In how many languages can you count to 10? (midwest.social)

submitted 3 weeks ago by sxan@midwest.social to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world

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Ok, Lemmy, let's play a game!

Post how many languages in which you can count to ten, including your native language. If you like, provide which languages. I'm going to make a guess; after you've replied, come back and open the spoiler. If I'm right: upvote; if I'm wrong: downvote!

My guess, and my answer...

My guess is that it's more than the number of languages you speak, read, and/or write.

Do you feel cheated because I didn't pick a number? Vote how you want to, or don't vote! I'm just interested in the count.

I can count to ten in five languages, but I only speak two. I can read a third, and I once was able to converse in a fourth, but have long since lost that skill. I know only some pick-up/borrow words from the 5th, including counting to 10.

My native language is English
I lived in Germany for a couple of years; because I never took classes, I can't write in German, but I spoke fluently by the time I left.
I studied French in college for three years; I can read French, but I've yet to meet a French person who can understand what I'm trying to say, and I have a hard time comprehending it.
I taught myself Esperanto a couple of decades ago, and used to hang out in Esperanto chat rooms. I haven't kept up.
I can count to ten in Japanese because I took Aikido classes for a decade or so, and my instructor counted out loud in Japanese, and the various movements are numbered.

I can almost count to ten in Spanish, because I grew up in mid-California and there was a lot of Spanish thrown around. But French interferes, and I start in Spanish and find myself switching to French in the middle, so I'm not sure I could really do it.

Bonus question: do you ever do your counting in a non-native language, just to make it more interesting?

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[-] lukstru@lemmy.world 3 points 3 weeks ago

1. Python

for i in range(11):
    print(i)

2. R

for (i in 0:10) {
  print(i)
}

3. C/C++

#include <iostream>

int main() {
  for (int i = 0; i <= 10; ++i) {
    std::cout << i << std::endl;
  }
  return 0;
}

4. Java

public class CountToTen {
  public static void main(String[] args) {
    for (int i = 0; i <= 10; i++) {
      System.out.println(i);
    }
  }
}

5. Lua

for i = 0, 10 do
  print(i)
end

6. Bash (Shell Script)

for i in $(seq 0 10); do
  echo $i
done

7. Batch (Windows Command Script)

@echo off
for /l %%i in (0,1,10) do (
  echo %%i
)

8. Go

package main

import "fmt"

func main() {
  for i := 0; i <= 10; i++ {
    fmt.Println(i)
  }
}

9. Rust

fn main() {
  for i in 0..=10 {  // 0..=10 includes 10
    println!("{}", i);
  }
}

10. Zig

const std = @import("std");

pub fn main() !void {
    var i: i32 = 0;
    while (i <= 10) {
        std.debug.print("{}\n", .{i});
        i += 1;
    }
}

11. Scala

for (i <- 0 to 10) {
  println(i)
}

12. Fortran

program count_to_ten
  implicit none
  integer :: i

  do i = 0, 10
    print *, i
  end do

end program count_to_ten

13. Haskell

main :: IO ()
main = mapM_ print [0..10]

14. Julia

for i in 0:10
    println(i)
end

[-] Corngood@lemmy.ml 1 points 3 weeks ago

If you didn't cheat that's actually pretty impressive.

[-] benignintervention@lemmy.world 2 points 3 weeks ago

Uno, dos, très, quatro, cinco cinco, ses

[-] vodkasolution@feddit.it 2 points 3 weeks ago

You know it's kinda hard

[-] sxan@midwest.social 1 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

... siete, ocho, nueve, des!

Hah! I just needed to get started!

Spelling is probably horrible wrong, but Ima take it. 7! 7 languages, ah, ah, aahhh!

[-] KittenBiscuits@lemm.ee 1 points 3 weeks ago

You're pretty fly

[-] Tippon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 3 weeks ago

For a white guy

[-] vodkasolution@feddit.it 1 points 3 weeks ago

3 to 10 but 6 to 5

[-] sxan@midwest.social 2 points 3 weeks ago

25 or 6 to 4

[-] FeelThePower@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 2 weeks ago

English, Spanish, russian

[-] ThePancakeExperiment@feddit.org 1 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

I can count to ten in more language than I am able to speak (I just love learning stuff):

Can count above ten:
German (native), English, Norwegian, Romanian, Russian, Japanese

Can count only up to ten:
French, Polish, Mandarin

I am learning Romanian at the moment, those are 0-10: zero,
unu/ una,
doi/ două,
trei,
patru,
cinci,
șase,
șapte,
opt,
nouă,
zece

[-] SoulKaribou@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 weeks ago

Well if you can count to ten in mandarin, you can count to 100.

It's literally 5 10 2, 5 10 3 for 52, 53 etc.

Add one more word for hundreds, one more for thousands.

After that it gets tough cause numbers beyond thousands are split by packs of 10 thousands, not hundred thousands like most western world (I guess).

Similar to the lakh in Indian

[-] ThePancakeExperiment@feddit.org 0 points 2 weeks ago

Oh, just like in Japanese, did not know that, they have the ten thousands quirk too. Would love to learn more Chinese and other languages, but I lack free time.

[-] SoulKaribou@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 weeks ago

It's coming from the abacus, meaning most likely all of Asian languages have this.

I wonder about Arabic ones ?

[-] OmegaLemmy@discuss.online 1 points 2 weeks ago

Turkish, English, German, Greek, Kurmanji, Japanese

[-] mitchty@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 2 weeks ago

English, French, German, Portuguese, Spanish, and Japanese. Nothing special tbh.

[-] AI_toothbrush@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Lol do we count swedish, norweigan and danish as different languages? Btw other languages are my two native ones: hungarian and english, and then i know spanish because i had it in highschool and i lived 4 months there(cant really speak it anymore sadly) and then croatian because i had one if my friends teach it to me. I used to know some japanese but i also forgot that so without that the total is 5 i guess.

Bonus answer: as for everyday counting i do it either in hungarian or english so no i dont count in my non-native languages. My brain gets fried if i try to do maths for example in swedish. If i do english maths its no problem but i still prefer hungarian when i do large calculations without any paper.

[-] sxan@midwest.social 1 points 2 weeks ago

Yes, the Germanic languages all count separately. Canadian French doesn't count differently from France French because they call it "French" and it's essentially completely understandable. I've known Bavarians who insist Hamburgers are unintelligible, although it's all German.

I can almost understand Danish. Almost. Words, here and there. But not Swedish at all.

For the purposes of this count, if it's called a different name, it's a different language, regardless of how closely related. If it's called the same language, but they've drifted dialectically so much natives can barely understand each other, it's still the same language.

[-] Old_Jimmy_Twodicks@sh.itjust.works 1 points 3 weeks ago

English:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Spanish:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

French:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

German:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Italian:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Greek:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Mongolian:

᠐ ᠑ ᠒ ᠓ ᠔ ᠕ ᠖ ᠗ ᠘ ᠙ ᠑᠐

[-] Dicska@lemmy.world 1 points 3 weeks ago

The accent on the German is rather thick, though.

[-] SoulKaribou@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 weeks ago

German, Cantonese, mandarin, English, French.

I used to know in Swahili too, does that count ?

[-] Jumi@lemmy.world 0 points 2 weeks ago

English, German, Austrian and Eastern Swiss

[-] sxan@midwest.social 1 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Eastern Swiss is German, you sly dog. So ~~it's~~ is Austrian. I think they even call it "German" don't they? That's like distinguishing "American" and "British".

Edit: fucking autocorrect.

[-] Jumi@lemmy.world 1 points 2 weeks ago

You might have got me there

[-] Tippon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 0 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

English (native), Welsh, French, Spanish, German, and binary if I use my fingers 🙌

EDIT:Bugger, it's 5. I can't remember 6 and 10 in German 🙈

[-] sxan@midwest.social 0 points 3 weeks ago

"Fünf" I can understand, but you forgot sex?? :-)

[-] Tippon@lemmy.dbzer0.com 0 points 2 weeks ago

Funnily enough, I always remember it wrong 🙈

[-] sxan@midwest.social 1 points 2 weeks ago

Actually, it's the words that the the same as native words which are the hardest to remember, IME, because you're always questioning it, or you go reaching for a "foreign" word, but if it's also a native word...

Funny little story. When I first came back from living in Germany, I'd occasionally forget the English word for things and could only remember the German ones. I don't know if that happens to many people, but that last year, I don't think I spoke English with anyone more than a couple of times.

[-] LordWiggle@lemmy.world 0 points 3 weeks ago

Dutch, English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Norwegian, Swedish, Danish, Latin, Kmer.

[-] sxan@midwest.social 0 points 3 weeks ago

Wow. Impressive list!

[-] LordWiggle@lemmy.world 0 points 3 weeks ago

Yeah, no issue with counting to 10. The rest however... Im really bad in learning languages, I've had German and French in school for 13 years yet I can't speak either. I know English besides Dutch because of the internet and subtitles on TV. I wanted to learn languages like Norwegian, Latin and Russian but I gave up because I just don't remember words that well. Same with history, I remember stories but can't remember dates. I'm better at logic, like math and chemistry. But at least I know how to order up to 10 beers in multiple languages.

[-] sxan@midwest.social 0 points 2 weeks ago

at least I know how to order up to 10 beers in multiple languages.

Critical life skills !

Most languages go all wonky after 10. German is pretty regular after 12 (12 is such an important number in human history!), French is absolutely insane. Conlangs like Esperanto are the really only highly regular ones.

[-] LordWiggle@lemmy.world 1 points 2 weeks ago

German and Dutch (my native language) are similar systems. Still weird imo, naming the numbers in the wrong sequence: 32 is "two and thirty" instead of "thirty two".

Check out the system of Denmark. French looks rather normal after seeing the Danish.

[-] sxan@midwest.social 1 points 2 weeks ago

I love this map!

[-] Kazaxat@lemmy.world 0 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

For this question exactly I can claim 6, but beyond counting to 10 I know very little in most of these.

English (native language)
Spanish (took a couple years in high school)
French (took one class in middle school)
Japanese (took a semester in college)
Malayalam (parents' native language)
Hindi (popular old song with Madhuri Dixit where the chorus counts up to 13, lol)

[-] TerranFenrir@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 weeks ago

popular old song with Madhuri Dixit where the chorus counts up to 13

LMFAO I would've never expected someone to reference that song on Lemmy of all places!!! Such a goofy song lol

[-] sxan@midwest.social 0 points 3 weeks ago

13? Another commenter said they'd learned counting to 7 in Chinese (Cantonese?) because of a song that cuts off at 7. And both 7 and 13 are significant in US culture, 7 being lucky and 13 unlucky... I wonder if there's a relationship based on immigration and the cultural blending?

13 is an odd number, though. 12 is widely significant, as are 5 and 10, but 7 and 13 are strange picks.

[-] TerranFenrir@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 weeks ago

Nah the 13 in the song has nothing to do with the unlucky part. It's just that the song is a goofy ass song lol. The lyrics literally start with "ding dong ding ding dong ding dong". It's basically a woman asking her lover or whatever to come home (not in the ding dong part of course).

She's like, "I waited 1, 2, 3 - 13 days" for you and you didn't come. On the 14th day, I did this, on the 15th I did this, on the 17th I realized we broke up, my heart shattered on the 20th and so on. Many find the song nostalgic (not me, cuz I'm not from that generation). For me it's just another old random annoying-ish Bollywood song.

Also, just to add to my previous comment a little with a live example here:

Kazaxat's (the person whose comment you replied to) parents are Malayali. They're from the south Indian state of Kerala. See how Kazaxat doesn't speak Hindi? Kerala is one of the states resisting Hindi imposition. Also remember how I said that the land of modern India was never under one state? Kerala was one of the lands never under the rule of any state in the Ganga basin.

Also, the actress dancing in the song above is Madhuri Dixit, who is Marathi.

Here's a link to the song if you've suddenly become curious lol. Disclaimer: it's just another silly old Bollywood song. So if u'r not into that, u ain't missing anything.

[-] nargis@lemmy.dbzer0.com 0 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Four. English, Hindi, Marathi (native) and Kannada. Sanskrit as well, but it's a dead language, and I can't speak Sanskrit because the grammar is extremely complicated. Had it in school for 3 years. So 5, if you're counting Sanskrit.

I generally count in English, unless I am using another language with my friends (excluding Sanskrit).

[-] TerranFenrir@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 weeks ago

Marathi and Kannada??? Do u live in Belgaum?

[-] nargis@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

Nice guess, but no.

Edit: जर्मन आणि मराठी? मी कर्नाटका पासून आहे, त्यामुळे म्हाला मराठी (मातृभाषा) आणि कन्नडा येते. जर्मनी मध्ये फॅमिली आहे का? NRI?

[-] TerranFenrir@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 weeks ago

जर्मनी मध्ये फॅमिली आहे का?

नाही नाही. आम्हाला शाळेत ८-१०व्ही अर्ध हिंदी अर्ध जर्मन (१००च्या ऐवजी ५०-५० मार्कांसाठी) असल्यामुळे खूप थोडे जर्मन येते. तेव्हा बी २ पर्यंत यायचे. आता काही येत नाही lol.

पण माझ्या एका मित्राला खूप फायदा झाला जर्मन मुले. आता मस्त जर्मनी मध्ये फुकटात बॅचलर्स करतोय (तिथे जर्मन मध्ये शिकलात तर शिक्षणाची फी जर्मन सरकार भरते).

NRI?

हो, कॅनडा मध्ये.

[-] nargis@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 2 weeks ago

👍

[-] Semjaza@lemmynsfw.com 0 points 3 weeks ago

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.

Une, deux, trois, quatre, cinq, six, sept, huit, neuf, dix

Uno, dos, tres, quatro, cinqo, seiz, siete, ocho, neuve, diez

Yï, èr, sän, sì, wû, liù, qï, bä, jîu, shí

Yain, tain, eddero, peddero, pots, later, tater, ovvero, covvero, dits

So... 5. Far fewer than I can toast in.

[-] sxan@midwest.social 1 points 3 weeks ago

Drinking is clearly more important.

[-] TerranFenrir@lemmy.ca 0 points 3 weeks ago

English (school/friends): one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten

German (school): eins, zwei, drei, vier, fünf, sechs (hehe sex), sieben, acht, neun, zehn

Marathi (native): Ek, don, teen, char, pach, saha, saat, aath, naoo, daha

Hindi (friends/school): Ek, do, teen, char, panch, cchah, saat, aath, naww, thus

[-] sxan@midwest.social 0 points 3 weeks ago

I have not heard of Marathi, but from the context, you're Indian? Hindi is the official national language, but most Indians grow up learning a local regional language at home, IIRC.

[-] TerranFenrir@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 weeks ago

you're Indian?

Yepp

Hindi is the official national language

Oh noooo nonono. This is a large misconception (kinda one that was spread intentionally).

So here's the deal. India is very similar to Europe, in that there are hundreds of little cultures that have had very different histories, very different cultures, very different religious practices, etc. At no point in history was India (the current borders) under one state, just like Europe wasn't under one state.

India has 22 official languages, out of which Hindi is the most spoken one (largely in northern India in the basin of the Ganga).

Hindu nationalists have this idea that India needs to be a nation state to protect itself from foreign threats. "A very important step towards that is by having one language that is spoken by all. English can't be that language cuz it belongs to the colonizers. Hindi however, is Indian. Hence, all Indians must speak it."

The problem however, is that those that don't speak Hindi don't want Hindi imposed on them. According to them, English is a perfectly fine bridge language. South Indians generally hold this position. Their languages are very very different from Hindi. Even their scripts are different (like how English and Japanese have different scripts).

Lemme explain this by giving an example of Europe. Imagine Britain colonizes all of mainland Europe. Europe has never been united before. However, to defeat the British, Europe unites for the first time. They drive the British out, and establish their own state.

Now, a group of Catholic Christian nationalists believe that Europe must become more united to fight against such threats. They want all Europeans to speak one language. This language turns out to be German. State institutions across Europe start making their employees only talk in German. Understandably, the French are pissed with this.

That's kinda what's happening in India right now. Many (especially south Indians) are pretty mad about this and are resisting.

I have not heard of Marathi

It's the language spoken in the state of Maharashtra (whose capital is Mumbai).

83 million people speak it natively, while 16 million speak it as a second language. It shares the same script with Hindi. So if you know Marathi, it's kinda easy to learn Hindi and vice versa. There are many common words and stuff. I think a huge majority of Marathi folk can speak an ok amount of Hindi today (largely because of internal immigration from North India to cities in Maharashtra and the aforementioned "Hindi imposition").

[-] sxan@midwest.social 1 points 2 weeks ago

Thanks for the detailed explanation! I've worked with a ton of Indians (software development, East coast US), and I picked that up from one of them. It hadn't occurred to me to verify it, mainly because it wasn't critical knowledge for me; just trivia.

[-] TerranFenrir@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 weeks ago

Thanks for the detailed explanation!

Aww no worries <3

picked that up from one of them

Ah. Nah, it's a case of "repeat a lie again and again till it becomes the truth". I vaguely remember us being taught about this national language thing in school too! Kinda like the Mandela effect (but very likely spread intentionally).

this post was submitted on 17 Apr 2025

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