Friday, May 29, 2009

My cousin, Charlie



I selected the Spanish Course to learn (again) from Mango Language Online. I say "again" because I took Spanish in college many years ago and I didn't retain any of it. Part of the reason for my failure to learn is because I never really learned to "think" in Spanish, hence my "cousin Charlie" above (he is an excellent mimic).

Of all talking birds, budgerigars are the best mimics; Puck is the world record holder, with a vocabulary of 1,728 words. But beyond mimicry, other talking birds hold first places in cognitive ability and intelligence. African Greys not only can have fairly large vocabularies, but the famous Alex understood the concept of zero. Crows have been known to use stick tools to get food. You get the idea---learning a language goes beyond just parroting the words(did I really say that?). So, I vow to use Mango to learn Spanish again and try to "think" Spanish!
P.S. I've never heard a bird speaking a different language; unless you count the opera singing parrot.
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3 comments:

  1. LauraMay 29, 2009 at 9:55 AM

    When I was 12, we got new neighbors who had a dog (Clipper) and a parrot (can't remember its name). We would hide in the room adjacent to the room with the parrot, and Billy would tell the bird to call the dog. So the bird would call out "Clipper! Clipper!" and the dog would run into the room and look around all confused as to who called it. Then the bird would cackle a laugh as we were in hysterics watching this.

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  2. annot8May 29, 2009 at 2:46 PM

    ... and when I was but a few years older than Laura, there was a family who lived in a big beach house that owned an African Grey - and he knew all the whistles the beach walkers used to call their dogs. Hella confusion and hilarity!

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  3. BibliocroneMay 31, 2009 at 2:38 PM

    ...and when we rented a house in the Florida Keys last year, we were stunned and puzzled to be beseiged by very loud vacuum cleaners, bus doors opening, jack hammers,and a man's voice, dripping sarcasm, "Hey Baby. Come on in." Tured out the neighbor across the road kept an African Grey on his screened porch.

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