

Hack your anatomy: How To Whistle Loudly - eru
http://www.natwilson.com/stuff/whistle.html

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muriithi
Wish he could include some diagrams or pics!

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angstrom
I learned the hands free approach as a kid (no assistance, just
experimentation). Now I can reach ear piercing levels that temporarily damage
the hearing of those within 5-10 feet using either a 3-5 second burst or 10-15
second sustained whistle. I've found it makes for a very effective training
mechanism with dogs.

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wallflower
Now, if someone could teach me how to roll my Spanish R's - I've heard that if
you don't learn by age 3 you can't but I want to disagree.

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gruseom
_I've heard that if you don't learn by age 3 you can't_

Nonsense. I learned to do it long after I was 3.

This might help: put your tongue (but not the tip) just above your teeth, let
it relax, then blow air out so your tongue flutters.

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wallflower
I've heard someone explain to me that it's kind of like a flag fluttering in
the wind. Except that your tongue is the flag. He recommended that I try to
stick the tip of my tongue to the roof of my mouth and blow out hard - and
resist the outward pressure (and the tongue will flutter back rapidly like a
flag - the Spanish R vibration) - and once I got that, with time, the amount
of pressure needed would relax.

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gruseom
That sounds about right. Only don't take this too literally:

 _stick the tip of my tongue to the roof of my mouth_

If I do that, it gets stuck. What I think you want is the hard palate (behind
the teeth), not the top of the mouth, and keep it relaxed.

I guess I should add that I'm neither a native speaker (though I've studied
more than one language with rolled r's) nor have I any experience teaching
this skill. I'd bet money you can learn it, though.

Edit: one more thing - you may find it easier to try words that _end_ in a
rolled r. The words that begin with a rolled r are a little harder (to me).

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euccastro
Except there are no words in Spanish that end with a rolled r.

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maw
Not quite true. If a word ends in an r and the speaker is thinking about what
to say next, he may in fact roll the r. Think about this sentence: "Estuvimos
allí por... un rato." Often it'd be punctuated with ellipses, but in some
sense it might be better written "Estuvimos allí porr un rato."

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riahi
Also, a lot of native spanish speakers pronounce all initial r's as rolled
r's.

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tordek
That's the way spanish is pronounced.

Radio is "Rradio".

I've found amusing how some people who learn english as a second language end
up pronouncing spanish as "espanish", since no spanish word begis with
s(consonant), except for sh.

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sofal
I had a friend try to teach me how to do it, and it still didn't work. I
examined how he positioned his tongue, lips, and everything. I tried to do the
same thing and nothing worked.

I then spent a matter of weeks experimenting with different mouth arrangements
and almost making myself faint with the amount of blowing. Sometimes I could
almost feel the whistle beginning, but it never quite got there. In the end I
finally found the right configuration and I have now mastered this hack. I
like to use it to imitate the squeaking noises that basketball players make on
a court.

Other hacks I've mastered:

Talking like Donald Duck

Beat boxing

Raising my right eyebrow (for the life of me I cannot do it with my left)

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PieSquared
Hah. I can raise my _left_ , but not my _right_. Are you a leftie? (I'm not,
so I'm wondering if that extends somehow to your... eyebrow-raising-skill).

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seren6ipity
I'm right handed and can raise only left eyebrow.

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dkokelley
Same here, almost. I'm right-handed and I _can_ raise my right eyebrow but
it's not as easy as the left.

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PieSquared
Wow. I read the second method, tried it, and it _just worked_. I don't know
how that explanation helped me, but something just clicked. Now I can whistle!
(Though not loudly yet...)

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eru
As with everything the trick is to practice and practice and practice.
(Whistling is easier than unicycling, though.)

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mattmaroon
I don't know how many words that is, but it's all worth substantially less
than 1 good picture would be.

