What Are Your Experiences With Language Issues

[peejay 327]

I hate to burst your bubble, but you're trying WAY TOO HARD to learn Russian. The fact of the matter is, you're trying to be fluent in her language so you can have a better relationship and understanding and all the selfless things people do for someone they love. That's great! But, reality is, once she's here, you're going to use Russian about a fifth of the time, and then less and less after that. The only time you're going to use it is when you talk about Russian stuff, practice Russian together, talk about her family or try to really understand something that you guys need to work out. The rest of the time, she's going to be forced to use English, and that's only going to get more and more frequent the longer she stays here. So, learn what you can, but you're never really going to "need" Russian the way you're setting yourself up to use it.

How true! My grandparents immigrated to the USA from Byelorussia and I have been around people speaking the Russian language since I was in diapers, but I never became fluent. I know a lot of Russian words (mostly nouns) and phrases that I have picked up from my grandparents, mom, aunts, and other sources, but living in America since birth I never really had any incentive to become fluent in the Russian language (or any other language except English).

My Russian wife was an English teacher in Belarus and she was already quite fluent in English before we even met and married, so I have never really had any incentive to further my proficiency in Russian (and my Russian proficiency is poor).

My wife berates me constantly that I should learn at least one new Russian word every week, but I can't even manage that. I learn what I learn and do what I can. I'm 51 years old and I tell her, "You can't teach an old dawg new tricks!" However, with the few Russian words I do know, I often throw them into my sentences when I speak to her in English. It's a new language...I call it Russlish or Englissian. Sadly, it is more English than Russian. It is English with a little Russian sprinkled in and I've been speaking it since I was a little kid talking to my Byelorussian grandparents.

My advice to KGSodie...learn the Cyrillic alphabet to the point that you can read Russian words. Learn as many nouns as you can and sprinkle them into your English sentences and as time goes on you may attain some sort of proficiency level in the Russian language. Don't beat yourself up over it. Do what you can do. However, living in America it is much more of a necessity for your wife to learn English than it is for you to learn Russian.

Edited July 26, 2007 by peejay

[KGSodie 0]

I hate to burst your bubble, but you're trying WAY TOO HARD to learn Russian. The fact of the matter is, you're trying to be fluent in her language so you can have a better relationship and understanding and all the selfless things people do for someone they love. That's great! But, reality is, once she's here, you're going to use Russian about a fifth of the time, and then less and less after that. The only time you're going to use it is when you talk about Russian stuff, practice Russian together, talk about her family or try to really understand something that you guys need to work out. The rest of the time, she's going to be forced to use English, and that's only going to get more and more frequent the longer she stays here. So, learn what you can, but you're never really going to "need" Russian the way you're setting yourself up to use it.

How true! My grandparents immigrated to the USA from Byelorussia and I have been around people speaking the Russian language since I was in diapers, but I never became fluent. I know a lot of Russian words (mostly nouns) and phrases that I have picked up from my grandparents, mom, aunts, and other sources, but living in America since birth I never really had any incentive to become fluent in the Russian language (or any other language except English).

My Russian wife was an English teacher in Belarus and she was already quite fluent in English before we even met and married, so I have never really had any incentive to further my proficiency in Russian (and my Russian proficiency is poor).

My wife berates me constantly that I should learn at least one new Russian word every week, but I can't even manage that. I learn what I learn and do what I can. I'm 51 years old and I tell her, "You can't teach an old dawg new tricks!" However, with the few Russian words I do know, I often throw them into my sentences when I speak to her in English. It's a new language...I call it Russlish or Englissian. Sadly, it is more English than Russian. It is English with a little Russian sprinkled in and I've been speaking it since I was a little kid talking to my Byelorussian grandparents.

My advice to KGSodie...learn the Cyrillic alphabet to the point that you can read Russian words. Learn as many nouns as you can and sprinkle them into your English sentences and as time goes on you may attain some sort of proficiency level in the Russian language. Don't beat yourself up over it. Do what you can do. However, living in America it is much more of a necessity for your wife to learn English than it is for you to learn Russian.

Thanks for the personal insights, peejay! Since Natasha and I chat online in Russian now (via software translation) I always try and pronounce everything she writes. Some of the letters least common letters I still have to look up and some of the letters affect the pronunciation of other letters in ways I don't always predict correctly, but I find it helps anyway. Natasha corrects me when I'm wrong.

I think maybe I have given the wrong impression about why I wish to learn Russian and become as fluent as I can be - it is not something I need to do, it is something I wish to do. Because we will live in the USA I agree that Natasha will learn and become fluent in English, and our trips together back to Russia will only be for 2 or 3 weeks every year (or two), but who knows what the future holds? Natasha is a proud Russian and has no intention of seeking US citizenship, and after I retire there is the possibility that we will move to Russia to live. She is also giving up everything she knows to come here and be with me - her family (especially her sister - they are very close), her friends, her COUNTRY, her entire way of life. You could argue that life in the USA is better but it is not something I would state categorically. Life in the USA is different than life in Russia, and I wouldn't go any further than that. I don't want to change my Natasha, I want our lives to be joined. Part of that joining, for me, is to learn to speak Natasha's native language.

Keep the stories coming, though, I enjoy reading them very much, from everyone!

Kevin

[groovlstk 0]

Natasha may take English classes (something like ESL) and she may not - she has taken classes before and she believes that simply being here and immersed in English (and with me as her guide) will be all she requires. We will play this by ear and see how it goes.

Just my two bits, but you ought to urge your fiancee to begin taking English lessons NOW, not after she arrives.

As a single mom, she's probably accustomed to doing things on her own and has a strong sense of independence. Unless she's experienced long stretches of life outside Russia away from her native language, then she has no idea how isolated she'll feel when she arrives here. She'll be dependent upon you for everything, and as odd as it sounds this will sometimes lead to resentment, no matter how good a partner and provider you are.

There will be big, big hurdles for you both when she arrives, believe me the more that you can remove now the easier her transition (and yours) will be!

Good luck

[KGSodie 0]

Natasha may take English classes (something like ESL) and she may not - she has taken classes before and she believes that simply being here and immersed in English (and with me as her guide) will be all she requires. We will play this by ear and see how it goes.

Just my two bits, but you ought to urge your fiancee to begin taking English lessons NOW, not after she arrives.

As a single mom, she's probably accustomed to doing things on her own and has a strong sense of independence. Unless she's experienced long stretches of life outside Russia away from her native language, then she has no idea how isolated she'll feel when she arrives here. She'll be dependent upon you for everything, and as odd as it sounds this will sometimes lead to resentment, no matter how good a partner and provider you are.

There will be big, big hurdles for you both when she arrives, believe me the more that you can remove now the easier her transition (and yours) will be!

Good luck

I appreciate your comments, groovlstk, and I have suggested to Natasha that she take some English classes now, and offered to pay for them of course, but she has resisted so far. She spent 6 weeks in the USA last year, and her experience was that she learned far more in those 6 weeks about speaking English than she had in the English class. She actually speaks English very well (although she believes that she does not) even if her vocabulary might still be somewhat limited. It's understanding English when it is spoken to her that she still struggles with.

She reads this thread so she will find all of the comments and she will weigh them against her own experiences, and then she will do what she thinks is best, of course!

Kevin

[slim 1,530]

Declensions. This is a key point in Russian. The ending of a noun will change depending on what it is in a sentence. This is why you say "Мне нравится книга" or "Я люблю книгу." Мне and Я are the same word. Книга and книгу are also the same word. "Книга нравится мне" - does NOT mean the book likes me. These details are critically important to even basic understanding of Russian speech.

Case endings are useless if you don't know what the words mean. Situational usage and context clues are always going to tell you if the man bites the dog or the dog bites the man. Sure, once you know the endings it's a lot easier to tell which one did which, but, when you're first attempting to grasp a new language better to understand and recognize root words that you'll encounter than being able to identify which case or tense they're in.

My current nemesis is the word for 'bicycle'. My pronunciation of this word reminds me very much of Rob Schneider's attempted pronunciation of 'hippopotamus' in the movie 'Big Daddy'.

How many times are you going to need to say "velosipyed" to your fiancee? This isn't going to be a "normal" word that comes up in every day conversation. If you can't get it perfectly... SO WHAT??? Skip it, move on to the next one. (You'll never forget this word now because it's your nemesis. Til the day you die, you'll be able to recognize that funny Russian word for bike.) When you guys are talking about modes of transportation somewhere down the road (no pun intended) and you can't pronounce bike correctly, it'll be the one that pops up between a "masheena" and "gulat". (If you're from a town with no public trans. In the case where you have public trans, it may pop up between "gulat" and "avtobus" or a related public trans system.) Point is, you'll be able to tell what that funny sounding word is from the context of your conversation and the "missing" thing you don't know how to say.

she has no idea how isolated she'll feel when she arrives here. She'll be dependent upon you for everything, and as odd as it sounds this will sometimes lead to resentment, no matter how good a partner and provider you are.

There will be big, big hurdles for you both when she arrives, believe me the more that you can remove now the easier her transition (and yours) will be!

Good luck

This is spot-on! The single biggest mistake I made in my VJ was not having something for my wife to do when she got here. We (neither one of us) had anything "lined up" prior to her departure or after her arrival. She's just now (9 months after arrival) starting to get a "life of her own."

Concentrate on learning Russian language, but also concentrate on getting something for her to do that will smooth the transition. Great point groovlstk!

[russ 1]

Case endings are useless if you don't know what the words mean. Situational usage and context clues are always going to tell you if the man bites the dog or the dog bites the man. Sure, once you know the endings it's a lot easier to tell which one did which, but, when you're first attempting to grasp a new language better to understand and recognize root words that you'll encounter than being able to identify which case or tense they're in.

Well, you are never going to understand much at all just knowing nouns. I would argue that memorizing nouns is a waste of time, you will learn them anyway from reading and context. You can get by pointing at what you want. Studying dialogs is a good way to learn, but since Pimsleur does treat the grammar fully, it is better as a review. The textbook I used, Голоса, was good at having dialogs, along with questions to be answered in Russian about them.

If you are going to be putting in the time to learn, you might as well actually learn it instead of taking shortcuts. 2,000 hours is about enough time to speak Russian credibly.

How many times are you going to need to say "velosipyed" to your fiancee? This isn't going to be a "normal" word that comes up in every day conversation. If you can't get it perfectly... SO WHAT??? Skip it, move on to the next one.

If you like bicycling, it is pretty useful. I just said Я буду купить велосипед. Mine was stolen this year. Very different from saying ездить на велосипеде.

Russian verbs of motion have a lot of nuance. Going one way/round trip/by car/by foot changes the verb entirely. I still struggle with this. Taking a walking is not the same as walking to the store.

[KGSodie 0]

We have many activities planned to do together. During the school year, in addition to my regular full-time paying job, I also teach high school math. Natasha (and Vika) have expressed a desire to come to class with me and can amuse themselves on my laptop when class is too boring, and she also wishes to accompany me to my work. I have a very lax environment here so that is no problem. They are welcome to amuse themselves and hang out here all they like. Plenty of computers handy to keep them occupied, and watch movies on or whatever. Lunch together everyday! I like it! We will also learn the bus system together right away, and walk to the nearby stores together, so that she can have a degree of independence immediately.

Any other suggestions along this line would be greatly appreciated!

[slim 1,530]

If you are going to be putting in the time to learn, you might as well actually learn it instead of taking shortcuts. 2,000 hours is about enough time to speak Russian credibly.

If he is going to pick up his fiancee in about 7 months, 10 hours a day studying should get him speaking credible Russian by the time he gets there.

Russian verbs of motion have a lot of nuance. Going one way/round trip/by car/by foot changes the verb entirely. I still struggle with this. Taking a walking is not the same as walking to the store.

No, it's not. But, taking a walking "na magazine" is going to be understood as "I'm fixin to go to the store on foot."

I totally agree with you, Russ, that taking the time to learn the language correctly is important to do. The OP simply does not have the time to do this before he goes, and in reality, most folks here on VJ will never need Russian the way we hope to use it. "I'm engaged to this smokin-hot Russian chick. I'm going to get fluent in Russian, that way I can always talk to her and really understand her and talk to her friends and family and whenever we go to Russia I'll be able to understand everyone and converse with them about everything. It'll be awesome. I'm going to study really hard and eventually I'm going to be pretty fluent because I love my old lady, and she's that important to me."

We all start with the best intentions, but aside from going to Russia once every three years or something like that, maybe we need to know if her mom is calling for her or if she's pi$$ed off at us, or if she likes to hear us say certain things in her language. Maybe we want to know what she's talking to her friends about, and most importantly.... what's she saying about me???

Truth is, our OP has a short few months and he wants to learn the most Russian he can. The most effective way to do that is to practice everyday words and phrases and varations on those. 7 months is a long time, but not when you're here and she's there, and nobody else you know speaks Russian to you.

I will agree since our OP is an adult, he can concentrate on grammar and correct usages a little more than just studying vocabulary words. However, I believe he'd be better off in his 7 months disreagarding "correctness" and boning-up on as much vocabulary (verbs, nouns, adverbs, adjectives, and the "special" Russian words like dermo, et al) and phrases as possible and "backfilling" on grammar and correct usage. The brain can only take in and retain so much, if it's full of endings and case usages, it'll automatically divert to "which ending is correct for the dative case? Oh $#!t, I just forgot how to say toilet. I know the right ending, but I forgot the root word."

If he can memorize it all... good for him! (I know I couldn't do it all, still don't have them all down. But, I haven't really tried. I'm understood just fine using "incorrect" Russian.)

And a final tip for the OP.... you can always make yourself understood by saying a few root words (even if they're in the wrong tense or case) with a little emotion and a "BLAT!" after them. Bottom line with foreign language, everyone knows you're a foreigner, so don't sweat trying to be perfect in their language. You're already taking the time to learn what you can, and that will be good enough. (They were laughing at the "pronunciation game." If you're even remotely close to pronouncing it right, outside the game, they'll understand.) Have fun, and use it as much as you can. "Think" in Russian at your job and on the street, etc. If someone asks you a question, respond (in your head) in Russian first, then in English. Evenetually, you'll get it. GOOD LUCK!!!

[russ 1]

If he is going to pick up his fiancee in about 7 months, 10 hours a day studying should get him speaking credible Russian by the time he gets there.

10 hours a day is about right, with at least 2 of those in class or with a tutor. The basics of grammar can be learned in about 3 months though.

If he can memorize it all... good for him! (I know I couldn't do it all, still don't have them all down. But, I haven't really tried. I'm understood just fine using "incorrect" Russian.)

The critical part is getting the sounds right with case endings. You don't need to know how to spell the ending correctly, just knowing that you want an "AH" or "OO" souding ending is good enough.

KGSodie - did you have a chance to look at the link to the Princeton lessons I posted? What do you think?

[KGSodie 0]

Russ - I did look at the Princeton course, which is to say I have located it, but I'm still working on code to download everything so I don't have to save each file individually. Thanks again!

Slim - I appreciate all of your comments, but I think I'll have to politely disagree with many of your assessments and conclusions. Nothing personal - I just don't see things the same way that you do!

Thanks again, everyone!

[dmhweb 0]

Russ - I did look at the Princeton course, which is to say I have located it, but I'm still working on code to download everything so I don't have to save each file individually. Thanks again!

...

Thanks again, everyone!

Try Backstreet Browser...

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Cheers!

[russ 1]

Russ - I did look at the Princeton course, which is to say I have located it, but I'm still working on code to download everything so I don't have to save each file individually. Thanks again!

a Perl mirror script (for mirroring websites) is what I used.

wget will also do this. Google for it, or if you use a Mac or Linux, you already have it. I figured there must be a Windows port, and of course, there is: http://users.ugent.be/~bpuype/wget/

[Danno 1,228]

I send a big welcome to the OP too and thanks for an interesting topic.

I wish I had one tenth his motivation to learn, to be honest most of my motivation came when I was "looking" ... now that I have found her I can see where it will be of little importance down the road.

Don't get me wrong, I still have a list of new words on my desk all the time I glance at to help me recall them and in conversations I take notes too.

Before, in conversation we would speak mostly in Russian (as limited as mine is) now we are 75% english.

I would agree with others who believe The lady would benefit the most from all this energy to learn a new language. My Fiance goes to lessons at least twice a week and we work on her home-work in every conversation.

At first she wanted to wait until she got here to learn but I explained for a number of reasons she would really be at an advantage to start right away.

1. It would have to be easier to learn to speak English (especially in the beginning) from someone who can explain it in her language. I think most ESL classes are taught by someone who might not even speak Russian.

2. Where I live, there is no public trans, it might be difficult to get to and from ESL until she can drive.

3. While I have heard of some very cheap or free classes in USA... to hire a tutor in Russia is much cheaper than to hire one here.

4. I think the OP is dedicated enough to languages where he might be able to actually teach the new wife "principles of the language" in most cases just picking up from conversation at home could start bad speak habits.

From all reports I have heard.... the kids will learn lightning fast , no need to worry there.

As for me, I only want to speak enough Russian to make my point known, I am not interested in learning all the variants to words, if I were to live in Russia, it would be a different goal for me.

I agree we all have different methods we respond to best, as for me if I listen to Pimsluer while driving, I can absorb it ten times faster than if I try to do it at the house, I just get distracted to quickly.

It sounds like the OP girl already knows a little english, it might be helpful for her to get a good book and them two work on her lessons over the phone. I call St. pet for about 2 cents a minute.

This would help both with her learning more and with "hearing" english spoken better.

One thing we did to help both of us... I would speak russian and she would try to speak english, then we would correct each other.

As I side note; when I returned from my first visit, I recorded her and I speaking on the phone for about an hour. I thought it might be interesting to listen back to it some day after she is speaking fluent.

Good luck,

Danny

[slim 1,530]

Slim - I appreciate all of your comments, but I think I'll have to politely disagree with many of your assessments and conclusions. Nothing personal - I just don't see things the same way that you do!

And that's cool, because you don't have to. You're situation is unique to you, and you better know what you need than I do. I presented what worked for me, and it may not be what works for you. Hopefully it will help someone here on VJ! Good luck with your method, however you choose. And please, let us know how it works out for you! Who knows, maybe it will even work for me!

And with this... I bow out.

[Jason-Sasha 1]

I often try to think in Russian, just for practice. reading russian written books is a good way to learn the pronunciation, though i can only understand about 50% of it. While I'm walking my dog, I try to title everything I see with its Russian form. I think I'm just goofy like that.