Hello everyone!
Here in Switzerland, every grammar school graduate has to do a project as a completion of their education and preparation for University.
As part of this project, I'd like to ask the Esperanto-community a couple of questions, and I'd be incredibly thankful if some of you could give some personal, individual and detailed answers.

Questions:
1) What were your reasons to start learning Esperanto?
2) What is your favourite part of the Esperanto community?
3) What are your hopes for the future of the Esperanto?
4) How do you practice your Esperanto? Do you daily get in contact with it?

Thank you very much for your correspondence!

Yet again.

Questions:
1) What were your reasons to start learning Esperanto?
2) What is your favourite part of the Esperanto community?
3) What are your hopes for the future of the Esperanto?
4) How do you practice your Esperanto? Do you daily get in contact with it?

1) My first encounter with Esperanto occurred when my parents sent me to boarding school in Lausanne, Switzerland. I did not (yet) speak French. I had to share a bed room with an Italian and a German. Since we didn't understand each other, the Italian suggested that we all learn Esperanto until I learned French. Really, within three days we were able to communicate via (broken) Esperanto. It took me at least three months to understand anything in French. Until that time we used Esperanto. I relearned Esperanto when I was living in Germany and the Frankfurter Rundschau printed a crude, insensitive joke about Esperanto. That made me remember how useful the language was in a pinch.
2) My favorite part about the E community is when I am traveling and meet someone who speaks Esperanto and who can give me tips on what to see and what to do in their city. I especially like it if they have time to spend with me. I feel like I really get to know the place and I am not forcing them to use my culture to explain things to me.
3) I hope that the number of people who are internationally spirited will grow and that such cosmopolitanly minded people will use Esperanto and expand its scope. I do not work actively in propagating Esperanto but I also always mention it if someone asks me what languages I speak. I teach English to foreigners and think that Esperanto is a much better solution to the world language problem than English which can be very easily misunderstood - especially non-verbalized intentions in English which native speakers misinterpret when communicating with non-native speakers (who often sound arrogant and impolite when they use English.)
4) My husband is Brazilian and several years ago he got interested in Esperanto on his own. We use it every day - but not exclusively. He especially likes discovering new expressions in Esperanto and using it when we are in public. I also speak Portuguese and we both speak German and watch Deutsche Welle. Sometimes for fun we translate the program titles into Esperanto. Certain E words have become parts of our daily conversation (e.g. Ĉu vi volas kafon? Hastulo! Olda furzulo! etc.) and we code switch with them. I also read lernu and libera folio alot.

robbkvasnak:Questions:
1) What were your reasons to start learning Esperanto?
2) What is your favourite part of the Esperanto community?
3) What are your hopes for the future of the Esperanto?
4) How do you practice your Esperanto? Do you daily get in contact with it?

1) My first encounter with Esperanto occurred when my parents sent me to boarding school in Lausanne, Switzerland. I did not (yet) speak French. I had to share a bed room with an Italian and a German. Since we didn't understand each other, the Italian suggested that we all learn Esperanto until I learned French. Really, within three days we were able to communicate via (broken) Esperanto. It took me at least three months to understand anything in French. Until that time we used Esperanto. I relearned Esperanto when I was living in Germany and the Frankfurter Rundschau printed a crude, insensitive joke about Esperanto. That made me remember how useful the language was in a pinch.
2) My favorite part about the E community is when I am traveling and meet someone who speaks Esperanto and who can give me tips on what to see and what to do in their city. I especially like it if they have time to spend with me. I feel like I really get to know the place and I am not forcing them to use my culture to explain things to me.
3) I hope that the number of people who are internationally spirited will grow and that such cosmopolitanly minded people will use Esperanto and expand its scope. I do not work actively in propagating Esperanto but I also always mention it if someone asks me what languages I speak. I teach English to foreigners and think that Esperanto is a much better solution to the world language problem than English which can be very easily misunderstood - especially non-verbalized intentions in English which native speakers misinterpret when communicating with non-native speakers (who often sound arrogant and impolite when they use English.)
4) My husband is Brazilian and several years ago he got interested in Esperanto on his own. We use it every day - but not exclusively. He especially likes discovering new expressions in Esperanto and using it when we are in public. I also speak Portuguese and we both speak German and watch Deutsche Welle. Sometimes for fun we translate the program titles into Esperanto. Certain E words have become parts of our daily conversation (e.g. Ĉu vi volas kafon? Hastulo! Olda furzulo! etc.) and we code switch with them. I also read lernu and libera folio alot.

Thank you very much for your time and the detailed answer! I'm sure it will be very useful in the course of writing my paper. (I did also write this survey in French and German, so I'm really sorry if you had preferred to answer in German.)

Felicitous:
Questions:
1) What were your reasons to start learning Esperanto?
2) What is your favourite part of the Esperanto community?
3) What are your hopes for the future of the Esperanto?
4) How do you practice your Esperanto? Do you daily get in contact with it?

1. My grandfather told me about it and I liked the idea that it was easy to learn.
2. Everyone here is here for one main reason, to learn and speak Esperanto, and you can meet many people from all over the world.
3. I hope it becomes spoken more broadly and frequently around the world. I'm trying to get an Esperanto course on Duolingo, a free language learning website, and I hope it will be on there soon.
4. I'm still learning, and I only know some basic words and sentences, so I don't practice as often as I should. I don't use it very often because I find that Esperanto-language internet is difficult to find.

Felicitous:
Questions:
1) What were your reasons to start learning Esperanto?
2) What is your favourite part of the Esperanto community?
3) What are your hopes for the future of the Esperanto?
4) How do you practice your Esperanto? Do you daily get in contact with it?

1 - I found learning other languages difficult. One day I searched "What is the easiest language to learn"

2 - They are open minded and accepting.

3 - I hope that it will be a tool to bring people together. For example, people from different countries could communicate. This is already happening on a small level.

4 - I use this website.

I suggest you scroll down and find the topic named " Feel like helping somebody out? A few questions about your experiences with Esperanto "
You will find that the original poster asked questions similar to yours, and you might find the responses useful.

Felicitous:Questions:
1) What were your reasons to start learning Esperanto?
2) What is your favourite part of the Esperanto community?
3) What are your hopes for the future of the Esperanto?
4) How do you practice your Esperanto? Do you daily get in contact with it?

1) I came across it via an internet rabbit trail. At first I was like, "International language? What a crazy idea!" But I was curious, so I read more about it on Wikipedia and lernu.net. At first I was just curious, not really interested, but when I read that there are no irregular verbs, I got excited! At that point I didn't care whether or not it was useful, or anyone spoke it; with no irregular verbs, the hardest part of language learning is gone; why not go for it!

2) I really love the language itself. It's regularity was what got me in the first place, and as I keep studying, the list of things I like about it keep growing! There's the tablewords with 'a' (kia, ĉia, etc), the participles, the versitality of roots (how you can use just about any root as any part of speech, and the really fun ways you can put words together!), and the accusative; it's all so cool!

As for the community, I'm rather new to that, but I like being able to correspond with people in other countries who speak different languages, using a language that isn't native to either of us, but is easier to learn than our native languages. I also like just being able to communicate using a language that is different from English, and has it's own forms of expression. I can do this freely in Esperanto because it is so much easier and more regular than other languages, so I don't have to be afraid of looking silly by treating irregular words as regular, like saying 'bringed' or 'foots' in English.

3) I hope that more people will become interested in Esperanto. I especially hope that more people will learn it well, and contribute to the Esperanto culture, by increasing the quantity and quality of materials and media (music, books, videos, etc). I hope that Esperanto will come to be regarded by the general public as just as useful and worthwhile as any other language.

4) I am on some website in or about Esperanto almost every day, usually lernu.net. I also write my journal and talk to myself in Esperanto. One of my favorite things to do is learn songs; I like to sing and listen to music in Esperanto, especially Christmas carols !

Bemused:I suggest you scroll down and find the topic named " Feel like helping somebody out? A few questions about your experiences with Esperanto "
You will find that the original poster asked questions similar to yours, and you might find the responses useful.

Thank you very much for your suggestion! I thought there must have already been a Survey like this, but I couldn't find anything. Thank you!

A big thank you to everyone who has already answered my questions. It made me happy to see the sometimes very personal answers as well as the obvious love for the language and community.
Please do keep the answers coming!