comes about when you start to dream in that language in our case put English on the back burner

I spent long enough in France I could tell if that person was North or South accents just like here, consider subtleties in Lancashire accents then Glasgow Aberdeen Versus London so speaking a language doesn't necessary mean you will understand it .

The biggest difficulty I found was foreign young people wanted to test their English skills and rarely given chance to practise in my case French.

Structure can be confusing and the gender descriptions eg Le and La  Un and Une no sense to any of that just something you pick up English differs in that respect.

Working and living in a country I agree with Nigel is the best way to learn I disagree French is easier 

Channa


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## carol (Apr 17, 2018)

I can learn French and Spanish but I can't get to grips with Portugese. It looks similar but sounds like an Eastern European language to me. I'm sticking with French and Spanish and just a few basic words in Portuguese. Have you got the Duolingo app, Ed?


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## Ed on Toast (Apr 17, 2018)

carol said:


> Have you got the Duolingo app, Ed?



I have now


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## n brown (Apr 17, 2018)

if you look at a French/English dictionary you'll be surprised at how many words are exactly the same or very similar to each other- certainly close enough to get the meaning, like tractor and tracteur. 

and as for accents , there's a funny thing - northern French might pronounce ,say ,'maintenant ' as 'man te non' , but a southerner might say 'man te nang ', bit like our wurzel bashers over here. 
and a few times French folk have asked if i'm parisian - which makes me wonder if all capital cities sound like Londoners !
and Carol's right about Portuguese- it really doesn't sound like one of the romance languages


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## runnach (Apr 17, 2018)

n brown said:


> if you look at a French/English dictionary you'll be surprised at how many words are exactly the same or very similar to each other- certainly close enough to get the meaning, like tractor and tracteur.
> 
> and as for accents , there's a funny thing - northern French might pronounce ,say ,'maintenant ' as 'man te non' , but a southerner might say 'man te nang ', bit like our wurzel bashers over here.
> and a few times French folk have asked if i'm parisian - which makes me wonder if all capital cities sound like Londoners !
> and Carol's right about Portuguese- it really doesn't sound like one of the romance languages


 I was told 65% of French words and English words the same and often a clue Langue maternalle its not a phrase we use but language maternal we work out and mother tongue then comes as no surprise

Breton and Cornish are similar and Languedoc language of the south Occitan etc just to confuse us more

Sounds sad to some but I find it interesting albeit I would never describe myself as a linguist certainly speak everyday French visit to a government department and a technical conversation I was blown out the water lol

I worked with a lot of Dutch and latterly Danes English so good they sounded Naturalized ..only time I caught them out not deliberately was making a joke or throw away comment they didn't get the nuance (French word lol_)

I guess at the end of the day though making an effort and being prepared to laugh at yourself goes a longway . I used to play I spy with a local bar owners lad I have a girl I know in Limoges know her since she was a nipper spend all night and its still erbs (herbs) 

I love it all really don't always understand but great ....the kids whose mums and dads French / English sound natural flick from one to the other effortless a skill very envious of 

Channa


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## Deleted member 68397 (Apr 17, 2018)

*Jumped on this thread right away, thought it was an invitation?*

Unfortunately, I thought this was an invitation to use bad ? language, so sorry no worthwhile input at this point.
Learned some limited french at school, and that's where it stayed.
Enjoy picking up some gaelic and a smattering of bad words in Polish, Dutch and Danish.
Not much to contribute so I'll go now.


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## izwozral (Apr 17, 2018)

I am still learning English so trying to cram another language into my brain cell would be difficult. However, I always try to learn how to order food and drink in the local lingo, also a greeting and a farewell. Never got the hang of Dutch though, just got vacant stares when I garbled something at them.
In Turkey we were given the colloquialism yok sar which loosely means no thanks, it worked wonders on the street vendors trying to sell anything we didn't want.


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## REC (Apr 17, 2018)

If the choice is between Portuguese and Spanish I would go for Spanish as European Portuguese lessons are hard to find, mostly Brazilian ,( Duolingo, Rosetta stone) Spanish has many similar words so we have found that those who speak Spanish can often make themselves understood in Portugal whereas the reverse does not seem to work as well. Portguese has harder accents imho.


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## Clunegapyears (Apr 18, 2018)

Interesting that no-one has mentioned German. I speak OK French and basic German the German had been so much more useful. I’ve used it in the N of Portugal where fewer speak English, Italy and Slovenia, particularly the East. Lots of Gastarbeiter. 

Of Spanish and Portuguese... definitely Spanish. All the reasons given above.


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## moonshadow (Apr 18, 2018)

Ed on Toast said:


> I have now



Duolingo is Brazilian Portuguese, try Memrise which is Portuguese


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## carol (Apr 18, 2018)

moonshadow said:


> Duolingo is Brazilian Portuguese, try Memrise which is Portuguese



Yes, I used that one for Portugese but as I said, I'm sticking to French and Spanish I think the Spanish will only be a very basic get by in level!


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## barge1914 (Apr 18, 2018)

*Languages*

Hi I speak reasonable French, from long practice, and enjoy reading books in French. Re-learning Italian (it sounds so good) and trying to improve my German. Gave up on Dutch once I started again on the German..too many similar words causes confusion..and could only practice Dutch with very old people...everyone else speaks embarrassingly good English..err...except the man on the “International 112 emergency number(another storey). Compared with German and French I found Spanish much easier to learn...simpler and more regular structure than German and less idiosyncratic than French, however that’s on hold now as we’ve been twice and probably won’t go again. In Eastern and Central Europe German is more widely spoken, nobody else bothers to learn French. In the America’s Spanish is more useful, although you need to think where you are most likely to go as many language courses are American and use the American version. Portuguese... apart from ‘No falar Portuguese’ I never got any further, most people I needed to speak to spoke reasonable English and I couldn’t think where else I could use it...my brains already hurt, had to draw a line somewhere! Really you need to think about where you are most likely to travel before deciding which languages to invest your time in. Whatever you choose it takes a lot of time, but it’s great fun trying and helps you better enjoy the countries you visit...good luck.


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