modern Greek

I'm learning Greek and it seems to me that Greek pronunciation is even easier than the Spanish one? I mean, Greek has fewer phonemes. Is anyone learning greek as well? What do you think about this topic?

I did try a few Greek lessons, even though I'm not serious about learning it, at least not now. From what I've seen, which isn't saying much, there are only two consonants that don't seem familiar. I believe it was some sort of "soft" H and a kind of "wierd" G. But those two didn't seem to be anything that couldn't be learnt quickly indeed. On a side note, the words seemed to be quite long as compared to Spanish.

>"I'm learning Greek and it seems to me that Greek pronunciation is even easier than the Spanish one? I mean, Greek has fewer phonemes. Is anyone learning greek as well? What do you think about this topic?"<

I'm learning Greek at the moment, however, not to the full extent that I would want to. In addition I can easily recognized few words similar to that of Spanish - spanish is my native tongue. The phonology is almost alike, moreover the grammar is intricated then that of Spanish or English. Suffice to say, I think I'll learn it once I have completed my Arabic course.....

Spanish sounds like Classical Greek.

Why would you wanna learn modern greek? It is the most useless language in Europe and probably World, no offence. If you wanna read old stuff from ancient Greece, you must learn ancient Greek, which is very different from modern one. Modern Greek should be the last on anyone's list of languages. Besides, it is very annoying to the people who hear it and doesn't receive a welcomed response socially. Spanish on the other hand is very sensual and very sexy I must say. If you learn French too, your prospects of becoming a "sex machine" are very good. In meantime, stay away from modern Greek, as it will be a cruelty towards precious lifetime. I'm Greek myself and I push my own kids to learn another language. Think about it...

I was missing our resident trolls. I got worried they might have decided to do something more useful, but no, hurray. Panagiotis is a Greek name, but "Panagiotis" is no Greek, as you have probably gathered.

On topic: Spanish and Greek sound similar because they have quite a few similar sounds; I remember some Spanish speaking member had an experience similar to mine - heard Greeks speak from some distance and thought they were speaking Spanish (for me it was the other way around). Both languages share pretty much the 5 basic forms of vowels, plus a couple of "weird" consonants, so I suppose that's why.

There are two "H" sounds and two "G" sounds, and those are the sounds most learners have a hard time getting :) It doesn't really matter though, if you get relatively close, no one will be bothered that you didn't get it *exactly* like a native. Oh, long words, sure... never thought anything of it myself, until my non-Greek friends started pointing it out, heheh.

How do you know he isn't Greek? Not all people are nationalists.

Between being a nationalist and hating, there's a huuuuuge gray area.

I forgot that many of my Greek compatriots still think and live in the old ages, with the nationalistic scarf covering all their areas of brain that control freedom of expression. Yes, once again for you that didn't hear it the first time, Greek language is horrible and useless for any non-Greek, not for me though, I'm Greek and still have to communicate with my own people. It is hard to listen to (confirmed continuosly by non-Greek listeners) and not even fun to learn. I speak four other languages and I can tell with competence that if I wasn't born Greek, I would've probably never tried to even get close to a Greek language book. Dear innocents, stay away from this useless, time consuming burden of hell. I would probably recommend Ancient Greek which can be certainly used to read or "decipher" old scriptures, but not the modern one, which is a bastardisation of the ancient one, plus borrowings from Bulgarian, Turkish, Albanian, etc. It is a diluted version of a made up language. Greeks themselves say this in secret between them, like something that must not be heard from the "enemies", etc, etc,...it all comes from many years of wars and sufference under different rulers. Don't blame us Greeks for being clinical paranoids, but as I said, years of invasion from so many enemies, who brought with them their languages, customs, genes, changing so for good the Greek population in one of the most mixed populations of Europe today. Even though many Greeks don't like this when said in public (from the reason stated above), you can find all kinds of Middle Eastern and Ottoman genes in todays' Greeks. It is a wonderful thing that, if we Greeks were not so nationalistically blind, it could have been a very nice thing to be proud of. Anyway, Greek language is a mixture of all those races who along their genes, left their "stamps" in the Greek language as well. That's why modern Greek is can be considered a Gloomy Balkanic Mixture. But Greek food is the best, even though it contains scary amounts of fat. Good luck!

Why do I learn Greek? Because it's a beautiful language and Greece is a lovely country rich in history and art. Moreover I'm Italian and we're neighbours.

Panagiotis
It is not clear from your posts why exactly do you dislike Greek. Maybe you can explain this some more. I'm confused right now.

I like how Greek sounds. I don't know if I will learn it, but it's always pleasant to casually listen to a few Pimsleur lessons from time to time. Maybe one day I'll get serious about learning it. But currently I'm still in the "pondering" phase. Have to wonder why *some* people are trying so actively to get us not to learn it. Especially considering that I would never see myself as a specialist of how hard/interesting/usefull it is to learn my native language.

Learn Turkish rather than Greek. It's more useful and beautiful. I had a Turkish boyfriend and he taught me Turkish. Since then I prefer this language rather than Greek despite this is my mother tongue.

No way, I prefer Greek to Turkish!

Which is your native language Yop?