Farin Posted January 19, 2008 Report Share Posted January 19, 2008 Hi everyone! my name is Tammy and i live in sunny South Africa! at the moment i am living in a suburb of Johannesburg but i will soon(as in tomorrow) be moving to Pretoria as i am going to university there! okay. when i look outside my window... sorry to disappoint but i live on a main road opposite a fire station and next door to a KFC. no wild animals in sight. we have a holiday house in Vumelane which is near Kruger National Park and we see wild animals there but otherwise not so much. as for education, im not the best person to ask because my school did the Cambridge system so i have just written my AS and A levels on a british syllabus. Im sure wikipedia has some frightening statistics on literacy and education here because it is frightening. feel free to ask any other questions you may have about my country! hey TammyJane Welcome to Songfacts Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Earth-Angel Posted January 19, 2008 Report Share Posted January 19, 2008 Hi everyone! my name is Tammy and i live in sunny South Africa! at the moment i am living in a suburb of Johannesburg but i will soon(as in tomorrow) be moving to Pretoria as i am going to university there! okay. when i look outside my window... sorry to disappoint but i live on a main road opposite a fire station and next door to a KFC. no wild animals in sight. we have a holiday house in Vumelane which is near Kruger National Park and we see wild animals there but otherwise not so much. as for education, im not the best person to ask because my school did the Cambridge system so i have just written my AS and A levels on a british syllabus. Im sure wikipedia has some frightening statistics on literacy and education here because it is frightening. feel free to ask any other questions you may have about my country! Welcome to Songfacts TammyJane I'm also a born and bred South African, been in the UK for 5 years. I don't think anyone really thinks we ride giraffes to school and have a crocodile in the swimming pool, but the illiteracy and corruption are shocking. What are you studying? Good luck with the move! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steel2Velvet Posted January 19, 2008 Report Share Posted January 19, 2008 Hi, TammyJane. Welcome to the Songfacts family* * declared "not a cult" in five U.S. states and eight international countires - determinations pending in other locations Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super Ry 71 Posted January 19, 2008 Report Share Posted January 19, 2008 (edited) Yes, Farin is right... you should have told us... instead of posting a weird funeral cake as your avatar I even asked you if it was your b-d but I got no answer... I did answer your question: you just weren't cryptic enough to figure out its meaning. EDIT: Oh, and a 'howdy' to Tammy. Edited January 19, 2008 by Guest Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarcM Posted January 19, 2008 Report Share Posted January 19, 2008 Welcome Tammy Jane! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edna Posted January 19, 2008 Report Share Posted January 19, 2008 ... Welcome to the Songfacts family* * declared "not a cult" in five U.S. states and eight international countires - determinations pending in other locations Welcome, TammyJane... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Viaene Posted January 19, 2008 Report Share Posted January 19, 2008 Hi everyone! my name is Tammy and i live in sunny South Africa! at the moment i am living in a suburb of Johannesburg but i will soon(as in tomorrow) be moving to Pretoria as i am going to university there! okay. when i look outside my window... sorry to disappoint but i live on a main road opposite a fire station and next door to a KFC. no wild animals in sight. we have a holiday house in Vumelane which is near Kruger National Park and we see wild animals there but otherwise not so much. as for education, im not the best person to ask because my school did the Cambridge system so i have just written my AS and A levels on a british syllabus. Im sure wikipedia has some frightening statistics on literacy and education here because it is frightening. feel free to ask any other questions you may have about my country! that was..unexpected welcome to songfacts, I think we almost have all nations here now Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shawna Posted January 20, 2008 Report Share Posted January 20, 2008 I don't think anyone really thinks we ride giraffes to school and have a crocodile in the swimming pool I grew up in the foreign land of Southern California, where everyone lives next door to a movie star. Welcome, Tammy! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jenny Posted January 22, 2008 Report Share Posted January 22, 2008 Welcome to our crazy family, Tammy! It's nice to have you Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenacious_Peaches Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 I'm taking a "World and Its Peoples" class and our professor told us an interesting tidbit last night. I don't know where he got this information, but he said that 90% of all internet communication is conducted in English. However, he claims that although a great deal of non-English speaking people are fluent in writing the language, most cannot speak it. So my question to our Songfacts family members is: Are you able to speak English as well as you write it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Levis Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 I can (or so I like to believe) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edna Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 Are you able to speak English as well as you write it? SÃ, mi beloved Melocotones. Even better... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farin Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 ooh, cool class, the title alone sounds quite interesting and to tell you the truth, I'm actually not quite sure... I could probably hold my end of a conversation without too much difficulties ( ) but I simply have much more practise in writing PS I wouldn't say 90%, but it's sure over 3/4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steel2Velvet Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 Many Greco/Latin root words are very similar, therefore understood when seen in writing, however many times incomprehnsible when heard in a different dialect than one is used to hearing. While attempting to learn Portuguese, for example, I can read certain words much easier than discerning the same words during conversation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edna Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 But English is very easy, Ron. Almost everybody in the developped countries grew up with an American cultural background, almost everybody watches movies in English and listens to music in English and knows people from England, America, Australia, Canada... Portuguese is more difficult for me than English... I wish I could speak, read and talk Italian like it was English though they share Latin/Greek roots with Spanish. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farin Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 But English is very easy, Ron. Almost everybody in the developped countries grew up with an American cultural background, almost everybody watches movies in English and listens to music in English and knows people from England, America, Australia, Canada... that's mostly true... even if not everybody knows people from english speaking countries Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edna Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 Martin chéri, I said almost ... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farin Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 yes, I know I just wanted to make it clear that there are certainly more people listening to english music than those who personally know someone from there Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steel2Velvet Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 Oh yeah, television, the movies and music are probably the biggest exporters of English around the world. Here the subtitles of English speaking movies are many times less than accurate, however, occasionally adding some confusion. All animated features, such as A Bug's Life are overdubbed in Portuguese. I sideline by teaching English and am impressed how many people are interested in acquiring English skills. I think the internet popularity has a lot to do with that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rayzor Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 I actually write in english better than I can speak it, but my first language is french and I'm not very good at writing in french yet I speak it much easier than english. The internet really changed my speaking and writing instincts! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Farin Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 oh but writing french IS much harder than speaking... just because something sounds the same doesn't mean that it's written the same... how many ways are there to write the sound "o"? Bordeaux, eau, chaud, Pau...? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rayzor Posted February 1, 2008 Report Share Posted February 1, 2008 in english you can write the same thing and it makes a different sound: match, watch... read (present tense), read (past tense)... foul, soul... you get the idea. I think every language has it's pros and cons. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Levis Posted February 2, 2008 Report Share Posted February 2, 2008 I like Hindi... it doesn't have all these pretenses. You read it like it's written Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
edna Posted February 2, 2008 Report Share Posted February 2, 2008 how many ways are there to write the sound "o"? Bordeaux, eau, chaud, Pau...? If I wasn´t French I would have trouble to learn it... The sound "o" isn´t the same as "au", "eau", "ô"... you have three sounds for "e" : "e", "é" and "è" sound different... "ai" also sounds like an "è"... English is very simple, believe me... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rayzor Posted February 2, 2008 Report Share Posted February 2, 2008 I first learned english by reading english books so that probably explains why I'm better at writing it than speaking it... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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