I prefer this one:

My mom's learning Italian right now for a trip in October.

kidelrich said:

What is she using?

Steadwood said:

naw, i thought about this when i was in NYC last month and some french people passed by, i thought they were talking about me and wanted to know what they, but because i don't know french there was no way of knowing...so i guess its just curiousity, that and i've always wanted to be bilingual in Italian and Spanish, but never took up those courses while i was in college.

Imago said:

yeah what is she using? inquiring minds want 2 know

missfee said:

FOr vacabulary building supposedly http://www.rosettastone.com are really good.
The problem with Rosetta stone is it is set for you to learn without the use of translations. He get a picture of 4 images and you have to guess the correct image to the word/phrase being used. They create patterns in the tests that force you to try and find the relationship to words in the actual language that you are trying ot learn.

For Thai, it was very frustrating to me, but when I figured some of it out, it was like being slapped across the face with something big and meaty.

Imago said:

gotdamn! that software like 300 dollars for all three levels!!!

missfee said:

Or you can do it via the Internet for about 50 bucks a month and you have access to all the launguages.

It cost about 400-500 bucks for College courses on foriegn languages.

I think I will end up taking a college course, cuase there is nothing like having a professor scare you into learning it.

Imago said:

i'm curious about this software though...i think its worth a try....

missfee said:

I remember I took College German once, and the German instructor was a Native of the Pfalz(spelling?) region near Kaiserslaughtern.

One night she was totally upset with our lack of progress and went on a rampage about preperation.

She ended with "Zis is not high school Anymore!" to which a student in the back of the class quickly replied "well, can we at least pretend?"


.
[Edited 7/31/06 14:29pm]

same with the Netherlands, which used to be my favorite country in Europe until a few years ago.


Love is the best teacher you can have.
[Edited 7/31/06 15:31pm]

KoolEaze said:

what happened a few years ago?

I was seriously in love with the Netherlands up until the slaying of Pim Fortyn and Van Gogh and the reactions that followed. Made me kind of disillusioned and disappointed, I expected one of the most progressed countries in Europe (IMO) to react differently and in a more intelligent, less generalizing way, including here in the P&R forum and haven´t visited the Netherlands eversince, and I don´t think I ever will in the near future. I used to have lots of respect for its diversity, its history and its culture and I LOVE Dutch cheese but burning dozens of mosques and simplifying complicated political and sociological matters by blaming a whole part of the population is not the right way. All parties involved made big mistakes and things were blown out of proportion...Hirsi Ali or whatever her name is and Van Gogh made a stupid little film ( don´t get me wrong , I totally believe in freedom of speech and freedom of expression but that short film , provocative as it was, was simply a primitive piece of shit, and I usually like Van Goghs films but he clearly had an agenda, just like Hirsi Ali), and believe me , nobody I know , including the most hardcore Msulim fundamentalists, agree with what happened to Van Gogh, yet people reacted as if all Muslims agreed with one brutal murderer.

This topic has been discussed to death and I don´t think that this is the right forum for discussing this (again) so I leave it like that, just to answer your question and to give you an idea.

Of course I don´t expect you to show understanding for the way I see things, from what I remember back then you are a bit more rightwing or conservative when it comes to these issues, which is fine, I respect that, but I have a different approach. Then again, maybe I was a bit too naive about the Netherlands.

I remember this discussion you head a while ago with DexMSR and you said the same to him, you know, about people being too naive and gullible about the Netherlands and that the Netherlands had a racist history etc. ( you mentioned the Dutch word apartheid etc. as an example).

Anyway, it´s late and I really don´t want to go off topic, just wanted to answer your question , that´s all, and I don´t think that we can discuss this big issue in a few sentences, this wouldn´t do any justice to this BIG topic.

I kinda liked certain things about Pim Fortyn though...I really would´ve liked to meet him and have a little discussion with him, he was different
.
See, things were always a bit different and more sophisticated in good old Holland, even rightwing politicians .
[Edited 7/31/06 16:02pm]

I prefer this one:

KoolEaze said:

I see what you mean.....

Without wanting to jack this thread and make it political, I just want to say this:

eventhough Holland has a history of racism (we were just about the biggest slave-traders centuries ago ), this doesn't mean we're a racist country right now. Despite some racial tensions we have (like any country, certainly the US....even worse there), we're still pretty liberal over here!



oh, and Hirsi Ali was a provocative fraud, with some good ideas.....a mess!

a friend is teaching me Japanese

Funnily enough, I am re-teaching myself Italian, well brushing up on all thats forgotten over the years.. so I went to the library and got some CDs and a book, its kinda good lying out in the sun, topping both my tan up and my Italian

At school (many years ago) I used to listen to French tapes while I slept and sure enough it does really sink in and work.. I woke up saying Bonjour! and a hell of alot more than that I may add, but French is on my agenda after Italian

This one isn't selling too well, I hear...