Online Translations

A couple of statistics:

1. With 329 million native speakers, Spanish ranks as the world's No. 2 language in terms of how many people speak it as their first language. It is slightly ahead of English (328 million) but far behind Chinese (1.2 billion). (Source: Ethnologue)

http://spanish.about.com/od/historyofspanish/a/10_facts_about_spanish.htm

Campana! There is a billion and a half difference between the number of people whose mother tongue, mostly UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, parts of South Africa, and the USA   ...  and those who can speak English as a second language. So your 328 million is quite fallacious as well as ridiculous.

No one was comparing the numbers of NATIVE speaking English or Spanish: The indisputable fact is that anything between 1,000 million (a billion) and 1.8bn can make themselves understood in the English language. Only an estimated 500 million people can speak Spanish. If you want to make a contribution, fine; but don't use distortion.

The figures aren't mine, Mike (and there is no need to bite my head off!!)  Why is everyone so unpleasant to each other, I ask.

I think everyone is entitled to make a contribution here.

Patricia

 Too true patricia good to see somebody nice on here shame its often more like idiot on spain. Dont know why I bother trying to help sometimes. I wonder what sort of junk Mike writes? You certainly wouldn't want to pay or meet him either I suppose.

Mike

at least Patricia quotes a source.  If you were to do the same for your "indisputable facts" you would have a lot more credibility. 

328 million is not self-evidently wrong when you consider the number of people whose first language is Spanish, Italian, Russian and all the other immigrant communities in the USA; French Canadians; not to mention the millions of UK immigrants from other EU and Commonwealth countries.   328 million sounds quite plausible to me.  But you may have a more credible source for your contradiction.

I suspect that you are right on those who can communicate in English particularly when remembering that there is no language called Chinese.  The principal language is Mandarin which, according to Patricia's source has 800,000 speakers.  But, again, if you are going to post "indisputable facts" without a source, you should expect to have them disputed.

Another link:

http://www.vistawide.com/languages/top_30_languages.htm

We can all go Googling through the various statistics until we come up with a figure that suits our position. There seems little dispute that the number of people able to speak English is at least double the number of those who speak Spanish. I maintain that confusing this with numbers relating to native speakers is a fallacious departure. If you want to prove that there are more people in the world who speak Spanish than English then I am happy to see those figures.

JEK! With respect, you have a damned impudence to constantly accuse me of lacking credibility when other than 'retired civil servant' you choose to remain anonymous. For all I know you could be my mother-in-law, my ex-wife. You could be posting under many names across many forums. Why don't you stop sniping from obscurity and tell us who and where you are?  I really do think this practice of forum anonymity should either be banned or it should be a condition that everyone is anonymous. I am very uncomfortable with those who post anonymously; we should all be suspicious of their motives and wonder what they have to hide.

maybe going a bit off track here but the Spanish are very fond of speaking English when they have something to sell and want the expat money.

Nowadays you only have to walk into the big department stores on CDS and the adverts are being blasted out in English.

It's fair to say some Spanish are not too fond of the invasion now that we are here but they weren't complaining when they were taking in the English money and now they are stuck with the fact the English own half the coast.

Mike:

This is what I said.

"The figures aren't mine, Mike (and there is no need to bite my head off!!)  Why is everyone so unpleasant to each other, I ask.

I think everyone is entitled to make a contribution here."

I did not accuse you of rudeness, Mike.  And I agree with you that there are posters who seem to be constantly ill-humoured and jump on one for even the most innocuous remark and on threads dealing with absolutely inoffensive topics. AS for googling to find statistics to suit my position, please don't second-guess me, Mike.  That was not my intention.    I looked up the stats as a matter of interest.  And just for the record I surely have no quarrel with you nor indeed with anyone else here. 

On the matter of forum anonymity, I suppose rules in this area are a matter for Justin (EOS).  Perhaps it is time to review the situation with him and perhaps he will re-state the rules.   I am sure you will correct me, but I think that it is a matter of choice whether a forum member wishes to give full name, address and contact details.   There are, unfortunately, trolls on the internet whose idea of entertainment is to register on a forum or forums for the sole purpose of causing havoc.  I should not like one of that sort to have my personal details.

 Anyhow, all the best to everyone.

Patricia

This is just a FYI link:

http://www.nationsonline.org/oneworld/countries_by_languages.htm

As I press "send" I am diving under  my desk to avoid any flak LOL.

Patricia

Peace, Patricia,

I told you google translate does the job but then you can lead a horse to water but you will never make think

No problem Mike

Given the times that are in it, I cannot quarrel with your suggestion that it might be a good idea for the board owner/moderator to have the posters' real names, addresses and contact details.  Perhaps Justin might give the suggestion some consideration.  We shall see.

Cyberspace can be a  jungle!

Good wihes

Patricia

To return to the original question! 

We use Google to translate, but the automatic translations do leave a lot to be desired.  However we have been learning Spanish over the past three years since moving here, so most of the time we are able to suss out when it is wrong.  Somebody mentioned keeping it simple, which definitely helps.  We look at the translation and, if something appears to be incorrect, we rewrite the original English version until we are fairly confident that what we are saying in Spanish is correct.  I think that some Spanish restaurants and other businesses must use Google to translate into English, judging by some of the strange English phrases that we come across!

I would be very wary of recommending Google to anyone who doesn't have much knowledge of the Spanish language. 

Mike, newspapers do publish letters anonymously, however they know the writers' real identities and print something along the lines of "writer's name and address witheld on request".

Sue

 I GIVE UP WITH YOU ALL SUCH CR*P  IF YOU CAN'T SPEAK SPANISH HOW WOULD YOU KNOW AS I HAVE EVER SEEN MAY GOD BLESS YOU ALL BECAUSE I CANT LOVE AND XXX'S

Chefette22

What is your problem?  I am learning Spanish, but for older people (I am 63) it takes time to learn a new language.  I know enough to get by, but when I am sending an email I find it helpful to translate it from English first, then check anything that doesn't look right.  My point was that if you don't know any Spanish, there is a danger in assuming that a translation tool is perfect.

I am glad to say that the local people aren't as critical as you and appreciate our attempts to speak to them in their language.  At least I know that over the next few years my Spanish will improve.  Can you say that your manners will?

Sue

 OH NO THEY DONT THEY HATE US

 OH NO THEY DONT THEY HATE US

 GOD3  YEARS TAKES 6 MONTHS IF U GOT UR WIG ON STRAIGHT GROW UP