macliam

My solicitor said Bom Dia to me today as he arrived for our meeting at 2pm. It didn't phase me half as much as a lawyer actually arriving on time for a meeting!

ouriquejan

Bon dia liveabroad??

Annetje

And how am I supposed to learn ???

Ps. in my village nobody can teach Portuguese, I can learn Spanish though. Seems a bit weird to change my future just based on teacher qualifications in my village ...

macliam

Check out the links I gave - there are online courses for European Portuguese, but given the number of Portuguese living in France. I'd be amazed if there's nobody near you who could at least converse.......

Otherwise, just get out here and start from scratch - there are plenty of people living here who don't speak the lingo - the desire to learn is the important thing.

As I was told "Falar português é fácil - até bebês sabem fazê-lo!" (Google translate is you friend - sometimes)

Annetje

Yes, definitely will do, tbh I'm not too worried about it, sure the language will work out. maybe a bit worried about Portuguese Doctors and Specialists, is already confusing in French. I mean, as one gets older one might need those a bit more. But again, all to be investigated. I think I have seen a thread about that not too long ago on here.
Just funny that there are no Portuguese people here ... very small village with very few foreigners. As far as I know, no Brits at all, just a few Belgians which I do not know.
Yes, let's talk Google translate .From my head : (falar) portuguese is easy, ... nope, second sentence was google
At the beginning of my ''English'' life, I was always amazed that British kids spoke English so well whilst I was struggling,

Red Eric

I think you're being a bit greedy here Annetje.

You already speak fluent Flemish, English and French (at least - any others?). Now you want to add Portuguese. Are you going to leave some for anyone else?

dmu

A myth - there are no Portuguese in my neck of the woods (Languedoc).
Unless Annetje is Senior, like me, she'll have no problem picking up the spoken language once on the spot, provided she's got the basic grammar and vocab.
@Annetje: in addition to on-line courses, you could get the basics from "Portugais Express" (Ed. Dauphin) or "Portugais pour les Nuls" (although there are some typos in the latter).

macliam

What's a myth? According to wikipedia, and from data prior to thr economic crisis, there were almost 650,000 Portuguese-born residents in France and almost 1.25m of direct Portuguese background......

Areas quoted with large populations are Languedoc-Rousillon and Provence. So, I stand by my statement. In the UK, the numbers have swelled in the last ten years and even my local town has more than one Portuguese cafe and shop, so I find it hard to believe that the same hasn't happened in France. A quick search on Portuguese in Languedoc came up with an expars site...... a little more research maybe?

EMR

The Portuguese diaspora as we know is continuing.
A lad who used to work for our gardener is now a bar man in London.
He moved post brexit, he had no concerns about finding a job or somewhere to live as he has friends who already live in London.
When fishing I got chatting to two others who it turned out were on holiday in Portugal visiting family
Their home was in Norfolk where they worked for a well known producer of Turkey products...
How many Portuguese now live in the UK?

AliceCaroline

If you have a good internet connection you can have lessons via SKYPE. I have lessons with a lady in Lisbon, just google SKYPE language lessons.


A very good book to explain the grammar of portuguese is; "The language lovers guide to learning portuguese, Pronunciation and grammar explained in plain english" by Russell Walker and Rafael Tavares.
ISBN 978-0-9929592-0-3

It is European Portuguese not Brazilian, but does cover the differences.

I've found it really, really helpful. It assumes you know nothing but over the 300 plus pages covers just about everything to do with grammar. I found it a bit daunting to start, but since you are already multi lingual it probably won't faze you.

AliceCaroline

According to the governments White Paper on BREXIT over 200,000.

EMR

Thanks.

macliam

We married on June 10 (Dia de Camões, de Portugal e das Comunidades) so every anniversary is a bank holiday! When we first married (a lifetime ago) the estimated Portuguese population was 30,000 ..... yet every year they filled a park in London to overflowing - and that was just London.

The problem with the UK is that they have absolutely no idea how many are there because the border control is a farce for anyone not requiring a visa. Nobody ever registers my passport on the way in and nobody (except Ryanair) even checks it on the way out! That's not because of the EU, its because the UK don't bother and Brexit isn't likely to change that really......

EMR

I think that you will find that every time UK border control scans a passport etc , it is recorded.

macliam

So they have cameras in their eyes now? My passport is electronically scanned maybe 30% of the time - and what's the point of knowing who's coming in when you don't check who's going out?