Trellum

@sillylucy I think those two are two different languages. I'm not familiar with the language the Amish speak, but it sounds a lot like German. As far as I know the way words are spelled and pronounced is so different from Dutch. Similar to the language spoken by the Mennonites here, I think both of those people use a language closer related to German, but I am no expert.

@anna3101 The most weird thing happened when I was a member of that site (I no longer log in there because... bleh, lol) is that most, if not all of the people who contacted me were natives D: I wanted so desperately to find a learner, specially a girl in a similar situation to mine, but no luck! I did find a man who was also a learner, he wanted to practice Spanish, but spoke Dutch so well! He has been the best so far. By the way, the other learners who added me didn't pass from the first message, no idea why Sometimes I think I wasn't effusive enough? When that kind of things happen you can't help but to wonder. Those sites are tricky :/ I think very few of those people are truly interested in languages

You think so? I've been learning it for one year (not seriously thought), only started to study it more seriously recently (one month). At first I got kinda scared wen I noticed the fact the second verb always is at the end and other weird rules regarding to word order. Word order was and still is my biggest problem, but I think I'm starting to get it I have no choice really.

Oh no! Best of luck with that! Actually yes, I needed that test in order to get my residence and work permit. And by the way, guess what? I passed!!!! I got the results just today and I passed!!! I am so surprised, and I didn't do as bad as I thought I had done I might post my results later!!! Excited!!!!!!! Don't wrry, I am sure you will pass that test. I gather that you have been living in Poland for a while, and since you said you are using a Dutch course in Polish, then I am really guessing your Polish is much better than my Dutch By the way, what's the level you need to pass that exam?

Hehehe, my Dutch is not that good either I first want to completely dominate this language, so I have a better chance to get a good job in the Netherlands, according to the inburgering video knowing Dutch well can open a lot doors, well, we will see Right now I know for sure my reading and speaking are just A1. By the way, we can practice Spanish whenever you like, I'm always open to any kind of questions... I like to believe I am good at explaining myself well, lol.

Bien por ti chica! De hecho lo escribes muy bien Que nivel dirias que posees? Mira que te soy sincera, estoy muy sorprendida con tu nivel porque mencionas que no estudias seguido (como yo, jajajajaja!). Me muero de curiosidad, amiga... ¿cuánto llevas estudiando español???? En fin, encontré muy poquitos errores en tu mensaje (realmente minimos, ya quisieran muchos amigos que han estado estudiando español por años tener tu nivel de espaoñ). En fin, corregi por ti los pocos errores que encontré: ''Muchas gracias para tu gentileza y las canciones! Me gustan! Es bastante dificil decir cuanto tiempo estoy estudiando español porque siempre hago pausas. Estudio durante algunos meses, pues no hago nada durante un año Soy muy perezosa pero he apredido de vivir con eso. Ya no me reprocho a mi misma por no ser una persona diligente. Estudio cuando puedo y quiero hacerlo. Estos dias, trato de aprender espanol cado domingo. Tengo un manual de estudio que me gusta mucho. Es destinado para jovenes, y yo soy joven de corazon ''

Hahaha, same here! Sometimes a word is harder to pronounce than others, so I need to listen to it several times. Sometimes I need to review a word several times before I memorize it, this is the case now that I am learning Dutch I believe that working on my own Memrise course is helping me though, because I am adding the auio myself, and I often have to repeat the same word over and over while the recording process, I do so until I get it right and then I proceed to upload it on the site.

Whenever I am not sure about the pronunciation of certain words I use this site: http://forvo.com/languages/nl/ Other languages are available as well. While creating my Memrise course this site has helped me enormously to find the pronunciation of words that are unknown to me I love it! I don't know what I'd do without it.

What about Memrise? I know a lot people find it tedious to create their own word lists, but they ignore that doing that actually helps them learn said words even faster. I know it did help me, but it requires constant work I'd never go back to Duolingo to ''learn'' a language ever... total waste of time. Maybe if they used phrases that were more useful, and made more sense (maybe some context wouldn't hurt) Duolingo wouldn't be so bad.

Awww, thanks for sharing, Anna I love Belgian accent even more than Dutch one, the Dutch one sound so rough, but the Belgian is so nice Wish I was moving to Belgium instead of the Netherlands, I think it would be easier for me to understand people better over there, as well as pronouncing words better. I've some trouble with some words that carry the ''ng'' combo, lol. A friend of mine is Belgian, by the way, I might surprise him the next time we talk I bet he doesn't expect me to talk Dutch to him!

Hi guys, just two weeks ago I had to take the Basis Examen Inburgering. I haven't gotten the results yet, but I am confident I passed ''Leesvaardigheid A1'' and ''KNS'', but not so sure about ''Spreekvaardigheid A1''. It was such a long day for me, I couldn't sleep the previous night and I was in a different city I didn't even know (I had never been there and that place is so damn huge! I was scared actually!). They delayed the exam a little too much, they had already told me it'd be 30 minutes later, but it ended up being a whole hour. I was very upset about the fact that they used words that weren't in the course sold by the Dutch government to those wanting to take this exam, the ''Naar Nederland'' course. Not at all. I was lucky I came across this site: https://basisexameninburgering.nl/lessen There I learnt a lot new words (still learning actually). I thought it was so shady of them. I actually plan to write to DUO to let them know what I think, but I will wait until I get my exam results If you plan to take this exam... get ready to find and hear words that weren't even in the course. You must learn as many words as possible so they don't shock you with strange words you don't even know. Try to learn the basics, like for example the names of foods, fruits, vegetables, clothes, body parts, places vocab, music, professions, weather, etc. Also be aware that during the Spreekvaardigheid you might be asked about topics that were never covered in the book, so be wary of that. And yes, check out the practice exam at the official Naar Nederland site, if you are lucky you will get the same questions (valid only for Spreekvaardigheid) during the real exam, but it's really about look, because they have at least 6 different combos for each exam. The guy picks them randomly, some harder than others. Anybody here has taken this test? What did you think of it? Did you pass it the first time or had to take it a second time? Please share your experiences, I am looking forward to hearing them!

Oh my good, same here, @anna3101 !!! Well, I got contacted later on by more people on that site... a loooot, but you know what is the funny thing about it? When I was finally contacted by someone... I sent a message to them there, some of them took ages to log back in and when they finally did they never replied Some added me to their friend list, but never ever spoke to me, sometimes we'd hit it off and exchange a couple of message and suddenly they'd no longer log into the site. Some Dutch people expected me to teach them Spanish! I'd never ask anyone to teach me Dutch from scratch... not even my own fiance! A girl said she'd prepare lessons for me, I didn't want that, plus I haven't created lessons in a long time, and I could never accept such a deal unless I was ready to do the same. I was teacher and to be honest disliked it, not sure I'd do it even if I was paid. I just don't like to teach... I have no problems if they ask me to translate whole phrases, or ask me grammar questions. I'm a very trustworthy person and it's always good to have a language exchange buddy who is like that. My fiance is not very helpful when it comes to Dutch grammar Hence I needed language exchange buddies. I guess I should just get a good dutch grammar book, lol.

Interesting I had heard about the similarities of both languages before, but I had never read a dialogue in Afrikaans. So interesting! I understood almost everything, even though the use of certain words didn't make that much sense to me tho, like for example the use of ''dit'' instead of ''het'' and ''gaan'' instead of ''gaat''. Plus other things

I am a Spanish speaker and to be honest my whole life I thought that Catsup was only used by Spanish speakers and ketchup was only used by English speakers. I thought we were responsible for that odd spelling Glad to know we really aren't, that both versions are used in the English speaking countries. I personally prefer to use ''Ketchup'' when speaking English, and only use catsup when speaking with Spanish speakers.

Me gusta hacer correr y hacer ejercicio. Me gusta tambien estudiar los idiomas y me gusta tocar (eh?) con mis gatitos. <----- Not sure what you meant with this last bit, but I will assume you meant you like to play with your cats. In that case you can simply say: Me gusta jugar con mis gatitos. Me tome la libertad de tachar las palabras que no hacen falta y corregir las que estaban mal escritas.

Hace poco estuve en la ciudad de Mexico, en que delegacion estás? Yo tambien soy de Mexico Es muy interesante ver gente por aca que tambien sea de Mexico. Espero que estes disfrutanto tu estadia en este forum, si tienes algun problema con el idioma aleman ten toda la confianza de preguntar. De hecho el administrador de este foro habla Aleman

Muy buen trabajo, chica. Algunos pequeños errores, pero nada de que preocuparse. De hecho tu nivel es bastante bueno Felicidades! ¿Cuanto tiempo has estado estudiando el idioma español? Pareces escribirlo bastante bien! Por cierto si te interesa la musica de antes, entonces deberias escuchar a artistas como: I TOTALLY love this one:

Concuerdo contigo amigo, a mi la verdad ni la música en español ni la música en inglés modernas me gustan. En mi opinión la escena musical actual es aun peor caundo hablamos de la musica en ingles, especialmente el mercado americano. Es terrible, la misma musica reciclada una y otra vez... es dificil distinguir un artista de otro en la radio. No es como en ls 90's Antes los videos de musica eran sper originales, ya no mas. Por eso tambien prefiero las viejitas Que suerte haber crecido en los 90's!

I can help you with your Spanish if you want =D What methods are you using to learn it and what is your level in Spanish? And by the way, right now my speaking level (Dutch) is A1, as for reading also A1. I need to work harder, but while I wait for my results I guess I can try and relax for a bit Last weeks have been very stressing. By the way, from what part of Russia are you? I'm curious =D My great great grandfather was Russian as well I might try to learn Russian as well, but the script makes me kind of nervous.

Same thing happened to me, very weird message! It's a shame, I was hoping to see Dutch there Oh well, I recently found some very helpful sites, I hope I can share them on here very soon. Some are a bit old, but really good I still prefer a good grammar book though, but those are not so easy to find, not even in English.

Really? Creating my word list helped me memorize more words even easier =D Now I understand more Dutch You should consider giving it another try I first wrote all the books I wanted to add from my course on a notebook (so I didn't end up repeating the same words several times), then I transcribed those words to WORD, after that I added them to Memrise and voila!

That is true, you need to have certain level of knowledge in that language in order to be able to take advantage of this. So I definitely think is not for everyone. I actually tried watching movies with Dutch subtitles earlier on and didn't see a lot benefit from it, but I think that once you reach the conversational level and you are looking for colloquial phrases I think that is where you need to be looking.

Ugh, I got nauseous just thinking of that, lol. Gosh, I repeat it: I respect those who are learning this language so much! It takes a lot courage and motivation to do so, something not many people have. I definitely don't I could only imagine myself learning Chinese if I really had to. @Blaveloper Aren't you learning spanish anymore? What happened?

Wow... your teacher sounds like the most amazing teacher ever, for reals! I wish I had had a teacher like that, but I have never had a teacher that motivated and passionate for what he does. I guess I haven't been very lucky in that sense either. Are you one of those students who ended up going in a student exchange to Germany?

When you face this during high school is different than when you face it when you are a 3rd grader, believe me. This whole incident traumatized me so badly, but fortunately I got over it and now I am a new person. I still have confidence issues, in which I feel some doubt. Specially when it comes to school, I still fear I might not be able to do certain things, specially if I ever go back to college.