Earth's many languages... Many!

[knightkrawler]

Ever heard Indians (not native Americans, but Indians from India) speak English?

Yes, dat sounds orful widiculess sometimes! Wid a dash of cuwwy.
I had a co-worker from Sri Lanka for ten years. Great guy.
But the Indian Pidgin English is really that... pidgin. Incomprehensible.

[IvenBach]

Pretty much like this?


I would have to say some of the funniest Spanish accents I heard were while I was in Costa Rica hearing the asian store owners talking in broken Spanish. I didn't think I'd heard bad Spanish accents up till that point. Nothing has touched it since. Well maybe Cuban accents

I didn't want to pick directly on foreigners speaking English... Tasteless link. You've been warned

[Ragner]

Heard the talking Englishman and an American. As to the ear, then I think that the English classic gentler and more American slang. If I am wrong, please correct me. / Finnish language is very similar to the Russian Karelian. / Guys in your countries and the many dialects of what you yourself can not understand what you say?

[TMU]

Yes, finnish is very similar to the russian Karelian. And that is, because Karelian use to be part of Finland.
And about dialects, I have lived all my life in Jämijärvi, so I have a little twist on my mother tongue. But, my both sides of my family are coming from Rauma, so I can speak texts in Rauma too

Use wikipedia on names if interested

[Ragner]

And where I live, multi-ethnic population, they say here in the Bashkir, Tatar Turkic group. In the area where I live a lot of Russified Germans who remained after the war and started families, so that the German speech could still hear recently (in the 90's, many went home to Germany.)
By the way in schools in the Soviet time, we must have to know or German or English. In some schools, instead of German could be studied French language.

[knightkrawler]

Don't wanna come off as self-opinionated, but of course Karelian sound very similar to Finnish.
It's because Karelian is a Finnic language as is Finnish. Some linguists even classify Karelian as a Finnish dialect.
As TMU pointed out, there's Finnish history.

[Kaiyanwang]

Rheinfränkisch, eh? You're lucky they avoid speaking it...

I live in Edenkoben and work in Offenbach on Queich, basically in the heart of the Palatine, so it's very definitely Palatine German (which is of course part of the Rheno-Franconian family). And yes, it's awful. But there are worse dialects around, both German and other.
I can understand Palatian and Berlinerisch (my mother comes from Berlin) quite well, even when it's very thick, but I can't speak any dialect to save my live.

I can manage High German, Moselfränkisch, Oberpfälzisch, and General American.

And then English, some German, a wee bit French, a few words Spanish. Just enough for having a vacation there

I speak German, English (enough to hold lectures without script), Arabic (not really, but enough to do some polite smalltalk), and read French (not very well), Latin, Dutch and Egyptian (Middle Egyptian, Late Egyptian, Demotic and Coptic).

Grüessech mitenand !

You should have some experience of Swiss German... is.. fascinating in its own way. But I guess that for Austrians or Bavarians is less alien than to people of, say, Hamburg.
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I am Italian, I work in Switzerland now. I use English regularly (I work in Research), I studied French and I have my own terrible German that I try to improve. Still, for me is generally easier to understand Germans or Austrians than Swiss german Speakers. Is true that my boss is German and not Swiss and we alternate English and Hochdeutsch..

[TMU]

Suomen kieli on yksi maailman kauneimmista kielistä!

This is Finnish?

Hmm...is he talking about a mailman here?

So yeah, it is Finnish. It means the world. Not mailman

[knightkrawler]

I am Italian, I work in Switzerland now. I use English regularly (I work in Research), I studied French and I have my own terrible German that I try to improve. Still, for me is generally easier to understand Germans or Austrians than Swiss german Speakers. Is true that my boss is German and not Swiss and we alternate English and Hochdeutsch..

Swiss German IS one of the worst varieties to understand. The consonant and vowel sounds - that is, any sound - is so different that it takes an evil amount to get used to it.

[Kaiyanwang]

I am Italian, I work in Switzerland now. I use English regularly (I work in Research), I studied French and I have my own terrible German that I try to improve. Still, for me is generally easier to understand Germans or Austrians than Swiss german Speakers. Is true that my boss is German and not Swiss and we alternate English and Hochdeutsch..

Swiss German IS one of the worst varieties to understand. The consonant and vowel sounds - that is, any sound - is so different that it takes an evil amount to get used to it.

Yep, I still find Austrians or Germans newcomers that struggle. Or other foreigners from Netherlands or France but with a good experience with German.

And the bernese variety.. e becoming ä, l becomin a sort of "u" (schnell --> "schnäu")