Postby M23 » Sat Aug 10, 2019 5:29 am
Spanish
I am about twenty pages away from finishing La Llamada del Tribu. I learned about a few political philosophers I had never heard before, and I will have to revisit this book for all the useful political philosophy vocabulary that was in it. Some of it was not so useful since Mario Vargas Llosa has a very ample vocabulary, and uses words that I would not necessarily use in my native language. Anyway, it was a good book, and the next time I find myself in a bookstore in Spain I might want to pick up something by José Ortega y Gasset.
Speaking of Spain, my wife and I went to Spanish happy hour tonight and chatted with a lady who was originally from Barcelona. Normally Spaniards are a bit difficult for us to understand since we are both used to Spanish from the Americas, but this particular lady's accent was not much of a problem at all. We have also had quite a few not-so-great experiences with Spaniards, so it was nice to repair that a bit with someone who was really warm and friendly. My Spanish felt pretty rusty since I am not getting much output practice due to my studies. If I can manage it, it would be good to get some tech vocabulary in so I can talk more about what I am learning, and to talk shop with all the software developers and sys admins that like to go to that meetup.
German
The road is going to be really long with this language at the rate I am moving with it. I will learn it one day, but it will probably take me twice as long as it would for most people. I keep at it with the Duolingo, and it seems that some things are starting to sink in a bit more while other things feel as new as the first time I was exposed to them. I have been poking away at the One Punch Man mangas that I picked up on the last trip to Germany, but it is slow going. I am going to need to finish getting through them, scribbling out the vocabulary for the dialog, and then just rereading them until I do not need my vocabulary lists anymore. It's hard to get much time in with the university studies and all, but I love German and having to take the long road with this language is not going to dissuade me from learning it.
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