>>Well, someone wrote (was it you?) that languages are fluent and ever-changing (or something to that effect). That is certainly true. People tend to speak using phrases that are common in their environment. The use of the language here has gradually deteriorated. That doesn't change the rules of English grammar though. Students still get graded on grammar in school (for the most part -- I've heard news stories where it is not done in some cases). While it might be okay to speak poorly among your friends, it is certainly not a good idea in business relationships. I'm sure the same is true in Nertherlands?
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>The dutch language seems a lot more dynamic than the english one. Each and every year new words are added to the dictionary. English derived words like updaten, deleten, googlen, skypen, have been added to the dictionary recently.
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>And as I said, also the spelling is adjusted every few years to a point that no-one who is not a language freak or just recently learned it would have no idea how to spel certain word.
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>As for changed to the gramar rules, how to construct whole sentences, I'm a bit less up to date, but it would not surprise me there are changes there as well. I can't remember any rules as discussed on this topic on the usage of the word "mijzelf" ever been tolds to me dureing my education. But then again. Dutch is complicated enough and I do not have a degree in "Dutch" as a language, so I do not know for sure.

So, if somehow I were to manage to learn Dutch, in a couple of years I would have to learn an entirely new language? :o) That's very daunting, but then learning Dutch is daunting period. I've had periods in my life where I was fairly adept at speaking another language (French, Russian, German, Spanish), but each time I learned a new language, I forgot the others (all except English). I'm not one of those who have the ability to maintain proficiency in multiple languages. :( In fact, I spent more time learning Spanish (all day every day for months) and speaking it (living in Central America and a few South American countries), that I forgot almost all of the French, German, and Russian I ever learned. I actually reached the point once where I thought in English and Spanish intermittently. Today I use Spanish so seldom (unless I'm speaking with a few friends of mine and that is mostly colloquially), that I'm not proficient like I was. I can read it okay, but I don't recall all the tenses anymore. I can't think of the words anymore but I remember them when I hear them. It's fading away... :(