AroAro's log (languages, books, certificates)

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AroAro
Green Belt
Posts: 354
Joined: Tue Sep 01, 2020 12:57 pm
Languages: • Native - Polish
• Certified - C1: French, Italian, Romanian; B2: English, German
• Estimate - B2: Russian; B1: Bulgarian
• Learning - Czech, Hebrew
• Dabbled in - eo, la, uk, sw, lt, oc
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... d80b60a5e9
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Re: Russian/Bulgarian/Hebrew + EN,FR,IT,DE,RO

Postby AroAro » Mon Jan 02, 2023 12:26 pm

Happy New Year to Everyone!

GOALS FOR 2023 (AND REVIEW OF MY GOALS FOR 2022)

English/French/Italian/German – maintenance mode in 2022 and the same for 2023. I did a lot of listening in German in the second half of 2022 but I’ll need to free some timeslots for Bulgarian in 2023.

Hebrew – I came back to Hebrew after a few months’ break and I think I’ve made “some” progress, mainly in the vocabulary area thanks to Clozemaster. I will continue to study the language for some time while I enjoy it again. But it’s a language I study periodically, so in a few months’ time, I intend to leave it and dabble in a new language (see below…).

Russian – my listening skills have improved a lot, I can watch YT videos, understand them, follow the story and sometimes even catch a meaning of a joke. I will have to make some space for honing my Bulgarian listening skills though, so Russian will go into maintenance mode.

Bulgarian – as mentioned above, I plan to work on my listening skills – I have found some podcasts and will work on them this year. I will also go through “Intensive Bulgarian vol. 2” and “Bulgarian Textbook for Foreigners Part 2”, they are geared toward intermediate students and these are the last books in my learning plan for Bulgarian, I couldn’t really locate any resources for advanced learners. That’s probably fine as I will explore native content in Bulgarian sooner than I did in my other languages.

Romanian – I want to travel again (after a long hiatus), my trip to Warsaw a few weeks ago was an opportunity to see what it is like to go somewhere else, without kids and wife (I have a preference for lonely travels). This year, I would like to go to Romania for a few days. There are direct flights from Warsaw to Bucarest and Cluj, I still haven’t decided which one to go to. Before the trip, I would like to take some italki lessons with a Romanian tutor, I have never spoken Romanian with anyone so it would probably be a good idea to practice conversations before trying to interact in Romanian on site. My intention will be to use the language when possible, I don’t want to impose my bad Romanian on random people and if they switch to English, that’s fine, happened to me before in other languages before.

Occitan – I have reignited an interest in Romance languages, I think that taking up one shouldn’t be a real burden if I know already three of them. I will put Hebrew on pause anyway in a few months’ time because I don’t want to overstretch myself with this language and then I could dabble a little bit in Occitan or Catalan or Aromanian. We’ll see but I’m especially interested in “small” languages at this moment so no Spanish or Portuguese. Right now, I guess I’ll choose Occitan because in case of Catalan, it probably makes sense to learn some Spanish before (even if this is surely not a requirement). And regarding Aromanian, the resources are simply very scarce. But if it turns out that my Romanian lessons take more time and effort than initially planned, I will probably have to put this Occitan project on hold.

Yiddish – maybe, why not… I’m tentatively planning to sign up to online Yiddish course organized by the Jewish Theatre in Warsaw – there are 15 (1.5 hour long) meetings each semester. I will see in July/August if I can find some free time once a week for this course. The semester starts in October and costs around 50 euros (I think it’s quite a reasonable price), it would be a pity not to use this opportunity. But first, I will have to be successful in their recruitment process, the course is open to everyone but one has to answer several questions in the submission form, including that one: why Yiddish? I think they want to make sure that people are actually motivated and will regularly show up in classes.

Reading books – I wanted to read 25 books in 2022 and in the end, the number skyrocketed to 46! I’ve experimented with different rotation systems and here are the final stats by language. I hope to reach a similar number in 2023:

Polish – 20
English – 9
French – 9
Italian – 2
German – 2
Russian – 2
Romanian – 2

For the first time ever, I tracked in Excel the books I read, and I can share with you that the three best/most perplexing books I read this year are:

1. The Fifth Child - Doris Lessing
2. The Memory Police - Yoko Ogawa
3. The Samurai - Shusaku Endo

Reading magazines – dropped in favor of reading online articles

Non-language learning goals
– still doing intermittent fasting, though I have to admit I’m not as strict about it as I wished to so I’m starting afresh with it more rigorously. I didn’t buy read meat a single time this year but I still consume quite a lot of dairy products (I tried plant milks but cannot really get used to it, but I’ve replaced milk yoghurts with coconut based ones so that’s a success). And I’m still addicted to sugar/sweets/candies! So there is room for improvement in 2023. And finally, I want to start jumping rope this year (got one as a Christmas gift).
14 x
corrections are welcome

User avatar
AroAro
Green Belt
Posts: 354
Joined: Tue Sep 01, 2020 12:57 pm
Languages: • Native - Polish
• Certified - C1: French, Italian, Romanian; B2: English, German
• Estimate - B2: Russian; B1: Bulgarian
• Learning - Czech, Hebrew
• Dabbled in - eo, la, uk, sw, lt, oc
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... d80b60a5e9
x 1779

Re: Russian/Bulgarian/Hebrew + EN,FR,IT,DE,RO

Postby AroAro » Tue Jan 10, 2023 8:07 pm

Bulgarian – lesson 62 (out of 81) from “Bulgarian Textbook for Foreigners Part 2”

Hebrew – lesson 48 (out of 63) from Assimil 1983 edition. I just can’t stress enough how good this book is, way better than the current edition. I have a lot of Assimil courses but used them only for a couple of languages so far. However, I’m inclined to say this one has the best dialogues in any course I’ve used until now. The Hebrew dialogues seem very natural and useful and I could probably make a good use of learning them by heart (well, I don’t…). This is not to say it’s some kind of a “phrase book” disguised as a full-fledged course but the author definitely found the right balance between usefulness of the content and that typical “assimilesque” sense of humor that she applied in reasonable doses.

Clozemaster
#Bulgarian from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 7479, mastered 7083 out of 7479 sentences
#Russian from English (>50,000 Most Common Words) => playing 9995, mastered 9830 out of 9985 sentences
#Hebrew from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 1884, mastered 1385 out of 19999 sentences

Reading – I read “Love Life” and wow, what a book, I needed only 4 days to read it because it was so hard to put it down, I felt I needed to know what will happen next immediately. I’m not sure I understood the motivation behind the heroine’s actions (cheating on her husband with an older guy who was once her parents’ close friend) but it was an interesting reading experience. My next book was definitely not so good – I quit reading “Danubio” by Claudio Magris 15% (or 66 pages) into it. Not because I found it hard to understand (the book is in Italian) but it’s so dull that whenever I started reading it, my eyes literally closed by themselves. I’m sure that Magris is a very wise and educated man but it seems he wanted to impart all his knowledge on the reader – but instead of being informed, I just felt bombarded with names, places, dates related to Danube that were thrown at me with no reference or explanation. Finally, I decided not to torture myself and picked up another book (a travelogue from Faroe Islands in Polish). I think I will try to read “Danubio” in bursts, between other books, so that maybe I will finish it eventually one day. My next books: “2084” by Boualem Sansal and “Le Mage du Kremlin” by Giuliano da Empoli (both in French).
11 x
corrections are welcome

User avatar
AroAro
Green Belt
Posts: 354
Joined: Tue Sep 01, 2020 12:57 pm
Languages: • Native - Polish
• Certified - C1: French, Italian, Romanian; B2: English, German
• Estimate - B2: Russian; B1: Bulgarian
• Learning - Czech, Hebrew
• Dabbled in - eo, la, uk, sw, lt, oc
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... d80b60a5e9
x 1779

Re: Russian/Bulgarian/Hebrew + EN,FR,IT,DE,RO

Postby AroAro » Fri Jan 20, 2023 9:18 am

Bulgarian – lesson 71 (out of 81) from “Bulgarian Textbook for Foreigners Part 2”. Doing a lot of listening in the language, mostly news reports at the moment. I think I understand quite a lot – some news are repeated throughout several episodes so that helps a lot too.

Hebrew
– lesson 54 (out of 63) from Assimil 1983 edition, read one article online (about Russian migrants stuck at the Mexico-USA border)

Clozemaster
#Hebrew from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 1884, mastered 1385 out of 19999 sentences. At this pace, I’ll need 4 years to finish it all, fortunately Hebrew is a long time project for me so I am patient.
Finished my Russian and Bulgarian collections. Looking back, I think I could have used it in a better way, writing down difficult words and expressions but at first, I just wanted to use it primarily as a reading resource and so I didn’t pay proper attention to completely unknown vocabulary. At least, now I know what errors to avoid in the future and I’m trying to get the best of it in Hebrew.

Reading – finished “2084” and well, the premise is interesting but the book as a whole was rather disappointing. I liked best the first part that takes place in a remote health resort because the author created a mysterious atmosphere but then, he put too much effort trying to explain how the oppressive state functions, I just simply stopped caring about it. And the main hero was unconvincing, it was hard to believe he was that brave to commit all the exploits he did. Then, I read “Le Mage du Kremlin” and that one is actually very good! It’s a fictionalized story of ascent to power of Putin, it’s really gripping and sad at the same time (I couldn’t stop thinking that similar political manipulations take place everywhere in the world, just to a lesser degree probably). It was a finalist for Prix du Goncourt a few weeks ago (the jurors probably thought it would be too obvious to give it the award considering the circumstances). My next read is an attempt at clearing the pile of paper books on my shelf – Steve Sem-Sandberg’s “De fattiga i Łódź” in Polish translation (almost 700 pages!) about Liztmannstadt Ghetto and its infamous “administrator” Chaim Rumkowski.
12 x
corrections are welcome

User avatar
AroAro
Green Belt
Posts: 354
Joined: Tue Sep 01, 2020 12:57 pm
Languages: • Native - Polish
• Certified - C1: French, Italian, Romanian; B2: English, German
• Estimate - B2: Russian; B1: Bulgarian
• Learning - Czech, Hebrew
• Dabbled in - eo, la, uk, sw, lt, oc
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... d80b60a5e9
x 1779

Re: Russian/Bulgarian/Hebrew + EN,FR,IT,DE,RO

Postby AroAro » Tue Jan 31, 2023 8:50 am

Bulgarian – finished “Bulgarian Textbook for Foreigners Part 2” – quite a slog because the lessons in this part were full with excerpts from 19th century Bulgarian literature instead of everyday dialogues. My next book – “Intensive Bulgarian vol.2”. After one month of listening to current news in Bulgarian, I think it’s time to include other resources in my routine. My goal for February is to explore some book channels on Youtube in Bulgarian and 1 or 2 podcasts I already bookmarked last year.

Hebrew – almost finished Assimil 1983 edition, only two lessons left. Next step – I’ve found yet another book for Hebrew, “A Textbook of Israeli Hebrew”, I will try to see if it’s worth going through it or not. In any case, I will do the first 10 lessons at best and move on to something else.

Clozemaster
#Hebrew from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 2084, mastered 1579 out of 19999 sentences

Reading – finished “De fattiga i Łódź”, even though the book was quite voluminous there was not a single redundant word. The author takes us on a journey to the ghetto and we discover every facet of it through stories of those on the bottom of the hierarchy as well as those at the top. I already miss the protagonists, especially the good ones, those who showed a touch of humanity in their acts. The author spares us nothing – violence, sexual exploitation, pedophilia, tortures, imminent deportations but doesn’t do it just for the sake of shocking, I really had a sensation he wanted to show us what the life in the ghetto looked like and what it meant to be closed inside, and well, it’s still us humans whether we like it or not.
Next read – “Nirgendwo in Afrika” by Stefanie Zweig. I remember very vaguely seeing the film based on the book but cannot recall any details so I have no idea what exactly is going to happen in the book.
10 x
corrections are welcome

User avatar
AroAro
Green Belt
Posts: 354
Joined: Tue Sep 01, 2020 12:57 pm
Languages: • Native - Polish
• Certified - C1: French, Italian, Romanian; B2: English, German
• Estimate - B2: Russian; B1: Bulgarian
• Learning - Czech, Hebrew
• Dabbled in - eo, la, uk, sw, lt, oc
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... d80b60a5e9
x 1779

Re: Russian/Bulgarian/Hebrew + EN,FR,IT,DE,RO

Postby AroAro » Fri Feb 10, 2023 8:18 am

Change of plans – I put all my languages on hold just two days after my last update. I’m focusing solely on Romanian at this moment because I’m going to take the B2 exam held by Institutul Limbii Romane. I contacted them a few days ago and they replied that a next session will be held end of February/first half of March. At first, I thought it’s too early but then, I decided to sign up and just try it and see what an online language exam looks like. If I don’t pass the exam, there will be another sessions in May and July, and if I do pass, I will be able to pick up my certificate on place in Bucharesti when I go there in June :) (they don’t send the original by mail, just a pdf copy by email).

Why? - I don’t really need a certificate but… I feel I need to “put the seal” on the languages I’ve been learning and prove to myself that I’ve reached a reasonable level in them (or at least in those languages for which exams and certificates exist). I’m also at risk of spreading myself too thin with languages, and even though I’m a great supporter of the concept of dabbling, I want to get my languages under control. B2 is what I would aim for, I learn the languages mostly for reading/listening so getting a C1 would put too much pressure on me (and anyway, I don’t intend to move to another country for work or education purposes in which case C1 would be more appropriate I guess). Moreover, I spoke with a friend of mine from the university who is also a little bit into languages, and she’s preparing for CAE in English, and it reminded me how much satisfaction it gave me when I got my B2 certificates in English and Italian many years ago, so why not trying my luck with another language. And of course, I’m also inspired by people here on this forum who have recently taken language exams. There is still chance that I won’t pass the exam but at least I will try to get a tangible proof of my competences in Romanian.

Action plan - there is actually no book that would prepare me for the Romanian exam, just a handful of exams from previous years available online so I’m going do them all (including those for levels B1 and C1, time permitting, just to get more practice). I will also take a few online conversation lessons but I still haven’t figured out how to fit those lessons in my daily schedule with work, two kids and so on. We’ll see, I guess no one will teach me how to speak Romanian in 2 or 3 weeks anyway but yeah, I’ll need to practice speaking via Zoom (the way it will be during the exam). I will not do any grammar exercises because grammar is not tested during the exam but I have already reviewed chapters on syntax from my Romanian grammar books and written down a list of “connectors” that serve to express cause, scope, condition, consequence and so on. That may come in handy for written and oral parts.
In fact, I have already done 3 sample exams and for oral part, I’m using a list of “First Certificate in English” questions – I prepared my answers to around 20 of them so far.

One caveat though – if the session is held between 27.02-02.03, I won’t be able to take the exam because of my work commitments. Last year, it took place on the 18th March so I hope it’s going to be held around the same date this year. The exact date will be announced two weeks before the exam.

Here’s the status for Bulgarian and Hebrew:
Bulgarian – I did the first two lessons from “Intensive Bulgarian vol.2”. I listened to a couple of interesting podcasts – one about travels, the other about movies – but will continue with them after the exam.

Hebrew – finished Assimil 1983 edition, part 1. The second volume is more of a “perfectionnement” so I’m leaving it for another occasion.

Clozemaster – I will continue doing Clozemaster because I don’t want to lose that streak ;) but 5 new phrases will do just fine
#Hebrew from English (Fluency Fast Track) => playing 2084, mastered 1579 out of 19999 sentences

Reading – I stopped reading “Nirgendwo in Afrika” halfway through because I want to go 100% into Romanian mode. The book itself is quite ok but not overly exciting so I don’t have any regrets about abondoning it, I will come back to it anyway after the exam. So for Romanian reading, I decided to avoid this time around books written originally in Romanian (because I’ve had rather negative experiences so far) and opted for translated works. The first one – “Nomada” by Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Politics aside, this one is very interesting in that the author describes her relationship with her family so at times it’s really touching and even heartbreaking.
8 x
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cjareck
Brown Belt
Posts: 1047
Joined: Tue Apr 25, 2017 6:11 pm
Location: Poland
Languages: Polish (N) English, German, Russian(B1?) French (B1?), Hebrew(B1?), Arabic(A2?), Mandarin (HSK 2)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... =15&t=8589
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Re: Russian/Bulgarian/Hebrew + EN,FR,IT,DE,RO

Postby cjareck » Fri Feb 10, 2023 2:35 pm

Good luck with your plans! The arguments you listed are very reasonable. I also had similar ones when I considered getting formal status for my languages. In my case, however, lack of time forced me to abandon such plans. Maybe the fact that I am mostly the one who examines and not the one who is examined played a significant role ;)
1 x
Please feel free to correct me in any language


Listening: 1+ (83% content, 90% linguistic)
Reading: 1 (83% content, 90% linguistic)


MSA DLI : 30 / 141ESKK : 18 / 40


Mandarin Assimil : 62 / 105

User avatar
AroAro
Green Belt
Posts: 354
Joined: Tue Sep 01, 2020 12:57 pm
Languages: • Native - Polish
• Certified - C1: French, Italian, Romanian; B2: English, German
• Estimate - B2: Russian; B1: Bulgarian
• Learning - Czech, Hebrew
• Dabbled in - eo, la, uk, sw, lt, oc
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... d80b60a5e9
x 1779

Re: Russian/Bulgarian/Hebrew + EN,FR,IT,DE,RO

Postby AroAro » Fri Feb 10, 2023 8:16 pm

cjareck wrote:Good luck with your plans! The arguments you listed are very reasonable. I also had similar ones when I considered getting formal status for my languages. In my case, however, lack of time forced me to abandon such plans. Maybe the fact that I am mostly the one who examines and not the one who is examined played a significant role ;)


Thank you! Maybe you should try one day, you'll see what your students go through when you examine them:) on the other hand, aren't academic lecturers "evaluated" by students through anonymous surveys? It's not an exam though so it's hard to compare both things.
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cjareck
Brown Belt
Posts: 1047
Joined: Tue Apr 25, 2017 6:11 pm
Location: Poland
Languages: Polish (N) English, German, Russian(B1?) French (B1?), Hebrew(B1?), Arabic(A2?), Mandarin (HSK 2)
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... =15&t=8589
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Contact:

Re: Russian/Bulgarian/Hebrew + EN,FR,IT,DE,RO

Postby cjareck » Fri Feb 10, 2023 10:06 pm

AroAro wrote:Thank you! Maybe you should try one day, you'll see what your students go through when you examine them:)

The last time I tried was during exams for a driving license about 13-14 years ago. Yes, it wasn't easy. I passed after the fourth time ;)

AroAro wrote: on the other hand, aren't academic lecturers "evaluated" by students through anonymous surveys?

Yes, academic lectures are evaluated by the students, but luckily my notes are pretty good ;)
1 x
Please feel free to correct me in any language


Listening: 1+ (83% content, 90% linguistic)
Reading: 1 (83% content, 90% linguistic)


MSA DLI : 30 / 141ESKK : 18 / 40


Mandarin Assimil : 62 / 105

User avatar
AroAro
Green Belt
Posts: 354
Joined: Tue Sep 01, 2020 12:57 pm
Languages: • Native - Polish
• Certified - C1: French, Italian, Romanian; B2: English, German
• Estimate - B2: Russian; B1: Bulgarian
• Learning - Czech, Hebrew
• Dabbled in - eo, la, uk, sw, lt, oc
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... d80b60a5e9
x 1779

Re: Russian/Bulgarian/Hebrew + EN,FR,IT,DE,RO

Postby AroAro » Mon Feb 13, 2023 7:59 am

TELEFONUL MOBIL ÎN VIAȚA NOASTRĂ

Este binecunoscut faptul că telefonul mobil est în zilele noastre omniprezent și ar fi greu să scăpăm de el. Dar telefonul nu are poate și efecte negative asupra viața noastră?
În opiniea mea, telefonul este un lucru folositor dacă este folosit într-un mod rezonabil. Spre exemplu, putem să-l folosim ca să avem un contact direct cu alți oameni, putem să sunăm la urgență dacă ni se întâmplă ceva de neașteptat și avem nevoie de ajutor a cuiva.
Pe de altă parte totuși, există dovezi scientifice potrivit carora telefonum mobil poate avea o influență dăunătoare asupra viața noastră. El poate chiar duce la dependență, în special cănd are o coneziune la internet. Copiii mici se lăs influența cu ușurință de tot felul de videuri pe care îi pot vedea pe telefonul lor.
Toate lucrurile considerate, eu consider că telefonul mobil are mai multe avantaje în viața noastră contemporană, chiar dacă în același timp trebuie să stăm atenți la cât timp ne folosim de el în fiecare zi. Poate o conversație reală față în față cu un prieten pe care nu l-am văzut de mult ar fi un pas bun? Totuși, trebuie să-l sunăm mai întâi la telefon...
1 x
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User avatar
AroAro
Green Belt
Posts: 354
Joined: Tue Sep 01, 2020 12:57 pm
Languages: • Native - Polish
• Certified - C1: French, Italian, Romanian; B2: English, German
• Estimate - B2: Russian; B1: Bulgarian
• Learning - Czech, Hebrew
• Dabbled in - eo, la, uk, sw, lt, oc
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... d80b60a5e9
x 1779

Re: Russian/Bulgarian/Hebrew + EN,FR,IT,DE,RO

Postby AroAro » Tue Feb 14, 2023 3:11 pm

ISTORIA SE VEDE ȘI SE ÎNȚELEGE MAI BINE DIN INTERIOR SAU DIN AFARĂ, DE APROAPE SAU DE DEPARTE?

Este binecunoscut faptul că istoria are o mare influență asupra vieții noastre. Dar cum pot oameni constata dacă evenimentele care i se întâmplă vor avea vreo importanță în viitor sau nu?
În primul rând, evenimentele pe care îi vedem în zilele noastre ni se par mereu mai importante. Avanatajul este că putem fi niște martori ai istorii, în așa fel că putem scrie în detalii despre ea. Prin urmare, aceste mărtorii pot fi de mare valoare pentru generațiile următoare, chiar dacă oameni se lasă influența cu ușurință de emoții care îi pot schimba perspectiva neutrală de a vedea lucruri în jurul lor.
Pe de alta parte, uitându-ne la evenimente dintr-o perspectivă îndepartată poate fi un avantaj, dat fiind că putem constata mai ușor dacă ele au fost cu adevărat importanți, deoarece ceea ce ni se pare important tocmai acum poate nu va avea nicio povară în viitor. Ne trebuie timp pentru a determina corect importanța evenimentelor și pentru a spune dacă putem trage din ele niște conluzii și învățămânți.
În concluzie, eu sunt convins că istoria se înțelege mai bine de departe, cu o perspectivă neutrală asupra lucrurilor. În acest mod, putem cântări evenimentele fără să fim copleșiți de emoții. Prin urmare, putem le aprecia ținând cont de un șir întreg al evenimentelor care creează istoria.
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