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1.       Nuts
1 posts
 13 Jun 2009 Sat 01:56 pm

Came to Turkey for 2 weeks and my turkish language is really bad. am into my 2nd week in turkey and the depressing thing in turkey is rarely u find a person who can speak english. i really wanna learn the turkish language too. but is anybody out there from Turkey and knows english?? (jus curious)Cool

2.       Trudy
7887 posts
 13 Jun 2009 Sat 03:37 pm

 

Quoting Nuts

Came to Turkey for 2 weeks and my turkish language is really bad. am into my 2nd week in turkey and the depressing thing in turkey is rarely u find a person who can speak english. i really wanna learn the turkish language too. but is anybody out there from Turkey and knows english?? (jus curious)Cool

 

Do you have a (travel) dictionary with you? If not, buy one! And where in Turkey are you? My experiences are that in Istanbul and other touristy places enough people speak (some) English, but indeed in the East or South-East hardly anyone does. Well, just smile and use gestures, it worked fine for me. Oh besides, I quite often experienced (in Sivas, in Erzurum, in Þanliurfa) that when people didn´t speak English they did speak German or French which was ok for me as well.

3.       Elisabeth
5732 posts
 13 Jun 2009 Sat 05:41 pm

One of the wonderful things about Turkey is that if you don´t know the language completely, you can still manage a bit.  If you know a few key words, you will be surprised at how far that can get you.  Most Turks are extremely helpful and are so pleased that you even know a few words that they will go out of their way to help you.  I have had several experienece where a Turkish person will find someone who speaks English to help you.

4.       catwoman
8933 posts
 15 Jun 2009 Mon 05:09 pm

Which city did you go to? If you are in a little town, then it may be very hard to communicate with people around. Even in big cities it is not so obvious that people will speak English, although it´s certainly much easier to get around..

5.       alameda
3499 posts
 15 Jun 2009 Mon 07:58 pm

 

Quoting catwoman

Which city did you go to? If you are in a little town, then it may be very hard to communicate with people around. Even in big cities it is not so obvious that people will speak English, although it´s certainly much easier to get around..

 

 I think English is widely taught in Turkey, but many people only have an academic understanding of it.  It could be a lot more people can understand, but can not speak the words, and for many they have not heard a variety of English accents.  One has to be careful in speaking to clearly pronounce the words.  If the speach is rapid, they may not understand.

 

But as Trudy and others have said, you need to get a Turkish dictionary ASAP

 

It was amazing to me how there always seemed to be someone around who could speak English, even though the pronounciation was "odd".



Edited (6/15/2009) by alameda [add]

6.       catwoman
8933 posts
 16 Jun 2009 Tue 03:29 am

 

Quoting alameda

 

 

 I think English is widely taught in Turkey, but many people only have an academic understanding of it.  It could be a lot more people can understand, but can not speak the words, and for many they have not heard a variety of English accents.  One has to be careful in speaking to clearly pronounce the words.  If the speach is rapid, they may not understand.

 

But as Trudy and others have said, you need to get a Turkish dictionary ASAP

 

It was amazing to me how there always seemed to be someone around who could speak English, even though the pronounciation was "odd".

 

Actually, maybe the youngest generation does learn English widely, but most people who have alrady graduated from high schools do not speak English. That is not because of ´variety of accents´ or ´careless pronounciation´ -- they simply can´t speak English because they never larned it. When you go to Germany or Netherlands, EVERYBODY speaks English although they never visited an english-speaking country.

 

I must add that I did meet an older gentleman in the subway once who asked me which language do I prefer: italian, german, english, spanish...... Confused

 

You can get by in Istanbul without knowing Turkish, but from my experience, it´s much harder in other places.

7.       alameda
3499 posts
 16 Jun 2009 Tue 07:43 pm

 

Quoting catwoman

 

 

Actually, maybe the youngest generation does learn English widely, but most people who have alrady graduated from high schools do not speak English. That is not because of ´variety of accents´ or ´careless pronounciation´ -- they simply can´t speak English because they never larned it. When you go to Germany or Netherlands, EVERYBODY speaks English although they never visited an english-speaking country.

 

I must add that I did meet an older gentleman in the subway once who asked me which language do I prefer: italian, german, english, spanish...... Confused

 

You can get by in Istanbul without knowing Turkish, but from my experience, it´s much harder in other places.

 

What I said is English is widely taught in Turkish schools.  One can study a language and never speak it. I think most people in the US have studied another language, but most can not speak, read or understand the spoken words.  I met many in Turkey, in fact all I met,  from the ages of 10 to 30 who had some English classes in school.....and that was from Istanbul to Sanilurfa.

 

I often find it hard to understand some of the different regionalisms in spoken English myself when hearing people from other places speak English. 



Edited (6/16/2009) by alameda [add]

8.       catwoman
8933 posts
 16 Jun 2009 Tue 10:22 pm

As I said, it is not whether they had English in school, but how much. Clearly not enough to be able to speak or understand. People who do study enough, do understand most of what they hear.

9.       tayyarali
17 posts
 21 Jun 2009 Sun 06:11 am

that is also valid for me...i learned english when i was in midle school...but getting older i started to forget words and barely speaks...i do not why but speaking is always hard even i watch movies with subtitles to improve my English really takes time

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