Out of curiousity

[Che -Guevara]

Dutch sounds like Germany's 'special' cousin.

[Ms MoOns]

OdaySomali;896379 wrote:

Gefeliciteerd Ms MoOns. En trouwens jouw Engels is erg goed voor iemand die hier alleen maar twee jaar is. Goed gedaan.

Dank je wel! Haha, in Nederland leer je Engels als een verplichte vak vanaf de middelbare school toch. Daar heb ik heel wat van opgestoken, plus had een persoonlijke ambitie voor de Engelse taal

 

You're not too bad yourself haha. H0e lang ben jij weg uit Nederland?

[Ms MoOns]

Apophis;896382 wrote:

A question for Dutch speakers: how do you maintain a hold of the language after leaving the country? Do you practice? I ask because I used to be very fluent in Swahili but I have totally forgotten it because I never had the chance to us it in the UK.

That's a very good question. Practice does make perfect. However, I haven't been away that long from Holland, so it's too soon for me to forget it that easily. I still speak Dutch with my siblings, my husband and email almost daily with close Dutch friends. I guess because of my regular use it's harder to forget lol - I must say though, it depends on age as well. Children tend to forget a language easier ones they stop using it. My little brother was 7 when we came to the UK, didn't know a word English and now he speaks English more fluently than Dutch. While older people tend hold on to a language a longer period of time, even without regular use.

[Marksman]

@ Che-Guevara. A German friend of mine said Dutch sounds like German but retarded. I will never forget that. Haha.

[OdaySomali]

Ik ben het met je eens Chimera, er is geen beter land om in op te groeien dan Nederland. De buurt en dorp waar we woonden had een "New Urbanism" ontwerp en ik denk dat vooral dat het een prettige plaats om te wonen maakte.

 

Maar de Britten zijn meer gezellig denk ik, en ook meer 'open-minded'.

[OdaySomali]

Ms MoOns;896384 wrote:

Dank je wel! Haha, in Nederland leer je Engels als een verplichte vak vanaf de middelbare school toch. Daar heb ik heel wat van opgestoken, plus had een persoonlijke ambitie voor de Engelse taal

 

You're not too bad yourself haha. H0e lang ben jij weg uit Nederland?

Één van de goede kanten van het Nederlandse school-systeem is dat talen verplicht zijn. Maar middlebare school had ik nooit in Nederland meegemaakt.

 

Ik ben al bijna 10 jaar uit Nederland... en als mijn rekenen goed is dan zou dat zijn geweest rondom de tijd wanner jij middlebare school begon haha. Ik geloof bijna zelf niet eens ho'e lang geleden het nu is.

 

Dus welke opleiding route nam jij op school... Gymnasium, Havo of VMBO. Of is dat nu alemaal veranderd?

[OdaySomali]

Apophis;896382 wrote:

A question for Dutch speakers: how do you maintain a hold of the language after leaving the country? Do you practice? I ask because I used to be very fluent in Swahili but I have totally forgotten it because I never had the chance to us it in the UK.

In my experience whether you retain your fluency in the language depends on how often (or not) you use it, but also how fluent you were in the language in the first place. I was an avid reader in Dutch which meant I had an extensive vocabulary which I suppose makes it harder to forget.

 

How young were you when you came to the UK?

[OdaySomali]

Apophis;896399 wrote:

I was 13.

13 yr old from Africa is a grown man.You've got no excuse then If you spent a week there It'd probably come back to you though.

[5]

Dutch sounds really weird.

 

I go back and forth Europe-US a lot and noticed that everytime I'm in the US I somehow seem to have an American accent, but then as soon as I'm in the UK and hear the Brits talk, my accent becomes Brehtesh. It's doubly especially weird because I didn't even grow up in either of these two countries.

 

 

 

My first language is of course Somali and second is some obscure euro lingo. When I lived in the UK full-time, I'd sometimes call my sister and ask stuff like see lagu dhahaa 'curtains' in our euro lingo or some other words that had slipped through my mind, and write them down so I wouldn't forget again.

This is also one of the reason why I'd want to marry a Somali haduu ilaahey idmo, he'd speak Somali to the kids but I'd teach them my little obscure euro language and we could speak our little secret lingo that nobody else understood mwahaha

[5]

[Chimera]

5, never heard of the country "Obscure Euro", but I'll bet its located somewhere in Vikingland.

 

Don't worry about potential stalkers, they have taken possession of Alpha Blondy's passport at the Hargeisa airport, he's not going anywhere.

[Chimera]

OdaySomali;896393 wrote:

Ik ben het met je eens Chimera, er is geen beter land om in op te groeien dan Nederland. De buurt en dorp waar we woonden had een "New Urbanism" ontwerp en ik denk dat vooral dat het een prettige plaats om te wonen maakte.

 

Maar de Britten zijn meer gezellig denk ik, en ook meer 'open-minded'.

Which is sad because around 10-15 years ago the Dutch were even more openminded and welcoming than any other place in Europe . I think the immigrants played a big role in that change, because the immigrant communities in the UK are very British, while I remember in my youth the disdain for anything Dutch coming from the Turks, Moroccans and yes, Somalis. Mix that with the Islamophobia and you have recipe for xenophobia and the rise of right wing nutcases.

[Ms MoOns]

OdaySomali;896395 wrote:

Één van de goede kanten van het Nederlandse school-systeem is dat talen verplicht zijn. Maar middlebare school had ik nooit in Nederland meegemaakt.

 

Ik ben al bijna 10 jaar uit Nederland... en als mijn rekenen goed is dan zou dat zijn geweest rondom de tijd wanner jij middlebare school begon haha.

Ik geloof bijna zelf niet eens ho'e lang geleden het nu is.

 

Dus welke opleiding route nam jij op school... Gymnasium, Havo of VMBO. Of is dat nu alemaal veranderd?

Haha, nee dat is niet veranderd. Ik heb 6 jaar VWO (gymnasium equivalent) gedaan. Mijn middelbare school tijd was lang, haha. VMBO studenten hebben het makkelijker met hun 4 jaar, ben je zo mee klaar. Met vwo diploma op zak was ik naar UK verhuisd.

[Ms MoOns]

Marksman;896390 wrote:

@ Che-Guevara. A German friend of mine said Dutch sounds like German but retarded. I will never forget that. Haha.

LOL I strongly disagree. It's the other way round. The German language sounds more like a retarded knock-off of the Dutch language. They just sound loud and rude.

[Marksman]

True. German sounds like they're always yelling and mad.

 

@ Apophis, the Dutch and Danish don't really have a common link with each other. We don't know much about each other. The funny thing is that the Dutch usually have negative views of Germans, but other way around the Germans are very fond of the Dutch.

 

They even like some Dutch tv shows and movies. Some famous Dutch people learn German, host tv shows in Germany and are very popular in Germany.