Esperanto

[shootingstar]

Looks like it's bemi, an international assoc. of esperanto cyclists.

http://www.cyclingforums.com/t444377.html

and I just realized the female contact on one of the web pages....is that SAME person who stayed overnight at our place from netherlands..

[kat_h]

Interestingly I knew of a Dutch cyclist who was cycling around the world solo ..and she dropped by Vancouver to visit us. She was an enthusiastic speaker and learner of esperanto. There seems to be whole community, if I am not mistaken...even a cycling informal Internet group who speak esperanto. She did stay in her trip with some esperanto folks worldwide.

That is cool. There's a book published each year or so of esperantists who are willing to host others for free, basically like Warm Showers but for language geeks. There's even someone listed in Japan who is willing to let guests stay for free for several weeks. That alone is worth learning the language for IMO.

Not sure if alot of engineers in a fast-paced, high pressure project environment would take time to learn esperanto.

I can't imagine many of the engineers I've met ever volunteering for anything either. Maybe the ones who go for Without Borders are different.

When I started taking the class a friend commented that Klingon would be more useful. I'd like to see a comparison of the numbers worldwide on that actually. I suspect there are probably quite a few people who speak both. I have noticed that most esperantists speak multiple languages anyway and picked up esperanto because it's easy and fun. There's a pretty lively esperanto community in Calgary. Once the summer comes I'm going to go to their weekly coffee nights.

[MomOnBike]

Mi parolas esperonton.

In fact my entire family, including Elder Daughter's boyfriend are Esperantists. We learned it as a way of expanding the girl's educational horizons. It seems to have done its job, both girls are comfortable with language, and learning languages. No small feat for a USA-ian.

I have to disagree about Esperanto having no culture of its own. There is, it just isn't - can't be - a national culture. Travel, books (I read Pinocciho in E-o, translated from the Italian), magazines, music (all-time favorite music group - Kajto), and general education and socializing are high points. I've opened my home on less than a day's notice to traveling Esperantists - it's just what we do. (Didn't regret it, either)

All in all, Esperanto has been good to me and my family. I love the ideals it has of peace and open communication between all peoples.