Czech ppl friendly n welcoming?

Discussion in 'Culture' started by shreypete, Jul 14, 2007.

  1. Eleshar

    Eleshar Well-Known Member

    The problem with Finnish and Hungarian is not their general difficulty but their distance from what we experience usually. Finnis and Hungarian are not indo-european languages. English and Czech have some similarities. The reality is divided into the same notions and patterns. In other language families it might be quite different.
    The Czech is said to be more difficult than other slavic languages because of its extensive consonant and vowel shifts (mlok, pl. mloci; hluchý, pl. hluší; měkký, comp. měkčí;...).
     
  2. shreypete

    shreypete Well-Known Member

    that's actuall true, in fact after the extensive research i did on european languages, it can well be hypothesized that the only reasons why finnish, hungarian, and latvian are tough is because they dont have many relatives (of the finno-urgic family)...in reality polish and its relative languages (indo-european west slavic family) are supposed to be very tough in grammar as well as other morphological syntaxes......
     
  3. Karkulka

    Karkulka Active Member

    I am original Czech, as much as can be :lol: But thank you for the compliment. :wink:
     
  4. Karkulka

    Karkulka Active Member

    Whatever your reasons are, go ahead and keep asking :) It´s great that this forum exists and people can come and ask questions and get in touch with people all over the world.
    When I went to visit Canada in 1996, there were no such things (or if there were, I did not know). So I went right in, no preparations. It was great!
     
  5. Sova

    Sova Well-Known Member

    Shreypete, I think you are confusing Latvian with Estonian. Latvian is Indo-European, while Estonian is Finno-Ugric and closely related to Finnish.
     
  6. Karkulka

    Karkulka Active Member

    Belgians are absolutely horrible.. :roll: I am in Brussels already three years, and no matter how much my French improved by this time, I still get very rude and impolite responses, when I try to communicate in French. :evil:
    People will simply turn their back at me, if I don´t speak perfect French. They will say eeeEHH? several times and then wave me away, as if trying to get rid of a fly. They will cheat me on money, try to charge me on things they did not do, if they believe I did not understand all they said.. They will never speak slowly, if asked, neither repeat the same sentence again for me, if I did not understood. They will look at me like at some foolish beggar from Eastern Europe.. It made my really cry already several times! :(
     
  7. Sova

    Sova Well-Known Member

    Wow, Karkulka! That's just horrible! Just curious, does this happen in the Dutch-speaking side of Belgium as well?
     
  8. shreypete

    shreypete Well-Known Member

    wow Karulka i guess you faced (are i guess are facing as you are there now) exactly what i did....when i went to belgium, the same think happened to me....i mean even my cousins for godsake didnt respond properly when i tried my french....france was similar...infact worse...

    and thank you karkulka for the suppors...i did come across a guy in this forum who kind of got an impression that i'm only a guy who seems to be interested in "beer, girls, culture and food...ofcourse not that i care at all...but nevertheless thank you.... :)

    i just hope you are to cope with with the French language (i dont really like it that much...probably because the people hardly appreciate when foreigners speak their language, unless they speak it like them)....
     
  9. shreypete

    shreypete Well-Known Member

    hey Sova, yes thanks for correcting me...its actually estonian...latvian indeed is an indo-european language (got confused there....)
     
  10. Karkulka

    Karkulka Active Member

    You´ve point, Sova. No, it does not happen to me on the Dutch speaking side. For two reasons - I don´t speak Dutch, and I don´t speak French to them either, because the Dutch-speaking (or Flemish speaking) Belgians are usually very annoyed when spoken to in French :roll: They don´t like each other here in their own country! So in the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium I simply go and speak English and everything is all-right. Isn´t it crazy?
     
  11. Karkulka

    Karkulka Active Member

    Yes, French speaking Belgians and French people are known for this. However, I spoke with several people with similar experience and they all said the worst response they had in Belgium, not in France.

    No problemo 8)

    You see, I hate the French language. And it is hard to try to learn it, when at the same time you are being constantly discouraged by the locals, when using it! One would think, that they will appreciate that you try to talk to them in their language, that you are making effort. But no, it´s quite opposite!
     
  12. shreypete

    shreypete Well-Known Member

    you got that very much right!!! there's just no motivation to learn french (i mean there can be one but its really tough when nobody actually supports you or reciprocates well when you try your french on them)..... :cry:
     
  13. Petr_B

    Petr_B Well-Known Member

    My two cents about Czechs speaking with foreigners:
    I think there are two large groups among people capable of decent conversation in English (but I don't dare to guess which one is more numerous).
    1. People trying to use every possible chance to practice their English conversation skills - they use English even if the other party may be sufficiently proficient in Czech. It's common that people native in English living here complain it's hard to learn Czech when most people they speak with prefer English.
    2. People not confident in their skill so they try to avoid speaking English at any cost, in order not to feel embarrassed.

    It's also important to keep in mind that generally speaking (situation in Prague is probably a bit different) most people like me who finished their (institutional) education prior to early 1990's are not really that good at English, particularly their conversational skills are quite low (lack of ability to understand fluent spoken English tends to be the biggest issue). Back then, ability to communicate in English was not in demand - quite the opposite, learning English was just a waste of time and effort for most of us since we couldn't travel abroad or meet (English speaking) foreigners, watch (non dubbed) US movies, buy books in English, .... At that time Russian language was mandatory subject, people in high school usually had to choose between German and English for their third language. There's many people who didn't even go to high school, they graduated from training institution (učiliště), so they usually weren't taught second foreign language at all. For example in my elementary school class, only less than a half got accepted for high school (late 1980's).
    There's many jobs here in which you can get away without knowing even basic English, pretty much everything we see here on TV is dubbed etc, so there's not much incentive for them (us) to try to improve (of course same goes for other foreign languages). Based on this, I would guess that among people older than 30 years, there's less than 1/3 of people good enough at English and the number rapidly decreases with age. Does anyone have verified numbers regarding this issue?

    I've never been to France or Belgium so I don't have personal experience but I find hard to believe such things happen frequently. I would label this kind of behaviour as extremely rude. Maybe your attitude towards French language is too obvious Karkulka? To me it's even more surprising considering you're living in Brussels, which (with some exaggeration) can be said to be the capital of European Union so people there should be accustomed to meeting non natives very often resulting in more foreigner friendly approach. But on the other hand maybe the city being flooded by foreigners annoys locals and is one of the reasons for their hostility?
     
  14. shreypete

    shreypete Well-Known Member

    hey Peter_B thanks on your insight...that indeed sounds very realistic a reason for the czech not learning english (before 1990s i mean)....

    well abt the brussels question...you answered the question yourself :) (ie...the last question you made in your post)...its is very true that there are quite a few foreigners who live in Brussels bt nevertheless the french, and the flemish are just the kind of ppl who expect perfectionism in their language...becuase that's what thing they value so much..... so much that they end up being rude to the core :x .....i've faced more of this problem in franch rather than brussels...i wonder why?
     
  15. Karkulka

    Karkulka Active Member

    My attitude towards French language has nothing to do with the locals being rude. They simply are extremely impolite, what can I say. I was faced with this rudeness (pretending not to understand but not making any effort, making faces, saying eeeh?eeeh? etc.) even when I was in the role of customer (in copy shop, magazine shop, etc.). They cheated me on the money in our car service (and I just went to pick up the car, everything was set before with my husband) to the point, that my husband later went almost through the roof and went there to yell at them..
    People do stop me on the street to ask questions, and if I don´t understand immediatelly everything, but ask them to repeat it, when at the same time apologizing for my bad french, they just wave their hand, turn around and go away..
    In fact, I got used to say "sorry, I don´t speak well French, but.." as first thing, before I start to communicate with any local here! What more can you do?

    I think that exactly the fact, that Brussels is flooded with foreigners (as the whole Belgium), is the reason why the locals despise us so much. I did not ask to be here, but while I am here, I am trying to get along with people as much as I can. Only it´s really hard.

    And you are right, these rude contacts do not happen to me too often. Because I started to avoid them, rather. So it happens only if I have to go and ask people for things!
     

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