Lilly's log - French, Russian, Spanish and Italian

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blaurebell
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian and Spanish

Postby blaurebell » Fri May 19, 2017 1:43 pm

Spanish

So far, the most obvious problems in my GdUdE grammar mission are grammar points where my language learning machine is broken due to confusing input: preterito perfecto vs indefinido and imperativos for example. Those things work differently for Argentinian and Iberian Spanish and my brain seems to be a little confused about these things since I hear both versions all the time. There is probably no other way than learning both versions separately, so that my brain starts to keep these things apart somehow. Right now it's all in a muddle. FSI seems to be the Latin American version, but of course it will use the most common version which is tuteo + ustedes. Both I already know fairly well. I did learn the Iberian version tuteo + vosotros in language school, but I find that vosotros sounds silly so I tend to avoid it when I can. I will definitely have to practice the voseo separately, since that's not very common outside of Argentina and I've never learned it explicitly. My Spanish teachers over here gave me some material on it at some point, but those were just a few pages of descriptions without exercises, and the teachers couldn't produce voseo themselves. There is a specific Argentinian course called Aula del Sur, but of course it's not to be found in Europe, that would be too easy! I'll probably have to find a way to get it from Argentina at some point. In any case 77 of 107 lessons done on GdUdE, fast progress and I'll be finished soon!

The other thing I've started to do is to transcribe tango lyrics and then put them into LWT. I always wanted to learn enough lunfardo - Argentinian street slang from the beginning of the 20th century - to understand all the tangos I hear and I guess the best way to do it is to work with the tangos directly. So, right now I'm doing scriptorium with tangos and then put all of them in LWT looking up all the words I don't know. Every tango I transcribe I put in a playlist and then aim to have 30min playlists of tangos with the transcribed lyrics in LWT. I already know some tangos almost by heart, because I've heard them a million times (probably a slight exaggeration, but more than 1000 times each is very very likely, probably far more frequently for my favourite tango orchestras). Although I know many tangos well, there are always single words that I don't know, most of them slang. Knowing the majority of the tangos I hear in their entirety would be really nice, so it's a really cool project. I've been meaning to do this for years, but only now that I'm really going into the details with Spanish does it seem like a worthwhile exercise. Right now I'm focusing on my favourites and the most popular ones for which I can find the letras online to double check. As I make progress I will probably also get to tangos where I will have to rely on my hearing and perhaps have my husband check my transcripts. One additional perk is also that I will probably be able to recognise single tangos by title rather than just orchestra or singer. I already know more about tango music than most dancers, but still far too little to keep up with musicians. I always loved to dance with tango musicians though, so they occasionally made me feel like a bit of an uneducated louse for not knowing all the tangos that they mentioned or knew by heart. By the way, all Argentinians know tangos by heart, even non-musicians who can't dance. As a tango beginner, my husband would occasionally start to sing while dancing, because he grew up with it. When we tango dancers who are not from Argentina say that Argentinians have tango in their blood, we actually mean this insane familiarity with the music that is the basis for the musicality required to become a good tango dancer. So, by working with the tangos I'm not only improving my Spanish, but probably also my tango!

Last night we finished the first season of En terapia and started on the second season. It's a really great series and I'm enjoying it a lot. I really like the American version too, but the Argentinian version is definitely a superb adaptation well worth watching! There was also one scene in there that made me miss Argentina quite a bit, because the local birds started up their racket and there was a barking concert in the background too (there are insane numbers of dogs in Buenos Aires). As for the birds: there is nothing like getting insulted by a bird to feel like home. You might think WTF, but the benteveo actually sings "bicho feo" according to the locals :lol: And as soon as someone told you what he sings, you will hear it too!

French

I'm shooting myself in the foot with reading academic books for my second French SC, but that's what I have to do for my PhD. I can read 100 pages of a novel typeset in medium sized print in the time it takes me to read 30 pages of a dense type academic book with footnotes. Oh well. At least it's efficient in so far that it combines PhD reading and language learning! And I definitely don't have any problems with my comprehension, which is definitely cool. I'm getting closer and closer to my goal of understanding French philosophy in the original.
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: 20 / 100 Дэвид Эддингс - В поисках камня
: 14325 / 35000 LWT Known

: 17 / 55 FSI Spanish Basic
: 100 / 116 GdUdE B
: 8 / 72 Duolingo reverse Spanish -> German

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blaurebell
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian and Spanish

Postby blaurebell » Sat May 20, 2017 1:12 pm

Spanish

Between grammar mission, En terapia and a noticeable increase in tango madness I'm actually getting an awful lot of Spanish these days without even trying at all. I trick myself into doing the grammar before anything that I find more fun and the rest of the engagement just happens naturally throughout the day. I forced myself quite a bit more when I was still insisting on the Iberian Spanish when now I don't really need to push at all. In total I got about 250h of active Spanish engagement in the last 2 months, that's quite a lot. I should probably make an effort to get the last 20h of Iberian Spanish out of the way, but I'm actually quite sick of it by now. Oh wait, I was actually sick of it even before I started :D I'm even less inclined to pick Iberian Spanish resources now, since it was quite a bit of torture! But well, at least it actually worked and I have now very little problems understanding the locals. The irony is that understanding the locals better is actually why I started to listen to French podcasts on the bus, since I'm really forced to overhear an awful lot of stupid conversations! Don't think that I'm eavesdropping, these people speak so loudly that they entertain the entire bus with their silly opinions, unappetising details of doctor visits and telenovela-like personal anecdotes. That's really something I didn't factor in when I decided that I need to make an effort to understand the locals ...! Do I really want to understand 99% of the things I hear on the street? Turns out that the answer is no :roll: It does help when having proper conversations though, so that's something.

French

Spanish conversations are not the only ones I overhear on the street since the tourist season is starting. I actually understand pretty much everything I hear also in French which is quite common on the street around here. This is still so new to me, that I forget how well I understand and surprise myself when it happens again. Today I was a bit tired so I couldn't quite concentrate on my academic book. In the end I decided to check youtube for some French documentaries about tango. I've seen pretty much every Spanish, English and German documentary about tango, but never bothered to look for anything in French. Now that I'm pondering the possibility of getting a car for tango, picking up some French ways of talking about tango isn't a bad idea, since some of the tango events in the area are actually on the French side of the border. So, tango could also be a good reason to activate my French a bit. In any case, there are some nice enough tango videos in French on Youtube. Not bad at all.

Russian

88% of my first book done which equates to 264 pages! The end is in sight!
2 x
: 20 / 100 Дэвид Эддингс - В поисках камня
: 14325 / 35000 LWT Known

: 17 / 55 FSI Spanish Basic
: 100 / 116 GdUdE B
: 8 / 72 Duolingo reverse Spanish -> German

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blaurebell
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian and Spanish

Postby blaurebell » Sun May 21, 2017 1:43 pm

Spanish

Today I had a big success, I wrote a formal email without any mistakes! The reason? Well, my iPod touch needed a replacement since it's about 7 years old and none of the apps work properly anymore. I use it every day, so it's been driving me nuts for the last few months. And since my shitty 9 year old Sony Ericsson phone doesn't even turn on anymore without being plugged in, I decided to get a used iPhone 5s to make the replacement of both a bit cheaper. Basically I got a phone for the price of a new iPod, not a bad thing at all. I have been totally against having a smart phone for the longest time - I simply don't want to be connected to the Internet when I'm outside, it would be such a huge distraction! And phone zombies personally drive me nuts not only while walking around outside, but also on my photos. However, all the basic phones are so awful nowadays that I wouldn't use a new phone any more often than my old one - Not at all. Buying a new phone that I won't use is idiotic, so an iPod with phone function sounded like a good compromise. I will just leave data off most of the time and only use it when I have a situation where it's actually useful. The only problem: Now all of a sudden I need a new SIM card that gives me some data each month, which means my old German prepaid card isn't the cheapest option anymore when I'm in Spain. Of course Spanish bureaucracy is making it thoroughly enjoyable (hint: irony!) to get a mobile phone contract! I have to send a million documents and emails back and forth, so I'm getting a bit of unplanned Spanish writing practice.

Last night we watched El último aplauso which is a documentary from about 10 years ago about a tango bar and the singers who used to sing there - the bar is now closed. It was really nice to watch the documentary, since we actually met some of the singers in the story when we were in Buenos Aires 2 years ago, in a different bar of course and aged about 15 years. The perfect documentary for my current mood.

84 of 107 lessons done for GdUdE A, 79% done.

French

My current academic book is so boring that I decided to slow down with it on the weekend, since it's really a pain. Pages and pages about statistics *yawn*. I was listening to a bit of Transfert though and I'm now 2 episodes away from finishing them all. I will have to look for a new podcast to continue my native French audio exploration. I'm also very close to reaching 800h of French, just 2h left and I think I might make an effort to get there today. I wasn't really planning to do any more than 730h in this first year of French - 2h a day - and I still have 7 weeks left! 2h of French a day is pretty normal for me and depending on how much I read I might even do more, so I will probably reach 900 or even 950h in my first year. I achieved a lot more with my French than I expected and being at a point where I can use French sources with ease and watch Arte is really a cool achievement.

General

My PhD goals for languages were these:
1. Be able to read Spanish with precision. Write and speak it at a level that won't embarrass me in front of Spanish speaking academics.
2. Be able to read Russian with a dictionary to confirm certain points in the original sources. Maybe B1+ passive.
3. The same level of French for essential sources only. Maybe A2-B1 passive.

So, right now I have reached my original Russian goal, way surpassed my French goal - I simply understand everyday written and spoken French without any strain - and I'm still working hard on my Spanish goal. I actually modified my goals now insofar as I would now like to use a substantial amount of French sources and read some of the French philosophy needed in the original. I'm also trying to get my Russian to the same level as my French which would really help a lot. Instead of only getting my Spanish to C1 and French and Russian to like B1 at best, the outcome of my PhD will probably now be C1 comprehension and production for Spanish, C1 comprehension for French and B2+ comprehension for Russian. French and Russian kind of stretched my schedule a bit and I'm probably going to need 2-2.5 years more instead of 1-1.5, but I think it will be all around better for my PhD and my personal goals.

You know what's cool? Now it's actually conceivable that I will have 5 languages at C1+ in a few years and that was always more of an unrealistic dream rather than a real goal for me. Part of why it seemed unrealistic is that this would mean to understand as many or even more languages than my Dad (German, English, Russian, Spanish, a bit of Italian), definitely an "impossibility" in my eyes! What separates me now from the inconceivable state of existence of understanding more languages than my Dad is the comprehension barrier of Russian, which is just a matter of time now! Another 300-500h of reading and I'm there! That's pretty crazy ...!

By the way, people who know many languages aren't rare in my surroundings. My mum understands 3 languages: Russian, Ukrainian and German, and my husband understands 4: Spanish, English, Italian and French. What's strange is that between us we know 7 languages and still we somehow ended up in a state where we need to translate all the time, since my mum and my husband don't have a language in common.
5 x
: 20 / 100 Дэвид Эддингс - В поисках камня
: 14325 / 35000 LWT Known

: 17 / 55 FSI Spanish Basic
: 100 / 116 GdUdE B
: 8 / 72 Duolingo reverse Spanish -> German

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blaurebell
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian and Spanish

Postby blaurebell » Mon May 22, 2017 9:14 am

Weekly Update

Spanish

: 127 / 150 peninsular Spanish audio
: 71 / 150 Argentinian audio
: 4786 / 10000 Spanish Pages
: 84 / 107 GdUdE A

At the moment I'm mainly focusing on my grammar mission and with an hour each day I should be finished with GdUdE A by the end of the week. I feel tempted to already start FSI, but I don't want to overdo it with the grammar torture, so I better wait until I'm finished with GdUdE B.

No progress with reading, since I'm already reading between 3 and 5h a day in French and Russian. That's ok though, since I'll switch to Spanish for my PhD reading as soon as I hit 10,000 pages with French.

After watching lots of En terapia I'm now almost halfway through my Argentinian audio SC. I haven't really made any progress on the Iberian SC though, because I needed a bit of a break from silly TV. I think I'll try to make some progress with that this week so that I get it out of the way. I'd also like to start on some Mexican content to get a bit of a change, but first the Iberian SC needs to be finished. In general, I'm now up to 773h of audio, 420h dubbed series and 350h native content. My C1 goal is about 500h native TV and I'm expecting to get there by the end of the year at the latest.

I'm also now working with tango music which is pretty interesting and good training. The idea is to transcribe one tango a day. Even Argentinians who don't dance know certain tangos by heart and I as a tango dancer know only a few where the lyrics are sung especially clearly. I want to know more now and also get to know some that are especially hard to understand. Yesterday I actually transcribed one that I never really understood at all and it turned out to be about faith rather than the usual unhappy love story. It's a tango that I've heard many many times and I simply never listened closely enough to catch the meaning of some of the more complicated lines. Seems like a worthwhile exercise!

Spanish hours: 26h

French

: 7498 / 10000 French Pages
: 42 / 150 French native audio

I'm now halfway through my second French reading SC and there are about 500 pages that aren't even counted yet, because I haven't finished the books, so actually I'm already beyond 8000 pages! At my current rate I will reach 10,000 pages very quickly. I'm also 12h away from finishing the audio part of the second SC. Only 42h of native audio so far, but since this was audio only I'm actually noticing a huge jump of comprehension when watching French native content. I think the strategy of getting a whole SC audio only will actually speed things up a lot for me with French, since it forces me to rely much less on visual cues.

French hours: 19.59h

Russian

: 88 / 100 Дэвид Эддингс - Обретение чуда
: 6861 / 35000 LWT Known

Last week I read 21 pages in Russian, which isn't an awful lot, but still going in the right direction, since my reading speed has increased and I now only need 14 min per page (I started at 1h!). I only read 5h though and with the 6WC I should be more focused than this. However, I still find Russian reading straining and I'm doing an hour of Spanish grammar a day already. Best not overdo it when my health seems to be getting a tad better these days. It's simply a matter of time, so I keep going at a pace that seems natural to me, rather than forcing myself too much. I suspect that reading will only become fun when I hit 500 pages and I'm now at 264. Patience! If I can reach 500 pages until the end of July, maybe I binge read for the rest of the SC starting in August which is the month I normally take off from work. I did the same for French last year and it worked really really well. To reach 500 pages by the end of July I will have to read for about 6h a week from now on, which is certainly doable. So, this week the goal is 6h+!

Russian hours: 4.95h

Total: 50.55h
1 x
: 20 / 100 Дэвид Эддингс - В поисках камня
: 14325 / 35000 LWT Known

: 17 / 55 FSI Spanish Basic
: 100 / 116 GdUdE B
: 8 / 72 Duolingo reverse Spanish -> German

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blaurebell
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian and Spanish

Postby blaurebell » Tue May 23, 2017 2:34 pm

My success with certain activities is totally dependent on some sort of routine. Yesterday my husband wanted us to go into town to run some errands in the morning and immediately I dropped the ball on the grammar exercises. Once we came back I basically only had time for some photography stuff before my husband got restless and wanted us to watch something. This morning things were back to normal and I started my day with an hour of Spanish grammar and a bit of PhD reading in French.

These last few days I picked up the habit of watching tango videos while having a quick lunch. The problem is clearly that I forget to eat while watching. My food got a bit cold because of a milonguero couple who did the most amazing minimalistic things ever, oops! Lovely, lovely, lovely though! Afterwards I transcribed a tango and right now my method of picking the tangos is actually pretty random. I watch videos until I've seen enough and then pick the last one in the dance video playlist that had lyrics. Dancers usually don't pick the most common ones for their performances, so I usually get some tangos that I don't know very well. After about a week of making my husband feel guilty ( :D ) he finally gave in and danced with me a little. He's still a beginner, but when the stars align - i.e. music, his own confidence, space -, he totally has moments where he shows how talented he is. It's lovely! I haven't made him dance much the last couple of years, because he has been very busy, but now that the end of one of his projects is in sight I'm already letting him know that I won't go easy on him forever :D By the way, during one of the tangos he started singing along and I noticed that I knew the letras as well. It was an Angel Vargas tango which I had on my iPod for ages. Transcribing those would probably be very easy for me.

Also, I reached 800h for French! The next big milestone is of course 1000h, which I will probably reach sometime this year. For French and Spanish it's really easy to log many hours, because I'm just having fun, watching stuff, listening, reading, not so easy for Russian where everything is still so much more difficult. I really need to be a little more disciplined with the Russian now to make progress. On the other hand it's starting to get warm and sunny outside and my photography mojo is returning. I make sure to get a little bit done each day though.
2 x
: 20 / 100 Дэвид Эддингс - В поисках камня
: 14325 / 35000 LWT Known

: 17 / 55 FSI Spanish Basic
: 100 / 116 GdUdE B
: 8 / 72 Duolingo reverse Spanish -> German

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blaurebell
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian and Spanish

Postby blaurebell » Thu May 25, 2017 12:35 pm

Spanish

As I mentioned the other day, I actually got a new phone and after lots of back and forth with the company they actually sent the SIM via next day delivery. So, I spent some time, setting it all up, installing my usual apps and trying out a few things. I'm pretty happy with it actually, because many things are just a tad better and it's overall a lot faster than the grandpa of an iPod touch I was using. Grandpa retired now and will go into the box of outdated technology, same as my old phone. All this playing with new technology of course distracted me quite a bit and I didn't do anything until after siesta when I decided to go out into the sunshine with one of my really old cameras. I felt a bit bad about not doing my grammar exercises again, not doing the PhD reading, but it was such a nice day, it would have been idiotic to sit inside. I walked to the city centre, went along my usual round through the old town and finally decided to go a little up the hill along the harbour to come back down at the aquarium where the locals let their dogs into the water in summer. It's one of the most beautiful spots in town and I tend to go up there to get a view on days when nothing much is happening in town. Down at the harbour there were a bunch of kids throwing themselves right into the harbour inlet with quite amazing jumps and my camera was happy. It wasn't quite super warm yet, but not cold either and I just had a bit of a walk without caring too much whether I get good pictures or not. This place only delivers when you're not waiting for it.

So far so useless for language learning, eh? Well, a punk who was hanging about the harbour noticed my very old camera and started a conversation with me. We ended up sitting in the sun for like an hour talking about all sorts of interesting things, like a forest occupied by punks in Germany, his summer work in the fields across the French border - picking grapes, kiwis, and all sort of other fruit - his last squat that burned down because he got too stoned with a friend. It was fun! Felt a bit like my teenage years when I was hanging out with many dudes like that. That said, it's one thing to hang out with punks in depressing surroundings when you're a bored teenager, quite another to hang out looking at a beautiful harbour on a glowing spring day! What a life this guy has, living in a tent up the mountain, making plans to go fruit picking over in France to buy himself a little van in Germany! The funniest part: They call him Gato - cat - and he has two dogs, totally cracked me up! I ended up taking some pictures of him and the dogs, and I'm pretty sure that they're going to turn out great!

Going out with my Rollei is my main trick for getting speaking practice around here, people just love it, tourists and locals alike. In summer I often hang out with people who are just passing through town on the tourist circuit - the guys who make sandcastles, giant bubbles, musicians, puppeteers. They are often really interesting and do the same thing that Gato does - pick fruit to get over the winter, tourist circuit in summer, hang out in the sun, take care of the dogs, travel. The region around here is popular among such travelling folk, because it is apparently more "refined" than the areas with the English and German tourists down south. Sounds like I'm in a nice place? Well, only in the summer months. The rest of the year it's a boring rainy town full of old rich people. Right now the fun part of the year is starting though and I'm looking forward to the beach, my waterproof camera, the sunshine and the relaxed atmosphere.

Coming back to Spanish: Yesterday I spoke an hour with that punk and the day before we spoke to my in-laws on Skype for half an hour, which is always a challenge, because the connection tends to be less than ideal and it's hard to get a word in with them even without skype delays. In both situations my Spanish was noticeably better than it used to be. I made less mistakes, I wasn't really hunting for words and the dude I was talking to yesterday didn't comment on my Spanish at all, because it was no barrier! After about half an hour all sorts of Argentinian stuff started to come naturally and at some point I really noticed that the Argentinian intonation is becoming more and more natural for my Spanish. Not bad at all. What still confuses me is that I often get the question whether I'm French. I'm not sure whether my accent really sounds French or whether it's the proximity to the French border. I guess not always being able to roll my Rs mid word and the total lack of the local lisp might sound French to the locals, since the French apparently have a real problem with both. I will have to ask my husband what he thinks about that. My aim for my accent in any language is that people can't really place where I'm from, since native-like isn't really achievable. I never managed to get rid of my East German vowels when speaking High German and that's my native language, so there is simply a limit of how far I can get with accent reduction. As long as I don't sound German it's all fine. When my father-in-law said the other day that I don't sound German at all, I was quite happy about that. In combination with the persistent question whether I'm French I think I can be reasonably happy with my accent for now, especially since I haven't really worked on it properly yet.

In any case, lots of speaking practice! And it's really nice to know that my hard work with the grammar books is actually paying off. 92 of 107 lessons done in GdUdE A, that's 86%! 4 more 1h sessions to go until I can move on to GdUdE B!
5 x
: 20 / 100 Дэвид Эддингс - В поисках камня
: 14325 / 35000 LWT Known

: 17 / 55 FSI Spanish Basic
: 100 / 116 GdUdE B
: 8 / 72 Duolingo reverse Spanish -> German

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blaurebell
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Languages: German (N), English (C2), Spanish (B2-C1), French (B2+ passive), Italian (A2), Russian (Beginner)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=3235
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian and Spanish

Postby blaurebell » Fri May 26, 2017 6:02 pm

Spanish

I'm very close to finishing GdUdE A, which will be the first time that I finish a Spanish grammar book. All the others totally bored me to death or were simply confusing. Definitely recommended! And instead of dreading it, I'm actually looking forward to GdUdE B. I also feel that it helped me and that I have been making less mistakes lately. My grammar mission looks like this: GdUdE A, GdUdE B, FSI Spanish Basic, GdUdE C. So, 1 of 4 courses almost done.

On the side there is of course more En terapia happening and in between I listen to tangos and transcribe them when I'm not too tired (today I am).

French

I'm making progress with the history book I'm reading for the PhD. Today I thought I'd make it a little more interesting by listening to music, but apparently my brain decides to go "does not compute" when I try to read in French while listening to music in Spanish. That said, the same experience was actually a success. I listened to an album that I hadn't really listened to in 10 years and which I know very well. However, back when I listened to it a lot I actually never understood what it was all about, because it was in Spanish and French. Now that I've learned both languages I was like :shock: :o 8-)

Russian

92% done of my first book in Russian. Just a few more days to go and I'll be done with it, how cool! Also, I reached 7000 known word forms, 20% of my goal of 35,000! I'm still plodding along at 47% known words in the library, but I'm getting whole stretches of new pages below 15% unknown words. It's becoming less and less of a hassle now!
5 x
: 20 / 100 Дэвид Эддингс - В поисках камня
: 14325 / 35000 LWT Known

: 17 / 55 FSI Spanish Basic
: 100 / 116 GdUdE B
: 8 / 72 Duolingo reverse Spanish -> German

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coldrainwater
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Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... =15&t=7636
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian and Spanish

Postby coldrainwater » Fri May 26, 2017 10:58 pm

blaurebell wrote:I'm very close to finishing GdUdE A, which will be the first time that I finish a Spanish grammar book. All the others totally bored me to death or were simply confusing. Definitely recommended! And instead of dreading it, I'm actually looking forward to GdUdE B. I also feel that it helped me and that I have been making less mistakes lately. My grammar mission looks like this: GdUdE A, GdUdE B, FSI Spanish Basic, GdUdE C. So, 1 of 4 courses almost done.

Moments after reading your update, my first GdUdE knocked on my doorstep (delivered ironically by a Mexican friend of mine who is native from a nearby border town). I ordered the GdUdE series in the paperback format based partly on reading about your experiences with it. Out of curiosity, have you taken a look at A New Reference Grammar of Modern Spanish by Butt & Benjamin? It may be the only reference grammar that I have been able to tolerate reading (feels like the authors actually have some writing chops and invoke them from time to time). I think the point of interest for you might be in their region-specific remarks and insights that might be tough to glean from other references (at some later point of study for you so as not to interfere with current work). In comparison and contrast stark, I am using the Practice Makes Perfect series for near pure drilling exercise since I haven't found them tolerable from a reading perspective. B&B may be too peninsular for your interests and needs, but from what I can tell, they make a legitimate and honest effort to obtain worldwide applicability and coverage. I'll peek into GdUdE this weekend (starting at B1-B2 simply b/c that is the one I have at the moment). I find that to get through the boring ones, I often have to add concomitant challenge factors to raise the level of processing depth while studying. I am at a much lower level with my Spanish than you are, but we may end up following a similar study path notwithstanding different overall grammar goals (I am making an auditory pass through FSI also).
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blaurebell
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Languages: German (N), English (C2), Spanish (B2-C1), French (B2+ passive), Italian (A2), Russian (Beginner)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=3235
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian and Spanish

Postby blaurebell » Sat May 27, 2017 12:09 pm

coldrainwater wrote:Out of curiosity, have you taken a look at A New Reference Grammar of Modern Spanish by Butt & Benjamin? It may be the only reference grammar that I have been able to tolerate reading (feels like the authors actually have some writing chops and invoke them from time to time). I think the point of interest for you might be in their region-specific remarks and insights that might be tough to glean from other references (at some later point of study for you so as not to interfere with current work).


Thank you so much for your recommendation, this will come in really handy once I get going with the Output Challenge after my GdUdE + FSI grammar mission! I also had a look at the Practice makes Perfect books and I think I might get the Advanced Grammar and the Subjunctive book at some point. I think the Basic Grammar isn't for me since I've already gone through all the basic stuff 3 times - Spanish course, Duolingo, GdUdE. With FSI it will be the fourth time, so that should hopefully be enough. And if that's still not enough I also have Gramática básica del estudiante de español that I could try again after already failing to finish it twice! It's actually not a bad book, but I just didn't manage to keep up my motivation with that one. GdUdE seems better structured! There are so many grammar resources out there!
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: 20 / 100 Дэвид Эддингс - В поисках камня
: 14325 / 35000 LWT Known

: 17 / 55 FSI Spanish Basic
: 100 / 116 GdUdE B
: 8 / 72 Duolingo reverse Spanish -> German

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blaurebell
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Posts: 840
Joined: Thu Jul 28, 2016 1:24 pm
Location: Spain
Languages: German (N), English (C2), Spanish (B2-C1), French (B2+ passive), Italian (A2), Russian (Beginner)
Language Log: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=3235
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Re: Lilly's log - French, Russian and Spanish

Postby blaurebell » Sat May 27, 2017 1:58 pm

Spanish

Only 2 more days to go until I finish GdUdE A! I actually bought myself a new pencil just for my GdUdE mission, since the ones I use for drawing are somewhat suboptimal for writing, especially since there never seems to be enough space in the fill-in-the-gaps exercises. Much less annoying now with a mechanical pencil! I haven't had one of those since I finished school, so it made me chuckle a bit to buy it. I guess it also didn't help that I had to ask for "minas" in the shop - pencil lead refills in Iberian Spanish. Doesn't seem so funny? Well, minas means "girls" in Argentinian! Trying to say "I also need girls ..." to a shop assistant with a straight face made me feel even more like a school kid :lol:

My husband keeps complaining about the odious characters in En terapia segunda temporada, nevertheless we keep watching. We were watching some of it via Dailymotion, but ended up fiddling about with a proxyservice to get HD quality. Can't wait to be finished with the second season, not only because of the odious characters, but also because we won't have to deal with the proxy working or not working from one minute to the next.

I also watched one more episode of Chicas del Cable - no empathy for the characters, the acting is ... acceptable, the story ridiculous. The only reason I watched it was because I got fresh anchovies for lunch and eating them while watching tango videos is a dangerous operation - I might choke on fish bones ;)

And since the French comic I was planning to read got lost somewhere between Switzerland and here, I actually picked up a comic in Spanish at a local bookstore. It's been a while since I've read comics in Spanish. When I'm in a bookshop around here most of the time I end up just browsing books that I ultimately buy in another language. I always buy lots of books when we're in Argentina, but here the bookstores are simply boring. It still infuriates me that it's almost impossible to get Argentinian and Mexican books here! Sure, I can get garlic from Argentina but reading something that was published there? Impossible! :roll:

By the way, with lots of difficulty I've finally found a course for Argentinian Spanish: Macanudo by Elina Malamud and María José Bravo. Of course the title was stupidly chosen since that's also a comic by Liniers. I managed to find a copy online though for a reasonable enough price and hope it arrives soon!

French

I ordered some more Irène Némirovsky books and look forward to starting the next one! At the local bookshop I also stumbled over a couple of Spanish translations of books that I will get in French soon. So much to read, so little time!
2 x
: 20 / 100 Дэвид Эддингс - В поисках камня
: 14325 / 35000 LWT Known

: 17 / 55 FSI Spanish Basic
: 100 / 116 GdUdE B
: 8 / 72 Duolingo reverse Spanish -> German


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