After spending last November in Vienna I was reminded of my
lifelong desire to learn and speak another language other than English and, of course....Lesia-speak. And German won’t do it
either. That language is already taken
by my honey and Clair. I don’t need to
speak that one. I want one all my very
own. Well, at least in the Flynn household. I know, I know. I’m feeling a little Fancy
Nancy on this one. And I know she shares
her vocabulary, but I don’t want to share mine.
I want to be five years old for a little while.
Just let it go, okay.
A few years back I gave the effort my all……towards an accent
at least. That was when I was directing
a Renaissance Faire at my library.
Sadly, the best of my efforts toward a Scottish brogue came out as the
most deplorable cockney accent you’ve ever heard. No, really.
The patrons begged me to stop.
The volunteers and staff threatened me.
The Storytimers were completely confused and baffled. My own children
almost disowned me. So I had no choice but to stop. Until now, that is. Tehehe.
Today as I was skipping down Pinterest Lane in my little pink-and-oh-so-shiny maryjanes (hypothetically
speaking, of course!) and I happened across the pin for scheduling out the
perfect child-ordered summer. Yessss! THAT got my attention! Because I don’t care how old or young my kids
are, summertime scares the hell out of me unless I have a plan. A real, tangible, working plan, that is. None of this we’ll-make-it-up-as-we-go. No, no, no!
Not for me, anyway. Plan. Assemble.
Attack. That’s my method.
So anyway, back to fairyland where Pinterest Lane delivers me this plan. So I peruse the ideas of this magical plan with
readiness and excitement. And there, in
the midst of all that motherhood investigation, is the beautiful gem of
languages trimmed with the words “Free” and “Online”! Okay. I
was skeptical and said inside my head….”Yea?
Let’s just see how friendly you are to my summertime plans, for realzy!”
And off I went to participate in the first lesson of Coffee Break French at Radio Lingua
Network at http://radiolingua.com/cbf-step-1/# And what should greet me there but a wonderful masculine Scottish brogue to
teach me the nuances of that other language, francais! Ahh. My little heart pitter-patters out its
flutterby wings and stretches out into the sky.
I drift away on the musical rhythms and sounds of that voice for ……..oh. Sorry.
But then, wait! It
didn’t stop there! Because I’m the
curious librarian-type, off I went to another language lesson…….go with it here…….dahdadadahdadaDAH! You guessed it! One
minute Gaelic! Oh. My. Gawd. I was in Nirvana! Scottish Brogue Heaven where I understood
absolutely nothing… nada… and I did
not mind one tinsy little bit! Lordy! But that man can twist his tongue around an “R”!
So there you go! I
get the Scottish man with the Twisted Rs to teach me French, free and online for
the cost of a 15 minute coffee break….all summer long! And the kids?
Well, I can’t really remember what else was on that plan…..I’ll have to
go check it again after lesson two. Tehe…..
Have you ever wanted to mangle, I mean speak another language? Was
it for real or did you just like the idea of speaking another language? Or do you really just want to listen to Mr.
Scottish roll his “R”s? : D
Yes! I took Spanish in High School and LTC and I went to DLI, Defensive Language Institute, to learn Italian for 6 months. I know some German from living there 3 times, a bit of Japanese, from living there as a child too.
ReplyDeleteI'm enthralled by languages and their origins. I might have to take this online class. Love me some Scottish brogue. ;)
Ooh! Then we can have a French Coffee Break for realz and try out our newfound words! And yes, you can have tea, s'il vous plaît. :D
DeleteI took Spanish for two years. I can understand it but can't speak it too well; too slow at it. I tried to learn Scottish Gaelic but it was too hard - Irish is a lot easier. I just don't have the ear for languages. I can mimic the accents which drives my hubby crazy. LOL
ReplyDeleteHa! I can just hear you mimic-ing away! But did you ever learn the Irish Gaelic? And what did you do with it? I'm curious....
DeleteThere's a British government website, can't remember the name, that teaches the Irish Gaelic through pictures. Kind of fun. No, I gave up and didn't really learn. My son did, but then he speaks Japanese fluently, Spanish fluently, Italian, French and some German. I just don't have the ear for it.
DeleteThat DOES sound fun! I'll go look for it, for sure.
DeleteFunny the things we try that our kids pick up and run with, huh! For some reason, my kids didn't take up the Fancy Nancy inclination. That, or they're both still in denial. Tehehe...I wonder what will happen when realization dawns! :D
Lesia, I always thought it would be romantic to speak another language. I always intended to learn another language. I studied French for a while, certain that was going to be my language. But it was hard, and after a year of it in high school, I moved on to Spanish in college. But since I only had to take one class of it, I didn't really learn much. I spent one summer in Germany and tried to study German. But lo and behold, it was hard too! Then I spent some time studying Russian and actually went to Ukraine and studied under a real language tutor for a while, in Ukraine, but alas, Russian was hard too!!! REALLY REALLY HARD! I admit, I got lazy and stopped going to class. There were enough English speakers in Ukraine and a lot of them became my friends, and I learned enough of the basics to get by. So I never learned Russian either.
ReplyDeleteThe idea of learning a foreign language always appealed to me, but it's not easy and I turned out to be pretty lazy when it comes to learning a language. To this day the only Russian sentence I remember is "Oohadiche villi ya vizivoo mileetsia." When means, "Go away or I will call the police." My friends taught me to say that after a scary man came to my door in the middle of the night and kept ringing the doorbell. :-)
That should be illi, not villi. Not that any of you would know. LOL!!!
ReplyDeleteHahaha! Oh my gosh, Melanie! That's a lot of persistence! And i have to admit, I'm probably language lazy too. But I'll give it another go, just for fun...well....and getting to listen to the broguy-man! :D
ReplyDeleteAnd that should be I, not i. :(
DeleteComing out from under my rock! I took French in high school and can't remember a darn word! Rock...stone age (high school)..well, there's a connection! lol I would love to try it again someday. It just sounds so romantic! :-D
ReplyDeleteSherry, you should go check out that website. It's easy-peasy! And just long enough to grab a hold of a few usable words and wish the brogey-man would stay for another cup of coffee! lol
DeleteAnd you're right...French sounds so romantic. But what about Italian....oooh! I wonder if the brogey-man speaks Italian? :D