It’s actually quite close to other European languages. It just seems more different than it is because it’s written in Cyrillic. Which is also surprisingly close to Latin once you learn to read it.

Definitely a lunatic 😂

Basic Russian ain’t hard, and it’s easy to get yourself understood. Some are scared by Cyrillic letters, but that’s essentially a fusion of Latin and Greek, and there’s nothing special about it - it’s not hieroglyphics or something. Many, if not most, letters are same as in Latin scripture. Some are a catch though, and designate entirely different sounds - like “c” letter actually meaning “s”, “B” actually meaning “V” etc.

Advanced Russian is a bloody meat grinder. Grammar is such a pain in the ass locals struggle with it, and there’s a LOT of synonymic words to learn if you expect to be fluent or understand what we’re talking about.

On a positive side, despite the huge size of the country, most Russians speak roughly the same standard Russian. There are some regional words, but nothing I would call a dialect is popular anywhere but deep rural areas. You don’t have to learn all that to be fluent.

I’m native Russian speaker and I often reflect on what I’m saying and how I say things. This is very counter-intuitive.

Do you know the joke that ‘flammable’ and ‘inflammable’ mean almost the same things? Guess what, in Russian I can give you a dozen of such pairs, some of them are essential in a casual conversation.

Your Russian is decent but why tf you are spending your life on that

You lost me at cyka