Conversation with Ziad Fazah October 20, 2007
Posted by Edwin in Motivation, Skype.trackback
Today, I had the honour to talk with Ziad Fazah. Yes, the person who claimed to have learnt 59 languages in his youth.
Thanks, Keith, for the inspiration. At last, I decided to talk to the legendary linguist. I sent an email to Ziad yesterday, and was surprised to receive his reply on the same day. He asked me to call him today.
I felt so mad at myself when I found out that I messed up the time zone. I was an hour late. It seemed to be an inconvenient time for him, so we only talked for a few minutes.
We spoke English most of the time, but then we had a short exchange in Mandarin. He admitted that his Mandarin was rusted since he has not spoken it for 20 years. But he claimed that he could pick up any language again if he wanted. It would probably take him 2 days to 2 weeks depending on his available time.
As soon as I heard him speaking Mandarin, I thought the coming conversation was going to be valuable. So I started my Skype recording!
“Your call is now being recorded…”
The program was new to me, and I later found out the above message could be heard from both ends! I did not ask his permission to record the call, so I felt very embarrassed afterwards. But he seemed to be alright with that.
He indicated to me, as to other people in the past, that there was simply no significant financial benefit for knowing to speak so many languages. I kind of agree with him.
I have arranged another time to speak with him next week. I am hoping to get more inspiration from him on language learning.
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Hi Edwin,
You are welcome. You might want to correct the spelling of his name in the title and body of your post. You typed an ‘r’ both times instead of a ‘z’ in his last name.
I don’t know your email address. Could you email me?
Thanks,
Keith
Wow, that really sucks that you didn’t had much time to speak with him. I’m really looking forward to the next talk you have with him! Heep us updated!
Thanks Keith.
Rmss,
Actually, we talked for nearly 10 minutes. So it was more than I expected for being 1 hour late.
pls record your next conversation and put it up if you can.
Thanks,
Did he say he would speak with you in Mandarin next time? Or are you just going to leave it at that?
He said we can speak English, Mandarin, French, and other languages next time.
Keith, I’d like to congratulate you on your successful blog, but I am not allowed to leave any comment.
How do you know my blog is successful? Nobody can leave any comments!
Unfortunately, only registered members can leave comments. But at least everybody can read my posts and listen to my audio.
Keith,
I determine if a blog is successful by looking at its quality, not the number of readers and subscribers.
Dear Edwin,
I live in Rio de Janeiro and I´ve been trying to find some way to talk with Mr. Ziad Fazah for some days. Unfortunately, I´ve found only phone numbers and e-mails about him on Internet that are not recent anymore.
Today I read this message and noticed you talked with him few days ago. Could you please send me his current phone number or e-mail ?
Best regards,
Mr.Castro, Mahatma
Hi Mr Castro,
The email and phone number I used to contact him are the same as the ones found in the language forum:
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=289&PN=2&TPN=12
Thank you very much, Edwin. I´ve already sent an e-mail according to the informations in the language forum. I hope to talk to him as soon as possible.
Best regards.
i want to talk to ziad fazah…
im from greenland and i would like to talk to him in danish…
fork over the number please