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At first glace, Welsh is quite the intimidating language. However, other than word order the language has fewer irregularities thand English. Once the basic rules have been understood, reading Welsh becomes significantly easier. Many believe that it lacks the use of vowels but there are more official vowels than in English with Welsh beating English out 7 to 5. Speaking of beating English out, fol...

Xhosa or isiXhosa is one of 11 official languages spoken in South Africa. Like the Zulu with which it is mutually intelligible, the language is heavily influenced by the San and Khoi people with whom they mixed. This is evident in the presence of clicking consonants in the language. The story of the origin of the term "Xhosa" is quite interesting. The word means "angry men" and was a name given to...

A language so sweet, the people created a drum to mimic the undulating rhythms of the this south-western Nigerian language. This melodic language is the most-well-known Nigerian language outside the country's borders and is studied at University level by foreigners. In terms of structure and tense, the language is easy to learn but its classification as a tonal language makes it slightly tricky fo...

Zulu or isiZulu is a widely spoken language in South Africa, characterised by its clicking consonants - vestiges of a the influence of the San and Khoi peoples who were the indigenous people of South Africa. Like many other African languages, Zulu is tonal and slight variations in tone can alter the meanings of similarly spelled words, so be careful! However, if you are to pick a South African lan...

Macedonian is the official and widely spoken language in the Republic of Macedonia, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia as opposed to the historic ancient region of Macedon in Greece. The language is very closely related to Bulgarian (both are from the Slavic language family and use the Cyrillic alphabet). Great news! If you can speak or understand Macedonian you, would be also understood in...

Learn Malay, the language of the multi-ethnic, multi-cultural land of the Malays, blended into a unique cultural identity. Lacking the complex scripts and tones of other East Asian languages, Malay is by far the most approachable language in this part of the world. Malay is not just useful, but a gift to language learners who’ve struggled with the complexities of other Asian languages. Spoken ma...

Māori is the language spoken by the indigenous Māori people of New Zealand, mainly in the North Island, and it has been one of New Zealand's 3 official languages since 1987. It's closely related to the language spoken in the Cook Islands (known as Cook Islands Māori or Rarotongan). The Māori call their language either te reo Māori (the Māori language) or simply Māori . Until the Second Worl...

Learn Norwegian, the language of explorers such as Roald Amundsen (first to reach the South Pole and also the first to fly across the Artic Ocean) and Thor Heyerdahl (the famous Kon-Tiki raft). For such a small population (just over 5m), Norway has an incredible rich and varied cultural heritage. Think of the composer Grieg, the writer Ibsen and the painter Munch, to name just a few. Did you know?...

Papiamento is a language you will encounter in your Caribbean travels, being one of the few Creole Languages of the Caribbean that has survived to the present day. Spoken by the local people of Curaçao, Bonaire, and Aruba, this language was only made official in 2007! Learn this fascinating language, Papiamento,a language with influences from all over the world, including Portuguese, Dutch, Spani...

As the national language of Afghanistan, Pashto is primarily spoken in the east and south and has some presence in northern and western parts of the country.  Different estimates show that Pashto is the mother tongue of 45–60% of the total population of Afghanistan. The language also has a strong presence of Arabic and Quranic vocabulary and is significantly influenced by the Persian language!...