Well, after six months of language learning and twenty three years of crazy life, I give you this:
(And I didn't even throw up.)
Let it be known that I am not a public speaker, I never will be. I'll do it, but it'll probably sound that nervous every single time. Unfortunately it seems that I get a fat UHM American accent when I have to give a talk like this, one that I don't think is always there quite so strongly, but I am hoping that by the time I'm fluent enough that I don't have to think about how to say what I want to say, it'll tone down a little.
For those who don't speak Romanian, this is two minutes from a thirty minute talk I gave, this in particular part of my testimony. And though I stumbled through it, the conversations I had afterward with some of the girls remind me that he works through all the junk we bring him. Which of course is the whole point, his work, I mean. Definitely felt honored and privileged to get asked to do this.
You speak pretty good Romanian. I mean... Romanian is considered harder than German and I know hundreds of people in my company that try to learn German... and they try for years and they can't speak it... they understand it but don't speak it.
ReplyDeleteOh... and the accent american is not that strong. Actually is barely noticeable compared to other Americans that try to speak Romanian.
ReplyDeleteIt would be nice to share your learning technics ...maybe we/I can apply them to other languages too.
ReplyDeletewell thank you, that is very encouraging :) for the record, though, it is normally a little better--meaning at least i don't say UHM every five seconds and my pauses are normally 'pai...'
ReplyDeleteanyway, the best advice i can give is if there are native speakers around, spend time with them and insist on english (which, unfortunately for our reputations and fortunately for those of you learning, isn't hard to convince). that's what's helping me the most. i work with romanians, i speak with them in romanian. recently i started reading a book in romanian and that has helped too because even if i don't understand every single word, the structure/rhythm/vocabulary of it all just kind of start to soak in and make more sense.
hope that helps :)