I've never thought of learning Greek before but if I decide one day to study this language ,I'll consult your post. It seems that there are lots of resources online and it makes studying languages available for everyone.

Thanks Mariola! Greek is a beautiful language and I can thoroughly recommend you give it a go.

I've never thought of learning Greek before but if I decide one day to study this language ,I'll consult your post. It seems that there are lots of resources online and it makes studying languages available for everyone.

Thanks Mariola! Greek is a beautiful language and I can thoroughly recommend you give it a go.

When in Greece I purchased Brian Church's "Learn Greek in 25 Years". Obviously it's not the sort of book you learn vast swathes from, but it might be a nice supplement to any hardcore learning, if just for the humorous stories and vocab lists.

Brian Church is quite a prominent figure in the British ex-pat community in Greece and had a column in the Athens News. He's a funny guy and has some interesting things to say about Greece without being too critical. I haven't read that book but I've heard good things about it!

When in Greece I purchased Brian Church's "Learn Greek in 25 Years". Obviously it's not the sort of book you learn vast swathes from, but it might be a nice supplement to any hardcore learning, if just for the humorous stories and vocab lists.

Brian Church is quite a prominent figure in the British ex-pat community in Greece and had a column in the Athens News. He's a funny guy and has some interesting things to say about Greece without being too critical. I haven't read that book but I've heard good things about it!

Damn, I found the Level 2 Teach Yourself Greek CDs and really thought I was getting somewhere with it! Maybe that's because I have a little understanding of the verb stuff and just need to hammer it in more. Although that stuff will always somewhat confuse me anyway... Good to know there are other decent (cheap) sources, I'll definitely be looking into these.

And you're totally right, French and Italian (and Spanish) always get priority with everything!

In fairness I haven't looked at the Level 2 book. I've noticed a lot of 'self-taught' courses pass off aspect as simple future etc., it's just that I really disagree with not telling people the full picture for things like that. If you have a look at a good grammar book, like Routledge's "Greek: a comprehensive grammar of the modern language" it explains it all in no uncertain terms, as aspect.

Aspect works very similarly in Greek to how it does in Slavic languages. It really does affect meaning: the difference between πηγαίνω στο γραφείο and πάω στο γραφείο is what you do habitually and what you're doing now. If you want to say "I went to school in London" you have to say πήγαινα στο σχολείο στο Λονδίνο, because πήγα στο σχολείο στο Λονδίνο means you paid a school a visit once. Does your Teach Yourself course offer any explanation on those lines?

Not that I've noticed yet. To be honest I have no idea, I thought it was giving me a bit of a heads up but I guess with all of these things it's only going to say the stuff they think you'll need for travelling. The sentence you've given as an example about school - I'd have had no clue about that, that's where I get really stuck. I think I have OK vocabulary but grammar's the killer, it's something I'm going to have to focus on. Might try and find that Routledge book online or something. Thanks!

A few corrections.. "Πηγαινω/Παω στο γραφειο" are exactly the same with absolutely no difference in the meaning.. What defines the final meaning is the rest of the sentence. Παω/Πηγαινω στο γραφειο, means now. Πηγαινω/Παω στο γραφειο καθε μερα, means every day.

When you want to say, I went to school in London, it's "Πήγα σχολείο στο Λονδίνο", without the article, and it's the most used expresssion. When you say "Πήγαινα σχολείο στο Λονδίνο" you have to define "when" (e.g. ..όταν ήμουν εφτά χρόνων) otherwise it sounds like an incomplete sentence. When you say "Πήγα στο σχολείο στο Λονδίνο" it can only mean that you paid a visit to a specific school you've been talking about, as you said. "Πήγαινα στο σχολειο" can only be used when you are telling a story that happened for example yesterday. I was going to school when it started raining.

It makes me so happy when I see people learning Greek!! I wish I could help you more! I'm Greek by the way.. :)

Damn, I found the Level 2 Teach Yourself Greek CDs and really thought I was getting somewhere with it! Maybe that's because I have a little understanding of the verb stuff and just need to hammer it in more. Although that stuff will always somewhat confuse me anyway... Good to know there are other decent (cheap) sources, I'll definitely be looking into these.

And you're totally right, French and Italian (and Spanish) always get priority with everything!

In fairness I haven't looked at the Level 2 book. I've noticed a lot of 'self-taught' courses pass off aspect as simple future etc., it's just that I really disagree with not telling people the full picture for things like that. If you have a look at a good grammar book, like Routledge's "Greek: a comprehensive grammar of the modern language" it explains it all in no uncertain terms, as aspect.

Aspect works very similarly in Greek to how it does in Slavic languages. It really does affect meaning: the difference between πηγαίνω στο γραφείο and πάω στο γραφείο is what you do habitually and what you're doing now. If you want to say "I went to school in London" you have to say πήγαινα στο σχολείο στο Λονδίνο, because πήγα στο σχολείο στο Λονδίνο means you paid a school a visit once. Does your Teach Yourself course offer any explanation on those lines?

Not that I've noticed yet. To be honest I have no idea, I thought it was giving me a bit of a heads up but I guess with all of these things it's only going to say the stuff they think you'll need for travelling. The sentence you've given as an example about school - I'd have had no clue about that, that's where I get really stuck. I think I have OK vocabulary but grammar's the killer, it's something I'm going to have to focus on. Might try and find that Routledge book online or something. Thanks!

I'm thinking of learning Greek...Is it necessary to learn to read and write too.

It's really important to learn the alphabet but it's not that hard, there are fewer letters than in English!

Thanks. .I'll give it a shot ... :)

I'm thinking of learning Greek...Is it necessary to learn to read and write too.

It's really important to learn the alphabet but it's not that hard, there are fewer letters than in English!

Thanks. .I'll give it a shot ... :)

I've actually found another great free site for learning Greek. I'm actually learning the language because I'm going with friends to Crete and found this website quite useful. It says you should buy the CDs but they have many free chapters with grammar lessons and vocab and audio tapes of dialogue. http://www.xanthi.ilsp.gr/f...

Thank you for your valuable tip! I´m adding this link to a posting I´m writing about the subject on my blogs.

Hi Alex!! :-) Thank you for these recommendations!! Definitely Greeks is on my list. Also, thanks for the advice about Teach Yourself. So, would you recommend Colloquial Series for Greek? Because I've heard that some books are good for certain languages and others are definitely not. For example, Colloquial Series Russian is better than Teach Yourself Russian (in my opinion). So, do you really recommend it? And as for the alphabet, where can I learn it in a simpler way and how? Because I've seen some books for the Greek alphabet and they are sometimes not understandable. Anyways, thanks once again for these pages.
I hope we can get in touch soon!! Cheers!!

Hi Julio! Thanks for your message. To be honest I haven't looked at Colloquial Greek so I can't tell you whether it's good or not. But in my experience Colloquial are far better for experienced language learners, while TY can be a bit slower paced. Buy it and give it a go – I'll test your Greek at the end and we'll see how effective the course is! :)

These tips were very good and useful.. Thank you for sharing these informations with people.

ευχαριστώ!

I dont know why, but I've had this tingling sensation of wanting to learn Greek for some time, but I never gave it a go because I was studying Russian. THANK YOU SO MUCH for these!! Especially the podcasts, radio, tv shows, and newspaper!! This is going to be so much fun.

There's also a new free website for learning modern Greek:
http://greek.pgeorgalas.gr

Thank you for your tip as well!

http://multipedia.com might also help if you already have some level and just need to practice the language

Alex,congrats for all your job and thank you for all the advice and help that you give us.I just want to say for anyone interested in our music, that there are radio stations who play solely Greek music such as "Ellinikos 93.2" and "Melodia fm 99.2" that have a wider range than Derti and on the whole are f a r more representative of our culture.-some would add "far more bearable to listen to" as well.
It was a great pleasure to know that you exist Alex. Even more so that you are from Leonidio(I'm from Astros) :-D.(pls let me know if I make mistakes in my English and forgive them ;) )