

Ask HN: Are you bilingual? - yangtheman
http://www.bloglation.com
If so, do you think correctly translating blogs could be useful?<p>I created the site after frustrating attempt to translate one of Paul Graham's essays to Korean. I used Google Translate initially, but the translated content completely sucked. Yahoo wasn't any better. My Korean isn't all that good, so it took me a while to correctly translate his essay. Then I thought of crowd-sourcing/wiki model, where there could be combined efforts from anyone on the web to correctly translate interesting blogs or any other contents on the web. Another good example is Ryan Tomayko's blog about REST. It's just fundamental concept, I think all web developers should know and follow it, no matter what language they use.<p>While I did two-years of computer science in college (eventually graduating with EE degree), I didn't have programming career. I used Ruby on Rails to build it, but I don't think it's nowhere close to be good enough. And having a full-time job prevents me from working/improving it seriously.<p>So, if you are bilingual and find it useful, I would love to elicit your help. Perhaps I could learn one or two things from you. I am always up for learning new things and improving my skills (however low it might be).<p>Please let me know!
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snitko
I have a feeling I am, because I speak english fluently. Although I'm not
truly bilingual: I started learning english when I was 4, but it was not the
language I spoke, but rather the language I studied. I also don't feel that's
such a huge asset, because being able to speak english is somewhat a must and
being able to speak Russian is only valuable in Russia. I hope I find time and
motivation to learn spanish someday.

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phamilton
Yes. I speak 4 languages with varying degrees of fluency (mostly due to lack
of recent use.) From most fluent to least fluent. English (I'm American)
Swedish (I lived in Sweden for two years as a missionary) French (I spent High
School in Belgium as an expat) Spanish (Took 4 years in High School and got
pretty darn good at it.)

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petervandijck
Yes: Dutch native, English fluent, Spanish pretty good, French ok, German
basic.

One day I'll learn another language or two. Perhaps when I finally create that
online language learning thing ;)

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ElbertF
Same here, except for Spanish. No Habla Español.

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c1sc0
French, German, Dutch, English. My fluency varies from year-to-year depending
on which language I use most in daily life. I remember the first time I came
back 'home' and found out that I had trouble adapting to speaking my mother
tongue. So bi-/tri-/x- lingualism (is that a word?) is not a fixed, but
varying property on one's cv.

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barry-cotter
English mothertongue, German at a conversational level and it's steadily
improving though writing is still a pain, Irish and French were both pretty
good about 9 years ago but are goddamned rusty. I can still read both of them
pretty well though expressing myself at all, whether in speech or writing is
torture.

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helveticaman
English: native.

Spanish: oh-so-close to native. Varies from day to day. I mean, I've spent 20
years in Chile, but it is not easy to stay bilingual. I'm not even sure it's
possible to remain completely native in 2 or more languages permanently.

~~~
wlievens
Sure it's possible, but only if you use both frequently. Most of what I type
is in English, so I'm fluent, but my daily life happens in Dutch.

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davidw
I speak Italian quite well, but will always speak it as a foreigner. My 2 year
old daughter, on the other hand, has a shot at growing up truly bilingual, and
is doing a pretty good job of it so far. I'm quite proud of her:-)

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Mz
I speak conversational German and can read and write some French, neither to
my satisfaction. I also know a smattering of words in Russian and Spanish. I
consider myself a dabbler.

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it0ny
I speak Spanish (I am Mexican), fluent English (I have been in the US since
high school), and I am trying to learn French (beginner).

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wlievens
Dutch (Flemish) native, English fluent, French from high school but not very
fluent. Planning to learn Spanish in the near future.

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keefe
Ten years ago I was fluent in german and had a very limited chinese vocab, but
it's all pretty much gone now.

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Indyan
Yeah. I am comfortable in both Bengali (mother tongue) and English. My grasp
of Hindi is also quite decent.

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eru
Bilingual is quite a low standard.

~~~
wlievens
That's arrogant and elitist of you. What's next? Bragging about how many
programming languages you know? My coding-dick is longer than yours?

~~~
c1sc0
I'm sorry, but it _is_ a low standard. I'd say that almost anyone in Europe
with a little education is bilingual. Don't hold the rest of the world to your
own low standards.

~~~
vgurgov
I dont think so. In Europe its a must because you have to know English. This
is also a case for me.

If you are American or UK native you DONT HAVE TO invest in learning any other
lang. Although you can if you want to. But i know many smart ppl Americans who
rather invest ALL their spare time in learning/practicing programming and or
math. There is nothing wrong with that, i dont see why these guys are in "low
standards"

~~~
eru
Maybe.

It's a pitty, though. Done right language education shouldn't take any effort
at all: Just do it when the kids are very young, and learn languages
naturally.

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sleepingbot
English, Spanish and Catalan here. All of them as mother tongues.

