Thread: looking to learn to speak and read in russian

anybody who could help i'd be most grateful. i'd also like a penpal from russia, it would be great to have someone to write with.

Hi Theresa
I'll be glad to help you. And you help me to make my bad english better
Write me by email zagrr@rocketmail.com or by icq 246919569

sounds like a plan zagrr. first lesson, it woulds be 'and you could help me improve my english'. see? doesn't that flow better?

maybe it woulds be 'and you could help me TO improve my english'??

Hi Theresa
I'll be glad to speak with you in Skype.
Skype: antonov.dmitriy.sergeevich

"You could help me to make my bad English better"
"You could help me to improve my English"

Either of these is fine. (I think "You could help me improve my English" is fine colloquially, too, but to my ear it doesn't sound quite as good.) You both made a spelling error though - "woulds" is not a word. The correct word you want here is "would".

After some verbs as let, make, help, watch used "bare infinitive" (without 'to')

Hmm. My mistake then. It seems I don't know my own language!

hey, lets not get too technical here. i was running late for work when i made that correction indi, how do i register for skype? i'm not sure i have that feature. you could email me at shygal520_@_yahoo_._com though. Zagrr, check your email i'm going to write you in a few. i'm going to need help understanding the Russian alphabet, i'm completely clueless.

Hi, Theresa: you might be interested to edit your e-mail address so that spammers can't harvest it, the method is simple just insert underscores, so humans can understand it, but machines can't read it. (name)_@_(domain). or something like that, the method is discussed somewhere in a thread. You too zagrr Actually, I'm not sure anymore, was it square brackets? ?? Who knows how to fix email addresses and can post the correct solution?

also, you can get the skype download info via Wikiped. I downloaded it to a flash drive, so I can use it on other computers, instructions in one of the Wikiped articles. It's in the external links stuff at the end of article.

hi seraph, thanks for the tip. you mean the way i just edited it? i'm not sure what you meant.

Free Skype calls and cheap calls to phones - Skype

Download it directly from there, I don't see why you would need to go through wikipedia. It's simple to download and setup.

skype is something i'd have to download? why not just communicate through email or private messages on here instead? no need to download anything.

Email or private messages are fine for traditional "penpal" sort of communications (i.e. writing out letters of a couple of paragraphs and awaiting a reply), but much less so for real-time communication, or "chatting". This can be either written or spoken.

Probably the most useful aspect of Skype for language learners is voice chat. If you have a microphone on your computer, you can have the equivalent of a phone call to anywhere in the world for no cost (as long as the other person has their own computer and microphone.) You can also make calls to phones from Skype - they do cost money but it's very cheap.

(I sound like I'm pimping this product now, lol. I'm not, honestly! They don't pay me! (wish they did...))

the only thing that stink about that is i don't have a microphone or volume on my computer other than that it sounds great.

It's possible to buy headsets with microphones for under £7 (probably around $10 if you live in the USA).

my volume on my computer is shot, it don't work at all

Originally Posted by theresa

my volume on my computer is shot, it don't work at all

No wonder. Why did you shoot at your computer?

theresa, Did you download Skype? I can help u learn russian. If so - add me in Skype - name-xru

my computer made me angry thats why i shot :P no i haven't down loaded skype, sorry. i have yahoo messenger though, would that work n8m?