Why is greek such a funny language?

Hi everyone! I was born greek and lived in Greece for a few years and then I moved to US. I have met people from different backgrounds and nationalities and one thing that struck me the most was their opinion about the greek language and how it sounded to them.

I made me think about it and I realized that it really does sound kind of funny (to say at least). I realized that when Americans say "It sounds greek to me", what they really mean is : No way I'm dealing with this! LOL!

Anyway, what do you guys think about this? How funny and strange does it sound to you too, and why?

It doesn't sound strange to me (I am Greek though :-P); however, if I had to guess, I would say it is the lack of intonation, certain sounds that are not common in other languages (at least not all in the same language), the fact that we speak from the front part of our mouth mostly and the lack of substantial common vocabulary with romance/latin based languages (not even mentioning germanic ones).

For English speakers (at least; probably for others too), I would add the different grammar (e.g. cases) and syntactic structure (e.g. not following a specific word order when forming sentences), and of course, the alphabet.

There's probably more, but that's all I can think of off the top of my head. I am also interested in seeing what non-Greeks have to say. It's always educational to hear how others perceive your language. :-)

Well, to me it doesn't sound particularily strange. It sounds sort of like a cross between Russian and Italian.

I remember when I first heard Greek, I thought about Spanish (because of words terminations and when spoken fast, or in some songs it sound to me like that. Now, since I've been more exposed to both of them, certainly I don’t get confused anymore and I find Greek a beautiful language!

Oh god, no...guys, with all the respect, greek is not a language but more like a code to distract inocent humans from living their own lives...lol...
I mean no disrespect, but hey, its true. It is one of the most anoying things I've ever gone through...listening to two greeks in front of me during a 10 minutes bus ride. You guys should do something about it, change it somehow...lol...
To my ears it was nothing but: kakees...kakees...takees...galapaka..takapaka...oh man...oh...

Is it true that it is somewhat similar to turkish? I have heard that it has borrowed a lot of turkish words while turks and greeks lived together in the Otoman Empire..

Americans say "It sounds greek to me" because they are called 'gringos', word that cames from 'greek', and most of them are linguistically ignorant.

Greek is beautifull. stop.

Ooops!, wrong key: "word that comes from 'greek'..."

Yes, it is similar to turkish. Greeks and turks lived together for more than 500 years, married each other, exchanged their language, culture, music, songs, costumes, even food recipes. That's why when you see them on the street together you can't make the distiction who is who, they both have dark skins, etc...well, more turks have mustaches than greeks, but that's it.

If you listen to their music and if you're not one of them, it would sound as it comes from the same source, it's basically identical.
There are some who say that at this point in time, only 3-4% of the greeks who live in Greece now have their origin from the real greeks, the rest is turks who speak greek. Some historians argue about these numbers though. Some say that no more than 75% of the todays greeks are turks.

Anyway, it's a horrible language to learn. I am happy I don't have to deal with it.

But I like greek food though, or turkish, whatever, same thing...

Anybody would like to teach me how to tell apart the difference between "Classical Greek" and "Koine Greek"? And their mutual relations? Thanks!

@Pavel

I have to agree with you on that greek and turkish food, music, and most of their contemporary culture is almost identical. But I must disagree about the number of turkish population actually called greeks in Greece. Turks settled there for centuries and yes, they married greek women and vice versa, but that was a common thing in the Balkan peninsula, so you can say that greeks were more or less assimilated genetically by turks, but kept speaking greek as it was easier to communicate with each other and live their daily lives.

So, in this context, those who today call themselves greek in Greece are more or less half turks who speak greek, but not turks. Well, maybe genetically turks, but greeks because they live in Greece. So, when you meet a greek today, you are actually meeting a half-turk, but that doesn't make him/her 100% turk, so you have no right to say that 90% of those who live in Greece now are turks who speak greek. You must not forget that they are half greek too.

And by the way, I respect both greeks and turks, but please guys, your languages are a little hard to learn...but greek and turkish food is great, even though a little fatty-fatty...

I can see how someone can mistake Greek for Spanish, to the untrained ear they sound almost the same. I think Greek is a very beautiful language. However I do find it hard to learn and the vocabulary hard to memorize, considering a simple word like 'sad' has 10+ letters in Greek!

ZhongGR:

The relationship between Koine Greek and Classical Greek is something like the relationship between Yiddish and German. It basically consists of changed phonology and the way it is written.

Classical Greek was closer to 'written how it's spoken/spoken how it's written', but in Koine Greek alot of that was lost. Old diphthongs were turned into two-letter combinations that had a sound of its own (such as OU being pronnounced as U, as in French) as well as new added vocabulary and the evolution of older words.

Also the accents on the letters (á/é/í/ó/ú - ά/έ/ί/ό/ώ/ύ) changed from meaning a tone-like change in the vowel (pitch maybe?) to a stress change in the vowel.

I would say its a transition phase between Classical Greek and Modern Greek, much like there was a transition phase in Old Dutch to Modern Dutch. I don't use Old English/Modern English as an example because there were many radical changes during the period of Norman rule in England.

@Paolo

Maybe you are right when you say that over 90% of those greeks who live in Greece are 1/2 greek 1/2 turks, but lets not forget that some of them might be 1/2 bulgarian too. So, there should have been a lot of influence of slavic languages in todays greek language (if it can still be called greek) too. So, in what degree this influence is and where can we find the real greeks today?

What is the distinction between turkish language and greek language and why greek language has survived all those inter-marriages and cultural breeding. After all, aren't they today the same people (1/2 turk-1/2 greek), just speaking two similar languages?

P.S. Just a personal example. Where I work, there are two guys, one turkish Hakim, and one greek Stavro. They look like twins. Maybe they had the same turkish father, you never know...

What are you guys talking about? Are you creazy or what? Everybody knows that there are no real greeks living today in Greece. Whoever lives in Greece right now is either turk or arab who speaks greek. They spoke greek all these centuries because it was easier to integrate and live their daily lives. The real greeks, ancient genetically greeks are gone from a long time now. That's why all greeks today look more like turks or arabs and nothing like other Balkanians or Europeans. Historians have been saying this for a long time and almost everyone agrees.

Yes sir! I don't like the fact that I get stopped all the times at the airports because I look like a bad guy. I am greek not ... you know.
Anyway, greek/turkish food is ok.

C'mon guys. Not everyone who lives in Greece is a turk or a bulgarian who speaks greek. There are also albanians too. Albanians have been living in the northern Greece for thousands of years and they married with greeks and exchanged culture and language with them. There is a territorial dispute in European Council regarding the albanian province in todays northern Greece called "Cameria" (pronounced Cham-ae-ree-a). Most of the living population in the northern Greece are albanian Cams (pronounced Chams) -some were expelled from their land and houses in an ethnik cleansing (not the first one on albanians) during the greek dictatorship of Veniselos and some came back. Cams are now asking to return to their lands and houses and they have all the legal propietary documents and legal rights etc., etc. and the case is going to the Court and UN. Even today many words or even names of greek streets or geographic locations in Cameria (northern Greece) have an albanian (and/or Illirian) origin, but this is not the theme of the discussion, so it will be in discussed in another topic.

Greeks who live in Greece now are a mix of old greeks with albanians (Cameria - northern Greece), mix with bulgarians - northeastern Greece, and mix with turks - south/southeastern Greece. If you really want to meet a few real greeks and listen to how greek language sounds, you should look somewhere around the greek islands in the southwestern part of Greece. There you can even find the few left ancient greek words still in use since ancient times. There is where historians and other scientists go to study the greek language and anthropology. The rest of the territory is the same as going to Albania, Bulgaria, or Turkey.

Anyway, it is so nice to see that people are interested about history and languages and this forum is a perfect place to discuss these issues. We must thank you this website for this excellent opportunity.