Esperanto

Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports
1

Thanks, Monty, for an interesting discussion of Esperanto ( http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mesperanto.html ).

There were a couple of typos in the paragraph from The People’s Almanac.

“Moderno” should be “moderna”. (The adjectival ending is -a. “Moderno” would be a noun, meaning something or someone modern.)

“Konsieron” should be “konsideron” (“consideration”).

Of course I’m an absolute expert in Esperanto, having taken a 10-week postal course in 1985. ;-{)}

Dankon. --Dave

(P.S.: This is my first time using UBB code, so I hope it turns out all right.)

Life’s a disease… enjoy the symptoms.

2

Sending this one over to the forum for commenting on Mailbag columns…
Jill

3

[QUOTE=DaveoRad]
Thanks, Monty, for an interesting discussion of Esperanto ( http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mesperanto.html ).

One of the links (to demon.co.uk) is obsolete, but the information is available on one of the other links.

The U of Hartford course no longer exists. The SFSU course has moved to Brattleboro Vermont, at the School for International Training.

Links for that course and, in general, a good starting point for Americans or other English speakers is the website of the Esperanto League for North America, www.esperanto-usa.org .

Thanks –

David

4

I’m bumping this because I got to see Esperanto “in the wild”, so to speak. Way back ine the beginning of January this year, I finally got around to going inside the Palace Museum in Beijing. For a small fee, visitors to the museum can rent one of those proximity translators (as you approach a particular exhibit, the translator picks up its signal and you get to listen to something about that exhibit. The number of languages available is respectable (I think around 20); one of those languages is Esperanto.

5

mm

6

I concur.

7

On a Sunday afternoon, the members of the Esperanto Club met in a classroom for a chance to speak this International Language.

After the meeting, they met outside the classroom to speak the real International Language: Yiddish.

8

I’m just geeky enough that next time I’m in Beijing (if I have time) I might consider visiting this museum just to see the Esperanto!

Upon further research, I realize that that’s just the museum in the Forbidden City, and I have absolutely no desire to ever get close to that crowd again! :smack:

9

America’s second language! Well, it seemed like it was when I was a kid, there was so much Yiddish on TV.

10

Oh. Sorry. I was going to type “You know, I never noticed that Esperanto looked like some mixture of Spanish and English before. Anyone know why?”

I can’t remember why I wrote “nm” instead of fixing it. Oh well.