Language Barriers

This last weekend, I was able to travel to Rome, Italy for a few days. It was absolutely marvelous—definitely make the time to go. Seriously, it was more than I could have ever expected. Up to that point, I would say that there was an enormous language barrier here in Ireland. Now, though, I do think there is a very small language barrier in Ireland in the grand scheme of things simply because everyone speaks English. There are very few people that I have encountered that speak Irish outside of the classroom. As a matter of fact, the people that I have talked to hate the language and find it useless especially coming from the younger generation. I can and will say that there are times where I don’t catch everything a person is saying when I’m having a conversation and I need them to repeat what they had said. I can say that their accents differentiate between location and age and they always talk rather quickly—faster than what I am used to back home.

Apart from verbal language barriers, there is also a written language barrier. While I was in Rome, everything was in Italian and very few signs were in English. It’s different in Ireland. English is used on the sign, but so is Irish and Irish is used first for the most part. I appreciate the English used and utilized in  Ireland so much more now after being in a country that does not use it.

While I’m here I am studying the Irish language. It is hard.  We learn very simple words and phrases and it still is enough to get me frustrated because I can’t pronounce half of what I’m trying to say.  I personally think it is so hard because consonants and vowels have very different sounds that what I am used. For example, the letter combination of “bh” sounds like the Endglish “v.” Because of my English background, I like to learn the grammar behind a language, but my teacher said it is complicated even for native language speakers. It is a hard language, but I truly do enjoy trying to learn and I try to practice at the grocery store, pubs, and restaurants.