The Enid Blyton Society

I also know a Syrian Arab who speaks Aramaic. Aramaic(the language spoken by Jesus) is his mother tongue. It sounds very similar to Arabic and Hebrew as well. It has been an eye-opener to me!

sixret wrote:Same goes with Arabic and Hebrew. I have been learning Arabic and it has struck me how those two languages sound very similar. Both languages have layer upon layer of meanings i.e. double meanings. So reading them in context is very important hence the most difficult languages to translate to other languages because of their nature!

I watched parts of a documentary years ago and it explained that the origin of the people that later became "Jews" located in today's Palestine is based in Arabia.

sixret wrote:Same goes with Arabic and Hebrew. I have been learning Arabic and it has struck me how those two languages sound very similar. Both languages have layer upon layer of meanings i.e. double meanings. So reading them in context is very important hence the most difficult languages to translate to other languages because of their nature!

Arabic is definitely one of the languages which I would love to learn. It is a beautiful language and undoubtedly a key to an amazing culture ...

sixret wrote:I also know a Syrian Arab who speaks Aramaic. Aramaic(the language spoken by Jesus) is his mother tongue. It sounds very similar to Arabic and Hebrew as well. It has been an eye-opener to me!

They say that The Passion of Christ is in Aramaic?

Speaking of which, this reminds me of a case about how children. They are quite young maybe three years of age, and between them they spoke a laminate which of course the parents thought it was a childish language but yet it sounded too perfect to be so. They went to a person with an expertise in languages and it turned out the children where talking Aramaic.
It's quite strange but this story fills me with wonder

Most of the characters in The Passion of The Christ speak Aramaic.

At one point I got scared because I started being able to understand what the characters were saying without needing the subtitles. Then I realized that Pontius Pilate and the other Roman characters weren't speaking Aramaic, but Latin.

It's a good movie to watch if you want to learn how to count to 39 in Latin. Jus' saying.

Just remembering we had a discussion some time ago about a certain famously lengthened Welsh place name — as I've just discovered, there's even a song about how to pronounce it. All together now...

The Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch Song

I am half Welsh and Irish with a bit of Scots and I want to learn Welsh. I can and do sing in welsh which I love but am looking for a c orrespondence course to do as have no computer only a phone. Can't do much on that. Any ideas as to weather your course dies correspondence courses. Cofion Gorau. Sue.

Sue, have I or anyone else already mentioned SaySomethinginWelsh? https://www.saysomethingin.com/welsh" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

It's an audio-only course that you can do with just a phone — each lesson starts you with a few new words at a time and has you repeat them, then put them together in sentences in different ways. I used the Cornish version of it to start learning Cornish and it was a HUGE help, as it really gets you thinking in the language. The Welsh course is the most developed — I think you do have to pay a small amount for the higher levels of it, but the lower levels are completely free and you go at whatever pace you like. Worth trying and seeing what you think of it.

My first visit in Britain in 2017
I arrived in Newcastle by ship. I went out of the harbour to get a taxi. What a great idea. I got one.
The problem:
In Newcastle the people speak something called Geordie. And I speak something like English. Perfect.
But I got the possibly best taxi driver on planet earth. With 81 years he was the oldest taxi driver in Britain. And he had a lot of fun teaching me absolute everything about british politicians. So the journey from Newcastle to Hereford was very interesting.
After arriving in Hereford I had to go to a school in Monmouth with my friends truck. Honestly, why the hell everyone in Britain drives on the wrong side of the road. I made it. Almost. The traffic signs were in English and Welsh. Nice idea. But I didn´t find the school. Because the sign of the school was written only in Welsh. And to be honest, what was written on this sign had nothing to do with english. I found the school with a lot of help from a police officer.

I'm learning Welsh (among quite a few other languages) on a site called Duolingo. Anybody else here tried that? It's a seriously awesome site, and completely free to use (although you can take out a paid "Plus" membership, which I actually have done).

My Welsh is very rudimentary, but I'm finding it easier than Irish (another language I'm studying on Duolingo). Probably the most challenging aspect of it so far is mutations and remembering when to use them.

Dw i'n hoffi dysgu Cymraeg. (I've probably said that wrong, but for non-Welsh speakers, what I said - or tried to say - was, I like learning Welsh.)

Bendigedig, Rowan!

Oh dear, I just ran across yet another "lost in translation" gaffe that had me cracking up laughing: last year an Asda store in Wales was found to have a sign that was meant to advertise "alcohol free" wines — but guess how they inadvertently worded it in Welsh...

Did you read this one that was linked from that page, Courtenay? As it happened before the 'Free Alcohol' one, it can't be blamed on consuming too much of the free alcohol.

https://www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north- ... rs-7253676" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Oh yes, I've seen the bladder inflammation one before! But my favourite mistranslation ever — it's under a link I posted somewhere earlier in this thread — was the sign that read "Warning: Blasting in Progress" in English, but the Welsh "translation" was "Warning: Workers Exploding."

EDIT: just found where I posted it before. It also includes the bladder sign, among others...

All right, this is just one of those now-I've-seen-everything moments... a Welsh learner with perhaps a bit too much time on his hands has translated the entire London Tube map into Welsh.