Radioclare's 2020 log (Russian, Croatian)

[Radioclare]

20 November
I had wine with my dinner again this evening, so didn't feel like doing any Russian grammar

Russian
Instead I watched a new Russian Progress video, which involved someone talking about their life story. They'd had a really interesting life, but they managed to talk about it in a really boring way so I got towards the end of what I think was about a 17 minute video and realised that I had no idea what the past 10 minutes had been about; not because I couldn't understand the Russian but because the person was droning on so much I hadn't been paying attention. So I listened to part of it for a second time and did a bit better that time around, but it still wasn't wildly exciting.

My evening then degenerated into watching more Russian videos about the UK on YouTube There's one vlogger who doesn't like the healthcare system in the UK. I listened to 15 minutes of her and the gist I took from it was that the doctors in the UK will only treat her when she's actually sick, whereas in Russia she can get an appointment/treatment for anything at all whenever she fancies it. So she thinks it's critical to have private health insurance in the UK or else fly back to Russia if you want to go to a doctor/dentist.

Then I watched another video about things Russians might find strange if they move to England. There were seven examples of English weirdness given. 1) You can't drive to work in Central London because there aren't (m)any car parks; 2) Men don't stand up for women on public transport, in fact sometimes women stand up for men; 3) The behaviour of men on stag nights; 4) Gay pride; 5) Prevalence of food allergies/intolerances/unusual dietary requirements; 6) Tolerance and the fact that when the vlogger said something racist, people thought it was racist; 7) People drink a lot and it's socially acceptable to drink every day of the week, especially with colleagues after work. While the 7th is true I found it quite amusing, because a lot of English people probably have a stereotype that Russians drink a lot.

Anyway, you can probably tell that this was an evening well spent. I will study lots of prepositions tomorrow as penance

Russian - 59 mins

[Radioclare]

21 November
I had a bit of Esperanto-related work to do this morning, but not too bad

Russian
As promised, I was more diligent today and did some proper studying. I continued with the prepositions chapter in Schaum and revised 22 additional prepositions which take the genitive. It took quite some time to write out all these prepositions plus their meanings and some examples. There were also a couple of exercises to do at the end of the section on the theme of picking the correct preposition to use in a sentence. I got around 80% correct again. I thought I might be nearly at the end of prepositions now, because in my head most prepositions take the genitive, but I flicked forward in the book and there are still over 10 pages to go on prepositions that take the instrumental, dative and prepositional cases. So I will be writing about prepositions here for some time to come!

Croatian
I watched another episode of 'Drugo ime ljubavi'. I haven't watched many episodes this week because I've been lazy and not cycling in the evenings every day. I've also been enjoying a new song 'Kišna nedjelja' (Rainy Sunday) by one of my favourite bands, Hladno Pivo.



Total - Russian: 46 mins, Croatian: 50 mins

[Radioclare]

22 November
A very lazy day today, I didn't even leave the house to go for a walk.

Russian
I began studying the prepositions which take the prepositional case. I learned about uses of the preposition при, which is a less common preposition that normally only gets a brief mention in textbooks, and then started working through a long section about nouns which take в versus nouns that take на. The book has devoted several pages to explaining this in a way which makes it seem quite complicated, but my approach so far of assuming that the split is exactly the same as in Croatian doesn't seem to be far wrong

I tried to do a few Memrise reviews at various points throughout the day as well, because I've built up quite a big backlog again.

Croatian
Another episode of 'Drugo ime ljubavi' while cycling. One of the characters found out today that she's pregnant. This has been obvious for several weeks, but it isn't obvious is who the father is. It could be her fiancé, it could be her fiancé's son or it could be her sister's boyfriend

I've also started reading another novel in Croatian: 'Bilješka o piscu' by Julijana Matanović. It's about a woman who has spent her whole life hoping against hope that her childhood neighbour will leave his wife for her. Not very cheery, because it seems like he never had any intention of leaving his wife and now the narrator is dying of cancer. But I think it's the sort of book that you enjoy because it's beautifully written rather than because it's going to have a happy ending. I've read 117 pages today (I did say it was a lazy day!) but I wouldn't say I've found it easy to read so far; the sentences are quite long, of the variety where you've sometimes forgotten what the beginning was before you get to the end of them. There's also been quite a lot of unfamiliar vocabulary. I was thrown by the word "gebis" for a while, for example, until I was struck by the realisation that it must be from German "Gebiss", and I was also confused by the word "šinobus", which I could tell from context wasn't a type of bus. I googled "šinobus" and it seems to be a type of diesel passenger train.

Total - Russian: 47 mins, Croatian: 221 mins

[overscore]

I was thrown by the word "gebis" for a while, for example, until I was struck by the realisation that it must be from German "Gebiss", and I was also confused by the word "šinobus", which I could tell from context wasn't a type of bus. I googled "šinobus" and it seems to be a type of diesel passenger train.

ah this one is easy –– šina is "tracks", like trains tracks, so its a bus that rolls on the train tracks

[cjareck]

ah this one is easy –– šina is "tracks", like trains tracks, so its a bus that rolls on the train tracks

We have "szyna," but you need two of them to make tracks - "szyny."

[Mista]

ah this one is easy –– šina is "tracks", like trains tracks, so its a bus that rolls on the train tracks

We have "szyna," but you need two of them to make tracks - "szyny."

And in Norwegian, it's "skinne", "skinner" in plural (and the plural is used to designate the set needed for a train to run on). It is pronounced with a "sh"-sound, like I presume is the case in the other langauges, and the origin of the word is German, which I also presume is the case for the other languages.

[cjareck]

and the origin of the word is German, which I also presume is the case for the other languages.

Yes, most probably. We have o Polish word for that "tor" and "tory" in the plural. In this case, you may use both singular and plural to describe a set necessary for the train to run on it.

[Radioclare]

Thanks all, that's really interesting! It seems like šina is another word which I've failed to recognise from German, then. The word which I had learned in Croatian for a train track before was "pruga".

[Glossy]

22 November

and then started working through a long section about nouns which take в versus nouns that take на.

I don’t know if you know this, but в vs. на is a deeply political issue in Russia with regard to Ukraine. The Ukrainian government wants everyone to say в Украине. Russian speakers who support Ukraine say that. Those who’ve taken the Russian side in the Rus-Ukr conflict say на Украине, which is the older, formerly apolitical usage related to на окраине (on the outskirts) and на краю (on the edge). Some people mock this controversy by saying вна Украине. Вна isn’t a real word.

[cjareck]

I don’t know if you know this, but в vs. на is a deeply political issue in Russia with regard to Ukraine.

That is extremely interesting! We in Poland say "na Ukrainie" and also "na Węgrzech", "na Białorusi", but in the case of most countries we use "w".