Rdearman 2016-24 You Can't Have Your Kate and Edith Too.

[Iversen]

The Lexilogos site has got tons of Bible translations, and it can juxtapose them. I used it for a time, but prefer Wikipedia because I would rather sound like a nerdy scholar than like a preacher man.

[rdearman]

Still ticking along. Some frustrations though.

Clozemaster, HelloChinese and Speaky apps will not rotate when I turn the phone/tablet sideways. This is really bloody annoying especially when trying to work with them on the train. Not being able to copy words or sentences from the bible app for Setswana is frustrating, so I've switched to using twitter where I copy short tweets and try to do an interlinear, word-for-word translation. Which look like this:

Code: Select all

==========
O       hupile          tedu       jaanong!    Mme       o       molaetsa       wame       o       gorile!!
IT      PUT IN MOUTH   BEARD      NOW         MOTHER      IT      MESSAGE         MINE      IT      WHAT'S WRONG
THIS   SWALLOW         -         -         LET         THIS   -            ???         THIS   ???
IS      ???            -         -         BUT         IS      -            ???         IS      ???
==========


Looks better when the tabs align properly, but basically I align all possible translations of a word below the word and then try to work out the sentence. Another problem is the online dictionary I use isn't very comprehensive, but I have managed to ask the person who tweeted the message and sometimes they respond with a translation of the word or phrase. Most of these phrases come out as nonsense when you do it this way, but I can either get the gist of it, or at least I'm learning word definitions by exposure and repetition.

Had to blacklist the entire ken.mba domain in order to get their emails to stop.

Speaky, like HelloTalk, is just a bunch of people introducing themselves and then never speaking again. Or they are looking for a date. Or if they are going to speak to you for a long time it is because they are (or are pretending to be) a someone looking for love and if you just send them money for a plane ticket.... This doesn't actually bother me, since I had a two day conversation in French with one scammer. I'm sure there are some legit language learners on there, I'm just struggling to find them.

I keep reading ahead when LRing and struggle not to tune out the audio and just read. But practice is making perfect because I find I'm doing it less now than before. I have 3 Musketeers, Count of Monte Cristo, Last of the Mohicans, and Around the world in 80 days to LR. This gives me over 120 hours of LRing to do. You'd hope that would be enough to improve listening comprehension.

The Mandarin is coming back quicker than I had assumed it would. I am determined to try and get in some tutoring this time, not just pimsluer and apps. But finding time is a problem.

This was supposed to be a quick 3 line update... that didn't work out did it?

[rdearman]

Czech: Not much to report other than what is in the other log.

• I have some FLR (Mose McCorrmick) sentences translated into Czech and recorded.
• I'm working with a free online Czech course from the library but it is only short and I'll probably be done with it by the end of this month at this rate.
• Doing closemaster and a free ANKI deck I downloaded as well.

Setswana:

• Trying to do twitter translations with various levels of success.
• Read bible with parallel translation
• Do ANKI decks (I have two now, one Peace Corp one and another I generated from the SA tourist board)
• Watch some YouTube videos (repeat of Peace Corps stuff) and some cartoons, etc.

Mandarin:

• HelloChinese App
• Speaky with a couple of natives
• Closemaster
• Free online course from library
• (I have Assimil with a French Base, I plan to add that in soon as I complete the app)

French:

• I am 11.5 hours into my L2R1 of the Three Musketeers.
• Using Kwiziq. I paid for a subscription and I'm trying to do at least 20 minutes of it per day.
• Have a YA book which I'm reading intermittently.

Italian:

• Just talking to people on Speaky and a couple of friends. I'm trying to write more, because this is another language which I never write in.

Today I found out that my presentations at the Polyglot Gathering were accepted, which means I now need to humiliate myself in French for the whole world to see. So if you're the type of person who likes to look at train wrecks, be sure to come along to my presentation.

Rotation through 5 languages is a little tricky to do. I just don't know how people juggle a lot of languages. I'm not very good at timing myself, but the weekdays are easier since I know at what point stop 1/2 my train journey is complete, so I just switch language study to another one at that point so I'm flipping between Mandarin, Setswana, Czech in 20 minutes intervals. French & Italian I don't do on the train so I carve out time for French LR at night. Italian I need to do more with it, I have a grammar book on my desk which I look at periodically. (I look at the outside, not the inside unfortunately).

[Dandelion]

Speaky, like HelloTalk, is just a bunch of people introducing themselves and then never speaking again. Or they are looking for a date. Or if they are going to speak to you for a long time it is because they are (or are pretending to be) a someone looking for love and if you just send them money for a plane ticket.... This doesn't actually bother me, since I had a two day conversation in French with one scammer. I'm sure there are some legit language learners on there, I'm just struggling to find them.

Oh, have you said Hellopal? I used it several months ago, i wanted to make friends to learn English, but i found the same situation with you, and no one talk to me, so i have a little dispirited.

[rdearman]

Speaky, like HelloTalk, is just a bunch of people introducing themselves and then never speaking again. Or they are looking for a date. Or if they are going to speak to you for a long time it is because they are (or are pretending to be) a someone looking for love and if you just send them money for a plane ticket.... This doesn't actually bother me, since I had a two day conversation in French with one scammer. I'm sure there are some legit language learners on there, I'm just struggling to find them.

Oh, have you said Hellopal? I used it several months ago, i wanted to make friends to learn English, but i found the same situation with you, and no one talk to me, so i have a little dispirited.

I used HelloTalk and also Speaky. There are a LOT of mandarin speakers on both and I tried to engage with them. However, it was difficult because many people listed themselves with a very high level of English, but weren't. Because my level of Mandarin is very low, I tried to find people who rate themselves high in English (for French & Italian I do the opposite and look for people with a poor level of English). This is selfish of me, but I cannot handle complex conversations in Mandarin, so I need time to reply and I reply in short simple sentences. It is easier if the other person has good English. I'm happy to help with the English. When people rate themselves high in English then I encountered a real problem. Because basically we were two people who didn't understand each other sending messages back and forth. Soon one of us got tired of it and quit.

There was also a lot of Chinese speakers who would just say "Hi" and that was it. Very frustrating. Anyway, I'm happy to write/speak to you as long as you're aware that I'm a beginner and know nothing. :0

[Dandelion]

There was also a lot of Chinese speakers who would just say "Hi" and that was it. Very frustrating. Anyway, I'm happy to write/speak to you as long as you're aware that I'm a beginner and know nothing. :0

Oh, i think we will become good friends. Because of friends, i will never quit. My English is not good, and i want to learn from you. I don't mind you are a beginner, we can learn each other if you need, and then you won't a beginner of mandarin Chinese.

[rdearman]

Czech: See FLC log.
Setswana: See FLC log.

Mandarin:
My main activities are still the HelloChinese App and Closemaster. I use text input on clozemaster and it is bloody hard, but hopefully will make things stick better. I have been intending to re-listen to Pimsleur at some point, but just don't know when I will fit that in. So at the moment I'll just keep plugging away 20-40 minutes per day with these two apps. I'm planning to buy some tutoring lessons on iTalki but it is difficult because of the time difference.

French:
I am 19 hours into my L2R1 of the Three Musketeers and using Kwiziq daily to sort out grammar. I've been working on my presentation for the polyglot gathering in French. Can someone please slap me if I ever think of doing something this stupid again? This has been a lot of work just typing the presentation, using grammar checkers, then having it proofed by my tutor and a friend. With any luck I'll have it all written out by the end of next week. That will give me 60 days to practice the presentation until I know it like the back of my hand. Of course, my pronunciation is crap, my timing is rubbish, my accent is American. I hope to be able to get a good recording of the presentation and shadowing it. Serious, WTF was I thinking?

On the brightside, the presentation itself is pretty interesting and the subject is good. I'm really happy with the content and how I plan to present. It this was in English I'd be over the moon. I think I managed to follow Winston Churchill's advice: "A speech should be like a woman's skirt. Short enough to maintain interest, but long enough to cover the subject."

Italian:
Meet a lot of people on Speaky who are Italian and two of them are serious learners who want to do exchanges. I've cracked the Collins Easy Italian grammar and I'm reading at least 2 pages a day. Doesn't sound like much, but it is 2 pages a day more than I've ever done before. The people I've spoken to are actually happy with my Italian sentence construction and pronunciation, so as I suspected it is better than French. But I wouldn't be able to write anything serious in the language. So I need to start practising that too.

Doing five languages at a time is quite the scheduling nightmare something will have to give, but right now I'm keeping all the plates spinning.

[Dandelion]

Czech: See FLC log.
Setswana: See FLC log.

Mandarin:
My main activities are still the HelloChinese App and Closemaster. I use text input on clozemaster and it is bloody hard, but hopefully will make things stick better. I have been intending to re-listen to Pimsleur at some point, but just don't know when I will fit that in. So at the moment I'll just keep plugging away 20-40 minutes per day with these two apps. I'm planning to buy some tutoring lessons on iTalki but it is difficult because of the time difference.

Hello, good afternoon, I'm here is in the afternoon.
I also learning English with an app 30minutes per day, But i think it still need to practice in life. Now, i try to grasp every chances to practice. I have a lesson with a foreign teacher on the weekend, but it's not every weekend, it will depends on our time. Haha, i just finished my lesson. I think you also can have a try. Choosing a proper time to practice.
Today, the teacher suggested me to have a language partner, and practice everyday in free time.
If you need, I'm very happy to talk with you in Mandarin. I chat with you in English, it's very helpful to me, and i hope i can do something for you.

[jeff_lindqvist]

Doing five languages at a time is quite the scheduling nightmare something will have to give, but right now I'm keeping all the plates spinning.

The hardest thing for me is writing those weekly updates, haha! (I think I'm two weeks behind at the moment...)

[Iversen]

I would also have a problem writing weekly updates - my log posts are already fairly long, and with fewer updates I would have to make hard decisions about what to include..