what is the most irish you have ever spoken

tadcan · 04-12-2010 12:21PM #1

After reading some of the Irish language threads here, I was reminded of my Oral exam. After years of not having a clue, I'm put into a room with a teacher from another school to speak Irish. After running out of the stock phrases in the first minute, the man tried to drag every last bit of Irish out of me. I had to start putting in English words to complete sentences. By the end I was lucky to put two Irish words side by side in the sentence.

Thinking about it now, its the most Irish I've ever spoken at the same time. It seems insane that after 14 years in school, I had never had to have a conversation in Irish before the exam, when I had finished 'learning' the language.

So what is most Irish you have ever spoken?

Chuchoter · 04-12-2010 12:27PM

I went to the gaeltacht in 2nd year for 3 weeks and I was one of the only students actually speaking Irish there:mad:

Absurdum · 04-12-2010 12:29PM

ní thuigim Béarla

syklops · 04-12-2010 12:30PM

My Leaving cert Oral Exam almost a decade ago was the most I ever spoke.

Ulysses Gaze · 04-12-2010 12:33PM

tadcan wrote: »

After reading some of the Irish language threads here I was reminded of my Oral exam. After years of not having a clue, I'm put into a room with a teacher from another school to speak Irish. After running out of the stock phrases in the first minute, the man tried to drag every last bit of Irish out of me. I had to start putting in English words to complete sentences. By the end I was lucky to put two Irish words side by side in the sentence.

Thinking about it now, its the most Irish I've ever spoken at the same time. It seems insane that after 14 years in school I had never had to have a conversation in Irish before the exam when I had finished 'learning' the language.

So what is most Irish you have ever spoke?

Two times I went to the Gaeltacht. Colaiste Camus where you spoke Irish all the time.

Good times.

scotchy · 04-12-2010 12:34PM

"An bhfuil cead agam dul amach go dtí an leithreas"

Havn't used that in a while though.

.

mikemac · 04-12-2010 12:35PM

A lads weekend to the Aran Islands on St Patricks weekend a few years back

I made a fair stab at it
The locals were probably laughing at me

Vinta81 · 04-12-2010 12:37PM

Bainne.

Only word I ever learnt since moving here

snickerpuss · 04-12-2010 12:42PM

I went to a Gaelscoil so everyday for 8 years. And not so much in secondary but then I did it in college. So... loads.

Coriolanus · 04-12-2010 12:43PM

Irish college probably. Three weeks at a trot. Loved it at the time, sounds horrifying now.

LucyLouLou · 04-12-2010 01:03PM

Every school day for 14 years, went to all Irish primary and secondary schools and sat my leaving in Irish.

Son Of A Vidic · 04-12-2010 01:06PM

Tiocfaidh ár lá

phasers · 04-12-2010 01:14PM

Once in third year my teacher decided to give the whole class an oral exam as part of our mocks for some reason, everybody spoke for about 20 seconds except me and I ended up having a 40 minute conversation with him about The Simpsons or something

My Leaving cert one was 12 minutes I think, that was seriously easy

Ardennes1944 · 04-12-2010 01:15PM

irish college for two summers and 6years in irish class

TeddyTedson · 04-12-2010 01:22PM

I'd love to be able to speak good Irish, it's like a secret language that almost nobody knows.

04-12-2010 03:46PM

Never spoke it once outside of a school environment.. Pity really. I've been able to hold together basic conversations with my crap french a few years later.
I don't think I was ever even taught basic conversational Irish during them 14 years.. ever. The oral isn't conversational Irish.. I don't meet someone on the street and reel of what I did for my holidays last year.

imwatchingyou · 04-12-2010 03:53PM

im not irish,but all i can say in irish is: pog ma hon

cml387 · 04-12-2010 04:03PM

Hey OP I can really relate to that,since my oral Irish was the most I've done in the First Official.

The teacher told us that if the examiner felt you were a bit weak he would start asking simpler questions.

By the time I was finished I think we were discussing a cat sittting on the mat.

God I hated Irish.

Rowley Birkin QC · 04-12-2010 04:52PM

Probably the Irish oral exam too.

Mine wasn't too bad though, the guy recognised me from playing GAA and helped me along when I got stuck.

Change my facebook language to Irish last week in an effort to pick up a cupla focail again.

scientific1982 · 04-12-2010 04:54PM

From the age I began to talk until I was seven, I could only talk in Irish.

Faith+1 · 04-12-2010 04:55PM

scientific1982 wrote: »

From the age I began to talk until I was seven, I could only talk in Irish.

Care to elaborate?

Scuid Mhór · 04-12-2010 04:58PM

crayolastereo wrote: »

I went to the gaeltacht in 2nd year for 3 weeks and I was one of the only students actually speaking Irish there:mad:

Same here. It's pretty easy if you just go with the flow.

HalloweenJack · 04-12-2010 05:00PM

I went to all-Irish primary and secondary but the reality was we didn't speak Irish all the time.

My secondary was very lax. Quite a few of the teachers would speak to us in English and the students would speak English all the time when the teachers weren't around and even a lot of the time when they were.

You were supposed to get in trouble for speaking English but it was never enforced. The odd time you'd be told to switch to Irish but that was the furthest it ever went in terms of punishment. A lot of the teachers spoke to each other in English.

In primary, I spoke a lot more but even then, the students would always talk to each other in English. Punishment for speaking English outside English class was tougher and the teachers would never speak English during other classes.

scientific1982 · 04-12-2010 05:07PM

Faith+1 wrote: »

Care to elaborate?

I live in the gaeltacht. English is my second language.

deconduo · 04-12-2010 05:08PM

LucyLouLou wrote: »

Every school day for 14 years, went to all Irish primary and secondary schools and sat my leaving in Irish.

Same here. There should be more all Irish schools around the place, you actually get to learn the language as opposed to drivel that gets taught in other schools.

tadcan · 04-12-2010 05:15PM

scotchy wrote: »

"An bhfuil cead agam dul amach go dtí an leithreas"

Havn't used that in a while though.

HMM it was a bit different in my primary school.

"An cead agam dul go dtí an leithreas, Más é do thoil é"

We also had to answer the roll call in Irish as well. If your name was Patrick, then you had to say Padraig or if your surname was Tool, you would say O'Tool, etc. My name was the only one in the class that didn't have an Irish equivalent. Having a surname of Norman decent meant I was part of the problem, not part of the solution.

When I was traveling abroad I was told this story by some Irish folk I met up with. A group of them were working in an industrial food growing factory in the Netherlands. Early on the Turkish workers said we can speak in Turkish and you can't understand us, but we can understand you. So to annoy them, they spoke Irish and said, 'this is our language'. For the first few days it was to annoy them and see how much Irish they could remember, but after a few days they got into it and between then remembered enough to hold all their conversations in Irish.

Ghandee · 04-12-2010 05:29PM

I shouted 'TIOCFAIDH AR LA', as hard as I could one night at a Wolfe Tones concert in Bundorans Astoria in 1994!

CrazyRabbit · 04-12-2010 05:52PM

In 2nd year of secondary, I spent a week learning how to tell my Irish teacher in Irish that I didn't want to learn it, so he should just leave me alone. I had to do this as he refused to listen to us if we spoke English.

tadcan · 04-12-2010 06:02PM

Gucky wrote: »

I shouted 'TIOCFAIDH AR LA', as hard as I could one night at a Wolfe Tones concert in Bundorans Astoria in 1994!

I was on a cross community exchange program in Derry in the late '90's. A teenager passing by said that from behind a wall and walked past as if it wasn't him. Later I thought I should have said 'Cunas atá tú' in a big happy voice to embarrass him.

Setun · 04-12-2010 06:59PM

On holidays in Morocco last christmas and some local fella in the market heard my accent and immediately started speaking Irish with me. I bought some textiles off him for his efforts. That's probs the most use Irish has gotten me since the leavinc cert.

MultiUmm · 04-12-2010 07:07PM

Third year Irish teacher had a ban on speaking English in her class. It was a proper ban, if she heard you speaking English she'd correct you straight away and make you repeat the sentence as Gaeilge. All conversations were through Irish, so spoke a fair bit (albeit broken/ fairly shocking Irish) then. It seemed to have worked, ended up with a B in the junior cert. New Irish teacher for the leaving, haven't spoken it in months, I'm now ****ed once again.

what is the most irish you have ever spoken

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