Quoth Martin Ryan:- p.s. I'm fascinated to find the two ads at the foot of this page offering classes in IRISH - and ARABIC! Wonder what that second association is about?

I presume the association was terrorism ;-)

It's now become "Speak Portuguese in 1 day". That's the sort of shite that discredits language learning.

For the record, I had a very good standard of Irish by the time I left school - we even had a debating society in which we would pontificate fluently with the wisdom of our eighteen years - but one's mastery of any language, and especially the ability to express oneself fluently in it, decays very quickly if it is not used regularly.

Most Irish people have probably heard the story of the Irish pilgrim who gets lost in Rome, spots a priest wearing a fáinne and exclaims "Oh thank God, at last here's someone that speaks English!"