Microblog Memes

I think people from places that use idiographic languages that have to be transliterated probably actually have an easier time with English orthography than people whose language uses a Roman script and is pronounced phonetically. People who are used to puzzling through the layer of abstraction/obfuscation that sometimes ambiguous transliterations will have can see that English orthography is almost always substantially different than its pronunciation.

TL;DR: it's easier for a Chinese person to learn to read English aloud than a person from Romania, but the European would have studied it in school either somewhat or a lot

What about thought, through, tough, though... wtf?! It took me many many years to finally understand this crazyness lol

Lol in Polish

English is just Esperanto with no rules.

As a mainly spanish speaker the word that sent me is "brought" and being told is a monosyllabic word I swear I can clanly pass C2 tests and probably C3 tests and that shit still gets me even 10 years working with english speakers.
Also I laugh at any attempt of a pronunciation rule, english is a collage of borrowed words between Latin Anlgic later Fench and some made up ones. A specific word has a way to be pronounced and that's it same syllables in another word can be totally different. When I fail one I got a great trick, if they ask what pronunciation is that I say "Scotland, Ye cannae show I'm wrang"

I remember when I was a kid and we started learning foreign languages in school. My class got divided into two halves, ones that study English and other that study German. Few month later I was walking down the street with my classmate and he went like:

• Oh, so you're studying English, huh? What does DUHR mean?

• What?

• DUHRR

• Oh, you mean door? It's spelled do-o.

• Bro, there's an R in there and two O's. DUHR. Even I know that, and I'm not even the one studying English. If door was do-o, then would you spell TOH DOH as "to do"?

Little did the bro know... I hope he at least got German well enough, AFAIK there's little bullshit like that

Mandarin

50 000 characters used to live here

It's easier than Dutch at least

Also, how do you pronounce 'stingy'... 'Raphael'...

Tough, though and thorough were a major step for me back in the days...I never knew which one was which nor how to spell them, I felt so frustrated!

Oiseau