Anyone ever tried to learn Welsh, Gaelic or Irish?

Just wondering if anybody has attempted to learn a bit of the regional languages of the UK.  I want to give Gaelic (Scottish) a try.  With so few speakers, I wonder if I will just be talking with myself though.  I'd be interested in hearing of any stories where you heard people speaking Welsh/Irish Gaelic/Scottish Gaelic being spoken or you tried to use it yourself.

i've studied a bit of irish here and there.  i really enjoyed learning it, but found it too difficult to put to use.  i did travel through regions where i heard it being spoken, but never really had a chance to put it to use outside of a class i sat in on.  i still have a ton of books and cds--my goal is to one day bring them out again and try to brush up enough to gain a bit of reading knowledge.  i have a few poetry books that are in irish that i'd love to try to translate. 

I would love to be able to speak Irish.  Sadly, I doubt I ever will apply myself enough to learn.  The west coast of Ireland is my favorite place to be and there are Irish speakers there.  Out of Inis Oirr, one of the Aran Islands, I heard Irish being spoken on the playground by the kids, among a group of older men, and an old woman passed me by in the street and greeted me in Irish.

You can learn Welsh by distance via the University of Wales Lampeter, if anyone's interested:

http://welsh.lamp.ac.uk/Department/English/study/index.php 

I think they may be updating the distance studies link:

http://www.e-addysg.com/

No.  But many schools in Scotland have a Gaelic medium unit.  Indeed, Glasgow has a primary school that's entirely Gaelic and now a secondary school, too.  A friend of mine in Glasgow has her three children in the Gaelic primary and demand is so high, there were three P1 classes last August when the term started - for 75 pupils!

They still teach Manx Gaelic to the children here on the IOM. Even tho UNESCO has set it as a dead language....some ppl here do still speak it


Fastyr Mie!

(Good day)

While living in Dublin back in the 60's the school I went to taught Irish which I had to take.  I still remember how to count - up to 29 that is, and I think I remember how to say "what is your name?"   

I have found a growing trend to try and use Scottish Gaelic up here-  I have some friends that work as part of the Gaelic Society and they're always promoting it.   I see it written more and more next to English.  I also hear it spoken quite a bit now- usually before or after english- say like in a public speech.
Its a beautiful language. 

I bought an Irish language course on CD. I'm really excited to be learning it! It's a bit tough because it is in a completely different language family than that of English and the Romance languages, which I'm most familiar with.

Good insight guys!

I hope there are chances to use these languages (if only for a quip or two).  Welsh looks like it is used (at least in Wales).  Gaelic and Irish (in the UK) not so much.  I really want to learn Gaelic for highland heritage reasons.  I can't get a straight story out of Google though because the Gaelic issue in Scotland seems so polarized.  There is the "Gaelic is doomed/waste of money/we should speak Scots instead" crowd vs the "Gaelic is our soul/bedrock of our tourism/our unique identity" crowd.  Each is so fervent in their postings that there isn't much room for neutral information.

If your spouse is going to learn it with you, i think you'll have the most success. That will give you the opportunity to practice it much more frequently. My friend's parents decided they wanted to learn to speak Irish when they were in college and they did it together. When my friend and her sister were born they spoke Irish exclusively until they were 5, so English is their second language!  I would love to learn Irish now that I'm in Ireland, but I'm not so sure my Irish DF is interested in learning, so we'll see! It's no fun learning if you don't have anyone to speak it with.

I've toyed with the idea of learning Irish, but haven't actually done it yet.  My husband speaks it and has taught me a few phrases, but that's about it.  My SIL is an Irish teacher and she writes my kids letters in Irish, so I always have to wait for DH to come home to read the letters to the kids.  I'd love to do it myself. 

Bmore, try watching TG4 in the mornings, when the kids cartoons are on. It sounds really silly, but I started to learn basic things like numbers that way. They are all dubbed in Irish.  DH and I were flipping through the channels one day and Dora the Explorer was on, he understood the Irish bit, and I only understood the Spanish words lol.  It's too bad you aren't closer, we could have taken a class!

DH and I were flipping through the channels one day and Dora the Explorer was on, he understood the Irish bit, and I only understood the Spanish words lol. 

That's so funny - when I was in Dublin on holiday, we also saw Dora in Irish on while flipping the channels!  We watched it for a bit, mesmerized!

Bmore, try watching TG4 in the mornings, when the kids cartoons are on. It sounds really silly, but I started to learn basic things like numbers that way. They are all dubbed in Irish.  DH and I were flipping through the channels one day and Dora the Explorer was on, he understood the Irish bit, and I only understood the Spanish words lol.  It's too bad you aren't closer, we could have taken a class!

That's a great idea! I'll do that!

I took Irish my last semester of college for fun It's a really cool language, once you get over the weird consonant combinations (seriously, since when does "bhf" sound like a w??). It's totally useless, barely spoken at all anymore, but it's interesting being one of the few people who knows it and cares about it. I'm losing it fast but I know I'll hang onto a few phrases, which is nice.