I'd asked if anybody could guess what language "amike salutas" is. I should have known someone would know. The last time I made a similar comment on an internet forum, I got a reply in passable Esperanto, which is the language in question here.
About Esperanto, forum member Andrew Gibbens suggested that it was a good idea for 1909, but not for today.
angib wrote:That was back when people thought that if everyone could speak to each other, they wouldn't fight - a good idea in 1909, but it didn't work out.....
I must take issue with both points.
Did people believe that in 1909? In 1906, Ludovik Zamenhof, a well-known proponent of Esperanto wrote (translation mine):
We are not as naïve as some people think we are; we do not believe that a neutral [language] will turn people into angels; we know very well that bad people will stay bad. But we believe that communication and familiarity on a neutral foundation will do away with a great amount of crimes and inhuman acts which are caused not by ill will but simply by unfamiliarity and [the resulting] intrusions.
Being able to speak the same language will not bring peace (look at Northern Ireland.) They knew that even in 1909.
More importantly, telling someone like me that "Esperanto didn't work out" is like telling a vegetarian that animals want to be eaten, or a hunter that meat tastes better from the grocery store. Esperanto is as much a part of my daily life as brushing my teeth or drinking coffee when I get up. If Esperanto "didn't work out", then that's news to me.
The timing of this comment was especially ironic, since, as I said, I was about to head out to cook breakfast for some visiting Esperanto speakers. A long time aquantance was passing through town with her new boyfriend who was visiting from Italy. Clearly, Esperanto had worked for them, seeing as that's how they met, and is the language they share. It was also working for my children who were excited to have company and would ask "chu vi povas sidi apud mi?". Even without company, I can see how being native speakers of Esperanto works out for my children, for example, when my son understands unfamiliar words like "subteranian" because he recognizes the Latin roots of the word via Esperanto.
I usually explain Esperanto as a language which is learned by people who are interested in people from other cultures, and as a tool for getting to know these people, there can be no doubt that it has "worked out."
