Latest news with #languages
Irish Times
15-06-2025
- Irish Times
A Wicklow woman in Venice: ‘It really feeds the soul to have all that beauty around you'
Languages were always a strength for Orla McLaughlin at school, where she studied French and German. 'I always wanted another language,' she says, so she settled on Italian and politics as it combined Italian with her interest in current affairs. An Erasmus placement brought the Greystones woman to Venice and, having completed her degree in Italian and Politics at UCD, she returned to Italy for a postgraduate diploma in European studies in the University of Padua. During her UCD days, she had spent time in Italy working with children on summer camps: 'the best way to learn a language', she says. Having completed her studies in Padua in the 1990s, she returned to Venice with other plans as well as picking up a further degree in Fundraising and Non-profit Management from the University of Bologna. READ MORE 'I worked in film production and with theatre companies and as a translator, so I was having a great time in my 20s. It was the first time I was away from home and exciting to be somewhere new.' In 2001 she started work as a programme assistant to professors in the Venice International University (VIU) and now manages its academic projects providing learning and teaching opportunities for students and scholars from VIU's associated universities all around the world. 'It was founded in 1995, so as it grew, so did I,' she says. We are fortunate in having a nice house and garden, but it is harder to find such places now She works a 40-hour week, 'and where I work is on an island [San Servolo, formerly a monastery], so I am crossing the water every day as my office is on a lagoon and you have that wonderful view back to the city', she says. Her job at the university, which is now associated with 20 universities globally, brings her into contact with people from all over the world, 'so it's a real mix, with wonderful interdisciplinary and intercultural opportunities', she says. 'Working in an international educational environment is very rewarding. I meet many interesting people and travel regularly too.' She is married to Sebastiano, a Venetian she met through friends and whom she credits for her decision to stay in Venice. The couple have three children, Conall (17), Clodagh (14) and Oisín (11), who are bilingual. 'My husband has a small family business founded by his parents and his uncle making glass chandeliers in Murano. We have now set up a small business selling chandeliers or lighting directly to customers. He designs and assembles, and we sell them on '. 'I felt very connected to the city early on. It has intangible qualities and a lot of people feel really at home here, feel really drawn in, that it is their city. 'It's a city on water, it's a pedestrian city, it's very engaging as you meet people from all walks of life all the time – it could be your neighbour, your butcher, the bar owner. I made a lot of local Venetian friends early on.' One of the benefits of living in Venice 'is the extraordinary quality of light and it really feeds the soul to have all that beauty around you. It's like living in a town – there are 50,000 residents – but a very international town with enormous cultural institutions, built heritage, galleries and temporary exhibitions like the Biennale.' Despite all that, she notes that the cost of living is not as high as Ireland. [ Venice to limit tourist groups to 25 people to 'protect peace of residents' Opens in new window ] The challenges of living in Venice? 'Rising sea levels, flooding and overtourism are real and impactful. 'Floods are not so much a problem since the setting up of mobile dams three years ago at the inlets to the lagoon, so there have been no bad floods since 2019. 'Overtourism means that the centre of the city gets very crowded and the whole Airbnb issue means that it is difficult to find accommodation for students. We are fortunate in having a nice house and garden, but it is harder to find such places now.' Social life means 'you don't need to have plans; you can go to your local wine bar and sit down for drinks and a chat – especially on Fridays – from around 6.30pm-7.30pm, before dinner. The kids who finish school at 4.30pm can play football in the square, and watching them and having a drink as the sun goes down before going home for dinner is one of the things I love to do. 'At home we like to entertain quite a lot and enjoy having barbecues. We also have a boat – for free time, not for transport – for a day out for a picnic on part of the lagoon. In summer there is the beach, and in winter skiing is only two hours away.' She laments the lack of green spaces in the city, but they have a second home in the mountains, bought during Covid in 2021, 'and we go there for long weekends during the year, skiing in winter and for walks and hikes during the summer'. She misses friends and family in Ireland and returns once or twice a year, 'though it was easier when the children were younger. You inevitably miss out on some milestones and sharing some of your own too.' As to the publicity surrounding Jeff Bezos's planned marriage in the city later this month (estimated to cost more than $600 million), she describes it as the commodification of Venice, with others denouncing it as a great big nuisance. 'The tone of the mayor and his delight in handing the city over to him [Bezos] left me disheartened. It's not the first time that somebody famous has had a big wedding in the city. George and Amal Clooney did in 2014. That was received very well. 'There is also a total lack of housing policy or amenities for residents, so the frustration of people living here is the real lack of vision of politicians as to what the future of the city will be.'
The Sun
31-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Sun
Modest life of BGT's biggest star Susan Boyle revealed including £5 scampi & chips meals despite being worth £22m
SHE'S sold 25million records and is about to launch a musical comeback, but little else has changed for Britain's Got Talent legend Susan Boyle. Despite having an estimated £22million in the bank, the singer follows the same routine she fell into long before she became world-famous 16 years ago. 4 Susan, 64, often hops on the bus before carrying bags of shopping back to her four-bed council house. Lunch is her favourite scampi and chips that costs £5.05 at a local cafe in her hometown in West Lothian, Scotland. Karen McClure runs a cafe that was Subo's favourite karaoke pub until it was converted into a restaurant eight years ago. She said: 'Susan still pops in now and again for a roll and square (a square sausage and bun) and a cup of tea. She always sits in the same chair at the back and she's happy to chat with me and the other customers. 'A few years back, she ended up joining a French man on his table and she was speaking fluent French. Global phenomenon 'I couldn't believe it. She can speak five languages. She told me that she was learning Mandarin at that time. 'She also did a degree a few years back, after she rose to fame. It's just incredible. 'She goes down to the local music shop and sifts through the records. She seems happy in her life.' The daughter of a miner and a shorthand typist, Susan shot to fame aged 47 on the 2009 season of BGT. 'I'm back' cries Scots superstar as she announces major music return Revealing that she lived alone with her cat and had never been kissed, no one could have predicted the global phenomenon she would become when she took to the stage in Glasgow while wearing a gold dress. But her rendition of I Dreamed A Dream from Les Miserables became a social media sensation and led to BGT being named the world's most successful reality TV format by Guinness World Records. Judge Simon Cowell said: 'No one knew who this lady was. "She was from Scotland, a little village, and she goes on the show and within 48 hours the clip had 500million views. We sold the format to more than 30 countries after that. It was unbelievable.' This year and next are going to be massive for her as she releases new songs and shows off another side to her. Susan's debut album, I Dreamed A Dream, became the UK's best-selling record of all time following its release in 2009. The unlikely star made eight albums in total and performed for Pope Francis at the Vatican in 2019, but her parents never got to toast her success. Her mum Bridget died aged 91 in 2007 and her dad Patrick passed away in the 1990s. Last month, Subo announced she has returned to the recording studio for the first time in six years to work on new material. 4 The comeback, which she has been teasing to her 144,000 followers on Instagram, is remarkable given that she suffered a stroke in 2022 which reportedly affected her speech. One industry source told The Sun on Sunday: 'This year and next are going to be massive for her as she releases new songs and shows off another side to her. 'She's always wanted to do a documentary and let people into her world and she's so excited for what's to come. "She's told everyone she knows that she's ready for a biggie.' However, while the star is thriving, the place she calls home, once a bustling mining town, has fallen into decline. A number of shops have closed and her favourite Jolly Roger pub is no more, meaning she has to travel to the next-biggest town outside Edinburgh to sing karaoke. This could pose a problem for Subo, who still has not passed her driving test despite recently buying a new VW car, according to one source. And her modest lifestyle is well documented. After winning BGT, she paid £65,000 to buy the semi-detached, pebble dash council house she grew up in. In 2010, she also splashed out on a £300,000 five-bed new-build on the other side of town, but she never settled and soon returned to her old family pad. Four years later, she bought the house next door for £110,000, later combining the two properties to create her dream home. Besotted fans still travel miles to turn up at her front door. But locals believe she has still yet to receive her first kiss because — they say — she has never had a boyfriend. 4
Bloomberg
30-05-2025
- General
- Bloomberg
How Migration and Soft Power Made Indo-European Languages Dominant
About 5,000 years ago, a group of herders living in the grasslands north of the Black Sea headed west, taking their animals with them. They got as far as the Carpathian Basin — the western extremity of the vast Eurasian steppe centered on modern Hungary — but their descendants pushed farther, and within 1,000 years languages related to those of the original migrants were spoken as far west as Ireland's Atlantic coast. That is the leading explanation today for how the majority of Europeans came to speak the languages they do. And not just Europeans. At the same time that those intrepid steppe-dwellers set off west, others speaking related dialects headed east, planting their way of speaking in Asia. Both eastern and western dialect clusters share the label 'Indo-European' because, by the time linguists noticed the family resemblance in the 18th century, they were spoken from Europe to the Indian sub-continent.
CNA
25-05-2025
- CNA
Multilingual India's race to build own Large Language Model easier said than done
India is gearing up for what it hopes will be its own ChatGPT moment. The country is building its own Large Language Model that may one day rival OpenAI's chatbot. But in a country of countless languages and dialects, this is easier said than done. Ishan Garg reports from New Delhi.
Yahoo
19-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Kate Middleton Is Determined "to Make Sure" George, Charlotte and Louis are "Better" Than Her at This Royal Skill
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Growing up as a member of the Royal Family means polishing up on etiquette and protocol, knowing when to curtsy—and to whom—and meeting a wide variety of people from around the world. But while Kate Middleton is skilled at everything from playing the piano to scuba diving, she admitted she's not the most talented at languages. In fact, the Princess of Wales revealed that it's her "aim" to ensure Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis don't fall into the same category. When speaking with a fan during a 2018 event, Princess Kate said (via Hello!) that despite having studied abroad in Florence, her Italian was "so bad." She added, "I have to make sure my children are better than me, that's my aim." Unlike many other members of the Royal Family, the Princess of Wales is not understood to be fluent in a second language, but knows some Italian and French. Prince William, however, reportedly knows six other languages: Welsh, French, Gaelic, Spanish, Swahili and German. "Given the fact that George, Charlotte, and Louis will probably carry all out full-time royal duties in future and will meet people from all over the world, it's no wonder that the Princess of Wales wants her children to be confident linguists," said Hello!'s online royal correspondent, Danielle Stacey. The children are said to have already learned some Spanish before they started school because of their Spanish nanny, Maria Borrallo. And at Lambrook School, George, Charlotte and Louis have the opportunity to learn French and Latin, along with a third language that follows in the footsteps of Corfu-born Prince Philip. The school offers Greek lessons for students in year seven and eight like Prince George, who will enter his final year at the Berkshire prep school in September. Although it'll likely be quite some time before the public gets to see George, Charlotte or Louis use their budding language skills, their lessons will definitely come in handy when giving speeches and meeting dignitaries one day.
