aspiring polyglot

fluent in english and asllearning spanish and russian

[thenotglot]

Reblog if you're starting a new language this year

[catghibli-deactivated20210917]

my mind says college but my heart says isolated sheep herder in Iceland

[polyglot-what-blog]

I WAS JUST ABLE TO READ MY FIRST SENTENCE IN RUSSIAN

[pansoph]

for chinese new year they get all these famous actors and comedians together and they do a lil show and one of the comedians was like “i was in a hotel in america once and there was a mouse in my room so i called reception except i forgot the english word for mouse so instead i said ‘you know tom and jerry? jerry is here’

[beefmilkthings]

jerry is here

[eruriholic]

my chinese teacher once shared this story in class about someone who went to the grocery to buy chicken, but they forgot the english word for it, so they grabbed an egg, went to the nearest sales lady and said “where’s the mother”

[cuddlyaxe-deactivated20190218]

When I was a teenager, we went to Italy for the summer holidays. We are German, neither of us speaks more than a few words of Italian. That didn’t keep my family from always referring to me when they wanted something translated because “You’re so good with languages and you took Latin”. (I told them a hundred times I couldn’t order ice cream in Latin, they ignored that.) Anyway, my dad really loved a certain cheese there, made from sheep’s milk. He knew the Italian word for ‘cheese’ – formaggio – and he knew how to say ‘please’. And he had already spotted a little shop that sold the cheese. He asked me what ‘sheep’ was in Italian, and of course, I had no idea. So he just shrugged and said “I’ll manage” and went into the shop. 5 mins later, he comes out with a little bag, obviously very pleased with himself. How did he manage it? He had gone in and said “'Baaaah’ formaggio, prego.”

I was done for the day.

[ravenpuffheadcanons]

This makes me feel better about every conversation I had in both Rome and Ghent.

[elodieunderglass]

I once lost my husband in the ruins of a French castle on a mountain, and trotted around looking for him in increasing desperation. “Have you seen my husband?” I asked some French people, having forgotten all descriptive words. “He is small, and English. His hair is the color of bread.”

I did not find my husband in this way.

In rural France it is apparently Known that one brings one’s own shopping bags to the grocery store. I was a visitor and had not been briefed and had no shopping bag. I saw that other people were able to conduct negotiations to purchase shopping bags, but I could not remember the word for “bag.”

“Can I have a box that is not a box,” I said.

The checkout lady looked extremely tired and said, “Un sac?” (A sack?)

Of course. A fucking sack. And so I did get a sack.

[kat2107]

I once was at a German-American Church youth camp for two weeks and predictably, we spoke a whole lot of English. 

When I phoned my mom during week two I tried to tell her that it was a bit cold in the sleeping bag at night. I stumbled around the word in German because for the love of god, I could remember the Germwn word for sleeping bag.

“Yeah so, it’s like a bag you sleep in at night?”

“And my mother must probably have thought I lost my mind. She just sighed and was like ‘So, a Schlafsack, yes?”

Which is LITERALLY Sleeping sac … The German word is a basically a one on one translation of the English word and I just… I failed it. At my mother tongue. BIG

[eridaniepsilon]

My former boss is Italian and she ended up working in a lab where the common language was English. She once saw an insect running through the lab and she went to tell her colleagues. She remembered it was the name of a famous English band so she barged in the office yelling there was a rolling stone in the lab…

[backonrepeat]

I’m Spanish and have been living in the UK for a while now. I recently changed jobs and moved to a new office which is lost somewhere in the Midlands’ countryside. It’s a pretty quaint location, surrounded by forest on pretty much all sides, and with nice grounds… full of pheasants. I was pretty shocked when I drove in and saw a fucking pheasant strolling across the road. Calm as you please.

That afternoon I met up with some friends and was talking about the new job, and the new office, and for the life of me I couldn’t remember the English word for pheasants. So I basically ended up bragging to my friends about “the very fancy chickens” we had outside the office.

Best thing is, everyone understood what I meant.

[eridaniepsilon]

I love those stories so much…

[acleverforgery]

Picture a Jewish American girl whose grasp of the Hebrew language comes from 10+ years of immersion in Biblical and liturgical Hebrew, not the modern language. Some words are identical, while others have significantly evolved.

She gets to Israel and is riding a bus for the very first time.

American: כמה ממון זה? (”How much money?” but in rather archaic language)

Bus Driver: שתי זוזים. (”Two zuzim” – a currency that’s been out of circulation for millenia)

[learningftw]

that’s hilarious

[shiraglassman]

I am officially screamlaughing at my desk from that last one OH MY 

[the-adequategatsby-deactivated2]

When my parents were in Paris during their honeymoon, they went to a very upscale restaurant for dinner. My mom didn’t know what one of the words on the menu meant, so she pointed to the word and asked the waiter “qu'est-ce que c'est?” The word was lamb, but the waiter didn’t know the term in English, so he just said “le petit baaaaa”

[rosalui]

When I first got to Japan I was looking for free-range eggs but didn’t have the vocabulary to ask properly, so I said “Do you have eggs from happy chickens that don’t live in a box?”

[penaltybox14]

So I play hockey with a group that is comprised half of Russians.  Most of them have lived here a while, but English is … not their first language. One day, we’re trying to settle up the ice time bill.  We have one guy who likes to pretend he doesn’t have the money to pay, and we like to make fun of him when he actually pays.  So Petya, who is collecting the money, asks John for his share and John’s like “actually I have the money for this week AND next week” and Petya puts on a shocked face and he says “Oh John!  Is wonderful!  It is like golden showers!”

There is a pause of .25 seconds where everything stops and Petya realizes that he has made a grievous error in the English language.  He knows what he wanted to say, we know what he wanted to say, but we are now too busy laughing.  John is like whoa, whoa, hold on I don’t think we’re friends like that and Misha says this is not the sort of thing to bring up at hockey and poor Petya is just turning redder and redder.

English is a hazardous language, yo.

[eatingcroutons]

My Japanese vocabulary skews heavily towards science and research, because I spent most of my time there in the lab. One time in a supermarket I had no idea how to say “desiccated” so I asked for “anhydrous coconut”. It totally worked.

I also made the pants/trousers mistake rather spectacularly a few days after I first moved to the UK.

[relatable-duolingo]

this is something i would do tbh

[polyglot-what-blog]

I do this in my native language, of course I’m gonna do this in all the others.

[polyglot-what-blog]

🙃 and 😊

😊 - What made you pick your target language?I chose Spanish because a foreign language credit was mandatory for graduation and Spanish was one of the two. I chose Russian because the language is rather pretty to me. It’s also considered to be extremely hard by most, and I like challenges.

🙃 - Is your target language hard for you?Spanish isn’t very difficult for me. I get it quite easily.I’m still on the Russian alphabet. Take a guess…

[suikervrouw]

Langblr Emoji Asks!

😊 - What made you pick your target language? 💗 - What do you love about your target language? 🙃 - Is your target language hard for you? ⭐️ - What’s your favourite word in your target language? 🌙 - What’s your favourite sentence(s) in your target language? 😎 - Do you know anyone else who’s also learning your target language? 😝 - Do you watch any media in your target language? If so then what? 😡 - What’s your least favourite thing about your target language? 👽 - What’s a word or sentence in your target language with a hilarious direct translation? 😱 - What other languages do you know? 😍 - What other languages are you planning on learning?

EDIT: SORRY I realized I used the same emoji two times, it’s changed now

[studyblr]

reblog if you totally want people ranting in your ask about life, sharing their academic achievements, goals for 2017, stationery they bought, languages they want to learn etc!

[sprachtraeume]

When you’re looking for a slav bf because you want the Д

[polyglot-what-blog]

New Langblr Here

I’m having trouble finding studyblrs that are specifically langblrs. If you’re a langblr, please reblog!

[polyglot-what-blog]

When you find a good band in your target language

[smile--sugar]

Everyone smiles in the same language.

Unknown (via Smile, Sugar.)

[languagemoon2]

Hi!! Could you perhaps list some blogs/resources focusing mainly on Russian? Thank you! :D

Sure thing, anon! Now I’m not super focused on Russian atm but I’ve managed to scrounge up something for you :)

Free Online Russian-Learning Websites:

http://www.study-languages-online.com/

http://masterrussian.com/

http://www.russianforeveryone.com/

http://www.yesrussian.com/

http://www.russianlessons.net/

https://www.duolingo.com/course/ru/en/Learn-Russian-Online (I’m sure you’re familiar with this one)

Cyrillic Alphabet:

http://masterrussian.com/russian_alphabet.shtml

http://www.russianforeveryone.com/RufeA/Lessons/Introduction/Alphabet/Alphabet.htm

http://www.omniglot.com/writing/russian.htm (I absolutely love Omniglot and would recommend it to anyone with a general interest in languages)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GIKX9RYOX5w (For children, but good for learners as well)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhrSpf8kaqQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=64vWY8YIijY

Russian Keyboard:

http://www.apronus.com/internet/ruskey.htm (Online Cyrillic keyboard)

http://winrus.com/kbd_e.htm (A downloadable phonetic keyboard instead of the Microsoft keyboard that is already formatted in Microsoft computers, the phonetic keyboard is easier to use because Cyrillic letters are placed with the closest roman letter equivalent on an English QWERTY keyboard)

Online Dictionaries:

http://www.rustran.com/

http://www.freedict.com/onldict/rus.html

http://www.lexilogos.com/english/russian_dictionary.htm

http://dictionary.reverso.net/english-russian/ (Reverso is pretty good in my experience)

Immersion:

http://www.bbc.com/russian

http://ria.ru/radio/ 

http://all-radio.ru/

http://www.rususa.com/fun/radio/

http://ru-news.ru/

http://rusnovosti.ru/ (News)

http://www.pravda.ru/ (News)

http://rutube.ru/ (Russian youtube)

https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/33661.Best_Russian_Children_Books (For some beginner’s reading)

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPYC—L3hwnJHZZGpCaPo2DxiSFwjkYd (The children’s show ‘Masha and the Bear’ in Russian)

Movies in Russian (Click on title to see the wiki page):

Leviathan (2014)

Solaris (1972) 

Stalker (1979)

The Return (2003)

Hard to be a God (2013)

The Mirror (1975)

Russian Ark (2002)

Elena (2011)

Battle for Sevastopol (2015)

Battleship Potemkim (1925) 

Ivan’s Childhood (1962)

How I Ended This Summer (2010)

12 (2007)

Burnt by the Sun (1994)

The Thief (1997)

Faust (2011) 

Mongol (2007)

The Fool (2014) 

A Driver for Vera (2004)

Russian Music:

Aria (Heavy metal)

DDT (Rock)

Kino (Post-punk)

Nyusha (Pop, R&b)

Yulia Savicheva (Pop rock)

t.A.T.u (Pop, electronic)

Nautilus Pompilius (Alternative, post-punk)

Russian Novels:

Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)

The Master and Margarita (Mikhail Bulgakov) (BEST)

Anna Karenina (Leo Tolstoy)

War and Peace (Leo Tolstoy)

Dead Souls (Nikolay Gogol)

A Hero of Our Time (Mikhail Lermontov)

The Brothers Karamazov (Fyodor Dostoevsky)

Apps - Android specific (Sorry, I don’t have Apple ios so I cannot offer anything there):

Duolingo 

Memrise

Mango Languages (Offers a free trial)

Babbel

Learn & Speak Russian - Mondly

Radio Russia

Learn Russian by Babel Yak

Learn Russian 6,000 Words

Verses of Russian poets

Multitran Russian Dictionary

Tumblr Blogs:

@learn-russian-language

@russiangrammar

@rashn

@gemrussian

@lovsiberianhusky

Haha, this may be more than you were asking for but it was fun to make and I hope that this helps you and anyone else who may be studying Russian!

[kieletlanguage]

Goal: reaching a respectable level of fluency in a foreign language without anyone knowing that you have been learning it then randomly starting to speak that language

[polyglot-what-blog]

when someone suggests that you should settle down with one language and not start another

[polyglot-what-blog]

when you can't commit to a single language and keep jumping between 4 different lessons