语학子's gotta get back into it

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Yuhakko
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Re: 语학子's gotta get back into it

Postby Yuhakko » Sat Feb 13, 2016 9:17 am

Now first, a sum up of how the week I had put goals went :
It went pretty well and I actually did some extra things (watched 3 episodes of the Korean drama Signal, studied some Japanese Grammar, etc) but unfortunately I haven't been very efficient since then..

Japanese :
- Translate at least one article (if motivation is there, this will be the one : http://blogos
.com/article/155407/. If motivation is really here, I'll do it both in English and French) : 2/3 done that week and haven't touch it since then
- Read 2 short stories from the book I have : Done but read only 2 other since then
- Read 2 pages of the Tea magazine (totally stopped reading it in mid-december) : Done and have read another 6-7 pages since then. I will finish it in the next few days I think
- Doing one lesson of 日本語総まとめN1読解 per day * Not touched...

Korean:
- Follow the podcast at least 3 days out of the 5 (it's at 10pm so if I go out in the evening, that's a done deal) : Done until the end of the month but since then haven't done it because I didn't have the book for february
- Study 2-3 grammar patterns from Korean Grammar in Use : Done but none since then
- Read 10 pages of 엄마를 부탁해 : As expected... not done

Mandarin:
- Follow the podcast at least 3 days out of the 5 (I have to arrive at work early enough to have time to spend on it) : Done and have done also 1 full week in February
- Read 3-4 articles from TheChairmanbao (Just read one and they are exactly what I was looking for!) : Done (read 5) but haven't touched it since then. I really should. They're awesome
- Watch at least 2-3 episodes of The voice of China 2014 : Watched 1

General:
- Continue doing all the memrise decks : Done everyday since then but missed a day for Norwegian and haven't done for Tagalog in a week...
- Catch up on at least 3 members of the East Asian Team :) : Done!! I still have a lot of other people to catch up on though..
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Yuhakko
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Re: 语학子's gotta get back into it

Postby Yuhakko » Sat Feb 13, 2016 9:31 am

Now a bit about my absence : I had to finish working on a big thing at work and that took a lot of time from me. However, after this, I had to take care of loads of smaller things quickly because I was leaving for holidays on the 8th. As a result, my time has been divided between work and organizing my holidays for most of the first week of the month and the second week (reaching its end now) has been used for travelling. I'll be back in Tokyo on Tuesday morning so I guess I'll have more time after then.

For information, my holidays are happening in Hokkaido! First time here and it's exactly as expected! I've been to the Sapporo Snow Festival, to a ski station (Furano, small but beautiful) where I am right now, and tomorrow I'll go to Otaru (Famous for its canal and its light festival) and Yoichi (where the Nikka Distillery is).

The guesthouse I am at in the ski station has nothing (at all, really) around so it gave me time yesterday and today for reading and studying a bit. I'll actually get back to it now !

If everything goes well, I'll be back in a routine maximum by February 20th-21st! Until then my goal is simple : Do at least a little something everyday (apart from Memrise because this has to go on! Reaching my 50th day for Korean in 2 days :))
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Re: 语학子's gotta get back into it

Postby kujichagulia » Sat Feb 13, 2016 11:45 am

Hope you're enjoying Hokkaido! Although if it is as warm there as it was here in Osaka today, the Snow Festival might be in trouble! (Strange winter weather this year.)
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Yuhakko
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Re: 语학子's gotta get back into it

Postby Yuhakko » Mon Feb 15, 2016 5:58 am

kuji wrote:Hope you're enjoying Hokkaido! Although if it is as warm there as it was here in Osaka today, the Snow Festival might be in trouble! (Strange winter weather this year.)


Thanks! Indeed I've been enjoying quite a bit Hokkaido! However it's true that the weather has been quite unexpected : going from -5/-10 to 6-7 degrees, from snow to rain and back to snow! Still I'm enjoying it and making use of all the onsens I can find to relax and find time to think about everything (from work, to languages, to personal life). In Furano, I found an onsen empty and very nice so I spent 3 hours there moving from bath to bath to sauna and organizing my life :)
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Yuhakko
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Re: 语학子's gotta get back into it

Postby Yuhakko » Mon Feb 15, 2016 6:20 am

I've done it again... I bought a new book even though I haven't finished the 2 others I'm reading.. It's based on the movie 残穢 (ざんえ) (or the other way around). I still don't know if I'll first watch the movie and then read the book but I'll definitely do both.
If possible, I'll try to finish reading the Tea magazine before arriving at my place tomorrow noon and also read quite a bit of one of the 2 books I'm reading. If all goes well (which never happens...) I should be finished with the magazine and the book 言葉の習慣 by the end of the week. Let's call it a goal for this week! :)

I'll also try this week to watch 1 or 2 episodes of The Voice of China and ! or 2 episodes of the Korean drama Signal. That seems doable but we'll see how it goes.

Oh and btw, I don't remember if I said it already, but I registered for the HSK 3 for March 20th. The goal for this : get at least 95% right ;)
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Yuhakko
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Re: 语학子's gotta get back into it

Postby Yuhakko » Sun Mar 13, 2016 11:29 am

And I've done it again. Another month without news...
Unfortunately this time I'm not back to say I had a good month of study. I had been working since November on the coming of the Roland-Garros tournament here in Japan (Junior tournament to give the opportunity to youngs players to take part in the real RG tournament). We didn't have much time to prepare it but with hard work until the middle of the night and from early morning, we made it. This past month, since I've come back from Hokkaido, has been pretty much all work and no free time, thus no study.
But it's over now ! Which means I have a lot more time on my hands. So it's time to get back into proper study!

Before my short-term goals, here are the very few things I've done : finished (as planned) my magazine about tea before coming back from Hokkaido, finished my book 「言葉の週間」(way later, I stopped a few pages before the end and finished it in the middle of this week in one shot.), watched a few episodes of the K-drama 시그널 and 1 or 2 episodes of The Voice of China. I'm starting to get tired of this one though so not sure I'll last until the end.

So here are some short-term goals I definitely plan on following. Unless the time period is precised, it will be for the month of March.
- Read entirely my new book 残穢(ざんえ)in a month, maximum (starting tomorrow). Which would mean about 11 pages a day. If I organize myself, that should be easily attainable
- Finish translating the article I started a while back before the end of next week.
- Study at least 2 Korean Grammar points per week
- Finish 시그널
- Watch 1 or 2 episodes of The Voice of China per week
- Read minimum 5 pages of Mandarin per week
- Read at least one article of The Chairman's Bao per day
- Watch a few episodes of 花燃ゆ (number depending on how many I find to download)

I'll probably add a few small punctual objectives here and there too but that's it for now.

Ah also... I forgot to go pay on time the exam HSK so I won't be able to take it this month ><. I thought I had a month to pay for it (usually the case) but in the end it was only 3 days.

Anyway, I'm definitely back this time! :mrgreen:
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Re: 语학子's gotta get back into it

Postby Yuhakko » Mon Mar 14, 2016 11:58 pm

Taking a day off on a rainy monday sure helps to focus on activities inside. Yesterday turned out to be a rather good day back in languages. Here's a bit of what I did :
- I read 38 pages of my new book ざんえ. To make it simple, it's a story (adapted into a movie at the end of last year it seems) about a presence people can feel or hear in one apartment. For now the plot is just starting and we are getting to know the building, a few characters and what that presence does/sounds like. I get the weird feeling that it's going from easy to read to very difficult to read. Still, I'm already hooked so it's a good sign.
- I read one article from the Chairman's Bao about the "scary" slide that's been built in a new Chinese mall. It was rather easy to follow but I feel like I still can't remember perfectly some easy words.
- I watch 4 episodes of the K-Drama Signal. I am at episode 9.
- I translated one more sentence from the article I need to finish (planning on doing it tonight if work doesn't make me stay late).

This morning, I already read 3 pages of ざんえ and I'll probably go on reading during my lunch break.

Gosh it feels good to actually be able to do something I want to outside of work and not feeling like I should be working instead! :D
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Yuhakko
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Re: 语학子's gotta get back into it

Postby Yuhakko » Wed Mar 16, 2016 5:36 am

A quick update in the middle of the week. If possible I'd like to get back in that habit I had a while back, back HTLAL.

I am currently at page 74 of my japanese book. I find a number of unknown words per page but I usually stop to look them either when without it the sentence/paragraph becomes not understandable or when the word in question comes back numerous times.
Still, the book is rather easy to read and very interesting. I'm hooked! I wonder why I've never read horror books before... Maybe because for me it meant monsters and what not but anyway, I'll probably have a shot at another one like this after I finish this one.

I've watched the episode of "The Voice of China" and even started the next one. The only thing that's really bothering me is how long they are : 1h30 before and now that the first "round" is over, it seems it's going up to 2h15 per episode. That's way too long so I have to cut them in short parts. I may have found a way to go through them slowly but surely though : watching them only when I eat lunch at home. Including the time to cook and eat, that's about 30min for it and then I can go back to reading :)

I've read the second article of the Chairman's Bao yesterday. It was about a family in the UK which will have its 19th kid soon. Quite easy to follow. If I succeed in going on everyday for the next 2 weeks, I'll add to read 1 more every 2-3 days but of HSK4 instead of HSK3.

That's pretty much it. Of course I'm still reading a lot of Japanese at work too but I don't include that in my study per se. One pretty nice thing (or is it a curse in disguise? :lol: ) is that I'm going to do something that my Japanese colleagues normally do: find japanese prospects and organize meetings with a French company coming to Japan mid-April. That sounds like a huge challenge considering my level of Japanese (there's a lot of convincing to do) but we'll see how it goes.
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Yuhakko
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Re: 语학子's gotta get back into it

Postby Yuhakko » Tue Mar 29, 2016 1:30 am

Mmmh, and I thought I had succeeded in being active again. There we go. It's been 2 weeks again.

Since we're at the end of March, let's see what I could do among what I stated before :
- Finish Signal (I have a bug in the last episode, I can't watch the last 30min so I've got that to do, but I'll try to find a version that works today)
- Watch 1 or 2 episodes of The Voice of China : Done (watched about 2,5 : one being 1h30 and one being 2h15)

Aaaaand that's all I could do properly.

I did study 2 Grammar points the "first" week but didn't last week and I doubt I'll do it this week.
I also read one article per day of The Chairman's Bao the first week but didn't do it at all last week.
Didn't read any page of Mandarin.. and couldn't find episodes of 花燃ゆ

Regarding ざんえ, I read about 140 pages in five days and thought "hey, I can finish it before the end of March maybe" but then I almost stopped (the weekend killed my rythm). I am currently at page 191 and should finish it in the following weeks as first predicted but still, I wish I hadn't lost my rythm.

Now for some goals for April :
Japanese :
- Finish ざんえ before the 15th
- Start むかし僕が死んだ from Keigo Higashino. When talking about my current book, a colleague told me I might like Higashino so I looked him up and this book seems quite interesting. It's 314 pages long so about the same length as ざんえ. I'll probably try to read it again in a month
- Find and watch 4 episodes of 花燃ゆ at least
- Do at least one Mock Test of the JLPT N1 (doesn't have to be in one go)

Korean:
- Watch half the drama Remember, Son of War which I've downloaded a while back and was planning on watching. Thx Evita, you almost spoiled me with your last post (I stopped reading as soon as I noticed you were gonna spoil :lol: )
- Work on at least 1 grammar point per week and if possible 2
- Do some extensive listening at the Gym (just registered in one close to my place)

Mandarin:
- Read 5 articles per week of the Chairman's Bao. One should be an HSK4 level. It may be done in one go.
- Watch 1 or 2 episodes of The Voice of China. This should make me finish it maybe at the beginning of next month.
- Read 1 or 2 pages of Mandarin per week ?

Ainu: Yes, it's back on! As Von said it in his log, the new "year" is about to start so let's see how long I can last this year.
- Do one lesson per week!

Rest:
- Go on with Memrise in all my languages (4 for Japanese, 1 for Korean, 2 for Norwegian and currently looking for a good beginner one for Thai)


This month, again, I may not reach my objectives as many things are going to be happening (my best friend is coming in 2 days for an internship and will stay at my place for a while, another friend is coming for holidays at the end of the month, I have an event at work in the middle of the month, I might be going to Korea for 1 weekend and, of course: it's currently hanami so I know I won't study at all this coming weekend) but anyway, I'll try my best!

Also, since work has gotten a bit more relaxed now, I think I'll be able to post more often (and thus, less long rambling like today :) )
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Re: 语학子's gotta get back into it

Postby druckfehler » Sat Apr 02, 2016 7:06 am

Good to see a new post by you :) I find it really difficult to focus on more than one language at a time. I get so absorbed with what I'm currently studying that I often don't feel like switching to another language unless I get stuck. I'm a bit envious that you can decide to spend a weekend in Korea just like that ;)

Good luck with the HSK preparations! Sounds like you're very well prepared for HSK 3. Or will you attempt HSK 4 instead?
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