Interlingua Festival June 24th and 25th in Lido Tegelsee, Berlin, Germany

 

English version below   Hallå, namaste, sawubona! Wir können es kaum erwarten – in 10 Tagen startet das EXPOLINGUA Festival im Strandbad Tegelsee!   Am 24. und 25. Juni von morgens bis abends erwartet Dich ein vielfältiges Programm, u.a.: Korean in a bubble, Chinesische Kalligraphie, Encuentro Hispano, Berufsbild Übersetzer, Darbuka Trommel Workshop, Sumo, Jobsuche in Deutschland, Co-creative Haiku Poetry Workshop, Meet&Greet with famous Content Creators, Workshops für Sprachlehrer*Innen, Arabisch, Dänisch, Griechisch, Persisch, Schwedisch, Tschechisch, und das ist noch nicht alles!  Das Programm wächst noch immer jeden Tag!   Das alles Open-Air und gut erreichbar mit EXPOLINGUA-Shuttle-Bussen vom U-Bahnhof Alt-Tegel und S-Bahnhof Tegel oder alternativ mit den Öffis!   Sichere Dir hier Deine Freikarte – wir freuen uns auf Dich! ­ ­ Zur Anmeldung für eine Freikarte ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ENGLISH VERSION:   We can hardly wait: in 10 days the EXPOLINGUA Festival will start at lido Tegelsee, Berlin!   A diverse program awaits you on June 24th and 25th from morning to evening, i.a.: Korean in a bubble, Chinese calligraphy, Encuentro Hispano, job profile translator, darbuka drum workshop, sumo, job search in Germany, co-creative haiku poetry workshop, meet & greet with famous content creators, workshops for language teachers, Arabic, Danish, Greek, Persian, Swedish, Czech, and that's not all!   The program is still growing every day!   Open air and easily accessible with EXPOLINGUA shuttle buses from the Alt-Tegel underground station and Tegel S-Bahn station or alternatively with public transport.    Grab your free ticket here: we look forward to seeing you! ­ ­ Register here for a free ticket! ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ Unsere Partner: ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­

­ ­ ­ EXPOLINGUA Scharnhorststr. 24, 10115, Berlin

Useful Websites

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlingua

https://www.facebook.com/blauhomine/

Why You Should Learn Languages to live longer, and how to ask for help in Czech, French, Malay, Russian, Spanish

Problem:

It takes ages to learn a new language. Doesn't everybody speak English, as a first or second language?

Answer

No they don't. Times when I found people didn't speak English:

1 Russian railway station - I lost my group switching trains.

2 France - I lost my group - they turned into a nearby restaurant.

3 Spain - we wanted hotel breakfast.

4 Czech Republic - I want to buy a museum ticket, cheaply, and leave for lunch.

5 China - I lost my coach party.

6 Singapore - we've hit a pedestrian who's bleeding in the road - need ambulance+police urgently

7 London, England Euton Station bomb scare evacuation announcements only in English - Spaniards running into station - stop!

A second reason

On several occasions, I needed to speak a foreign language because I'd lost my group. On one occasion Euston station was being evacuated, but the announcements were in English. A group of Spanish girls, laughing and talking, came down the escalator towards the station.

The sentences I needed were:
Russian
I have lost my group
They speak English.
Where is my train?
Where is the restaurant?
Can you phone for me?
Can you make an announcement that I'm lost?
Russkiy - Angliyskiy
YA poteryal svoyu gruppu
Oni govoryat po-angliyski.
Gde moy poyezd?
Gde nakhoditsya restoran?
Mozhete li vy pozvonit' mne?
Mozhete li vy sdelat' ob"yavleniye, chto ya poteryalsya?

Русский - Английский
Я потерял свою группу
Они говорят по-английски.
Где мой поезд?
Где находится ресторан?
Можете ли вы позвонить мне?
Можете ли вы сделать объявление, что я потерялся?

If all else fails, say, gruppu, Anglisky, restauran.

French
I have lost my group.
I think my friends are in a restaurant.
Where is the nearest restaurant?
Please show me the entrance.
Thank you very much.
So kind of you.

J'ai perdu ma groupe.
Je croix que mes amis sont dans un restaurant.
Ou est le restaurant le plus proche?
S'il vous plait, montrez-moi comment entrer.
Merci beaucoup.
Vous êtes très gentil.

Czech - English
Where is the toilet?
How much is a ticket for the museum?
Any reductions?
Is there a cheaper group for several museums?
What time will it close?
Can we eat lunch here?
Can we buy a ticket, go for lunch and come back?
Toilet
ticket
museum
restaurant
thanks

Česky - anglicky
Kde je toaleta?
Kolik je vstupenka do muzea?
Jakékoli snížení?
Existuje levnější skupina pro několik muzeí?
Kdy bude čas zavírat?
Můžeme sem jíst oběd?
Můžeme si koupit jízdenku, jít na oběd a vrátit se?
Toaleta
lístek
muzeum
restaurace
Děkuji

Chinese and Malay
Phone for an ambulance.
Call the police.
I need a phone urgently.
Somebody's injured in the road.
Quick.
It's an emergency.
Does somebody speak English?

Chinese (see next post)
I have lost my coach - English speaking people.
Show me the way, please.

Malay
(Rusia is Russian) - Bahasa Inggeris (Language English ie English language)
Saya telah kehilangan kumpulan saya
Mereka bertutur dalam bahasa Inggeris.
Di mana kereta saya?
Di manakah restoran?
Bolehkah anda telefon saya?
Bolehkah anda membuat pengumuman bahawa saya hilang?
>>>
Malay - from  Bahasa Inggeris
Dimanakah tandas?
Berapa tiket untuk muzium?
Mana-mana pengurangan?
Adakah terdapat kumpulan yang lebih murah untuk beberapa muzium?
Apa masa ia akan ditutup?
Bolehkah kita makan tengahari di sini?
Bolehkah kita membeli tiket, pergi makan tengah hari dan kembali?
Tandas - toilet
tiket - ticket
muzium - museum
restoran - restaurant
terima kasih - thanks

Terjemah ke Bahasa Sepanyol - Bahasa Inggeris
Anda mesti meninggalkan stesen sekarang. Ia adalah kecemasan.
Tunjukkan saya di mana.
Ikut saya.
Dengar.
Terima kasih.
cuti
kecemasan
bersembunyi
berlari
beritahu
membantu
tunggu
Ia ok
Anda boleh pergi.
....

Cina (Chinese) dan (and)  Melayu (Malay language)
Telefon untuk ambulans. (telephone ambulance)
Panggil polis. (polis is police)
Saya memerlukan telefon dengan segera.
Seseorang cedera di jalan raya.
Cepat.
Ia adalah kecemasan.
Adakah seseorang berbahasa Inggeris?

Melayu

Cina (Chinese)

Saya telah kehilangan jurulatih saya - orang berbahasa Inggeris.

Tunjukkan saya cara, sila.

Orang is person, as in orang utan. 

..............................................
Translate into Spanish - English
You must leave the station now. It's an emergency.
Show me where.
Follow me.
Listen.
Thank you.
leave
emergency
hide
run
tell
help
wait
It's ok
You can go.
......
Traducir al Español - Inglés
Debes salir de la estación ahora. Es una emergencia.
Muéstrame donde.
Sígueme.
Escucha.
Gracias.
salir
emergencia
esconder
correr
contar
ayuda
Espere
Está bien
Se puede ir.

Previous items in Spanish:
Español - inglés
He perdido mi grupo
Ellos hablan inglés.
¿Dónde está mi tren?
¿Donde está el restaurante?
¿Puedes llamar por mí?
¿Puedes hacer un anuncio de que estoy perdido?
>>>
Español - inglés
¿Donde esta el inodoro?
¿Cuánto cuesta un boleto para el museo?
Cualquier reducción?
¿Hay un grupo más barato para varios museos?
¿A qué hora se cerrará?
¿Podemos almorzar aquí?
¿Podemos comprar un boleto, ir a almorzar y regresar?
Baño - toilet
boleto - ticket
museo - museum
restaurante - restaurant
gracias - thanks

Losing your group, having an accident on the road, reacting to a bomb scare and directing others,

these are the short-term reasons for needing to speak foreign languages.

Long-term, learning languages is supposed to grow your brain and prevent it from shrinking and disintegrating.

https://www.mimicmethod.com/why-learn-second-language-everyone-speaks-english/
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2014/sep/04/what-happens-to-the-brain-language-learning
https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24537-learn-another-language-to-delay-three-dementias/

From the website mimicmethod I found links to German songs you can use to learn English, by singing along with the German subtitles.
In short, reduce stress and live a long, healthy and happy life. I always think of the road safety motto, the life you save may be your own.

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. I have many more posts on languages and destinations. Please share links to your favourite posts.

Learning languages And Listening to Words Being Spoken

Problems
Tinycards and Pronunciation
I just started trying to say hello in 50 languages, suggested by Duolingo's Tinycards. I had been using Duolingo's free ap to learn Spanish and decided to use the free Tinycards ap on Spanish fruits. The two systems are differnt. Duolingo gives you short sentences. So you learn to speak. The Tinycards are handy if you have a short attention span, it's late at night, and you want a few words of one type such as foods such as fruit to read a menu or labels in a supermarket.

Duolingo and Sounds
I have started learning twelve different languages, at first just three, Spanish, Italian and German, Welsh for a weekend in Wales, the Russian, Greek and Hebrew languages because lesson one is the alphabet and I know two or three letters from each alphabet and would like to know the whole alphabet, and others such as Portuguese, to see how it differs, and Romanian because I was hiking there.  The Duolingo main system gives recordings most of the way through.

Tinycards Without Sounds
The tiny cards don't have recordings, just one word on each side of the card, often with a picture. You click to reverse the card two or three times and then answer the question.

Learning Words For Hello In Fifty Languages
I was doing all right on the French word bonjour, which I would normally translate literally as good morning. But when I got to the second set of cards the words were Polish, cseść for hello; and Lithuanian sveiki. Firstly, no point in learning to say the wrong thing. Secondly I was stumped as to how to say it.

Accented letters
I tried Google translate which gave me the Polish.
ś=sh The accent is like adding another letter, turning the s into a sh.
ć=ch
cz is ch as in the Czech word for Czechoslovakia.
i=sounds like yeh (e as in bed not ay as in bay)

Lithuanian
But the Lithuanian isn't there. I presume no Lithuanians have yet volunteered to help.

I didn't know how the recordings were done. In a forum on one of the languages, I leanred that words have an occasional blip because in on-line dictionairies you don't have a native speaker reading every word.

Earworms
You do have a native speaker saying every word, a native speaker who is introduced and who gets the credit on the CD cover, in systems such as Earworms. That is the short version of Berlitz with background music which does all sorts of magic things, simultaneously keeping you focused whilst helping you relax.  About 200 first easy words for conversation on the plane and conversating with the flight attendant, the person sitting next to you, asking for directions, and asking the price or thanking the taxi driver.

Commputer generated voices work best when there's only one way to pronounce a word.

Let's come back to my problem, the Lithuanian and Polish prounciation.

To find the Lithuanian, I did another Google search.

YouTube
First I found a Youtube video.

Omniglot
Then I found omniglot which has a slide bar you click on to hear sounds.

Berlitz
Berlitz has schools in many countries where you can sign up for lessons.

MONEY OFF
I just went to one of their websites and they offered 30% off if I signed up by the end of this month (October 2017).

If you don't want to sign up for a course with a human teacher, you can buy their books and discs.

http://www.berlitz.de
www.earwormslearning.com
https://www.duolingo.com
https://www.tinycards.duolingo.com
https://www.omniglot.com/soundfiles/lithuanian/hello3_lt.mp3
https://www.googletranslate.com

You can also learn English and other languages from films with subtitles or set the TV to show subtitles.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-41516251 Can you learn English from Eastenders? (How one boy did so).

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and phtographer, author and speaker.

International Women's Day - March 8th, this year and every year

Problem
International Women's Day passed by and I didn't note it. I am a woman every day of the year. However, my friend Jilliana wrote a comment on Facebook on a photo of myself and a friend, so I thought I'd make a note now, in order to be prepared when it comes around next year.

Answers
People I should note:
1 Myself, my mother, grandmother, aunts, sister-in-law, niece by marriage.
2 Famous women I learned about in school: Florence Nightingale; Grace Darling.
3 Famous authors (in their day one might have said authoresses): (alphabetically by surname) Jane Austen; Charlotte Bronte.

4 Women in science: Marie Curie, pioneer in X-rays.

Tips
International Women's Day - a good day to write about and visit and re-visit homes of famous women:
Homes of famous women which I have visited and written about:
UK Charlotte Bronte, Haworth, Yorkshire, England, UK.

Jane Austen house, Bath, England, UK.
A BBC website shows a video of Jane's Austen's desk and around her home.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-16302982
Other BBC websites show supposed paintings of her, an analysis of the family nose in pictures of other members of her family, and a waxwork. I suppose eventually they will look for her skull and get a recreation of what she would have looked like.

Anne Frank House, Amsterdam, Netherlands.

Most men do not live in isolation. So visiting the home of a famous man you are likely to learn about his mother, wife, fiancee or lover, daughter, employee, servant.

For example, visiting the Marcel Proust museum in Prague, Czech republic, I was interested to read about the girlfriends he ski not marry, especially the last one who stayed with him at the sanitarium where he died.

Living women I admire:
Catherine Lim, author, Singapore.
Angela Lansbury, actress, UK and USA, my namesake.

More in Wikipedia.

Angela Lansbury

Language Pronunciation, French, German, Polish and Czech

When you visit a hospital or public building in the USA you might see signs in both English and Spanish. In Canada in the capital, Ottawa, you you meet people in government offices who are bilingual in French and English. (But the accent is different from France.) In Belgium you see street signs in French and Flemish (Dutch).

In England at an NHS hospital I was surprised to see a sign not in the 12 languages of the European Union but several others.

Problems
1 What do foreign looking words mean?
2 Assuming you can read the letters of words in the same alphabet as English, how do you pronounce them?
3 Can I learn a language where the pronunciation and writing are the same - it would be easier to speak?

1 You can put individual words or short phrases, whole sentences of paragraphs from books or copy whole pages and columns of words into Google translate. Locate the language. On many websites a small flag you can click on will translate. Your computer also has a flag symbols and you can click on it and turn on another language. The same apples to many devices such as smart phones and satnavs.
2 Having identified a written language, hunt for pronunciation. This is on the first page of most phrase books and dictionaries. You can hear the words spoken by touching the loudspeaker or ear symbol in Wikipedia, and language courses such as duolingo.

Story
I went through the above sign in Northwick Park Hospital. I found:

1 Bom-vindo (Portuguese for welcome - like bon for good in French)
Soo dhawow (or dhawoow) is Somali for welcome.
witajcie is Polish for hello

2 Pronunciation
FRENCH
The diagonal up accent is rising, whilst the downward diagonal is falling. So the word élève, meaning secondary school pupil (high school pupil for Americans), would be pronounced ay as in pay, lev as in levitate.

The French emphasis is on the last syllable. They pronounce Paris, ignoring the last consonant, as Paree.

The French have difficulty with the English letter H. They are told to add the H, so they add it randomly. Our au pair girl once said, "you 'ave no air", when she meant "you have no hair", and "you have no hair" when she mean "you have no air".

GERMAN
Watch out for interchanged V and W.

SPANISH
Watch out for interchanged H and Y and J.
Watch out for C and S and TH.


Tips
MALAY (same as Indonesian)
Malay is phonetic - sounds like it is written. What you see is what you say.

CZECH is also phonetic.
Here's a handy guide to Czech pronunciation.
http://www.music.ucsb.edu/projects/csms/czpronounc2.html

(More to be added later.)

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, teacher and turn of English and other languages. See my other posts, profiles and blogs in blogger.com, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and YouTuber. Please follow me, like my pages and share your favourites. Look at my books on Lulu.com and Amazon