Not fluent in any language other than English, tho I'm fairly fluent in Scots!
I have ' O' levels in French and German.
I reached intermediate level in Welsh, but that was some years ago and so I have forgotten much of it.
I took a beginners' course in Scottish Gaelic, but I only remember a few phrases.
I took one semester in Polish and only remember a few words!

Maybe you could change the poll somehow to show the first language as well. Mine is German, I speak English fluently and French not as good as I once did. 

I never come across with people who'd learn Finnish just for fun. I know no-one really needs it if they're not living in Finland but at least it'd be a real challenge. I mean Sheldon Cooper tried and it didn't sound bad. When he says "sisään" I must say it sounds perfect: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Opw6e7ItInc

I know a few words in spanish I've learned from movies of course. Hermanos, puto, cabron, gringo, vatos locos etc.

Last edited by Dramagod (October 9, 2012 6:04 pm)

Dramagod wrote:

I never come across with people who'd learn Finnish just for fun. I know no-one really needs it if they're not living in Finland but at least it'd be a real challenge. I mean Sheldon Cooper tried and it didn't sound bad. When he says "sisään" I must say it sounds perfect: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Opw6e7ItInc

I know a few words in spanish I've learned from movies of course. Hermanos, puto, cabron, gringo, vatos locos etc.

And here I am..... I still have my Finnish Grammar ( in English! Which isn't my first language either). My accent wasn't that bad (my friends always remark on how lovely I say
Yjvaskyla and how well I "roll"  the "r" in Turku).  But the grammar...... I just couldn't cope with "verbintaivutus".  I always though I was quite good at picking up languages quickly and that was quite a humbling experience, still not as bad as my failure with Navajo....

Dramagod wrote:

I never come across with people who'd learn Finnish just for fun. I know no-one really needs it if they're not living in Finland but at least it'd be a real challenge. I mean Sheldon Cooper tried and it didn't sound bad. When he says "sisään" I must say it sounds perfect: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Opw6e7ItInc

I know a few words in spanish I've learned from movies of course. Hermanos, puto, cabron, gringo, vatos locos etc.

Interesting examples you've learned.
Reminded me that I know a few swear words in Polish.

tiharoa wrote:

I just couldn't cope with "verbintaivutus".

I can imagine how hard that stuff is for someone who's language doesn't have those. We like to humble people with our demonic language.

@veecee - Well, the movies I've seen where people speak spanish haven't exactly been in the My Little Pony department. Currently I'm "learning" spanish from BREAKING BAD and DEXTER.

Last edited by Dramagod (October 9, 2012 9:00 pm)

Taught myself Japanese for about half a year. I remember a lot of common phrases and vocabulary words. I used to be able to read katakana but I haven't kept up so I lost most of it. Took French for two years in high school. Again, I just remember a few phrases and vocab words.

I'm wanting to learn German now

This doesn't really count but I'm just throwing it out there, haha.

For everyone who has English as a second language - how did you start learning and what made you want to continue learning it? I would love to know

Children, perhaps. Spanish children, didn't think about that. Maybe my spanish isn't as good as I thought it to be cause I thought only one of those is a bad word and that's the (literally) four letter word of the bunch.

Fascinating topic!  I teach English to speakers of other languages and am always interested in hearing about people's language learning experiences.  I, too, am very impressed with the level of proficiency of the non-native Egnoish speakers on this forum.

I didn't respond to the poll itself because I wonder how "fluent" is defined.  That's the professional language teacher in me.     I will say that I can communicate in Mandarin Chinese, French, Swedish, and Krio to the effect of having a social conversation in those languages.  I can barely read and write Chinese and it's the hardest language I've ever studied but it's the one I currently want to become more proficient in; I spent three and a half years in China teaching and am hoping to eventually go back to study the language.  French was my first foreign language and I took that in school for several years, then studied it in Quebec for a summer.  Swedish I was fluent in as a result of spending a year in high school there, but that was oh...xxx number of years ago.  Krio I learned as a Peace Corps Volunteer in West Africa; as a creole language, I found it very easy to learn. 

While in Sweden, I could understand a fair amount of Danish and Norwegian, and even a little German.  I studied Italian for a year in high school in the US and was always getting it confused with French.  I studied Russian in college for the equivalent of two years but now only remember a few words and phrases.  I had to go to Hebrew school as a kid and what little I learned, I've pretty much forgotten.  I tried to teach myself Old Icelandic my first year in college but gave up for lack of time.  I learned enough Bahasa Indonesia from working in Borneo for a year to communicate socially but I've forgotten it now.  I've learned some Spanish because most of my students are native Spanish speakers and it helps when I need to communicate with their parents (I teach children nowadays). 

I would love to learn Ladino as well as Hungarian.  My grandmother emigrated to the US from Austria-Hungary and taught me to count to ten in Hungarian and to say "yes" and "no."  I can count to three in Finnish and to ten in Japanese!  I know a few other words in Japanese because my family hosted an exchange student from that country for a year.

I love languages!   

(And if you made it this far, I'm guessing you do, too!)