Steyyan's log (DE | ES | nl | fr | ja)

[steyyan]

Week 25 20 Jun – 26 Jun

This week's goals
– ES Reading: 140 pages 307 pages (219%)
– ES Listening: 7:00' minutes 15:30' minutes (221%)
– FR Reading: 15 pages 36 pages (240%)
– FR Listening: 1:00' minutes 2:35' minutes (258%)
– DE Writing: 700 words 3030 words (433%)

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Output Challenge 2016: 48133 / 50000 (96%)

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-: 100 / 100 L'etranger
-: 100 / 100 Kafka en la orilla
-: 100 / 100 La playa de los ahogados

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German
I've got less than 2000 words left of the output challenge now. -- well, it's down to 761 now as I'm writing this. I can't believe I thought it would be such a tall order to finish it when I started out with the Output Challenge in January...

Spanish
I finished Kafka en la orilla and La playa de los ahogados this week. The former is a translation of Murakami's Kafka on the Shore whereas the latter is a crime novel by Domingo Vilar, which is translated from Galician.

The Murakami book had it's fair share of surrealism and kinkiness, which isn't unlike the other Murakami books I've read so far. I found it a bit boring in the beginning, but towards the end it was really intriguing. The trasnlation was a bit off at times though, Johnny Walker was "re-romanised" as Johnny Walken for some reason...

The crime novel was an enjoyable read, just like the other book by the same author, Ojos de agua. Just as you'd expect from a good crime novel, I couldn't guess "who-dun-it" before the inspectors.

French
I finished L'etranger, and I found myself reading it more quickly towards the end. To ease the transition from reading 15 pages over the week to 105, I'm going with the second Harry Potter book before picking out something native.

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Next week's goals
– JA Reading: 105 pages
– JA Listening: 7:00' minutes
– NL Reading: 20 pages
– NL Listening: 1:00' minutes
– DE Writing: 700 words

[steyyan]

Week 26 27 Jun – 03 Jul

This week's goals
– JA Reading: 105 pages 176 pages (168%)
– JA Listening: 7:00' minutes 12:15' minutes (175%)
– NL Reading: 20 pages 42 pages (210%)
– NL Listening: 1:00' minutes 2:22' minutes (237%)
– DE Writing: 700 words 1973 words (282%)

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Output Challenge 2016: 50000 / 50000 (50106; 100%)

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-: 100 / 100 ハリー・ポッターと死の秘宝
-: 58 / 100 Galgenveld (De Noordzeemoorden 1)

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Alright, this entry's going to be a bit longer than usual, since it will include a summary for the first half of the year, as well as some details about the second half.

German
I finished the output challenge this week, just as I've been planning to over the last few weeks. It's mostly been translation practice, but it's nice to use the little creativity I've got to find adecuate translations for idiomatic expressions.

Japanese
I finished the seventh Harry Potter book in Japanese today. It's nice to end a "japanese week" at a happier spot than the last few times. Two words: Fred and Dobby. For those who've read the book, that should be enough information. For everyone else, well, I'm not the one to spoil anything.

I also watched a few episodes of Naruto Shippuuden. I have watched about a dozern of them dubbed into German three years ago, but to be frank, I've almost forgotten all of it, so it just as if I watched it for the first time. The only exceptions would be the first few minutes and the part where Naruto appears more mature to Sakura, before disabusing her of that idea and making her go spare just like in the original series.

Dutch
Nothing new to report here. I'm slowly starting to understand the characters in Flikken Maastrich better now, but I still do miss a lot of what they're saying.

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Totals for the first half of 2016:
DE Writing: 50106 words
ES Reading: 3941 pages
ES Listening: 193:41' min.
FR Reading: 431 pages
FR Listening: 31:40' min.
JA Reading: 2603 pages
JA Listening: 163:43' min.
NL Reading: 570 pages
NL Listening: 29:11' min.

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Books I've finished during the first half of 2016
ES El prinsipio del fin Loureiro M
DE Allmen und der rosa Diamant Suter M
ES Cuatro días de enero Sierra i Fabra J
JA 愛おしい骨 O’Connell C
NL Een licht in de duisternis De Waal & Baantjer
DE Harry Potter und der Stein der Weisen Rowling JK
ES Los días oscuros Loureiro M
DE Die Zeit heilt keine Wunden Falkenberg H
ES Memorias de Idhún II: Triada (III & IV) Gallego L
JA ハリー・ポッターと謎のプリンス Rowling JK
FR Harry Potter à l'école des sorciers Rowling JK
ES La sombra del viento Ruiz C
NL Erfschuld Indriðason A
ES Memorias de Idhún. Panteón. Libro V: Convulsión Gallego L
FR L'etranger Camus A
ES Siete días de julio Sierra i Fabra J
ES Kafka en la orilla Murakami H
ES La playa de los ahogados Villar D
JA ハリー・ポッターと死の秘宝 Rowling JK

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I don't think I could say much about the first half of the year that hasn't been covered in previous log entries, so I won't say much beyond the fact that I believe I'm on track for making my annual goals. My only real problem right now is French, in which my listening and reading proficiency still leave a lot to be desired. I'm very happy with my Japanese listening proficiency, which I feel has noticably improved over the last six months.

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So for the second half of the year, I'll keep alternating between target languages. This time it'll be Dutch+Spanish and French+Japanese.

For listening, instead of having the goals in the two languages be seven hours and one hour respectively, I set both to four hours each, since 7+1 is the same as 2×4.

The major difference will be that I'll focus on writing in Spanish and Japanese. Since my Japanese is lagging behind, I'll set the weekly aim as 700 characters instead of 700 words (~1050 characters according to the estimate in the Output Challenge thread, if I recall correctly.)

Odd numbered weeks
NL Reading: 140 pages
NL Listening: 4:00' minutes
ES Listening: 4:00' minutes
ES Writing: 700 words

Even numbered weeks
FR Reading: 105 pages
FR Listening: 4:00' minutes
JA Listening: 4:00' minutes
JA Writing: 700 characters

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Next week's goals
– NL Reading: 140 pages
– NL Listening: 4:00' minutes
– ES Listening: 4:00' minutes
– ES Writing: 700 words

[steyyan]

Week 27 04 Jul – 10 Jul

This week's goals
– NL Reading: 140 pages 234 pages (167%)
– NL Listening: 4:00' minutes 6:07' minutes (153%)
– ES Listening: 4:00' minutes 8:13' minutes (205%)
– ES Writing: 700 words 1402 words (200%)

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-: 100 / 100 Galgenveld (De Noordzeemoorden 1)
-: 23 / 100 Hart van inkt

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Dutch
Primarily reading in a language other than Spanish or Japanese is definitely refreshing. My Dutch is improving quickly, and I get by really well with only an occational dictionary lookup.

As for listening, I watched an episode of Alfred J. Kwak, listened to a few chapters of the third HP audiobook (shame that they dissappeared from the Pottermore Shop before I got around to buying the rest), watched a few episodes of Flikken Maastricht and a few Youtube videos. Flikken Maastricht is definitely the most "difficult" source, since some of the characters have dialects and accents that requires some effort to understand.

Spanish
After having spent some time practicing writing in German, I find it extremely hard to do the same in Spanish. In German, I got a proper inner monologue going – if that makes sense – that helps me translate words and expressions mostly effortlessly. There's also the excellent and very user-friendly dict.cc online Ger-Eng dictionary that I've been using; after being spoiled by that one, I hate using spanishdict and wordreference, since they don't offer translations to as many idiomatic expressions as dict.cc, and they're also more cumbersome to browse...

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Next week's goals
– FR Reading: 105 pages
– FR Listening: 4:00' minutes
– JA Listening: 4:00' minutes
– JA Writing: 700 characters

[steyyan]

Week 28 11 Jul – 17 Jul

This week's goals
– FR Reading: 105 pages 170 pages (162%)
– FR Listening: 4:00' minutes 6:38' minutes (166%)
– JA Listening: 4:00' minutes 8:39' minutes (216%)
– JA Writing: 700 characters 1638 characters (234%)

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-: 47 / 100 Harry Potter et la Chambre des secrets

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(I'm slow at updating my log this week. I haven't really been too well to be honest with you...)

French
Reading French is more exhausting than Japanese, even though it's bloody Harry Potter. I'm glad I didn't go for something more difficult, though, and despite the difficulty, I somewhat enjoyed it. The second HP book is the most difficult one, because I have never really read it in a language that I was good at at the time (well, I've listened to the audiobook a few times, but I don't really pay 100% attention to those). I noticed that the French version adds some bits here and there, for instance when Justin Finch-Fletchley explains that he were to go to Eton, he clarified that it's the best school in England. Some French education terms are kind of hard to understand though, "premier cycle" what?

Listening is still a bit of a drag, although I'm starting to pick up more and more sentences, especially filler words (alors and so forth) and shorter sentences. I'm sticking to "Let's play" videos at the moment.

Japanese
Did I just complain about writing practice in Spanish last week? Well, I take that back. While I lack a proper "inner monologue" in Spanish, I don't have any at all in Japanese. Describing emotions, facial expressions and apperance is very hard in Japanese.

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Next week's goals
– NL Reading: 140 pages
– NL Listening: 4:00' minutes
– ES Listening: 4:00' minutes
– ES Writing: 700 words

[steyyan]

Week 29 18 Jul – 24 Jul

This week's goals
– NL Reading: 140 pages 221 pages (158%)
– NL Listening: 4:00' minutes 6:38' minutes (166%)
– ES Listening: 4:00' minutes 8:08' minutes (203%)
– ES Writing: 700 words 1512 words (216%)

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-: 71 / 100 Hart van inkt

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(Here I am again, forgetting to update my log frequently enough.)

I got accepted into the only Master's degree course I applied to, after originally being disqualified (which turned out to be caused by the fact that I sent them the transcript with my grades instead of my certificate).

Dutch
There's nothing new to report here. I am slowly getting used to reading 5-6 times more Dutch than before, and my listening comprehension is improving more rapidly now since I spend more time with the language. If I reached a solid passive B1 level before New Year's, that'd be nice.

Spanish
As for writing practice, I really struggle with anything too vulgar. In German, I had dict.cc and my so-called "inner monologue" to help me find the vulgar expressions that carries over the meaning of "blimey!" and "bloody hell!". In Spanish, I've got neither. I should listen to more Spaniards, I suppose...

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Next week's goals
– FR Reading: 105 pages
– FR Listening: 4:00' minutes
– JA Listening: 4:00' minutes
– JA Writing: 700 characters

[Ketutar]

I got accepted into the only Master's degree course I applied to, after originally being disqualified (which turned out to be caused by the fact that I sent them the transcript with my grades instead of my certificate).

Congratulations!

As for writing practice, I really struggle with anything too vulgar. In German, I had dict.cc and my so-called "inner monologue" to help me find the vulgar expressions that carries over the meaning of "blimey!" and "bloody hell!". In Spanish, I've got neither. I should listen to more Spaniards, I suppose...

Would http://www.jergaurbana.com/ help?

[steyyan]

Week 30 25 Jul – 31 Jul

This week's goals
– FR Reading: 105 pages 188 pages (179%)
– FR Listening: 4:00' minutes 6:42' minutes (168%)
– JA Listening: 4:00' minutes 6:33' minutes (164%)
– JA Writing: 700 characters 1328 characters (190%)

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-: 100 / 100 Harry Potter et la Chambre des Secrets

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I finished Odinsbarn this week, the book we're reading in the Nordic Book Club here on this forum.

French
I finished the second HP book today, and was considering picking up the third one, since I'll be starting uni soon, and struggling with a difficult French book while settling into student life isn't something I'd look forward to.

Instead, I picked up the first book in the La quête d'Ewilan series, which have decent reviews, but have also been described as having a simple plot - something that's not too bad for someone who's only been learning French for eight months.

Japanese
I translated a simple story from the writing prompts subreddit (~800ch) as well as writing a short journal entry for the week (~500ch). Translation into Japanese is still something I really struggle with, though...

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Next week's goals
– NL Reading: 140 pages
– NL Listening: 4:00' minutes
– ES Listening: 4:00' minutes
– ES Writing: 700 words

[steyyan]

Week 31 01 Aug – 07 Aug

This week's goals
– NL Reading: 140 pages 210 pages (150%)
– NL Listening: 4:00' minutes 6:03' minutes (151%)
– ES Listening: 4:00' minutes 7:05' minutes (177%)
– ES Writing: 700 words 1082 words (155%)

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-: 100 / 100 Hart van inkt
-: 24 / 100 IJskoud (De Noordzeemoorden 2)

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(I've been a bit busy lately...)

Dutch
Not much new to report, really. I'm glad to finally be done with Hart van inkt, as I didn't really enjoy re-reading it. The thing that annoys me the most is how the story progresses: a repeating pattern of breakthroughs and (annoying) setbacks (usually invovling Basta).

Spanish
Since I spent three of the days away from a proper word processor with spell and grammar checker, I didn't do much writing practice this week. Not much listening either, since I don't want to waste precious gigabytes of 4G internet on videos.

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Next week's goals
– FR Reading: 105 pages
– FR Listening: 4:00' minutes
– JA Listening: 4:00' minutes
– JA Writing: 700 characters

[Ketutar]

Instead, I picked up the first book in the La quête d'Ewilan series, which have decent reviews, but have also been described as having a simple plot - something that's not too bad for someone who's only been learning French for eight months.

It has "decent reviews", doesn't it... but the Wikipedia article about it sounds horrible. Sorry

[steyyan]

It has "decent reviews", doesn't it... but the Wikipedia article about it sounds horrible. Sorry

To be honest, I don't really care. It's not like my french is good enough to appreciate the finer details anyway. I'm just happy to have something easy to read that's not an "easy reader" or Harry Potter for once -- funny how I'd probably never get into that series if I weren't into languages, but now I'm quite the fan, but still, I've read the first few books way too many times, but not once in English