Learn to speak Bulgarian!
An Enlightening and Delightful Class
Since early August of 2005, my husband and I have been involved in the complex adoption of twin five-year -old orphans from central Bulgaria. We have spent over a month with the children during the last two visits to Bulgaria, and found that our limited knowledge of the Bulgarian has made communication with the children extremely difficult. For the past three months, we have been studying Bulgarian at BUC"Znanie", in a structured Bulgarian language class, with a qualified Bulgarian language teacher. The class has been enlightening and delightful!
I would recommend the class to anyone in any stage of learning the Bulgarian language. American and non -Bulgarian spouses and "significant others " would benefit from an education in language and culture , while opening the door to an entire new world of the blossoming Bulgarian community in the Chicago area .
My own knowledge of the language has been from limited contact with the Bulgarian community over the last 27 years. Although his grandfather was born and raised in Plovdiv, until now, my husband has practically no knowledge of the Bulgarian language.
We look forward to continuing our language class at Bulgarian Learning Center “ZNANIE” .
MaryAnne & Veli Korkut
So … I am learning Bulgarian
I go to class Saturdays in a school which Lily directs. There are fore other people in the class too. Fortunately for us, Kris, our teacher, is from Bulgaria, where she taught the Bulgarian, language to students there. This is a great thing. She presents our lessons much the same as an English teacher would to students in this country. Kris is professional and very patient, and I am glad that she is. We are lucky to have her.
Most annoying for me is the Cyrillic alphabet. The other languages I know, Spanish, and a bit of French, do not confound me with this difference. Personally, I find that one could actually do without some of these letters and use two other letters together instead. Alas! I don’t make the rules. Of course, Bulgaria could adopt the academic (Latin) rendering of the alphabet, which would solve my problem totally. This is not likely to happen soon. I will, therefore, will not mention this, and struggle to learn the best that I can. In defense of the Bulgarian language I admit that it is much more phonetic than the English language and it is much easier to spell the words. I hear this complaint about our varied and unpredictable spelling from everyone who tries to learn English. (except maybe the Chinese, who don’t even have an alphabet …)
I am enjoying learning Bulgarian very much. It is a different and challenging experience. I know that I will have to supplement my leaning with some audio lessons. Happily, I do not anticipate suddenly being dropped in the middle of Sophia trying to order dinner. If this were the case, I believe I would starve or someone might bring me dirt to eat. Even though I know just a little Bulgarian, I am safe for now.
Rob Holden
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