Sal,

Due to my profession I had to improve my English skills but I had no motivation to do this. I asked some of this language freax and they advised me to learn another language. Okay, I tried french 2 times. To difficult because you have to learn every word twice: how it is spoken and how it is written. I got bored of this. Anyway, I like the sound of the french language very much. So I was looking for another language what could attract me. Polish would be nice because I met a lot of kindly polish people abroad. But polish isn't easy, too. So I remembered this esperanto idea and took a fast search at the net to find out if there excist a local esperanto youth group (yes). But, they had some borring topics at their agenda (parlor game) again and again. So I searched on the net what topic I could connect to Esperanto. And then I found this free Karafun karaoke editor and made some esperanto karaoke songs. Later, some fellows added some new eo karaokeo but get frusted due to involved work of karaoke creation. So I had to bounce it by myself again and again. Firstly over the 50x and may be the next time over the 3 hr esperanto karaokeo limit. BUT - all this didn't help to improve my esperanto skills so I started with help of the de.lernu.net community 3x german subtiteled esperanto karaokeo. Sometimes you get the feeling that if you will not do something by yourself nobody else will make it reality. That was the reason why I kept on track to increase esperanto karaoke song choice namely the eobo arkivo.

Gbx,

Miland:Saluton, Uvi. I came across a copy of Teach Yourself Esperanto in a charity shop, and it became a hobby. Maybe one day, if you help Esperanto to flourish, Canada will have its first Universala Kongreso in Montreal!

Saluton Miland!!

Have you ever taken a look at the Esperanto Dictionary from J.C.Wells (also in the Teach Yourself series)? I happen to have it at home and I find it interesting to pick up from time to time, to discover new words. I'd like to find a copy of Teach Yourself Esperanto, especially because I know that the Teach Yourself series is excellent when it comes to concise grammar explanations.

You know, that's a very interesting idea you brought up about a Universala Kongreso in Montrealo We have an Esperanto society in Quebec (the province where Montreal is) http://www.esperanto.qc.ca/en and I would like to contribute to it when I become more fluent at Esperanto

Donniedillon:I have always enjoyed travel and languages. I couldn't say where I first heard about Esperanto, but I knew it existed for quite some time before I ever learned anything more about it.
The thing that pushed me to learn more about the language was the novel The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. In it, Santiago (the main character) learns Esperanto as part of his journey. It is an almost trivial part of the book, but it was enough to make me want to learn more about the language. So, here I am

I've come accross that novel at my local bookstore before, but the synopsis failed to attract my interest, as I am more into horror literature Is it a good read though?

Mutusen:I've always been interested in learning languages. I don't know when I first heard about Esperanto, but I didn't really think about it and was not especially interested.
And someday in February 2007, I don't remember how, I came across an essay written by Claude Piron, “Confession d'un fou”. The title means “Confession of a madman”, and the author talks about his experience with Esperanto as though it was a mental illness. (Sorry, as far as I know, it hasn't been translated to English or Esperanto.)

This got me interested and I read more about Esperanto, and I thought “If it's true, it must be awesome.” I liked the idea of an easy (although I spent a lot of time learning languages at school, I don't really speak them fluently), neutral language — and using it to travel and meet people from a lot of countries, so I decided to learn it.

And when I went to my first Esperanto convention in Hungary, in July 2008, I had almost no problem to understand others and express myself, and I spent a very good week. So I think Piron was mostly right.

Claude Piron has a very interesting perspective on the linguistic issue, indeed. I peruse through his site (http://claudepiron.free.fr/index.htm) whenever I have a moment. It's very agreable to know that there are people who share my view of how peoples should communicate with each other.

JulietAwesome:

Uvi:To that effect, I would like to know how you came to Esperanto, or how Esperanto came to you? How did you make the discovery? Was it through a positive or a negative experience?

I first came across Esperanto when my Star Trek geekdom lead me to William Shatner's performance in the 1965 film Incubus.

At least for me, I've wanted to learn a second language for a long time, mostly for the experience of learning a new langauge. Its probably very pragmatic to learn Spanish here in the US, but where's the fun in that?

I picked up on Esperanto for 3 reasons: 1) no cultural baggage, 2) greater mind share than other similarly purposed constructed languages, and 3) its a stepping stone to learning other languages too.

I've just started learning Esperanto during my lunch hour at work. The whole experience has been enlightening

Haha!! I'm familiar with the dillema between pragmatism and plain unjustified (but oh so delicious) fun!!

In my city, the main languages are English and French, and if you know Arabic or Spanish, that's a plus. So, given that I already speak Spanish, English and French, I've often had to face the awkward looks that people gave me when I told them that I was learning Romanian or Esperanto. The first question was always "what for?" and when I said "ah, just for the hell of it, the intellectual exercice" they'd look at me as if I'd grown a third eye on my forehead, lol!!!

But the truth is, you HAVE to have a bit of fun in life (if not LOTS of it). Without fun, what's the point of living, right?

So, welcome to the beautiful and ever-intriguing world of Esperanto, and I hope you'll find comfort in here with us!!!



PS: Inkubo was hilarious lol

TheBlackLilith:My reason would be slightly more mundane than most others I guess. I don't really care about communicating with bunches of people since considering my nature and human nature... well it doesn't work. I came to Esperanto, however, to learn a language mostly. I've been _really_ interested in Spanish, German, and Russian for quite some time now. But I never seem to stick it out. Esperanto is my stepping stone. Plus, I'm hoping to learn more about languages via learning Esperanto and other languages since I'm going to create my own private language for use in my notebooks and I _might_ create a dialect for use between me and my friends.

I think this is a beautiful project that you have.

It's cool that you like Elvish. Did you know that J.R.R. Tolkien (the author of Lord of the Rings) was a suporter of Esperanto? Here is another fun fact: his beautiful and magical stories grew out of a series of languages he invented. After he had invented those languages, he then imagined a miriad of different species of creatures speaking them....and then the magical world in his books came to life!!

arkadio:Saluton Uvi. I like languages. I was studying Russian, when I felt that I'd like a break from all those irregular verbs and inflections. Assuming that a constructed language would be the least irregular, I took up Esperanto. (I still enjoy Russian too.)

Russian kicks ass!! Although I only understand a few words and constructions, I'm caressing the intention of slowly getting into it for my own pleasure and personal knowledge. And also, I think Russian sounds awesome in music

ceigered:I really just got bored of learning one language then wanted to learn a bit of another. As a result my language exposure has pretty much gone English -> Italian (school) -> Indonesian (school) -> French (school) -> German (school) -> Indonesian AGAIN (school) -> Russian -> Swedish -> Hungarian -> Esperanto -> Japanese -> Chinese -> Korean -> Japanese etc. You can probably imagine that I've come across a lot of languages over a long time!

Now though I only tend to care about Japanese, Swedish, Irish and to a lesser extent Esperanto (only because I know it better in relation to some of the others), and the only languages I am constantly exposed to daily would be English and Japanese.

Holy s::*!! That's an impressive track sheet indeed, lol!!!

My sister has been a faithful student of Japanese for the last 5 years or so. She's a fan of the culture, and she's recently taken Mandarin Chinese as well. I find the sound of Japanese highly addictive, although I try to resist my curiosity to learn it because I have so many damned projects already, haha!!

qwertz:Sal,

Due to my profession I had to improve my English skills but I had no motivation to do this. I asked some of this language freax and they advised me to learn another language. Okay, I tried french 2 times. To difficult because you have to learn every word twice: how it is spoken and how it is written. I got bored of this. Anyway, I like the sound of the french language very much. So I was looking for another language what could attract me. Polish would be nice because I met a lot of kindly polish people abroad. But polish isn't easy, too. So I remembered this esperanto idea and took a fast search at the net to find out if there excist a local esperanto youth group (yes). But, they had some borring topics at their agenda (parlor game) again and again. So I searched on the net what topic I could connect to Esperanto. And then I found this free Karafun karaoke editor and made some esperanto karaoke songs. Later, some fellows added some new eo karaokeo but get frusted due to involved work of karaoke creation. So I had to bounce it by myself again and again. Firstly over the 50x and may be the next time over the 3 hr esperanto karaokeo limit. BUT - all this didn't help to improve my esperanto skills so I started with help of the de.lernu.net community 3x german subtiteled esperanto karaokeo. Sometimes you get the feeling that if you will not do something by yourself nobody else will make it reality. That was the reason why I kept on track to increase esperanto karaoke song choice namely the eobo arkivo.

Gbx,

You know, I share your opinion that, often, things are best done when they are done by oneself. However, I find myself slightly envying your energy. I can only dream of what I could achieve if I had a tad bit more of it

Uvi:Have you ever taken a look at the Esperanto Dictionary from J.C.Wells (also in the Teach Yourself series)? .. I'd like to find a copy of Teach Yourself Esperanto.. We have an Esperanto society in Quebec.. and I would like to contribute to it when I become more fluent

Saluton Uvi!

Yes, I have had Wells since I was a beginner. I have heard that there may be a revised edition published within the next few months.

Teach Yourself Esperanto can easily be obtained in used copies.

Visiting the Esperanto society in Quebec (especially since they appear to meet regularly in Montreal) is a very good idea. Once you can read and contribute to the easier parts of the Esperanto-speaking forums, it may also be a good idea to consider attending a national congress.

Finally I too am an admirer of Claude Piron. He passed on nearly two years ago, but I hope that his internet articles might be published in book form some day.

Bonan ŝancon!