daisyman1951

It's often been said that the average Sun reader has a vocabulary of no more than 200 words. Now I know that all the Sun reading expats are in Spain, or Turkey, (forum wars?) but do you think that if I master 200 words in Pt I can get by? Managed for 3 years in Saudi with that many plus of course shouting and arm waving! Thanks

mfesharne

I think you can get by with a lot less that 200 words..... I guess I have about a 10th of that and only rarely have a problem...... I'd like more and am trying to learn more but that said, I usually manage to get by with what I have.

daisyman1951

Thanks for that, is that an Irish accent?

mfesharne

British by birth and English by the grace of God but spent a large part of my life kicking around Africa and lived in South Africa for 12 years before we moved to PT about 21 months ago. (I'm more comfortable in Africa than England)

FWIW, I've tried several language CDs & online learning courses and haven't got anywhere at all with them but have recently starter watching the PT news & weather forecast on the box for an hour a day and have learned more since I started doing that than with all the courses put together.

s5tuart

You know more than you think!!
Most English words that end in "ent" are the same in Portuguese except that they end in "ente" (different = differente) Just emphasise the penultimate vowel and pronounce the last vowel as "ay". differ-E-nt-ay.
That is also true for words that end in;
"ant" (important = importante) import-A-nte
"ible" (possible = possiVel)...substitute V for B, also true for
"able" (probable = provavel)

The Times uses around 600 words in it's musings, the Sun much less, so I think 200 words will be more than adequate.

mfesharne

I hadn't thought of it like that but of course you're right........ One of the biggest problems in my area at least is the locals speak at machine gun speeds so it's sometimes difficult to understand where one word ends and another begins.

s5tuart

I actually got that info from the Michel Thomas course, so can't claim it as my own. Unfortunately Michel passed away and did not narrate the Portuguese course, so in my opinion it is nowhere near as good as, say, the Spanish course.

daisyman1951

s5tuart many thanks for that, I am also struggling with books & CDs so I'm hoping immersion helps. That's how I learned Arabic

Ingles

+ get PT newspaper ever now and then , once you get the door open just a bit you will be surprised how quick you will pick words & phrase's

daisyman1951

Ingles how long have you been living in Pt?

Ingles

Sorry double post

daisyman1951

So far no one has owned up to reading the Sun

Ingles

Since late 80's