galaxyrocker wrote:Let me know how Johnson's book is! It's been on my list for a while now, and I know the author personally so it'd be nice to pick it up if it's good quality (which I'm sure it will be, knowing him).
Sure thing! But I'm a little bit envious that you know Diarmuid Johnson. He used to teach Modern Irish at the University of Bonn and I've always wanted to take a course with him, but now he is no longer there. I checked out his website and he seems like a really interesting and inspiring person. At least his projects concerning Irish language and history are pretty interesting and he's also a musician. Last but not least, he's one of the native speakers on the recordings of Irisch für Anfänger, which is how he caught my attention in the first place. His Irish is excellent! How did you get to know him?
0 x
Oró, sé do bheatha abhaile! Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh.
Okay, seems I have overdone it the last weeks. My motivation for studying is absolutely low right now and I can't be bothered to take any textbook into my hands. Instead, I started working on my dissertation again, which was long overdue, and read a lot.
Gaeilge
Éigse Chonamara is boring me. I can't be bothered to read fairy tales any more and I can't be bothered to waste my time reading An Leon, an Bandraoi agus an Prios Éadaigh either. I want to read real stuff, literature for grown-ups (okay, that sounds wrong )! Maybe, I'll force my way through Dé Luain after all. Life's too short for reading bad books!
Ἑλληνική
Haven't touched Reading Greek for a week now. In the beginning, Greek was interesting. Now, it's tiresome and boring. Hope my motivation rises again as I don't want to drop it yet.
עברית
Hebrew might be the most interesting candidate out there right now, but even here... I memorized the paradigms of the possessive suffixes (no way I'm going to memorize the vocalization patterns though), but the practice sentences bore me out of my mind. I cheated and skipped a little bit ahead to lesson 22, which deals with the imperfect. Crazy stuff! Hebrew verbs really aren't for the faint of heart.
English
As I'm not really motivated to study systematically right now, I rather read English books voraciously. I went through Charles Jackson's Fall of Valor within three days. It's about a married professor who falls in love with another man. Slow and boring in the beginning, exciting as hell and even shocking in the end! While I was at it, I also finally read Annie Proulx's Brokeback Mountain. I'm a great fan of the film, so it has been on my reading list forever. The short story is also good, but very dense and, well, short.
I also got some books in English about the Celts and their mythology and two collections of classical Irish short stories. And then there's still Empires of the Word sitting on my desk, desperately waiting to be read.
In the movie department, I rewatched Pride and Prejudice. Hated it when I first saw it some years ago, liked it a lot better this time. Other than that, I'm still watching the old episodes of Friends. Just reached the episode where Chandler gets his duck. Classic!
Wanderlust
No wanderlusting, only listening to Dr. Jackson Crawford's translation of the Hávamál on You Tube. Good stuff!
1 x
Oró, sé do bheatha abhaile! Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh.
I think I just needed to vent my frustration yesterday. Today, my motivation to work on my languages was back. Probably just the normal ups and downs of motivation.
galaxyrocker wrote:I have a copy of Dé Luain too! Perhaps, if we could find a few more interested people, we could do a group read?
That would be great! Who else could be interested in reading it? Jeff, perhaps, or maybe Liam (Gaedheal92), but he isn't around a lot any more.
Gaeilge
So, as long as I'm not reading Dé Luain, I need to read something different. The stories from Éigse Chonamara are a bit boring. At least after having read two of them, the third one isn't very exciting any more. Maybe, I'll give An Leon, an Bandraoi agus an Prios Éadaigh another shot. It's children's literature, but at least it's an easy read. In order to read Dé Luain, I'd have to make extensive use of the dictionary, so I can use every kind of practice that I can get.
Ἑλληνική
I'm still not very motivated for Ancient Greek, but at least I read another text in Reading Greek. This was section 6G, which dealt with a story about the Amazons by Herodotus. The grammar point was strong aorist participles, which aren't very complicated. Tomorrow, I'll read the last text from section 6.
עברית
I made good progress with Hebrew. I worked through the translation section of lesson 20 and the entire lesson 21. The grammatical topic was "static" verbs and their perfect conjugations. The lesson was topped off with another reading from the Genesis, this time the story of Kain and Abel or קַיִן and הֶבֶל, as they are called in Hebrew. So, the next lesson will be lesson 22 with the imperfect conjugation and the dual of nouns. Will be interesting!
0 x
Oró, sé do bheatha abhaile! Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh.
After the bustle of the 6WC, I let things go a little bit more slowly over the last few days. In fact, you can't really call it "studying" what I've been doing. I'm still on sick leave, so I should have plenty of time, but instead I find myself listening to music all day and thinking about friendships that broke apart years ago. Isn't it just strange how you know somebody and take that person for granted and suddenly everything changes and you just don't see each other any more and lose every trace of contact?
Of course, there were reasons for falling out with that particular person, but you never think: "This is the last time I see you in at least four years or even longer", because they're just that important to you and you never imagined losing touch like that. Long story short, I miss that person although it would probably be no good idea to contact him. Things have gotten too weird between us. Yeah, well, whatever... Watching Friends all the time doesn't help to distract myself from the past either. All they have is relationship trouble and don't get me started on Ross and Rachel!
So, languages, eh?!
Gaeilge
I received Dúil and Conaire Mór in the mail. Now, all I've got to do is read them. Other than that, nothing!
Ἑλληνική
I made no progress with Ancient Greek. Somehow, all the excitement and motivation is gone. Sorry!
עברית
I worked a little bit on Biblical Hebrew, but I'm still on lesson 22 where the imperfect is introduced. So, no real progress here either.
Wanderlust
I'm not particularly wanderlusty at the moment, but I think about taking up Persian again. Might be good to do a major living language for a change. I also might try to read some Russian and, yes, I'm still keen on resuscitating my dormant Japanese! So, maybe there will be some change in my languages sooner or later. I have no plans for Old Irish or Old Norse at the moment though.
Bhoil, feicfidh muid (We'll see)!
2 x
Oró, sé do bheatha abhaile! Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh.
Hi everybody, I have been taking a break from studying for the last few days, but today I got back to work. I even was pretty diligent as you can see below.
Русский
Yes, I'm trying to revive my dormant Russian! Today, I read the beginning of Игрок (The Gambler) by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. It's an annotated version, so difficult words are given in the footnotes, but even so it's easier for me to read Dostoyevsky in Russian than anything supposedly easier in Irish...
Я сейчас попробую что-нибудь написать на русском языке, но мне немного трудно. Я уже давно не писал на русском и мне не хватает навика. Но, всё равно, я опять хотел бы упражняться. Но что мне писать? Сегодня я читал в первый раз в этом году книгу на русском языке, Игрока Достоевского. Книга очень интересная потому что она идет об игорной мании и о жизни в больших казино 19-го века. Я очень люблю литературу этого века потому что мир и обычаи были так разние, чем сегодня. Мне довольно легко читать, но иногда есть неизвестные слова. Это ничего страшного так как есть перевод трудных слов в комментариях. Поэтому я надеюсь, что чтение этой книги будет очень интересным и занимательным. До скорого!
Gaeilge
I needed something more interesting to read than the fairy tales from Éigse Chonamara, so I'm back at reading An Leon, an Bandraoi agus an Prios Éadaigh. I read ten pages today, which consisted of the entire sixth chapter.
Ina dhiadh a bheith ag scríobh as an Rúisis beidh mé ag scríobh beagainín as Gaeilge freisin. Is maith liom bheith ag léamh leabhair Ghaeilge, mar is mo rogha teanga í an Ghaeilge (mar a dúirt mé cúpla huaire cheana féin). Is deacair dom a léamh as Gaeilge, ach is cuma liom sin. Taitníonn liom gach uile rud atá ag plé leis an nGaeilge, mar sin beidh mé á foghlaim dá mba sé deacair. Mar sin féin, níl morán le scríobh agam, mar sin críochnóidh mé anois.
Ἑλληνική
Okay, I won't try to write in Ancient Greek. Suffice it to say I finished section 6 in Reading Greek today. The final readings dealt with strong aorist participles and the demonstrative pronoun αὐτός. This was pretty easy stuff. The next unit will deal with Greek comedy and the genitive case, which won't be anything new to me.
עברית
I won't try to write in Hebrew either, but I finished lesson 22 in Lehrbuch Bibel-Hebräisch today and started working on the next unit. This one is about more types of the imperfect conjugation and two irregular nouns. I'm still struggling with vocalization patterns for the status constructus and possessive suffixes though. Some nouns really change their shape!
日本語
こんにちは！ 日本語で書くことができませんが、 勉強したいです。 よろしくお願いします。
So, yeah, my Japanese has got really rusty, but I hope to brush it up soon. I haven't started working on it yet, but I'll get back to Genki soon. I'll probably have to repeat a good deal of Genki I as well as Genki II. After that, I can finally move on to Tobira.
頑張ってください。
4 x
Oró, sé do bheatha abhaile! Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh.
Just saw that Litriocht.com is having a free worldwide shipping event through the end of the month. Figured you might be interested. Use the code Gaeilge17 at checkout.
Thanks for the tip! Unfortunately, I'm a bit short on money at the moment and, also, I have quite enough Irish reading material for the time being, but I'll have a look at it. Maybe, I can find something cheap that catches my interest.
0 x
Oró, sé do bheatha abhaile! Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh.
Okay, you just made me spend € 45 on books in Irish although I really should be saving money right now... But saving € 10 shipping fee seemed like too good an offer!
In case you're interested, I ordered An Chéad Chloch and Seacht mBua an Éirí Amach by Pádraic Ó Conaire, Néal Maidine agus Tine Oíche by Breandán Ó Doibhlin, and An Prionsa Beag.
Now, I really have enough books in Irish... Or do you by any chance know where I can get a copy of Deoraíocht...?
2 x
Oró, sé do bheatha abhaile! Anois ar theacht an tsamhraidh.
)! Maybe, I'll force my way through Dé Luain after all. Life's too short for reading bad books!
Other than that, nothing!