Travel Niche Blog

It’s always important to be able to speak a little local language when you are on holiday or a business trip, and we’ve already featured a Spanish audio language download center in the Travel Niche blog, but multimedia learning resources for Indian, Chinese, Japanese and Arabic languages aren’t so easy to find on the web.

There are language books and websites where you can read about the basic of these languages before you start your holiday, but in my experience a book won’t help much
because the of the difficulties of correct pronounciation.

The Guardian Online newspaper has compiled a series of 10 minute podcasts (in mp3 format) where you can download and practice some of the basics such as “yes and no”, “please and thank you” and of course the all important “I don’t speak this language!”.

The audio language resources, sponsored by Air Emirates, are available from the links below:

• Chinese (Mandarin)
• Indian (Hindi)
• Arabic
• Japanese

Be sure to download and practice them before you book your vacation or trip!

If you’re going on holiday in a Spanish speaking country and you want to learn a little of the local language before you go, Guardian Travel are offering free Spanish lessons from their website.

There are four lessons available from their site. The first lesson is on how say “hello” goodbye” etc, then the are lessons on finding your way round, wining and dining, and then the final lesson is on expressing likes and dislikes. These are perfect if you want to make an impression whilst on holiday.
The free Spanish lessons are in mp3 format and there are accompanying notes in Adobe format.

I’m thinking about downloading the lot and booking a vacation in Spain; Barcelona’s a great destination.
The Spanish for travellers lessons are available from the Guardian Travel website.

The Guardian online newspaper has published an excellent list of travel websites that have revloutionised the travel industry.

Lastminute.com is of course number one on the list as are easyjet and expedia.

The article doesn’t just list the travel sites though, there are background informations as to the history of the site and why they have become important.

If you are interest ed in travel and the influence of the internet on it, then the article is well worth a read:

Websites that changed the travel world.