Mastering the 4 Languages: A Language Log

Continue or start your personal language log here, including logs for challenge participants
Purangi
Orange Belt
Posts: 138
Joined: Fri Oct 05, 2018 7:57 pm
Languages: French, English, Mandarin, Russian, Spanish
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Re: Mastering the 4 Languages: A Language Log

Postby Purangi » Tue Oct 29, 2019 10:32 am

I wish you the best of luck for your exam and I sincerely hope you will continue your Tamil study and keep logging your methods and progress here! Tamil is exactly the kind of language I wish we could see more here on the forum. Btw, you mentioned a Tamil music playlist in a previous post, do you mind making some recommendations?
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Bilingual_monoglot
Yellow Belt
Posts: 98
Joined: Sun Dec 24, 2017 5:15 am
Location: Singapore
Languages: English (n) Tamil (n-heritage) French Esperanto (can talk about language policy/lepak, and nothing else) Hindi (bumbling tourist) Malay (basic conversations) Chinese (introductions and ordering food)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16715
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Re: Mastering the 4 Languages: A Language Log

Postby Bilingual_monoglot » Sat Nov 02, 2019 1:19 am

Now that my Tamil exams have finished (like 3 days ago), I believe it's time to conduct a post-mortem on my performance for the paper. However, I would first like to thank everyone for their support.

So, there are 4 parts to the Tamil A-level exam. An oral exam, a listening comprehension exam,an essay paper, and a 'language' paper. The first 2 exams took place 6 months ago and I think I did alright. Now, for the essay, I think I really wrote quite well. In fact, I would go so far as to say it was some of the best prose I ever wrote. Next up, the language paper. This is divided into 5 sections. A grammar section that tests you on the rules of elison, a section traditional idioms, a fill in the blanks passage, a comprehension, and a vocabulary section. Generally, I tend to do quite well on the first 2 sections, and my tuition teacher has confirmed that I will do alright for that portion. I am not entirely sure of how I will perform for the fill in the blanks, but I think it should be fine. The comprehension was the hardest part of the paper. The text appeared to be made intentionally extremely difficult, and the entire passage revolved around a word I don't quite understand. The vocabulary section was also quite taxing, as the words were pulled from the passage, and their meaning has to be based on the context of the passage. Overall, I think I can pass, but i will not be a quality pass.
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Bilingual_monoglot
Yellow Belt
Posts: 98
Joined: Sun Dec 24, 2017 5:15 am
Location: Singapore
Languages: English (n) Tamil (n-heritage) French Esperanto (can talk about language policy/lepak, and nothing else) Hindi (bumbling tourist) Malay (basic conversations) Chinese (introductions and ordering food)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16715
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Re: Mastering the 4 Languages: A Language Log

Postby Bilingual_monoglot » Sat Nov 02, 2019 1:39 am

Purangi wrote:I wish you the best of luck for your exam and I sincerely hope you will continue your Tamil study and keep logging your methods and progress here! Tamil is exactly the kind of language I wish we could see more here on the forum. Btw, you mentioned a Tamil music playlist in a previous post, do you mind making some recommendations?


In regards to the continuation of my study, I have both good and bad news. I personally plan on continuing to improve my Tamil, it's my heritage language and a big part of my identity. However, I plan on putting it on hold for now. I will be going to India later this month, and part of that time I will be spending in Telengana and Andhra Pradesh. Hence, my immediate plan is to improve my Hindi and also teach myself some basic Telugu. Although, since both Tamil and Telugu are Dravidian languages, I will likely be using my Tamil knowledge to help me out with Telugu. Moreover, Tamil is the main language I use to speak to my family and I am a huge Rajinikanth fan, so it is never truly on hold. Not to mention that most of my India trip will still be in Tamil Nadu, so I will be using my Tamil there.

As for Tamil music recommendations, anything by A.R Rahman is going to be good. Also, Tamil music, at least in India, is still heavily linked to the Tamil film industry, so that is a good place to search. If you like your music multilingual and dope, Dopeadelicz is quite good, being pioneers in Mumbai hip-hop, using Tamil, English and Hindi/Marathi (or both?).
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Bilingual_monoglot
Yellow Belt
Posts: 98
Joined: Sun Dec 24, 2017 5:15 am
Location: Singapore
Languages: English (n) Tamil (n-heritage) French Esperanto (can talk about language policy/lepak, and nothing else) Hindi (bumbling tourist) Malay (basic conversations) Chinese (introductions and ordering food)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16715
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Re: Mastering the 4 Languages: A Language Log

Postby Bilingual_monoglot » Mon Nov 04, 2019 1:30 pm

Bilingual_monoglot wrote:I will be going to India later this month, and part of that time I will be spending in Telengana and Andhra Pradesh. Hence, my immediate plan is to improve my Hindi and also teach myself some basic Telugu. ere.

In line with this, I decided to register for the 6WC for Hindi.
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Bilingual_monoglot
Yellow Belt
Posts: 98
Joined: Sun Dec 24, 2017 5:15 am
Location: Singapore
Languages: English (n) Tamil (n-heritage) French Esperanto (can talk about language policy/lepak, and nothing else) Hindi (bumbling tourist) Malay (basic conversations) Chinese (introductions and ordering food)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16715
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Re: Mastering the 4 Languages: A Language Log

Postby Bilingual_monoglot » Wed Dec 25, 2019 3:08 pm

It's been more than a month since I last posted anything (man, I need to be more consistent in posting), there is a number of things to talk about. First, my trip to India. I ended up travelling to 4 different states, so my linguistic muscles were stretched. Outside of Tamil Nadu, I ended having to use a lot of Hindi, and I must say that my Hindi has improved some, though it still could use a lot of work. I also managed to learn some Telugu, though I mostly used it in conjunction with either Hindi or Tamil.

I also volunteered with at an old folks home for Christmas, which also required some language skills. The old folks I worked with could not really speak English, my own Chinese is not that great, and most of them could speak some Malay. So I spoke mostly Malay and quite a bit of Chinese.

Also, a few words about my plans for next year. First, I plan to make a video sample of where I am at in all of my languages by new years, so that I have something objective to compare my progress to. Next, I want to be more consistent with my learning and my progress updates, which might be made difficult my A level prep next year and my DCD, so any tips from the forum will also be appriciated (are there any threads addressing it?). As for what languages I plan on working on, I plan on continuing to work on Malay and Chinese at least until March. I would also like to improve on my Hindi, maybe some Telugu. During the second half of the year, I plan on moving to where progress yields are better, specifically I want to work on German and Spanish, maybe Kristang.
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Bilingual_monoglot
Yellow Belt
Posts: 98
Joined: Sun Dec 24, 2017 5:15 am
Location: Singapore
Languages: English (n) Tamil (n-heritage) French Esperanto (can talk about language policy/lepak, and nothing else) Hindi (bumbling tourist) Malay (basic conversations) Chinese (introductions and ordering food)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16715
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Re: Mastering the 4 Languages: A Language Log

Postby Bilingual_monoglot » Tue Jan 28, 2020 9:59 am

新年快乐万事如意!
恭喜发财!

So, happy Chinese New Year everybody.
So for this year, I want to have a balance between consolidating my current languages and getting in new ones. Also, I want to start working on Southeast Asian languages.
At the moment, I plan to continue focusing on Chinese and Malay, until at least April.
From May to August, I intend to focus on Spanish and Hindi. From September to December, I plan on focusing on Welsh and Maori. However, the languages for the May to December period are tentative,

However, at the same time, I plan on dabbling in Irish, Vietnamese, Japanese, Korean, Telugu, Arabic, and Kristang, as well as the other languages on the learning list (my strategy for dealing with wanderlust is to just put it into my plans).

Moreover, I want to spend some time on strengthening my French and Esperanto as well.

Next, is how I intend to work on these languages. For Malay, the plan is to mostly use lingq, and get back to watching those P Ramlee films. For Chinese, I'm planning on working through the Paul Noble course and lingodeer. I find that I can actually read a few characters due to being exposed to them a lot. After I get a few more characters and my vocabulary improves, I think I will go into lingq. For Hindi and Telugu, it's mostly going to be immersion via films. For Spanish and Arabic, I am going to use the language transfer course. For maintaining my French, there's a cartoon that I used to follow, but I haven't had time to watch lately. So going back to watching that is part of the plan. Esperanto will mostly be reading.
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samothin
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Location: Kuala Lumpur
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Re: Mastering the 4 Languages: A Language Log

Postby samothin » Fri Feb 07, 2020 11:20 am

Hi BM,

I found this YouTube channel that you might be interested in. It's something like Ted Talk in Tamil. A lot of the videos include Tamil transcript as well. Hope you find it helpful.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTOWKy ... OYtXontXoQ
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Bilingual_monoglot
Yellow Belt
Posts: 98
Joined: Sun Dec 24, 2017 5:15 am
Location: Singapore
Languages: English (n) Tamil (n-heritage) French Esperanto (can talk about language policy/lepak, and nothing else) Hindi (bumbling tourist) Malay (basic conversations) Chinese (introductions and ordering food)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16715
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Re: Mastering the 4 Languages: A Language Log

Postby Bilingual_monoglot » Sat Feb 08, 2020 3:20 am

samothin wrote:Hi BM,

I found this YouTube channel that you might be interested in. It's something like Ted Talk in Tamil. A lot of the videos include Tamil transcript as well. Hope you find it helpful.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTOWKy ... OYtXontXoQ


Thanks so much for this! Actually, I remember my Tamil teacher once showed us one of these talks, and it was quite inspiring, though unfortunately, I didn't search for it later. This should make for some interesting listening.
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Bilingual_monoglot
Yellow Belt
Posts: 98
Joined: Sun Dec 24, 2017 5:15 am
Location: Singapore
Languages: English (n) Tamil (n-heritage) French Esperanto (can talk about language policy/lepak, and nothing else) Hindi (bumbling tourist) Malay (basic conversations) Chinese (introductions and ordering food)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16715
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Re: Mastering the 4 Languages: A Language Log

Postby Bilingual_monoglot » Sat Feb 08, 2020 3:42 am

Hello folks. I think I'll just jump into things.

At the moment, things in Singapore don't look so good thanks to the Wuhan virus pandemic. I'm personally a little scared because of it. However, I am able to use the pandemic to help my language learning. You see, the government has a service where you can get whatsapp updates on the virus, and you can choose which language you want the updates in. I of course chose all 4 language options. So, I read the English message for understanding, the Tamil message to improve reading ability and get some occasional new vocabulary, and put the Chinese and Malay messages on Lingq as lessons for myself.

Moreover, I have started going through vocabulary for my main languages on Drops. I have to say, I'm really loving it. Drops is perhaps the best vocabulary app, it's so beautiful, it uses both images and the English translation and the 5 minute limit actually makes it kind of addicting.

Moreover, I am planning on reincorporating lingodeer into my Chinese routine and complete the Paul Noble course, but I think it's best to do baby steps first.

As I stated on another thread, I am going start going over Malay grammar. The weekend should give me some time for the task.

So, that's about it fro today. Thanks for your support through this journey guys.
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Bilingual_monoglot
Yellow Belt
Posts: 98
Joined: Sun Dec 24, 2017 5:15 am
Location: Singapore
Languages: English (n) Tamil (n-heritage) French Esperanto (can talk about language policy/lepak, and nothing else) Hindi (bumbling tourist) Malay (basic conversations) Chinese (introductions and ordering food)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 15&t=16715
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Re: Mastering the 4 Languages: A Language Log

Postby Bilingual_monoglot » Wed Feb 19, 2020 10:02 am

Ok, so today I had a somewhat surreal experience I wanted to share with you.

So, I just had a conversation with a group of friends that (including me) consisted of a Chinese person who picked Malay somehow, a Malay person for whom it's a native language, an Indian who is teaching himself Malay (me), and a Filipino person who took Malay as their language option. So basically al 4 races of Singapore (Chinese, Malay, Indian, Other) and from 4 different ways of learning a language using Malay as a Lingua Franca (bucking the trend of just using English). As soon as we finished talking, I immediately thought about you guys and how you might enjoy this anecdote.

Also, it was my first real Malay conversation in a while, so yeah.
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