AroAro's log (languages, books, certificates)

[AroAro]

I'm happy the forum is back and big thanks for everyone involved in restoring it!

Romanian – still reading “Dilema Veche” but I don’t write down every unknown word, only those words that I find interesting and worth remembering. I’m also using some general exam topics as prompts (but without ChatGPT this time) – I choose a subject (e.g. free public transport) and try to speak about it for at least 2-3 minutes.

Czech – doing lesson 8 from “Čeština pro cizince”

Clozemaster/Memrise
#Hebrew from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 4655, mastered 4442 out of 19999 sentences
#Occitan from French => playing 1658, mastered 1129 out of 1658 sentences
#Czech from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 625, mastered 304 out of 8474 sentences
#Dutch: 1001 most common words => mastered 380 – and that’s the end of the journey with this collection because my Memrise app went through an update and I lost access to community courses. I’m not really heartbroken about it because learning vocab only (without context or grammar) felt quite “dry” so I guess I wouldn’t continue for much longer anyway. Instead, I decided to subscribe tentatively to Memrise for a year and I started doing their official Dutch course.

Reading – I finished “Pompeii” and Guy Deutscher’s “Through the Language Glass”. My next read – “The Bee Sting” (the only book shortlisted for Booker last year that caught my attention).

[AroAro]

I got my results of CELI 4 and I passed! I got 168/200 which means grade B (written part 114/140, speaking part 54/60). It’s just 5 points short of grade A but I think it’s a reliable assessment of my current level in Italian and probably a solid foundation for a C2 exam I’d like to definitely take in the future. Here are the details and some comments:

CELI4.png

Reading 33/40 – the score is even better than what I got out of sample tests that I did before the exam

Writing 39/50 – to be honest, I thought I would do better here but I should probably be glad that they rated my essay at all as I hadn’t indicated the topic number on the answer sheet (it turns out I obsessed unnecessarily about this issue). Anyway, it’s a good result for someone who prepared on their own – I guess that if I had had some lessons with a tutor specializing in CELI exams, I would’ve got some tips and hints as to what exactly examiners expect to see in this part.

Linguistic competences 18/20 – nice, I did better than expected. Although this part weighs only 10% of the total score, it’s easy to lose points here because there are just so many tasks to do.

Listening 24/30 – did much much better than expected it was without a doubt the most challenging part of the exam and I expected the result to be rather in the 10-15 points range so that’s a nice surprise. And now I know how to prepare for CELI 5 – listen to radio interviews and avoid YT with its nicely edited videos where no background noises impede the comprehension.

Speaking 54/60 – well, I knew I would pass that part but not with such a high score! I deliberately tried to use “congiuntivo” regularly during the part (but without overdoing it in an artificial way) so that probably paid off in the end (that’s a tip I read somewhere on reddit I believe). Interestingly, my good results in speaking part at language exams are “inversely proportional” to my interpersonal skills – turns out I’ve been following unconsciously the advice from the video below (mistake 8, starts at 24:44):



So on to the Romanian exam next Wednesday!

Czech – doing lesson 9 from “Čeština pro cizince”

Clozemaster/Memrise
#Hebrew from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 4695, mastered 4481 out of 19999 sentences
#Occitan from French => playing 1658, mastered 1278 out of 1658 sentences
#Czech from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 665, mastered 344 out of 8474 sentences
#Memrise Dutch Course – 46 words mastered but I can’t find anywhere the total number of words/expressions in this course

Reading – finished “The Bee Sting” – it was brilliant. Generally speaking, I’m prejudiced against books longer than 400 pages (or movies longer than 2 hours) because rarely these additional pages add anything to the story but in this case I wish the book were even longer than its 651 pages! I don’t agree with all the stylistic choices of the author (such as eliminating punctuation in some chapters) but it didn’t stop me from being swept along by this family drama (or I just have a soft spot for family dramas/sagas). For a change, my next read will be a rather short one – Steinbeck’s “Of Mice and Men”, and then Zeruya Shalev’s “Husband and Wife” (in Polish).

[AroAro]

I took the Romanian C1 online exam two days ago, the levels C1 and C2 took their exams simultaneously (around 20 people in total) and it all went smoother than last year when I took the B2 exam. The same examiner supervised the exam but this time, everyone understood the instructions so there was no delay, and the atmosphere was more relaxed (and I knew how it was going to look like so that helped as well). Again, most of the candidates had Romanian sounding names but there was also a Polish girl (of course I googled her, she works for the Polish Foreign Office), there were some people from Serbia and Italy and one guy from Greece.

The time pressure remained the same however. First, only 45 minutes for reading and grammar section. I think I did ok in the reading but not so well in the grammar part – there was an exercise where you had to insert missing words but in same cases I just couldn’t come up with any logical ideas so just scribbled something randomly here. Then, 60 minutes for writing – one essay about freedom of speech and one letter of complaint (I’m glad I practiced writing such letters in Romanian prior to the exam). There was just enough time to write some ideas and I had to write the essay and the letter directly on the sheet so as not to exceed the time. My wife told me she couldn’t write anything of the sort in Polish in so little time, let alone in another language.

And finally, the listening and speaking parts – luckily, I was the first one on the list and I was paired with the Greek guy. For the listening, they sent the audio file via Zoom and we had 10 minutes to answer 10 questions – it was quite challenging but in the C1 spectrum. When each of us gave the answers, we were told we did ok in this part (oh yes, because interestingly, just like last year, we were given the feedback about our performance regularly during that part). Then, each of us had to speak for about 3 minutes about the following question “people work better when they earn more”. Then, we had to have a discussion about online education and yeah, we managed to speak for a couple of minutes about it, exchanging ideas and arguments, so that was fun. The Greek guy is an English teacher, so his professional experience definitely helped him, he spoke for a longer time than I did but I didn’t feel overshadowed or such. We were both praised for our dialogue, then the examiner asked some questions as to why we learn Romanian and so on. At the end, he said that maybe we’ll see each other once again at the C2 exam – who knows? I got the copy of the C2 exam and it looks rather similar to C1 so maybe I will try my luck one day (provided they’ll still offer online exams in the future).

So it’s time for my next project – taking Goethe C1 exam in June. I have 5 months to prepare for it, I hope it will be enough! And the good thing is that this exam structure was overhauled completely starting this year, and it’s very similar to B2 level, so I’m already more or less familiar with it to some degree. I started working with the book “Wortschatzübungen für Fortgeschrittene UNI? SICHER! 3 (B2-C1-C2)” that includes word lists for a dozen of vocabulary areas and corresponding exercises, then I plan to practice “sprachbausteine” and I will have to take some conversation lessons a few weeks before the exam. I will also try to read one article from “Der Spiegel” a day. When it comes to listening however, in February I’m going to focus solely on Bulgarian – I have bookmarked some 50 YT videos, and then I will still have 4 months anyway to practice my German listening skills.

Czech – still doing lesson 9 from “Čeština pro cizince”

Clozemaster/Memrise
#Hebrew from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 4725, mastered 4518 out of 19999 sentences
#Occitan from French => playing 1658, mastered 1379 out of 1658 sentences
#Czech from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 695, mastered 374 out of 8474 sentences
#Memrise Dutch Course – learned 63 words

Reading – I almost finished “Husband and Wife”, and then, I will start reading my first ever book in Bulgarian. There is no particular Bulgarian book or author that I had in mind when I started learning the language, and in the end I opted for Arthur C. Clark’s “Rendezvous with Rama” / “Среща с Рама”. When I was preparing for CELI 4 exam last year, I watched a YT video by Amadeo Balbi about Oumuamua and he said one of the reasons why it sparked interest is that its shape is similar to the object described in Clark’s book. It grabbed my attention so this is what I will read next.

[Caromarlyse]

You are a machine!

I'll be following your prep for German C1 with interest. I've had two aborted attempts in the past to prepare for that exam, but always got overwhelmed by the apparent size of the task at hand. I have complete faith in you, though

[AroAro]

You are a machine!

I'll be following your prep for German C1 with interest. I've had two aborted attempts in the past to prepare for that exam, but always got overwhelmed by the apparent size of the task at hand. I have complete faith in you, though

I can relate to that because the C1 exam used to be unnecessarily complicated in my opinion, however it looks now much more "user friendly" (doesn't mean it's easier though!) so maybe you could give it a go

Romanian - I passed the C1 exam (I got 91/100 points), I will get the detailed results next week.

German – I did 5 chapters from “Wortschatzübungen für Fortgeschrittene”. The book is great, there are a lot of collocations with examples, something that I find useful and necessary for improving my German.

Czech – doing lesson 10 from “Čeština pro cizince”

Clozemaster/Memrise
#Hebrew from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 4775, mastered 4578 out of 19999 sentences
#Occitan from French => playing 1658, mastered 1473 out of 1658 sentences
#Czech from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 745, mastered 429 out of 8474 sentences
#Memrise Dutch Course – learned 78 words

Reading – I fnished “Rendezvous with Rama” / “Среща с Рама” and to my surprise reading Bulgarian was easier than reading books in Russian! I guess there are two reasons that may explain that - “Среща с Рама” was a translation and I think that the English original was not overly sophisticated in terms of vocabulary. And then, in Bulgarian there is basically no declension, and my brain didn’t have to stop to analyze (even unconsciously) the case and verb rection. I decided that my next Russian book will be a translation as well (Dan Brown’s “The Da Vinci Code”). But now, I’m going to read to books in French – Leila Slimani’s “Le Pays des autres 1” and Tahar Ben Jelloun “La nuit sacrée”.

[AroAro]

German – I’ve done so far 2/3 of “Wortschatzübungen für Fortgeschrittene”, I should finish it by the end of the month. There are other books in the series (Wissenschaftsdeutsch, Wirtschaftsdeutsch, Hörverstehen) and I’m considering trying out the book for listening practice but probably closer to the date of the exam. I’ve been reading “Der Spiegel” as well (I’m at the page 52/122).

Czech – doing lesson 11 from “Čeština pro cizince”

Clozemaster/Memrise
#Hebrew from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 4820, mastered 4634 out of 19999 sentences
#Occitan from French => playing 1658, mastered 1551 out of 1658 sentences
#Czech from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 790, mastered 473 out of 8474 sentences
#Memrise Dutch Course – learned 111 words, at this point simple phrases are being incorporated so the course is getting more interesting

Reading – I read “Le Pays des autres and really liked it, I think it’s even better than Slimani’s Goncourt winning novel “Chanson douce”. I was supposed to read “La nuit sacrée” but I realized it’s the second volume in the duology so it’ll make more sense to read the first volume “L’enfant de sable” before - but I somehow lost interest in it, I will get to it later this year hopefully. I started reading instead “Код да Винчи” – so far so good!

I got my results of the Romanian exam – reading and grammar 20.5/25, writing 22.5/25, listening and speaking 48/50. Will I take the C2 level exam? Probably yes if they still offer it in online format in a couple of years. Preparing for the exam will be a nice opportunity to spend some time with Romanian again.

[AroAro]

German – I finished “Wortschatzübungen für Fortgeschrittene”, I think the book is very well conceived and will be helpful for my exam preparation. And now, I’m going to work with two graded readers for advanced learners – they contain lots of texts about topics that often come up in language exams and below each text there is a vocabulary list with Polish translation. The thing is that these readers tend to be boring so I will probably skip some pages (besides, I already read them a few years back). Moreover, I will try to tackle “Sprachbausteine” – I bought two exercice books on amazon for C1 level.

“Der Spiegel” – page 68/152.

Bulgarian – so in February, I listened every single day to Bulgarian podcasts or YT videos – mosty YT though. I think that on average, I spent around 45-60 minutes a day on Bulgarian but I can’t really say that my comprehension level skyrocketed but I guess it did improve a little bit - though it’s still not B2 level. I hoped to allocate more time to Bulgarian listening but with my sick kids staying at home most of the month it was the best I could do. However, I figured out how to get an official (or semi-official) certificate in Bulgarian so that will motivate me to spend more time on Bulgarian (maybe next year?) and reach that B2 level.

Yesterday, I listened to some news in Croatian and even understood some words/phrases – we’re planning to go to Croatia this summer so maybe I’ll learn some basic words and expressions before summer holiday Anyway, I’m now going to concentrate fully on German when it comes to listening skills. Here’s a real treasure trove of German podcasts offered by German public radio broadcasters. I shouldn’t run out of things to listen to for the next four months!

Czech – I finished “Čeština pro cizince” and it’s one of the rare course books that deliver on their promise as this one can really take the learner to A2 level. I’m glad I started learning Czech with it. Next, I will work with “Mluvíte česky”, a course book for Polish speakers published in 1972 (I will do 20 lessons out 37, I don’t want to jump into more complex stuff too soon).

Clozemaster/Memrise
#Hebrew from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 4865, mastered 4692 out of 19999 sentences
#Occitan from French => playing 1658, mastered 1643 out of 1658 sentences – this collection is mostly in the Gascon dialect which is a quite different from Langudocien. Having almost finished it, I’m thinking about starting European Portuguese course on Memrise (via Italian) just for fun and because I bought their subscription anyway.
#Czech from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 835, mastered 516 out of 8474 sentences
#Memrise Dutch Course – learned 146 words

Reading – reading “Код да Винчи” was a really good decision – it was entertaining, even unintentionally funny at some points, and it kept me interested so it didn’t feel like a slog. I can work my way thruough a slog in Polish, English or French but a bad book in my other languages does feel like a waste of time so I have to be careful about my reading choices. I’m going to read two books in English now – “The Crimson Petal and The White” by Michel Faber (I expect good things from that, the two books I’ve read by him were stunning) and J.M.Coetzee’s “Waiting for barbarians”.

[Axon]

Hi AroAro, I always recommend Die Frage as an incredible German podcast: https://plus.rtl.de/podcast/die-frage-4c4452vhzch3u
I listened to a lot of the episodes in 2019, when they were taking a few years off. There are now quite a lot more episodes available on this particular site, while other sites either don't have the older or the newer ones.

[tastyonions]

Hi AroAro, I always recommend Die Frage as an incredible German podcast: https://plus.rtl.de/podcast/die-frage-4c4452vhzch3u
I listened to a lot of the episodes in 2019, when they were taking a few years off. There are now quite a lot more episodes available on this particular site, while other sites either don't have the older or the newer ones.

Neat, I didn't know it was a podcast as well. I've watched a number of their YouTube episodes.

[lichtrausch]

I can work my way thruough a slog in Polish, English or French but a bad book in my other languages does feel like a waste of time so I have to be careful about my reading choices.

Interesting, I'm somewhat the opposite. Reading a bad book in one of my weaker languages, my mind is still stimulated by the relative novelty of the language, i.e. more unknown words and expressions. But with stronger languages, that novelty is not there, so the badness of the book just stares back at me in all its unsightliness.