Grassroots Language Learning

Half the time I go researching a German car, I find I eventually drive myself to German sites. I'd like to go visit BMW Welt and drive the Nurburgring Nordschlife. My wife spent some time there in college.

I'd like to learn more German than "Porsche Doppelkuplunggestribe" and the third verse of 99 Luftbaloons (thanks, Gran Turismo soundtrack). I'd like to know enough to be able to spend a week there and not be completely afraid if I leave my phrasebook at the hotel.

For learning on your own, have you found something that brought you success?

My hovercraft is full of eels.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/G6D1YI-41ao

Mike wrote: I'd like to learn more German than "Porsche Doppelkuplunggestribe" and the third verse of 99 Luftbaloons (thanks, Gran Turismo soundtrack).

This is sooo funny to me. I have that same verse memorized for the same reason. I once sung it to my buddy who was an exchange student from Germany back when we were in HS. He had no idea what I was saying, even after I tried multiple times.

Local community college. Seriously.

I do English French and Spanish quite well.

For Italian and Portuguese, I go back to how infants communicate: "Want" and "Need".

Rather than learn a bunch of grammar, learn how to say "I want" and "I need" in whatever language. Then add a noun. You would be surprised how far you can go with those two phrases and a cell phone to provide nouns in whatever language you need.

Huckleberry wrote: My hovercraft is full of eels.

The sister of a high school friend was doing some missionary work in a Brazilian village where they spoke Portuguese. She spoke fluent Spanish and just sort of knew Portuguese. They gave her the strangest looks as she was trying to explain that they needed to get rid of the fleas from the village dogs. It seems the Spanish word for flea is very similar to the Portuguese word for penis.

JoeTR6 wrote:

Huckleberry wrote: My hovercraft is full of eels.

The sister of a high school friend was doing some missionary work in a Brazilian village where they spoke Portuguese. She spoke fluent Spanish and just sort of knew Portuguese. They gave her the strangest looks as she was trying to explain that they needed to get rid of the fleas from the village dogs. It seems the Spanish word for flea is very similar to the Portuguese word for penis.

Same word in both Spanish and Portuguese "Flea" = "Pulga"

Now the word "Bicho" can mean "Penis" or "Insect" depending on what Spanish country you are in...gotta be careful with that one.

I've been listening to Pimsleur's Dutch in the car for the past 2 years on the commute to work. I've picked up quite a bit. Mom says my accent is perfect. Pimsler has an entire collection of language tapes and I'm sure they have German. You can start with the 5 disk set off amazon pretty cheap. That will probably get you through to "we will invade your country tomorrow."

I speak fluent Portuguese: Cer-vaj-ahhh. Batatas Freeetaas. And Spanish: Cervesa, Papas Freetahs. Resperante Profundo. Ultra mas. Necessito por el dedo en el trabaho.

Here you go: http://www.amazon.com/Pimsleur-German-Conversational-Course-Understand/dp/0743550471

I don't know, I guess it may just be up to the individual. Myself, I learn better in person like Appleseed recommended. But I studied it for 7 years like that.

Learning from tapes didn't work so well for me- mainly because languages aren't scripted. And because it was French.

For example, you can learn a phrase like "Wo ist das Klo?", or "where is the bathroom." On the tapes (I tried) you may get two different answers at the most to that question. Now if the person you ask in person answers with one of those two phrases you are set. For argument's sake, let's say the tape teaches you "it's on the left" and "it's on the right" in German. What if the person you ask answers with "take the stairs to the second floor, follow the hall to the right and it's the second door on the left"? A tape can't really teach you that.

Ok, so in reality you could just say "Danke!" and follow the signs, but that's not the point.

And I also realize they aren't tapes anymore. I'm too lazy to re type all that.

On the other hand, you don't need to sit through hours of classes learning to conjugate verbs based on cases either.

The other thing a person can teach you, especially a native speaker, is colloquialisms and dialects. This would be helpful for you.

I guess you just have to pick a method and try it. If it works for you stick with it. But I would definitely contact your local community college to see what they offer.

I have never been able to pick up another language. For a couple years in high school I worked in a warehouse where I was the only one who didn't speak Spanish. It was six months before I realized the boss's name wasn't Morty Cohen.

Thanks for the suggestions. The community college and the university in town don't have anything. The library has some "CD-ROM" materials that I'll try (free is good) and if that doesn't look viable, I'll probably go with the Doc's suggestion of Pimsleur.

NOHOME wrote:

JoeTR6 wrote:

Huckleberry wrote: My hovercraft is full of eels.

The sister of a high school friend was doing some missionary work in a Brazilian village where they spoke Portuguese. She spoke fluent Spanish and just sort of knew Portuguese. They gave her the strangest looks as she was trying to explain that they needed to get rid of the fleas from the village dogs. It seems the Spanish word for flea is very similar to the Portuguese word for penis.

Same word in both Spanish and Portuguese "Flea" = "Pulga" Now the word "Bicho" can mean "Penis" or "Insect" depending on what Spanish country you are in...gotta be careful with that one.

Yup, the local nouns are the real killers. Example: per both Salvadoran and Puerto Rican acquaintances, only in Mexico does the word "chalupa" refer to a cullinary item. What the word means to the rest of the Spanish speaking places is at least R-rated adult content. Neither of these two non-Mexican latino gents can say "chalupa" without giggling.

I use DUO. Been at it for about 3 months. Went from only a few words in German to at least understanding the gist of articles in the paper (website) der Spiegel. It's a free app. So pretty grassroots. I could probably manage a basic conversation beyond point & grunt communication.

oldtin wrote: I use DUO. Been at it for about 3 months. Went from only a few words in German to at least understanding the gist of articles in the paper (website) der Spiegel. It's a free app. So pretty grassroots. I could probably manage a basic conversation beyond point & grunt communication.

I assume you mean Duolingo, which is what came up when I tried searching for it. Duolingo looks really good! I'm going to go with that for the moment.

paranoid_android74 wrote: For example, you can learn a phrase like "Wo ist das Klo?", or "where is the bathroom." On the tapes (I tried) you may get two different answers at the most to that question. Now if the person you ask in person answers with one of those two phrases you are set. For argument's sake, let's say the tape teaches you "it's on the left" and "it's on the right" in German. What if the person you ask answers with "take the stairs to the second floor, follow the hall to the right and it's the second door on the left"? A tape can't really teach you that. Ok, so in reality you could just say "Danke!" and follow the signs, but that's not the point.

From what everyone I know who's visited Germany in the past ten years has told me, they will hear your atrocious accent and reply to you in near impeccable English.

I've been struggling with this for years. I've done the different pimsler discs but really struggle to work with it as it isn't conversational. Have kicked around trying rosetta stone.

I really need German, Mandarin, and Spanish for my professional life. I've picked up enough to get around in these places (food, hotels, cabs, greetings and easy stuff) but I really need to go deeper. Trying to work on a plan for the family on the spanish and the mandarin as I really think my boys would find it valuable as they grow up. Thinking some combo of classes and disks may get me there.

Some work friends make a point of spending typical one weekend day with a local to learn by immersion. In China they jokingly call this method "getting a long hair dictionary" as most the folks who are available reasonably are ladies who are trying to improve their english for "other" business reasons.

Germans speak a lot better English than you can ever learn in CC or via DVD. They start to learn it in school in 3rd or 4th grade. I wouldn't even bother. I talk to German folks everyday and I don't even bother learning German because we will actually communicate worse in German than English.

Not to sound sound like an elitest American but I wouldn't worry about it.

Knurled wrote:

paranoid_android74 wrote: For example, you can learn a phrase like "Wo ist das Klo?", or "where is the bathroom." On the tapes (I tried) you may get two different answers at the most to that question. Now if the person you ask in person answers with one of those two phrases you are set. For argument's sake, let's say the tape teaches you "it's on the left" and "it's on the right" in German. What if the person you ask answers with "take the stairs to the second floor, follow the hall to the right and it's the second door on the left"? A tape can't really teach you that. Ok, so in reality you could just say "Danke!" and follow the signs, but that's not the point.

From what everyone I know who's visited Germany in the past ten years has told me, they will hear your atrocious accent and reply to you in near impeccable English.

You are absolutely right, I was going to point this out but didn't. Many of them can likely do so in French too. But trying goes a long way, at the very least they will likely have a big smile on their face and compliment you on the effort.

I would never discourage someone from trying to learn a language, whatever the method. I remember when I studied there (in Germany) I took a beginner class to learn Swedish, but the base language was German. That was a real mind berkeley, but fun!

Don't get me wrong, I think it is a good idea to grasp the very basics of other languages, especially, as a car guy, your cars' birth language. Like German, you're looking at the ABS pump in your BMW, figuring out the brake line routing. L is left and R is right (links/rechts) but H and V? Vor and Hinten (maybe Hinter, I forget, rusty like a 2002). Vor is fore and Hinten is "hind" (rear, back, like the hinterlands, which are "out back" )

But I'll admit that my brain goes to sleep about four syllables in to any German freight train meganoun, and I go crosseyed even trying to read Japanese let alone comprehend it. Fortunately the Japanese cars we see were made for the US market, if not exclusively, and they seem to like to do things in English just for the lulz, so that's all well and good. (Saw an article a ways back about why Japanese cars, even in the home market, have their names written in the roman alphabet. The theory was, cars are from America, so to be correct you write car names with the roman alphabet. Okay then!)

To be frank - half of the interest is for business discussions where the other parties assume (correctly) that the american speaks no german and proceed to have a detailed discussion directly in front of me. The other half is for when someone really jerks you around and leaves you no choice but to prove their assumption wrong...

So, you're like: "Hey, I can sell you widgets at wholesale and buy your sprockets. Let's make a deal." And they're like (talking to each other in German): "This dumb-ass gringo wants to sell us widgets and buy our sprockets. Let's go invade his country tomorrow and take his gold and women." And you want to understand what they're saying. I can see that. Really, starting out with the Pimsleur CD's in the car when you're driving is a good way to go. I mean, what are you going to listen to otherwise? 40 year old rock songs? Throw a language CD in there and play along. I can watch a movie in Dutch now and understand maybe 30% of what they're saying. Man, Dutch movies suck, really really bad, but that's a different topic.

Why would you want to listen to something engaging while driving? You have to have those 40 year old rock songs on because they aren't engaging, you're supposed to be thinking about driving.

Anyway this is my excuse for listening to nothing but 30 year old metal and modern synthesized music with no lyrics, or lyrics in some language I don't understand. It's all stuff that blends into the background. (And there is something appropriate about driving 30 year old metal while listening to 30 year old metal)

I'm a one trick pony when it comes to languages, German is it. I've messed with Spanish, French and Italian and they don't make a damn bit of sense to me. Evidently I was even doing so with a German accent.

Folks that can make sense of Japanese, Chinese, Russian, or any other language that doesn't use our characters have my admiration. Things like that are way beyond me!

On the "business discussion" side, when I was in my 20s I was an apprentice tool maker for a little shop here in MI. We were building a prog die for (ultimately) Mercedes and were having trouble passing their quality specs.

A couple of their engineers came to our shop to look things over. The owner, thinking he was clever, had me fetched to tag along and listen in. I did, but eventually blew my cover- the two engineers were debating (in German) over who should ask where the crapper was, and (being Mr. Helpful) I said in English "it's right over there". They didn't speak another word in German and left very shortly after that. They were not impressed.

Naturally my boss wanted to know what they said. Basically they were trying to figure out why our parts looked like E36 M3, and why we were being paid when our die was not making the parts they wanted- in so many words. I think I said something like "they were concerned about the final surface finish." And I never did that again.

Knurled wrote:

paranoid_android74 wrote: For example, you can learn a phrase like "Wo ist das Klo?", or "where is the bathroom." On the tapes (I tried) you may get two different answers at the most to that question. Now if the person you ask in person answers with one of those two phrases you are set. For argument's sake, let's say the tape teaches you "it's on the left" and "it's on the right" in German. What if the person you ask answers with "take the stairs to the second floor, follow the hall to the right and it's the second door on the left"? A tape can't really teach you that. Ok, so in reality you could just say "Danke!" and follow the signs, but that's not the point.

From what everyone I know who's visited Germany in the past ten years has told me, they will hear your atrocious accent and reply to you in near impeccable English.

That's what I've heard too, hard to practice German on Germans because they all want to practice their English on you. Though I think this applies a little less with older people and a lot of what used to be East Germany.