Bye John, have a great holiday!
Enjoy your holiday John.
Funny.
Russian used to be quite popular before the events of '89; many people studied it, full-time at the university, or at night, for a hobby, and they had hardly any opportunity to talk russian to native speakers since there were no (or very few) russian immigrants. Today there are multitudes of immigrants from Russia, Ukraïne, Belarus etc. but nobody is interested in studying Russian. Those who studied it, and used to teach it, were forced to find another job or vocation.
But still I think few people in the west knew any Russian even in the 80s
Maybe it was popular among those who were interested in languages, but the average person on the street hardly knew any Russian I’m sure
And when Russian speaking people now come to Europe maybe they even prefer to communicate in English, German etc ?
The internet these days has also further established the English language as the premier world language
All this is both good and bad I guess
@ Alk0
How about Polish, is it related in any way to Russian even though you use the normal alphabet?
I think to many people the Slavic languages sound a bit similar
[quote=“Lindberg, post:44, topic:1879”]But still I think few people in the west knew any Russian even in the 80s
Maybe it was popular among those who were interested in languages, but the average person on the street hardly knew any Russian I’m sure
And when Russian speaking people now come to Europe maybe they even prefer to communicate in English, German etc ?
The internet these days has also further established the English language as the premier world language
All this is both good and bad I guess[/quote]
Of course all true.
Russian was popular among multi-linguists, but the number of students studying russian at the university was significantly higher in the 80s than today.
Languages that have become more popular (I’m talking about Belgium & Holland) during the last few decades, are Arabic, Chinese and Spanish (at the cost of French and German).
Languages that have become less popular are Russian, French (more so in Holland), German (both in Holland and Belgium) and the classic languages, Greek & Latin.
Oh, you will John…you will!
On a ‘better late than…’ note. Welcome back Sherp!.
Have a great holiday John !
[quote=“Lindberg, post:45, topic:1879”]@ Alk0
How about Polish, is it related in any way to Russian even though you use the normal alphabet?
I think to many people the Slavic languages sound a bit similar[/quote]
From what i know both languages influenced each other in the past. There’re some phrases that i can understand, but most of the time i can’t understand anything that’s being said in Russian, so the similarity is not that big. Polish is very similar to Czech. Except for some occasional words that have different meanings [and from what i know it can get you into trouble sometimes], you can pretty much understand everything if you know Polish - most of the words sound similar.
OK then, guys. I’m about to pack my bags to leave to Italy tomorrow morning, very early…
Unfortunately I’m leaving without sherps extensive essay. :-\
I hope you all can manage the whole thing without me. 
Bye 
Bye, enjoy your vacation in the Spaghetti land itself!
We will try are best 
.
Have a great time, Dillinger.
Don’t shoot any Italians, Dillinger
I have returned from holiday in Hawaii. It was amazing - perfect weather, the snorkeling was great, and the people were friendly. I am a little under the weather - just worn out I think - trying to get accustomed back to NJ time which is 6 hours different from Hawaii. I’ll post some pics from the trip shortly and I am glad to be back and hope everyone is doing well and hope Sherp is feeling better.
Welcome back. From Hawaii to Jersey. Not to much of a change of atmosphere there, is it? You know where to ‘post’ those picks, don’t you? Good to have you back FT! I told you things were looking up.
Thanks Idiot. The good side to the heat in Hawaii was the low humidity and the cool trade winds. Unlike NJ which has suffocation humidity and warm breezes off the landfills.
But you missed ‘Bob’. So, as some of you might have heard, Hurricane ‘Bob’ stormed his way up the East Coast. Rip tide warnings (which unfortunately cost a man his life) 15-20 foot waves & unpredictable weather. So what did I do…? Went to the beach a went in the water. By Sunday the surf was so bad, they were not letting people in the water. These pics do not do it justice.
I know what your thinking. This guy is an Idiot! On Saturday the water was rough but not as bad as Sunday. They were letting people in although it was hairy. Sunday (day of the pics) I would not have gone in if they let me. Largest waves I’ve ever seen!
We had our own hurricane to deal with in the Pacific but thankfully it downgraded rapidly even before it hit the big island. We had some heavy clouds and some rain on Maui for part of one day but other than that it was nothing to worry about.