Wow, I'm like three-fourths Irish ancestry and had not idea the Irish said 'Hola.' Welcome, newbie. I'm Praetor, an embarrassment to my heritage.
You know what, I have been posting here all week and I don't even think I introduced myself just yet. oops. Hi! you may call me Xip! In daily life I'm a student getting a bachelor degree in policy, management and technology and to pay for all that I work at a grocery store in the fresh baked goods department. My hobbies include writing (fanfiction!), cooking, science in general, horses and going on long walks. I got into Star Trek somewhere in my early teens, when my dad bought me a couple of Voyager episodes on tape. Later on I got into the Original Series and I've been hooked ever since. I particularly like TOS, VOY and ENT, but that's mainly because I haven't gotten around next gen or DS9 just yet. I love the JJverse and am really looking forward to the next movie. So hi! Nice to meet you all!
goedenavond Do you happen to post on startrek.nl as well? I lurk there most of the time - I understand Dutch well but still write it very badly. You'll find quite a few of your countrymen here. And a few fanfic writers, too. I'm so old that I saw the first run of TOS (yep, I'm ancient ) but am rather a TNG snd DS9 fan. Cooking is a cool hobby - but bad for the waistline... *sigh*
Thanks kirsten and Rhubarbodendron! ^^ I don't post at startrek.nl actually, not sure why I didn't get into that. It's cool you can read and understand Dutch, I've been told it's a difficult language to learn for non native speakers. Any particular reason why you went through the trouble of learning it? haha, having cooking as a hobby isn't necessarily bad for the waistline. I like to challenge myself to cook healthy meals.
Healthy meals can be pretty high calory, too I eat very healthy and am still 10 kg overweight. I have friends in Overijssel and in Leeuwarden It's a very nice language and I wanted to at least to know the basics like "please, thanks, happy birthday" etc. in my friends' native tongue. It's not that hard for me because Dutch is rather similar to some Northern German dialects I am familiar with (admittedly also a bit exotic for a native Bavarian ). The grammar is rather a challenge, though, and the pronounciation of the Dutch L still gives me trouble. Btw, feel free to call me rhubarb - Rhubarbodendron is quite long and complicated. It was coined in chat when I remarked that the rhododendrons were still in full bloom while there was already fresh rhubarb in the market. RJDiogenes tried to type that 3 times without typo and the result was a Rhubarbodenodrodon which had to be shortened a little to fit here as my username
Just the L? Because most non native speakers have trouble pronouncing the G or CH sound. As a matter of fact, I think the Dutch resistance used the word 'Scheveningen' as a way to identify undercover germans during WW2, but I'm not entirely sure about that. Funny though, I thought the L in Dutch and English was fairly similar. That's a fun way to get a forum name!
aww, I missed a career as the German equivalent to Mata Hari, then. I even can pronounce Schiphol correctly. Your ch is very similar to the Swiss ch. I have the impression that the Dutch L is formed a bit further back in the throat than the English one. It leans a bit towards the R, so to speak, and - like in English - you use the whole tongue to pronounce it, while the German L is formed immediately at the base of the front teeth and only with the tip of the tongue. Interesting, how a few miles can make a big difference with languages.
oh wow, I never realized you can talk this long about certain sounds in different languages! I tried and I think I pronounce the Dutch L like a little behind my front teeth, it's not as far in front as in German. (I used liebe (german) and land (Dutch) to try) Now I'm thinking though I don't pronounce the English L right, because I do the same thing with my tongue pronouncing an English L. Oh well, this is fun! And talking about how a few miles can make a huge difference, even in the Netherlands we have like a whole bunch of dialects and accents. I speak ABN (Algemeen beschaafd nederlands, the proper Dutch) because my parents are originally from the area where that's spoken the most. I never picked up the dialect from my home town for some reason. I particularly like the accents from Amsterdam and the Hague. Their fun, but down south they pronounce the g and ch sound different, a soft g they call it. It doesn't make the scratchy sound, it's kinda like the German G. I always smile at the accents up north, especially older people from Groningen, they put 'yes' at the end of every sentence and speak a lot slower. ^^
That comes from playing (and occasionally singing) in a Irish Folk band for years If I ever get to Ireland I'll bring my favourite recorder: I'm told you have awesome jam sessions in your pubs. (Had one in Wales, 2 years ago - most fun I've ever had!) LOL I really must go to Groningen, occasionally What amuses me most is the Dutch habit if putting a diminuitiv "-je" at the end of almost every noun. I always ROTF when people call me "meisje" - I'm close to 50 A few years ago I spent a few days in Belgium, in Leopoldsburg, to attend a concert of Jim Byrnes and the Soujourners. (It was totally cool! We shared the same tiny hotel). Their dialect is a bit harder to understand than standard Dutch but I managed to do a shopping expedition without having to use a dictionary