How many languages do you speak?

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Posted: 8/30/2005 6:19:26 PM EDT

I'm studying Spanish because soon it will become our national language (not really, a foriegn language is just required for my major, and besides it's fun). I got to thinking, how many people here are bi, tri, or more-lingual, and what other language(s) can you speak?

(Estoy estudiando Español porque pronto estará nuestro idioma nacional (no en verdad, un idioma extranjero es requerido para mi clase de estudios, y además es agradable). Empecé a pensar, cuántos gentes aquí hablan más que uno idioma, y qué otro idioma(s) puedes hablar?)

EDITED TO ADD: English variations don't count.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:20:27 PM EDT

[#1]

One.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:21:06 PM EDT

[#2]

I speak English and Alabama.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:21:32 PM EDT

[#3]

Io parlo Italiano abbastanza bene perche' Io abbitato in Italia per due anni. Io ho imparato il mio Italiano da le ragazze di il pub della' mia citta, chiamato Itri.

Un petit po du france' - non tre bien

Y' un poquito di Espanol.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:22:02 PM EDT

[#4]

English and redneck goober

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:22:36 PM EDT

[#5]

English, Australian, British, Canadian, broken spanish and enough Japanese to get my face slapped

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:22:56 PM EDT

[#6]

Quoted:
I speak English and Alabama.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:24:46 PM EDT

[#7]

i speak english, arabic, russian, german, a little spanish.
and basic and a little c++
and army

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:25:17 PM EDT

[#8]

I took four years of French in high school
and can speak about 7 words. I've attempted
to learn a couple of languages over the
years, but failed.

Right now, I have Rosetta Stone Russian
and Japanese installed on my computer, but
I won't bother with them because I am such
a procrastinating fuck.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:25:36 PM EDT

[#9]

uno

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:25:38 PM EDT

[#10]

I speak English and German, and I can get by in Spanish. I am not fluent in Spanish.

At my company we have a teacher that holds German classes for the employees. She speaks 7 languages! She is currently working on here 2nd attempt at learning Japanese.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:25:51 PM EDT

[#11]

Depends on how you count. I'm fluent in English, pretty good in Latin, can avoid giving offense or being cheated in French and Italian, and could avoid signing a false confession in Spanish or German.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:27:48 PM EDT

[#12]

If they don't speak the english, I no wanta talka to them douchebags

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:27:59 PM EDT

[#13]

English, Spanish, and Serbo-Croatian. (Which lets me sort of mash my way through Polish and some other Slavic languages.) Latin in High School, but I certainly wouldn't say that I have any degree of proficiency in it.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:33:50 PM EDT

[#14]

Quoted:
If they don't speak the english, I no wanta talka to them douchebags

Neat anecdote:

I used to spend most of my time in Mexico and other Latin American countries doing IT work for a multinational.

On my very first trip, I met our IT Director for a drink in the hotel lobby in Salina Cruz. (I was 19 at the time, so this was heady stuff!) I didn't speak more than a few words of Spanish at the time. The director was a grizzled old British bastard who still viewed the world as being either the British Empire, or some country hardly worth visiting.

Great guy. He spoke some obscene number of languages, from Mandarin to some Swahili to Spanish and many inbetween.

Waiter comes up and asks us what would we like to drink, in Spanish. Boss just looks at him. Waiter repeats, in Spanish. Boss just looks at him. (Even I knew what the waiter was saying, but I wasn't going to step on toes). Finally, in broken English, the waiter asks us what would we like. "Gin on the rocks, and keep it coming", Boss says.

Boss looks at me and says, "Remember, if the damned wogs don't speak English, they aren't worth speaking to!"

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:33:58 PM EDT

[#15]

English, German and French. I use all three with the public in my job, every day. Remember, "I'm from the Federal government and I'm here to help!"

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:35:14 PM EDT

[#16]

I can get by in french but I'm way out of practice.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:37:05 PM EDT

[#17]

3 English and German and Binary , all I'm going to. learned the other language words to say GTFO to everybody else.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:47:09 PM EDT

[#18]

American English and cunnilingus - better with the latter. I get tongue tied - but works for me.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:50:53 PM EDT

[#19]

Fluent - English, Danish and German. (although my german vocabulary has suffred since I no longer speak it regularly

)

(If you count Norwegian and Swedish as separate languages, I get to vote 5

).

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:51:31 PM EDT

[#20]

Just 1

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:52:02 PM EDT

[#21]

only english

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:52:25 PM EDT

[#22]

Quoted:
I speak English and Alabama.

+1

Anything else is just jibberish!

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:52:53 PM EDT

[#23]

English and spanish. But I can get by in alot of other places.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:53:13 PM EDT

[#24]

3. English (obvious), Mandarin (I'm Chinese), and some Spanish (from So. CA of course)

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:53:21 PM EDT

[#25]

Two proficiently: English, German.
One barely: Latin.

Several in the "just barely" way, i.e. about a half semester college course's worth. Russian, Japanese, Croatian, Spanish (a little better). I'm figuring on promoting Croation to "proficient" and adding Italian and Chinese over the next few years.

Jim

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:55:08 PM EDT

[#26]

English and Hungarian.

Posted: 8/30/2005 6:59:53 PM EDT

[#27]

4 English, spanglish, ebonics, and LEO. LEO is the most universal - you just point a gun at a bad guy and start screaming at him. He usually hits the deck and drops his weapon. Works like a charm.

Posted: 8/30/2005 7:00:39 PM EDT

[#28]

I speak every languange on earth known to man except Greek.....................................
And if it aint English, it's Greek to me!

Posted: 8/30/2005 7:01:08 PM EDT

[#29]

English and Mandarin Chinese

I took 6 years of French, so I might barely scrape by if I ever go to France

Posted: 8/30/2005 7:02:45 PM EDT

[#30]

Thank God nobody has said they are fluent in over four million forms of communication.

Posted: 8/30/2005 7:05:28 PM EDT

[#31]

English, redneck, and a little ebonics. And why the hell does it take twice as long to say the exact damn thing in spanish as it does in english?

Posted: 8/30/2005 7:05:37 PM EDT

[#32]

Bearly one.

Posted: 8/30/2005 7:06:00 PM EDT

[#33]

Quoted:
Thank God nobody has said they are fluent in over four million forms of communication.

Six million.

Posted: 8/30/2005 7:09:39 PM EDT

[#34]

I'm fluent in over SIX million forms of communication.

I'm gold plated and walk like I've got a light saber stuck up my ass.

But seriously...why would I want to speak any language but English unless I was planning to take
a vacation or long trip to a non-English-speaking country? Like New York City...

I'm making tentative plans for a vacation to India. I will learn rudimentary conversational Indian
before I go. "Where's the bathroom" "where's a brothel" "how much for a blowjob"
" bend over,here comes the dick" "How much to run through the entire Kama Sutra?" "Hey, Taxi, take me to my
hotel and don't even think about overcharging me, you curry-smelling rat eating SOB!"

Just the USEFUL phrases, in other words.

I'd like to go to Japan some day, and also learn Japanese. Same idea, different phrases.
"Take me to a bukkake party. I'll scare everyone there with my huge American penis."

CJ

Posted: 8/30/2005 7:13:21 PM EDT

[#35]

Quoted:
English and Hungarian.

+ French and Spanish. Conversant (barely) in German.

My parents came from Hungary and that's all we spoke at home.

I went to French Roman Catholic public school in Canada. Still get by just fine with French.

Took a lot of Spanish. I used to get all the Spanish-speaking patients during internship.

I had wanted to become fluent in German but it never happened.

Posted: 8/30/2005 7:15:01 PM EDT

[#36]

Quoted:
Why the hell does it take twice as long to say the exact damn thing in spanish as it does in english?

It doesn't necessarily. Para ejemplo, if you wanted to say,

"Why the hell does it take twice as long to say the exact damn thing in spanish as it does in english?"
You'd say
"Por qué en infierno toma dos veces tan de largo decir el mismo cosa en español como toma en inglés?"

Or

"I will learn another language so that I will be able to speak two languages"
You'd say
"Aprenderé otro idioma así que podré a hablar dos idiomas."