Siduction Forum

Siduction Forum => Free Speech => Topic started by: vilde on 2012/04/28, 11:14:34

Title: I feel outside
Post by: vilde on 2012/04/28, 11:14:34
It's quite dead here on the English part of the forum and as I wrote before in another thread the interesting discussions will be on the German forum, for example http://forum.siduction.org/index.php?topic=2101 (http://forum.siduction.org/index.php?topic=2101) would have been nice to be able to follow.

And don't tell me that it's possible to follow with auto-translation, it will be like discussing with a 1,5 year old child, that’s maybe working for a specific technical problem but not in a common discussion.

It's better to separate the German forum from the English so we not German speaking don't have to see the things we can't join.
Title: RE: I feel outside
Post by: dibl on 2012/04/28, 13:51:16
Hi vilde -- yes it's very quiet here. I have not seen any problem on my siduction systems for weeks.  It must be the same for other users, I guess.  Sid must be in pretty good shape these days.  I read the German side with chromium's translator, and they are not discussing any serious problems.
Title: RE: I feel outside
Post by: vilde on 2012/04/28, 16:51:49
I'm not afraid that I will miss anything important, but I miss the fun of a lively forum. Probably I have to accept this, there are maybe not so many people here? I mean, now there are two places, aptosid and siduction, even if some are active on both forum it will be less people on each forum.

I have two machines with siduction and two with aptosid here and then two others I manage for others with aptosid, probably I will change some more of them to siduction but I will wait for next release then. But for the moment I have an eye on both forums now and then.
Title: RE: I feel outside
Post by: DeepDayze on 2012/04/28, 17:43:22
It's maybe because the debian team's been doing a great job reacting to bug reports and getting things ready for the upcoming Wheezy freeze.
Title: I feel outside
Post by: dibl on 2012/04/28, 17:53:25
My desktop system is one built at the end of 2010 -- giant i7-950 rig.  I originally installed aptosid Ἡμέρα on it, then later I "cross-graded" it to siduction.  So it still has infobash:

Code: [Select]
Host/Kernel/OS  "imerabox" running Linux 3.3-4.towo.1-siduction-amd64 x86_64 [ aptosid 2011-02 Ἡμέρα - kde-lite - (201107131633) ]
CPU Info        8x Intel Core i7 950 @ 8192 KB cache flags( sse3 ht nx lm vmx ) clocked at [ 4216.926 MHz ]
Videocard       NVIDIA GF100 [GeForce GTX 480]  X.Org 1.11.4  [ 1920x1200@50.0hz ]
Network cards   Marvell 88E8056 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller, at port: d800
Processes 286 | Uptime 2:14 | Memory 1436.3/5966.5MB | HDD OCZ-REVODRIVE,OCZ-REVODRIVE,KINGSTON SS100S2,WDC WD1002FAEX-0,WDC WD1002FAEX-0 Size 2136GB (3%used) | GLX Renderer GeForce GTX 480/PCIe/SSE2 | GLX Version 4.2.0 NVIDIA 295.40 | Client Shell | Infobash v3.37


I also have a Dell E6500 and Toshiba NB205 netbook and they both have a native siduction OS.
Title: RE: I feel outside
Post by: ralul on 2012/04/28, 17:57:21
What about siduction official forums as dual language?
Title: RE: I feel outside
Post by: dibl on 2012/04/28, 18:47:42
Most simple:

Use only one "Upgrade Warnings" -- the warning is usually only one or two sentences, so write the warning in both English and German.  If a person cannot speak one of these languages, then use the free translator here (http://www.systranet.com/translate) and get the other version to paste in.  Of course the translation is not perfect, but here we are not linquists anyway, right?  I think we can understand the technical terminology when it is translated.

All other forums can be duplicates -- one for German, one for English.

Just my $0.02.  :)
Title: RE: I feel outside
Post by: Lanzi on 2012/04/28, 20:56:06
I was thinking the same for the germ,an forum, that there has't been a lot of new topics the last weeks. :-)

Every dist-updagrde runs smoothly. So no need to ask for me.
Lets hope it stays for a while like this...
:-)
Title: RE: I feel outside
Post by: vilde on 2012/04/28, 23:50:42
Of cause this forum is more quiet when everything is working smooth and nice. It is because there are a lot of people out there doing a fantastic work.

Probably I'm a little nostalgic, I remember the first time of sidux, the forum was full of life, a lot of discussions, some serious some was more fun and social. It was nearly always interesting to have a look at the forum. But time changes, people come and go, things get smooth and working and so on.

Still there are for me no other distributions that come near the tight, fast, clear and very good working os than siduction and aptosid. I mention both because I have not really seen any significant differences, the most difference so far is the look, the themes but time will show that also.
Title: RE: I feel outside
Post by: Lanzi on 2012/04/28, 23:59:53
Oh, don't worry. We are close to the freeze... then in hopefully less than 8 Month, when the freeze is over, the rought times will beginn.
It will be my fourth freeze... and it was alswas quite before, and very hasty (thanks treebeard for the word ;-) ) afterwards!
Title: RE: I feel outside
Post by: ralul on 2012/04/29, 00:20:19
@dibl, that is what I meant using the term "dual language"
But I would also include the other "official" forums news and bugs though.

@vilde, this is my sociology of forum life:
If you have some discurs and two or more parties of people having deep missions to persuade the "other" side, there will be heavy fighting and every single item will be a exploited to be a case!
Since the division we have lost some of those "deep" and "fundamental" issues:
- multimedia
- additional tools (not loved but not fighted any more)
- proprietary drivers (nvidia)
- use of aptitude (not loved but not fighted)
- naming and telling of other distributions
- doing things not the right way (nvidia-run)
Each of which gave an additional heated thread by mentioning just a little word ....
Title: RE: I feel outside
Post by: clubex on 2012/04/29, 02:29:27
I joined not long after the first siduction final was available for download and I'm sorry to have to say I don't ever remember the English section ever being anything but a very quiet backwater. In fact I can't remember any significant technical questions. Also look at the 4 pages of Upgrade Warnings in the German sextion as opposed to the single page in the English section

In comparison the German section is a smoothly flowing river.

Having moved from aptosid.com this lack of interest in the English section has been a source of disappointment to me. aptosid.com, although sometimes fractious, was always lively. It was somewhere where I and other English speakers could join in and express our opinions and experiences and perhaps even offer help to others. From day one this has been missing from siduction and there is nothing to suggest this will be any different in the future. I had hoped for a sense of community but at present it seems absent for me as an English speaker. I think the OP feels the same way.

Another and probably larger disappointment for me is the rate of new registrations is virtually stagnant. Like all of us I want to see the continued use and growth of siduction but it doesn't appear to be happening. It seems to me that as the German section has a substantially larger contribution/viewer base than does the English section. Given the ratio of English speakers to German speakers in the world I have to put this down to the website design failing to attract English speakers.

IMHO putting the German section first is not a good idea. Acquiring a larger registration base can only be achieved by increasing the exposure to English speakers. This isn't done by presenting the first page of the forums in a language the majority of the world doesn't understand. Perhaps putting the English section first might attract more registrations. I used to run a village community website and it was significant that if you didn't put the important stuff on the front page and link it to, say the pigeon racing page, people rarely went to the racing page to check what was happening.

What seems to bear this out is the number of viewers of the German section is much larger than that of the English section.One would think it would be the opposite given the number of English speakers out there. But it isn't.

Perhaps the website could be re-designed to offer either:

(a) An entirely English only website. Most distributions get away with this option but personally I don't think it is appropriate given siduction's historical origins and developer base. Nor would it suit the present make up of contributors/viewers. It might attract some more English speakers but conversely it might drive some German speakers away.

(b) Placing the English and German sections on different websites. This  is probably the best option if a brief examination of aptosid is anything to go by. aptosid.de (German speaking audience) does not get as many contributors and viewers as aptosid.com (English speaking audience) yet together they have a large number of registrations. This arrangement appears to be more representative of the real world and may gain English speakers while retaining it's present German speakers.

My apologies if this is a bit long and rambling. I could have said more but I should have been asleep a long time ago.
Title: I feel outside
Post by: holgerw on 2012/04/29, 07:37:49
Hello,

hmm, a difficult situation, because in case of siduction the community of siduction users forum is bundled with the developers and most of developers comes from germany, and the community is grown with the fork siduction

With pure debian the situation is very easy: We've the debian developers on the one side on the other side we've enlish debian forum, german debian forum and perhaps some more forums in other languages.

I think one point should be clear: All people here in forum are the user community of siduction and while discussing here problems about the chosen languages the part of community, who can't speak german and who prefers the english languages could discuss interesting stuff in english :-)

Okay, the area of update warnings is special and very important for users of a rolling release, and I'll ask all people trying to post and adding comments there in both languages.

But to eliminate german language here or to educate people here to use language x and not language a, sorry this is not acceptable.

Kind regards,
  Holger
Title: I feel outside
Post by: devil on 2012/04/29, 09:21:57
Quote

(b) Placing the English and German sections on different websites. This is probably the best option if a brief examination of aptosid is anything to go by. aptosid.de (German speaking audience) does not get as many contributors and viewers as aptosid.com (English speaking audience) yet together they have a large number of registrations. This arrangement appears to be more representative of the real world and may gain English speakers while retaining it's present German speakers.

I understand the frustration about not having a functioning EN forum yet. But splitting up on different pages is not the way we want to go. On the new website, which is still in the works :(  the differentiaton will be easier.

Two websites: aptosid.de was only done, because the 'renitent' german users needed a home due to the ongoing quarrels on aptosid.com. Since siduction took of, aptosid.de is dead in the water.

The number of registrations on aptosid.com does imho not represent the real situation. As you can see, even aptosid.com is quite quiet these days.

I have no solution to this other that to build a stronger international userbase. One step to do that is a more attractive forum for them. Users of the english part of the forum can help with that.

greetz
devil
Title: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: vilde on 2012/04/29, 09:57:52
Quote from: "clubex"
IMHO putting the German section first is not a good idea. Acquiring a larger registration base can only be achieved by increasing the exposure to English speakers. This isn't done by presenting the first page of the forums in a language the majority of the world doesn't understand. Perhaps putting the English section first might attract more registrations. I used to run a village community website and it was significant that if you didn't put the important stuff on the front page and link it to, say the pigeon racing page, people rarely went to the racing page to check what was happening.
I think this is important. There is a common knowledge for example around journalists that a big majority of people just read the headlines or maybe the first lines of text. Probably there is similarity to internet users, maybe a lot of new visitors of this forum never even realize that there are a English forum?

When surfing the Internet you sort of expect a English text. After a English headline on a English home site and then find a German language when you get to the forum, I believe that non German reading visitors leave then.  And as clubex wrote, there are a lot more English speaking people out there than Enlish. To put the German forum after the English would that feel bad for you German speakers?
Title: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: devil on 2012/04/29, 10:08:40
Why would it?

greetz
devil
Title: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: vilde on 2012/04/29, 11:13:03
Quote from: "devil"
Why would it?

greetz
devil
Because it feels a little sensitive this language thing.

To make things clear, I have nothing against Germans and the German language I just want this distribution with the forum be used by as many as possible.

You must have thought in an international (English) way when you created the website from the beginning, You have a English start site, with English menus, it would maybe be good to follow that logic by showing the English forum text first on the forum site also.
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: titan on 2012/04/29, 12:00:56
I think the Siduction devs need to decide where they want their distro to go.For me there is no difference technically between Siduction and Aptosid except the Aptosid forum is better being in English. I don't see any examples of the new freedom of speech being expressed in this forum. At the moment Siduction is a German distro with most of the forum traffic in German and will not attract new international users until it is in English. When Siduction first appeared I though great it would be like Kanotix or early sidux with an active forum but is more like current Aptosid but mostly in German, how will that attract new users. I will continue using both but siduction is missing an opportunity to develop by using German as it's primary forum language.
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: clubex on 2012/04/29, 12:43:56
Like titan I'm staying with siduction because it has the possibility of having a community in which I could enjoy being a member. aptosid is not a place I wish to return to. Saying that I desperately hope that the new website comes along quickly and has the ability to attract a larger English audience. Without a larger English representation in the siduction community I will remain feeling isolated and merely an onlooker in an largely uncaring community. Perhaps uncaring is the incorrect word but I can't express it any better at the moment.

I have issue with the view that devil aptosid is virtually dead. If you compare the number of users online at any one time you'll find that aptosid has way more users online. I just had a quick look and aptosid had 57 users online in comparison with siduction's 12. And aptosid bears favourably with forums.debian.net which had 84 users online. People may not be posting to aptosid (perhaps explained by their bad reputation?) but they're still visiting the site in reasonable numbers.
Title: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: ayla on 2012/04/29, 14:46:02
Quote from: "vilde"
Quote from: "devil"
Why would it?

greetz
devil
Because it feels a little sensitive this language thing.


Hi,

I dont care whether the one or the other language is set on top because I try to follow both sections. I can see the sense of placing english on top to attract more international users.

Also holgerw's suggestion of posting upgrade warnings in both languages is a very good idea and I would suggest to do it the way it was done in sidux times -upgrade warnings in a multilingual place on top.

For the remaining parts a few helpers who translate and maybe sum up what they think relevant would be nice.

greets
ayla
Title: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: michaaa62 on 2012/04/29, 15:14:22
Quote
I just had a quick look and aptosid had 57 users online in comparison with siduction's 12
devil was talking about aptosid.de. There is not much life anymore there, even the thread about it http://www.aptosidusers.de/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&t=1441 does not have many posts.

While i was opposing vilde's initial thought about the language used here, because i was optimistic about the activity in the international section. I now see the interesting discussions, like the razorqt thread http://forum.siduction.org/index.php?topic=2122 in the experimental section, for the direction siduction is heading to, are all in german, and some community members are shut off :oops: .

We should try to change that!
Title: I feel outside
Post by: holgerw on 2012/04/29, 16:06:41
Hi @michaaa62,

I see the situation, which could be made better. But what would you suggest? And another question. What is with possible new users with other languages like french, who can't speak english? And french language is also an international language.

I've start the razorqt thread and thanks for compliment, that this is an important one.

And when an english speaking member wants to start a thread about razorqt, she or he can do it in english area.

I've suggest a bilingual area aubout update warnings to make the situation here better but again: I don't like to educate or to be educated to use only langtuage x for a free software community.

Kind regards,
  Holger
Title: I feel outside
Post by: titan on 2012/04/29, 18:38:03
Quote from: "holgerw"


 What is with possible new users with other languages like french, who can't speak english? And french language is also an international language.

  Holger


If you primarily want a German Forum, that is fine it is your distro but don't expect many new users to join. English is the language of the internet and the primary second language for most other European,Indian, African, South American, Chinese etc. What is there on Siduction to attract even long term Kanotix , sidux, Aptosid users. Having a forum where most of the interesting dev discussion is in German alienates the non German speakers as they are excluded from the discussion.I though Siduction was about community but it seems that is only completely true if you speak German.
Title: I feel outside
Post by: clubex on 2012/04/29, 19:08:14
+1
Title: I feel outside
Post by: dibl on 2012/04/29, 20:47:30
I think a huge separation between the German and English forums (like separate sites) is NOT the way to go.  There are too many people who can manage in both languages (at least reading), and information will be missed by everyone who would like to check both fora.

Reality = the dev team are mostly German.  Reality = they will be most comfortable with discussions in German.  Let them be comfortable -- there is no reason to hide the German forum from English speakers.

However, titan is correct about the majority language for Internet conversations -- it is indeed English. So siduction must have a living English forum, and it must be attractive, especially for folks who are not confident of their ability with Linux, much less their ability with English.  Anyone who has caught a "RTFM" between the eyes knows not to ask any more questions at that place.

I would even go so far as to suggest a "Noob Corner" forum, for those who know they don't know. While Debian Sid is not a recommended branch for noobs, this siduction distro is a very reasonable choice for someone bored with Ubuntu and ready to learn more, IMHO.  We should welcome such users, and let them know it's OK to ask a question that might seem noobish.  I would personally be willing to help with their issues, to the limits of my limited ability.

/stump speech
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: axel668 on 2012/04/29, 21:22:09
You certainly can't expect German users (who currently seem to be the majority in the Siduction community) to lead all their discussions in English. There is an English part of the forum, and it's up to you, the non- German users to fill it with content.

But I agree that the different language sections could be structured a little better to make it easier to find the (numerous) English content
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: vilde on 2012/04/29, 21:54:50
Quote

You certainly can't expect German users (who currently seem to be the majority in the Siduction community) to lead all their discussions in English.
Yes, you can expect a international, world wide wannabe distributions main forum language to be in English.

It will always be a majority of German users in a German forum. And a distribution with the main discussion in German will remain a distribution with most German users, who in all future can claim that because we are mostly German users we will keep the main forum in German because we are mostly Germans here.......
Quote

There is an English part of the forum, and it's up to you, the non- German users to fill it with content.
What shall we do there if the main discussions are in German? Play games, send each other greetings or talk about the weather?
Title: Re: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: ayla on 2012/04/30, 03:23:19
Quote from: "vilde"
What shall we do there if the main discussions are in German? Play games, send each other greetings or talk about the weather?


What the germans also do. Ask the questions and discuss the matters of your interest. The devs and the germans who are able to will join in.  
 The team meetings are hold in english and the logs can be found at chili.siduction.org, so there is more a problem for only german users. :wink:

Greets
ayla
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: devil on 2012/04/30, 08:27:52
We have in no way planned to have a german distro or to have prominent discussions in german. you can see that for example if you look at the core-meeting logs (http://chili.siduction.org/projects/siduction/wiki/IRC-Logs) or our blog. (http://news.siduction.org/)The meetings are all in english, even though not all members of core team were good with that decision.

On the new forum (yeah, I know, it's not ready yet) it will be easier and no language will be prominent to another one. Until then, as soon as I have time, I will check, how hard it is to move EN up and above DE forums.

greetz
devil
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: ralul on 2012/04/30, 12:15:49
devil, can you give some more details status update of the new forum software somewhere, and what is missing: art, icons? Where we could help ...
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: devil on 2012/04/30, 13:33:09
You should better talk to agaida about that.

greetz
devil
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: devil on 2012/04/30, 15:07:11
...lets welcome dibl as mod for the EN forums :)
thanks holgerw for the initiative and dibl for accepting the job.

greetz
devil
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: dibl on 2012/04/30, 15:33:03
Thank you devil.

And now I go searching for my German-English Dictionary ....

;-)
Title: I feel outside
Post by: ayla on 2012/04/30, 15:51:55
fine
congrats to dibl.... and to the team. :)

greets
ayla
Title: I feel outside
Post by: ralul on 2012/04/30, 16:12:27
Yes, I really appreciate dibl as forum moderator!

regarding bilinguality:
For me it is double time to write english, because I am pretty unsure about wording, gramas etc. I will try to write in english though if it is about wishes and future developments of siduction. But I will stop as soon as a debate gets heated, because in english I depend my words not to be droped on a "Goldwaage" ...

I would like siduction to consider to use much less forums and some more forums as bilingual, but

- it is a question of overall traffic. In this moment we could just live using 4/5 forums. But what about times of a siduction release?

- surely we need support forums (install,software) with pure and single language. But some other topics could be tried bilingual as well, for me at least ...
Title: I feel outside
Post by: ayla on 2012/04/30, 16:25:06
Quote from: "ralul"

- surely we need support forums (install,software) with pure and single language. But some other topics could be tried bilingual as well, for me at least ...


Yep, would be fine for me too. Evryone who wants to join a discussion and isn't good in the other language(s) may ask for a translation. If I can, of course I would try to help.
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: hinto on 2012/05/01, 15:08:24
If I "know" these guys correctly (I've "known" some since the Kanotix days), IRC is much livelier. (I must admit that I haven't visited there often of late).
-Hinto
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: clubex on 2012/05/01, 16:25:42
Welcome dibl. I'm sure you'll make an excellent moderator for the English forum.

And thanks devil for the re-arranged forums page. I hope this soon increases the registrations as siduction deserves it.
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: devil on 2012/05/01, 19:11:54
New release in May will bring siduction to the attention of possible new users also.

greetz
devil
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: belze on 2012/05/06, 18:46:56
good move! i supported in the past the "language issue" and since i moved to arch i just keep an eye on siduction and aptosid forums. I really would have the time to translate some interesting stuff about razor and other experimental repos (i still have a partition with siduction installed). So i would appreciate to understand what is going on, what about chromium and so on in a language which i can read (i'm italian, we CAN'T write in english, the only one who can do it is Stefano Zacchiroli lol!).
Looking forward for the new forum and of course for the new release, as i hope this will attract a lot of new users and you (devs and stakeholders) have to take care of them. i like the noob section, but you definitively need a stronger english section of the forum, otherwise one might think this is not the right place to stay. Don't blame me, it is a common sensation i heard from multiple sources (friends of mine, random users commenting on blogs or social media).
i wish long life to siduction, and a happy user experience to german speakers!
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: sqlpython on 2012/05/07, 08:19:30
@dibl
Good luck at your New Position!
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: GoinEasy9 on 2012/05/07, 19:33:26
@dibl
Congrats.  With the forum changing and the next release imminent, we'll need more help dealing with questions.
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: dibl on 2012/05/07, 19:58:01
Thanks guys.  It appears I was selected mainly for my diplomatic writing style and (so far) lack of temper tantrums on the forum, not so much about my Gnu/Linux proficiency. :lol:

I will happily accept all the help that is offered, and thanks in advance!
Title: RE: Re: RE: I feel outside
Post by: cryptosteve on 2012/05/07, 21:42:35
You're welcome, dibl. :D
Title: I feel outside
Post by: jacmoe on 2012/05/19, 21:16:55
Quote from: "ralul"
For me it is double time to write english, because I am pretty unsure about wording, gramas etc. I will try to write in english though if it is about wishes and future developments of siduction. But I will stop as soon as a debate gets heated, because in english I depend my words not to be droped on a "Goldwaage" ...

Well..
You are lucky that you are allowed to write in German.

Or maybe not.

I've spent years on perfecting my English, due to me being a member of the Ogre3d community since 2004, and it's well worth the effort. ;)
Title: I feel outside
Post by: agaida on 2012/05/21, 03:17:18
@jacmoe: perfecting my english would be a time consuming job. So i have to decide what to do first: improve my debia packaging and writing skills (bash, perl, python ...) or improve my english conversation skills. Imho atm improving my skills as a programmer is the right thing for me.

Ich hab es halt lieber, wenn meine Programme fehlerfrei sind. Für den Rest gibt es im Zweifel den Google Translator.
Title: I feel outside
Post by: jacmoe on 2012/05/22, 08:15:07
Sorry about being rude. Wasn't intended.

I want to be able to write Danish whenever I feel like it too.
And what about Polish, Finnish, Dutch, Farsi and Pushtu?

I understand that you started out being a German community, but I think it's weird.
And in many ways arrogant.
But let that discussion rest, as I don't want to be rude again.

Du kan jo prøve at bruge Google Translate på dette her, da jeg altså ikke gad at skrive den sidste sætning på Engelsk. ;)
Title: I feel outside
Post by: vilde on 2012/05/22, 11:00:54
As an anecdote I can say that I have experienced this language dilemma before, but live, and that's what the subject-title of this thread is about.

Little more than twenty-five years ago I was backpacking around the world, I was traveling around in norther Thailand. I mainly traveled alone, but a lot of times there where others getting along for a few days or so.

I remember coming to a lodge where most of the guests where from Israel, they where sitting together speaking their only their language, I felt outside. Some other day and in another lodge there where nearly only Germans, and what did they speak? Yes, they where sitting in a big group speaking German, I felt outside.

It was not that they where not speaking to me on this places, everybody was friendly, but the main talking and having fun was on a language that I couldn't understand enough to enjoy it.

Some weeks later I was up north again, this time with Laura from Philadelphia, she was nice 8). Laura and I where of cause talking English with each other and we came to a Guest House with a lot of Swedish people, and of cause they where talking Swedish. This time I didn't feel outside because Swedish is my language, instead it was a little fun, me and Laura talking English made nobody realize that I understood what they where saying, so there I was sneaking on them ;)

Anyway, after that I realized that everybody is more comfortable in their own language, it's less energy consuming and you can express yourself with more finesse and with a more humor. Traveling around the world for months speaking only English as a foreign language make you feel quite easy with some hours speaking your native language together with people from your own country.

So it's really understandable, this groups of people getting together and talk their native language, but if they do that, if you do that, you are also keeping a distance to all other around you, even if you are not intending to, you are sending a message around you, we are together here, don't disturb.

There are also other issues with different languages, even if it's nearly 60 years since the second world war ended there are still people in Europe who have difficulties with the German language. I have experienced that myself being together with a German women, JZ, for seven years. (No, I didn't learn German, we only spoke English with each other) Anyway, she and I where biking on the countryside where I was living, we passed a little red house with some people outside and stopped to talk with them, I know they where Danish summer guests, JZ started to talk in English to them and that was fine for a time but on some point they realized that she was German and then they stopped to talk to here and went away in a rude way. This Danish people where old enough to have experienced the war, JZ was not born then, but anyway this feelings are there.

In central Europe, we have traditionally had three major countries with their own language, German, French and English. All of them wanted to be dominant in this part of the world. It's not really a secret that there are old competitions between these countries and with that some old stubbornness to not speak or at least not to pretend to understand some of the other languages. I hope and believe that this is a disappearing thing with young people and new generations.

For the moment English is the international language in the world, like it or not. But that's probably not for ever, we will maybe all, speaking Chinese, Mandarin or maybe Spanish in the future, who knows?

Everybody who manage to read this far without falling asleep will get a star in their book.  :wink:

And finaly, @ jacmoe Ha, jag förstod vad du skrev utan att använda Google Translate :)
Title: I feel outside
Post by: devil on 2012/05/22, 11:49:02
nice post. say 'hello' to Laura from Philadelphia from me ;)

greetz
devil
Title: I feel outside
Post by: vilde on 2012/05/22, 15:20:11
devil, you get the first star :) but if you want to get in touch with Laura you have to start looking in Philadelphia, I lost contact with here more than twenty years ago.