Does anyone here speak Esperanto? Is an international language that was created about a hundred years ago with the intention of becoming a second language that people around the world could use to communicate with each other. There are currently about 2 million Esperanto speakers around the world, mostly in Eastern Europe and East Asia.
Studies have shown that it's much faster to learn Esperanto than most other languages. It took French high school students 150 hours to reach a level of Esperanto that would take 1500 hours to reach in English or 2000 hours to reach in German.
Another study showed that one year of Esperanto study plus three years of French brought the students to a higher level of French than four years of French alone.
I'm fascinated by the concept of an international language. English works to some extent, but not everyone speaks English, while Esperanto is very easy to learn.
I'm wondering how many backpackers speak Esperanto. It seems like it would be a great language for backpackers to adopt in order to communicate with each other. There are many backpackers who don't speak any English, but could learn Esperanto in a month or two. I think it would open up new doors of communication for many travelers.
Esperanto also has something called Pasporta Servo -- a network of free accommodation around the world for people who speak Esperanto. It's something like Esperanto couchsurfing.
There are some tutorials here if anyone is interested in checking it out:
http://en.lernu.net/
13 years
I found most of the people's quotes very unclear and difficult to follow, and even though I know some words and the English was shown below, I could not catch much. Sylllables swallowed, etc. Or maybe the quality of the sound, or my speakers, is relevant. Maybe this is why it is many times more difficult to follow a conversation than to read or express yourself in a foreign language. I can speak 2 foreign languages adequately, but I can't follow chats in either of them at all.
13 years
It sounded like some of the accents might have been strong... :)
The documentary was interesting...
12 years
C'u vi faras progreso kun vian projekton de Esperanto? Mi lernis la lingvon dum kelkaj monatoj ekde 10 jaroj, sed mi ne finis miajn studojn.
Have you made any progress with your Esperanto project? I learnt the language for a few months about 10 years ago, but I never finished my studies.
12 years
I found most of the people's quotes very unclear and difficult to follow, and even though I know some words and the English was shown below, I could not catch much. Sylllables swallowed, etc. Or maybe the quality of the sound, or my speakers, is relevant. Maybe this is why it is many times more difficult to follow a conversation than to read or express yourself in a foreign language. I can speak 2 foreign languages adequately, but I can't follow chats in either of them at all.
That clip definitely isn't a good advertisement for Esperanto's ease of understanding! Most of the people's pronunciation in the clip isn't great and their native accents are fairly strong. I could just about understand the asian woman, the black chap and the japanese-polish chap and part of Dr Zamemhof's original speech more or less without following the english translations, but the other speakers seemed like they were reading from a script and possibly didn't understand what they were reading!
I originally learned the language for a few month's about 10 years ago and at that time I could struggle thru audio excerpts from different countries that had online broadcasts at the time (Polish and Chinese mostly as far as I remember) and get the gist of them without too much dictionary work. I was actually quite surprised to find that after 3-6 months of teaching myself Esperanto online that I could read, speak and understand it a helluva lot better than French and Irish, both of which I spent 5-10 years learning in school. I wouldn't go so far as to claim I was anywhere near fluent in the language, but I could easily make myself understood to the few Esperanto speakers I met at the time. Whereas sadly I still cannot make myself understood in French despite returning to studying it recently!!
12 years
Have you made any progress with your Esperanto project? I learnt the language for a few months about 10 years ago, but I never finished my studies.
Yes... slowly. There will be something available for hostels soon. :)
let's all just learn Latin!
Actually, there is a movement to revive Latin as a spoken language, but it's a very difficult language to learn. Esperanto is very easy. A person can start speaking it at a basic level in weeks...
12 years
I just saw this a minute ago: Google Translate is adding Esperanto!
http://googletranslate.blogspot.com/2012/02/tutmonda-helplingvo-por-ciuj-homoj.html
This will make learning Esperanto much easier. If you click the translate button on the top of the page, you can translate it into Esperanto.
The language is growing rapidly. :)
12 years
Welcome to the site... :)
Thank you, Josh :) I thought I deleted this test message))
I would like to say that I already organize travels with esperanto. First of all, I am interested in backpacking, I'm a fan of hostels as well, and would like to use hostels in it. I support the site about travel in esperanto - http://www.vojagxo.info and of course I would like to cooperation with the guesthouses\hostels, and the development of this application of esperanto.
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