International Nesties
Publius
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Dear Community,
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Neeps--because I'm seriously nosy
Do you speak Russian? If so, how difficult was it difficult to learn?
Re: Neeps--because I'm seriously nosy
Basically I'm wondering how difficult it would be to survive in Russia with zero Russian. Since you're the only person I "know" who has lived there, I thought I'd ask you.
*There is absolutely zero reason I'm asking this aside from my own curiosity.
I speak Russian like a wee small child. I can get by on a day to day basis with serious errors in grammar. I read really well, I write like rubbish. It is not intuitive at all. However, it's not tonal so it is learnable to a certain degree. Vocabulary is easily learned, but cases suck - and there are 6 of them. There are no "to be" verbs in Russian so answering the phone you would say "It I" instead of "It is I." Past tense is super easy though so if you can avoid talking in the present tense I recommend that
I do really think it's nearly impossible to be perfectly fluent unless you're a native speaker, married to a native speaker or lived there so long you become a native.
Absolutely depends on where in Russia. I had almost zero Russian when we moved there (I knew the alphabet). Cities with large expat populations - Moscow, St. Pete, and a few big cities in the far east - you can get by. The rest of Russia would be really, really difficult.
I am curious about everything to do with neeps, she is like an enigma
That is perfect! I feel like I was special because we emailed outside of the best about Laos 2 years ago
I have to agree. Neeps, you fascinate me.
Is it okay to jump in with my experience? I studied Russian for about six months before going there for a stint in 2007. What I studied in my class was a good base for getting around in the month or so I was there. I could read signs in Cyrillic, ask for basic directions (where is... left, right, straight, 2 blocks, etc.), get coffee to go (this was a huge accomplishment) and order basic food. I never learned all the different kinds of meat or their respective cuts (chops, steak, etc.), but I knew the words for fish and chicken and got by eating these and loads of pelmenis and blinis. Oh, and vodka & red caviar. Mmmm!
If you're serious about speaking well, though, it will take much more of an effort, unless you've got a background already in a language that is similar grammatically. I never quite got all the declensions and case endings and got really tangled up when I tried to ask for anything too complicated. I ended up hiring a guide for a day to take care of some administrative things like reserving a sleeping car on an overnight train after my stick-figure drawing of a cot and a train elicited nothing but a blank look from the woman at the reservation counter.
I will also say that like many places in the world, your ability to communicate in a language that isn't your own will depend on your audience. I found that people in Moscow brushed me off as not understanding me much more quickly than in St. Petersburg, where people seemed a bit friendler and more open to talking with me in Russian.
I feel like the Wizard of Oz - it's nothing but ordinary behind this curtain.
haha, it is the lack of personal info, it always makes people seem special