Learning Albanian For Your Holiday, Work, Fun, Curiosity: 10 handy words

I took a Lonely Planet guide with me to Albania. It has several languages and is small but quite thick and heavy. I considered cutting the spine in half. 

I did not want to spoil the book. It seems sacrilege to spoil a book. I did not want it to disintegrate. I might need to use it again. 

But it had not cost much. I had bought a cheaper second hand used copy. 

I then realized I could cut out the Albanian pages, which were first in the book, which had arranged the languages alphabetically.

I cut out the pages and stapled them together. I had too many for one staple. So I used two for two sections. i could have made a cover for the new mini book, in thicker paper to protect it, but I just put it in a see through zip lock bag.

The print is small, hard to read at night in a hotel bedroom, but handy in a restaurant and outdoors in daytime. The guide is something to read when waiting for other people, or for a table in a restaurant, or for your meal to arrive.

Many Albanian words are similar to English. The next challenge is how to pronounce each word, and how to pronounce the letters which have accents. The ling app is good because you start with one word or small groups of two or three words and learn the roounciation by hearing it straight away.

You see lots of English words and brand names.

Same Words

bar

hotel

spa

Similar words

1 agroturizem - agro-tourism

2 grupi - group

3 klient - client

4 ministria - ministry

5 objekt - object

6 recepsion / recepsionit - reception

7 republika - republic

8 restorant - restaurant

9 kafe - coffee (not eating place)

10 ora - time (like hour)

Useful Websites

https://play.ling-app.com/learn/unit/1/lesson/1

https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Albanian_phrasebook

Please share links to useful posts.

German language false friends and memory aids

Problem
I still get confused by the words Die Ärzte and think it means the arts when it means the doctors.

Answer
I already have my memory reminder: the doctors' arts.


German - English
die Ärzte - the doctors
Die Künste - the arts
(den) Mond. - (the) moon.
die Welt - the world

English - German
the arts - Die Künste
the doctors - Die Ärzte
...(the) moon. - ... (den) Mond. (here den for the is the object and end of a sentence - den like the English word them, rather than they, m at the end of the sentence)
the world - die Welt (Note that German uses capital letters for nouns)

Tips
Berlitz discs with an accompanying booklet cost about £20 on the internet for one or two discs, new or second hand on ebay. The Berlitz Earworms system has soothing music which is supposed to aid retention - at very least it means you enjoy the lessons and are more likely to continue listening.
They supply and speak about memory aids. The Greek word mnemonic is perhaps too hard for those who are listening.
If you are looking for something cheaper, or free, try Duolingo.
I began with the Earworms and later added duolingo to my daily language learning routine.

Angela Lansbury
Travel writer, photographer, author, language and public speaking teacher.
More about and by me on languages, spelling, grammar, travel and etiquette on Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Twitter. Please like follow and share your favourite posts.

English grammar terms you need to know (when learning German and other languages)

If I were you I would learn the subjunctive. What is the subjunctive? Learning languages, even on easy to use, or user friendly website Duolingo, involves learning some grammar, especially in German.

It's hard to learn a foreign language when you have forgotten the technical terms in English. Here's a quick reminder for me and you.

Technical term - easy explanation
false cognate - false friends (confusing words which sound the same but are different. For example in German
wo is where and
wer is who
(I remember 'who is where' and where is - who?)

nominative - name or subject of sentence, the person doing the doing (The cat in the sentence
'The cat sat on the mat.')
accusative - person who things are done to, object of sentence, in the sample sentence, 'the mat'

Noun - name or naming word (John, book, cat, mat)
In English only proper names - of people and places - have capital letters

Capital letters - THIS IS IN CAPITALS
lower case - all small letters - this is in lower case
initial letter - first letter of a word

verb - doing word (sat)
adverb (describes a verb) quickly eg he ran quickly / the fox ran quickly

adjective (describes a noun) quick his answer was quick / the quick fox
pronoun word which stands for a noun such as I you he she they it 

indicative - indicates what is happening - (I am or I will)
subjunctive - what your subconscious dreams or wishes, wishful thinking, possible but not actual if 'I were you I would' - sub meaning under - as in subway- the underworld underground - not real, usually prefaced by the words if or maybe.

If I were you I would learn the subjunctive.


Angela Lansbury, English teacher and tutor