[bbzealot]

Fun fact, George Soros (the banker much targeted by conspiracy theorists) is a native Esperanto speaker, as he was raised to speak the language but his father, who was a well known Esperanto speaker

[JetAlone]

I didn't know that. Fascinating to hear there actually is a native speaker of it. I was aware from reading the wikipedia article that Esperanto was championed by the Ba'hai and Oomoto religious groups, among others. I had also forgotten that Theosophy promoted it as well. Plenty of different Christian groups tried using it too, even Jack Chick, famous for his maligning of D&D.

[sshine]

I've heard there is around 1000 native speakers in the world.

I've met one such.

His parents met at a conference, and only had Esperanto in common.

I've been at music festivals where I met people who did not speak English, so Esperanto was our best common language.