Useful phrases Duolingo has taught me this week

[booboo57]

Trying Duolingo for the first for our upcoming Italian trip. This week I have learnt to say :
They are not forks
The horses drink the milk.

I wanted to learn how to order a g&t and teach my husband how to ask for the bill.

I've had all of those, including the screenshot!
Before the horse one I also had "my horse is neither an artist nor an architect" so I was pleased the horse was progressing in life.
This week I had "This rich business man from Siberia has bought himself a large house in West London."

I was joking with the friends we went on holiday with about this. About all I could say in the language of our destination is 'I am a woman' or 'I am a man', slightly more sensibly than above, 'the boy drinks milk'. I could have used that one for my DS if I'd had my wits about me, it is quite accurate.

Aren't we all, SomethingPunny, aren't we all.

Whoever it was that 'threw the water over Owen in the nightclub' has my complete sympathy.

I’ve been doing Duolingo Spanish for a few years now and I’ve mainly learned that cows and pigs do a lot of cleaning, cooking and TV watching. Not sure what the actual spanish people do….

It's not just Duolingo though. Here are some gems from my Russian textbook (not all from the same exercise):

• Ask your best friend to tell you why you are not popular
• I had a talk with him yesterday and I told him I had killed the dog
• Unfortunately my uncle is in hospital and my aunt is in prison. I visit my uncle once a week but it is not possible to visit my aunt.
• How many times must I tell you that the British delegation does not intend to go anywhere today?

I was charmed to see that while nearly every Duo language starts with a diet of tea, coffee, bread, milk and an apple, Scots Gaelic gets IrnBru in there from the off.

Pojken dricker inte ölja.

A classic of the Swedish Duolingo genre.

I saw this ‘poem’ made of Duolingo phrases on Twitter ages ago. I’ve just googled to find it again and it’s actually quite sinister-sounding!

This is why I stopped doing French lessons (apart from Covid that is). I don't want to have conversations about belfries in northern France, or world water shortages.

I want to know what to say if my car breaks down, or buy all day passes, or tell a plumber what's wrong with my shower.

That's very useful!
I got "Mother likes cleaning the house" once which she emphatically does NOT.
My DS can't really understand the stories though he likes doing them rather than the basics section he's really on, because of the characters.

I was charmed to see that while nearly every Duo language starts with a diet of tea, coffee, bread, milk and an apple, Scots Gaelic gets IrnBru in there from the off.

The Russian version has a thing for pizza, sushi and mashed potatoes.

Snakes also pop up a lot. Apparently they don't like mashed potato!

The Spanish course taught how to say 'I made a triangle out of cardboard". I can't think of any situation where I'm going to need to declare that proudly!

In the Dutch lessons, the ducks are insecure about the rhinoceros' clothes! To be fair, it does stick in the mind!

I've also done Welsh and did wonder if they eat more parsnips than the English. The frequent mention of omelettes was a nod to Gavin and Stacey I assumed.

I'm doing Ukrainian at the moment to help out with the refugees locally as I already have a degree in Russian so it's a pretty easy shift across. So far the Ukrainian Duo doesn't have any weird phrases!

The Russian version has a thing for pizza, sushi and mashed potatoes.

To be fair I think that is because pizza and sushi are still called pizza and sushi, so it helps in learning the alphabet.

I got a bit chessed of with duolingo when it started to critisise my accent!
Mind you, when a man came over from the country, he too said my accent wasnt that good in some places!

I'm old enough to remember the Monty Python Hungarian/English phrasebook; 'my hovercraft is full of eels'.

I'm not sure which I least enjoy. Ironing or trying to pronounce "smwddio".

I'm learning German on Duolingo and have got a few of these. My latest favourite phrases are "Can your elephant vacuum well?" and "Sorry, we do not exchange Euros for horses here"

Oh I love the word ‘smwddio’ (and ciwb, and sied, and siwmper).

I’m doing the Spanish course and haven’t had to say anything about cows cooking or making a triangle out of cardboard?! I’m not sure if I’m pleased or not about this!

I have learned really useful things like how to pay a bill and order things at a restaurant which was great on our recent trip to Tenerife. I did get a bit excited in the taxi from the airport though when I recognised phrases on the billboards as we drove by and screeched them out to DH in delight. I only realised later that the poor taxi driver must have been really confused why I was shouting about ‘Cocinas y banos baratos’ (cheap kitchens and bathrooms)!

In Polish Duo was very eager for me to ask if eggs are vegetables. As I know they aren't I can't imagine why I would want to ask this in Poland.

There’s a whole soap opera there!

One of my favourites is ‘Owen pays his taxes in parsnips.’

I’ve been doing French since Christmas. My neighbour’s cow is very nice but is often in the bedroom.

Is it only me who gets regular sentences about death?
Il pinguino muore da fame
That sort of thing!

Yep I'm on that part at the moment!!