Languages and Life: Gary's log (Italian, Spanish, German, Japanese, bits of French)

[garyb]

Greek is still damn hard, but I'm consistently managing my 20-30 mins per day, usually in the morning before work. One big difficulty I'm finding is that the basic vocabulary is just less "sticky" than in the Romance languages and I need to hear and repeat new words quite a few times before I have any hope of remembering them beyond 30 seconds or so of short-term memory. Language Transfer does at least emphasise how parts of words are similar to things we're familiar with in English when appropriate which can help to remember them, more so than MT did from what I remember, although on the other hand MT moved more slowly and gave more repetition. Anyway if I remember well I'm on lesson 32 or 33 of 100 so already about a third of the way!

I'm not sure where I'll go after LT. Assimil would be the obvious choice, as I'd like something that expands on the basics and has text as well as audio: seeing the words written would probably help me to remember them as well as get used to the script. I've heard the Greek course isn't one of their best, however. Suggestions welcome. At my current pace I still have a couple of weeks to decide.

I went to a screening of a Spanish film, the black comedy Justino, un asesino de la tercera edad. Between this and my recent French films, I've been thinking how much better I'd learn or at least maintain if I just watched a few of them per week (fully focused and in one sitting), never mind more "active" studies. I know everyone here loves series, but I find films better for everyday language, perhaps just because the series I'm into tend to be more specialised (crime and history/sci-fi for the current ones) while I like films that are closer to everyday life. And as I've said I'm not a "binge-watcher" and I struggle to even watch a single episode of a series in one go, but I can get into a good film. I don't have time for a few films a week right now and I'm not willing to take it out of music time, but trying to watch even one per week consistently would be a great start.

I did start watching another Netflix choice, Nuestros amantes, but after five minutes it became very clear that it was going to be one of the worst movies I've ever seen and completely predictable so I turned it off. Netflix is great for series but I wish they'd put up some half-decent foreign films rather than the current handful of theatrical flops.

Met up with the French exchange partner and the conversation went pretty smoothly. Either I was having a good day or the rust is finally coming off. I might finally have a Spanish exchange on the cards for tomorrow, but I'll wait and see whether it really happens or I'm just dreaming. I have had a few messages from Spanish speakers on Conversation Exchange but I can't really be bothered with Skype exchanges at this point and I'd rather just meet someone in town.

[jonm]

I'm not sure where I'll go after LT. Assimil would be the obvious choice, as I'd like something that expands on the basics and has text as well as audio: seeing the words written would probably help me to remember them as well as get used to the script. I've heard the Greek course isn't one of their best, however. Suggestions welcome. At my current pace I still have a couple of weeks to decide.

I've also seen posts where people say they found Assimil Greek decent but not riveting (for example, message 53 here). The good news is, there's a new edition. Looks like it came out in 2017, and the posts I've seen where people weren't so enthusiastic go back further than that, so I assume they were talking about the older edition.

I have the new one but haven't started it, since I have too many languages on the stove already. I went with the new one partly because I'd seen those posts about the older one, partly because I believe there's been a spelling reform, and partly because the author of the new one, Jean-Pierre Guglielmi, seems good. He also did the current Assimil courses for Ancient Greek (seems to be well regarded) and Egyptian Hieroglyphics. You can see him talking about designing those courses here.

I believe Expugnator has done both Assimil Modern Greek courses, so he'd be a good person to ask.

[garyb]

I've also seen posts where people say they found Assimil Greek decent but not riveting (for example, message 53 here). The good news is, there's a new edition. Looks like it came out in 2017, and the posts I've seen where people weren't so enthusiastic go back further than that, so I assume they were talking about the older edition.

I have the new one but haven't started it, since I have too many languages on the stove already. I went with the new one partly because I'd seen those posts about the older one, partly because I believe there's been a spelling reform, and partly because the author of the new one, Jean-Pierre Guglielmi, seems good. He also did the current Assimil courses for Ancient Greek (seems to be well regarded) and Egyptian Hieroglyphics. You can see him talking about designing those courses here.

I believe Expugnator has done both Assimil Modern Greek courses, so he'd be a good person to ask.

Thanks for the info! I think Expugnator reads my log so I'll see what he thinks. I did find his thread When should I start Assimil Greek?; the replies mostly aren't very helpful or relevant, but Ogrim's one is one of the negative opinions I had in mind. That's from 2016 so before the new version.

I might just take the plunge on the new one. Looks like it's only in French, so just as well I know that! Even a weak course by Assimil standards is probably better than most of the competition. It doesn't seem to be available for a reasonable price anywhere other than Assimil's own site (the usual online bookshops mostly have either the old one or just the book with no audio), and there's also an "e-method" option that's cheaper although I've heard more bad than good things about these. I might also check out the "Kypros" course he mentions since it's free!

[garyb]

No Spanish exchange in the end: the contact stopped replying to messages just as our plan to meet up yesterday was coming together, and I've not heard anything since either. No big surprise or disappointment, but it does feel like finding someone to speak Spanish with in a city with tens of thousands of Spanish speakers should be a little easier than this. Better top up my iTalki account since it looks like I'll be continuing with the lessons for now! Of course they have their advantage of not having to leave the house or speak English.

I had a look at the Kypros course. It's a little old-fashioned and "the book is on the table"-y, but it has written transcripts which is a big plus and it could be useful as a complement to Language Transfer. It's repetitive enough that things might stick. Not bad at all for a freebie.

Still undecided about Assimil especially since they charge another €10.90 for delivery to the UK; the e-méthode would work out at about half the price and I really don't need a paper book or another box on my shelf. This forum seems split between language learners and course collectors, and I'm in the first category. Not so keen on the 3-year limitation, lack of resale possibility, or inevitably crappy software though; a digital edition sounds great for easily making Anki cards etc. but who knows whether it actually allows copy-and-paste.

I forgot to mention on my last post that I ended up having a drink with some Greeks at the weekend! Obviously at this point there's no way I could understand or say much, especially in that noisy bar, but I just thought it was a big coincidence to meet some a few days after starting the language since I don't normally encounter many.

The weekend away with possible Spanish opportunities is in a few days, and I know that there will be at least one Italian and at least one Greek too. I'm sure the main language of communication will be broken English though, which will put me at a disadvantage as someone who speaks native English with a non-standard accent. I'll probably need my Italian and Spanish just to get people to actually listen to and understand me.

[jonm]

Still undecided about Assimil especially since they charge another €10.90 for delivery to the UK; the e-méthode would work out at about half the price and I really don't need a paper book or another box on my shelf. This forum seems split between language learners and course collectors, and I'm in the first category. Not so keen on the 3-year limitation, lack of resale possibility, or inevitably crappy software though; a digital edition sounds great for easily making Anki cards etc. but who knows whether it actually allows copy-and-paste.

I also like combining Assimil and Anki. I do the dialogues in the usual way, and then in Anki I have these dictation cards where I hear a sentence and type what I hear. When I flip the card, I compare what I've typed against the original and listen a few more times and practice saying it. I find this good for listening, spelling, and pronunciation, but especially for spending a little time with each sentence and noticing how it's put together. Assimil, bless them, makes it fairly easy to batch import the sentences into Anki by providing those individual mp3s with the corresponding text in the tags.

I'm curious if this kind of thing would be possible with the online version. From this post, it sounds like you do get individual sound files, but it also sounds like there's DRM that prevents them from playing in other programs. And then yeah, the other issue is grabbing the text. Even if it's possible to copy-paste, I wonder if it would be possible to do a batch import, which saves a lot of time.

I think that's a good point about some folks enjoying collecting courses and others seeing them more as a means to an end. I'm not really a collector. I do like leafing through the book, but if they offered a cheaper option where you could download a PDF of the book and DRM-free MP3s containing the text, I would go for that. Although it would be really easy to pirate, so I'm not surprised they don't offer it.

By the way, I couldn't resist doing the first (very short) lesson. Just dabbling, don't really have room for it in my language lineup, but a little while back I did the first ten or twelve lessons of Language Transfer Greek, and I really got a kick out of all the cognates Mihalis called attention to. I experienced that with Latin cognates back when I first got into Spanish. I like seeing how English words that tend to be a bit abstract or learned correspond to concrete, everyday words in Latin and Greek. I'm tempted to do a little Greek on the side for that reason and to learn the alphabet, even if I don't have time to really dig into it.

I like working with French-base Assimil. Your French is way better than mine, but for me at least I get a little bonus French practice, which is good, since my French isn't at a level where I can really justify branching out into new stuff as much as I do.

Kypros sounds good too, and you probably already know about these podcasts and transcripts, which folks seem to like apart from the musical interludes.

[garyb]

I also like combining Assimil and Anki. I do the dialogues in the usual way, and then in Anki I have these dictation cards where I hear a sentence and type what I hear. When I flip the card, I compare what I've typed against the original and listen a few more times and practice saying it. I find this good for listening, spelling, and pronunciation, but especially for spending a little time with each sentence and noticing how it's put together. Assimil, bless them, makes it fairly easy to batch import the sentences into Anki by providing those individual mp3s with the corresponding text in the tags.

I'm curious if this kind of thing would be possible with the online version. From this post, it sounds like you do get individual sound files, but it also sounds like there's DRM that prevents them from playing in other programs. And then yeah, the other issue is grabbing the text. Even if it's possible to copy-paste, I wonder if it would be possible to do a batch import, which saves a lot of time.

I forgot that the MP3 files had the lesson text in them! That's certainly easier than typing manually from the book, and a point in favour of the physical edition ("super pack"). With a paper book and MP3 files that work on any device, I at least know what I'm getting, while the e-méthode feels a bit like a pig in a poke with their own software that may or may not allow what I want and, like most cross-platform all-in-one apps that solve already-solved problems, will probably be horrible to use. My Anki use with Assimil is nowhere near as elaborate as yours - I just do cloze-deletion cards for words with mid-frequency vocab that I struggle to remember otherwise - but for a harder language like Greek something with more repetition might be helpful.

By the way, I couldn't resist doing the first (very short) lesson. Just dabbling, don't really have room for it in my language lineup, but a little while back I did the first ten or twelve lessons of Language Transfer Greek, and I really got a kick out of all the cognates Mihalis called attention to. I experienced that with Latin cognates back when I first got into Spanish. I like seeing how English words that tend to be a bit abstract or learned correspond to concrete, everyday words in Latin and Greek. I'm tempted to do a little Greek on the side for that reason and to learn the alphabet, even if I don't have time to really dig into it.

I know what you mean! Learning Greek is helping me to discover things I didn't know about English and my second languages. I'd love to study Latin one day too, for that reason and for the classics, but it's just not enough of a priority at this point in my life. Maybe when I'm older and retired etc... My main motivation for Greek is practical use, but the etymology and all is a great bonus.

I am finding LT a bit hard to keep up with, though. While with MT one often gets frustrated about how slow the students are, with this it's the opposite: I'm envious of their ability to remember all these new words! On the other hand, they do mispronounce words, often without being corrected, and the current guy keeps missing the "it" in phrases like "to do it".

I like working with French-base Assimil. Your French is way better than mine, but for me at least I get a little bonus French practice, which is good, since my French isn't at a level where I can really justify branching out into new stuff as much as I do.

Kypros sounds good too, and you probably already know about these podcasts and transcripts, which folks seem to like apart from the musical interludes.

I did the French-base Assimil for Italian. I enjoyed it, and it made sense since Italian's so much closer to French than to English: I saw the similarities and differences more clearly, and avoided dull explanations of things that work the same in both. The last thing the world needs is another description of y/en and ci/ne. Greek isn't as close but so far I'd say it's still far more similar to the Romance languages than to English. The word order is very close to Spanish and Italian.

Never heard of these podcasts, so thanks for the recommendation! I don't know much about Greek resources to be honest; if I've not mentioned it here I probably don't know it. Always happy to hear about them!

[Ogrim]

Hi Gary, have you considered Colloquial Greek? If you are mainly after a text-based course then I think it can be a good alternative to Colloquial. Less expensive, and the audio files are all available free for download on Routledge's website.

[jonm]

I forgot that the MP3 files had the lesson text in them! That's certainly easier than typing manually from the book, and a point in favour of the physical edition ("super pack"). With a paper book and MP3 files that work on any device, I at least know what I'm getting, while the e-méthode feels a bit like a pig in a poke with their own software that may or may not allow what I want and, like most cross-platform all-in-one apps that solve already-solved problems, will probably be horrible to use. My Anki use with Assimil is nowhere near as elaborate as yours - I just do cloze-deletion cards for words with mid-frequency vocab that I struggle to remember otherwise - but for a harder language like Greek something with more repetition might be helpful.

I just found this video (in French) that Assimil made demonstrating the e-méthode. My first impression is that it looks pretty decent, like they've put some thought into it. I wouldn't mind trying it out if it was included with the courses I've already got, but it doesn't make me want to switch from my current approach. I like having the files and being able to leave it to SRS to determine what needs reviewing when.

Yeah, it's great that Assimil includes the text in the sound files. Such a time-saver. I sometimes make those Anki cards I described using other sources, cutting up sound files and typing the text myself, but it's so much slower that I usually can't be bothered unless it's something I really want to work with and there's no other way. I like Assimil first and foremost for the material, but being able to get a whole Assimil course into Anki in the time it takes me to make a dozen cards manually is a huge bonus.

I know what you mean! Learning Greek is helping me to discover things I didn't know about English and my second languages. I'd love to study Latin one day too, for that reason and for the classics, but it's just not enough of a priority at this point in my life. Maybe when I'm older and retired etc... My main motivation for Greek is practical use, but the etymology and all is a great bonus.

I am finding LT a bit hard to keep up with, though. While with MT one often gets frustrated about how slow the students are, with this it's the opposite: I'm envious of their ability to remember all these new words! On the other hand, they do mispronounce words, often without being corrected, and the current guy keeps missing the "it" in phrases like "to do it".

I see that Greek is a heritage language for you and that you might have a trip coming up. Both excellent motivations! I'm in a similar situation with German, and not coincidentally, I'm finding myself very motivated and moving right along. Whereas I'm interested in Greek but don't have a strong personal connection to it, and that's probably why I'm just dabbling for the moment.

And the same with Latin. I did the first three chapters of Lingua Latina per se illustrada, and I loved it, but I guess we all deal with the opportunity cost of studying a particular language, and other languages (and other activities) won out. But it would be really cool to read the classics, and it's fun connecting it up with English and the Romance languages.

That's cool that you're so far along in the LT course. I also found, when I did those early lessons, that the students on the recording were remembering things more easily than I was. I wonder how many lessons Mihalis records in a single sit-down with a student. It could be that in some cases they're remembering something from five or ten minutes earlier rather than the previous day.

I did the French-base Assimil for Italian. I enjoyed it, and it made sense since Italian's so much closer to French than to English: I saw the similarities and differences more clearly, and avoided dull explanations of things that work the same in both. The last thing the world needs is another description of y/en and ci/ne. Greek isn't as close but so far I'd say it's still far more similar to the Romance languages than to English. The word order is very close to Spanish and Italian.

Out of curiosity, which "vintage" of Assimil Italian did you do? It sounds like some people found the current version decent but unexciting, so pretty much what was said about the previous version of Greek. Though Assimil Hindi has its detractors too, and I'm really enjoying it so far. I'm probably enough of a fan of the approach that I'd still enjoy their less popular offerings (which, as you pointed out earlier, are still probably better than most of the competition). Though of course I particularly enjoy the ones with entertaining dialogues, like the ones that tell an ongoing story or have humorous twists.

[eido]

I'm sure the main language of communication will be broken English though, which will put me at a disadvantage as someone who speaks native English with a non-standard accent. I'll probably need my Italian and Spanish just to get people to actually listen to and understand me.

Your location says Scotland - so you're Scottish? That's cool! Scottish accents are bomb! I find them very interesting. I understand your point, though. Not many English learners study the accent from your country. They pick English or American. (And there seems to be a divide on what's right to choose, just like there is with what we consider foreign.) Are you proud of your accent? I can't tell. If you're not, you should be

[Sandía]

Still undecided about Assimil especially since they charge another €10.90 for delivery to the UK; the e-méthode would work out at about half the price and I really don't need a paper book or another box on my shelf. This forum seems split between language learners and course collectors, and I'm in the first category. Not so keen on the 3-year limitation, lack of resale possibility, or inevitably crappy software though; a digital edition sounds great for easily making Anki cards etc. but who knows whether it actually allows copy-and-paste.

Is the e-method version you are referring to the app version? If so, I own the Spanish course and would be happy to give you more information over it.