Radioclare's 2018 log (Croatian/Russian)

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Re: Radioclare's 2018 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby IronMike » Wed May 30, 2018 11:06 pm

Kako ste? It's been a while.
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Re: Radioclare's 2018 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Radioclare » Thu May 31, 2018 9:57 pm

IronMike wrote:Kako ste? It's been a while.


Dobro sam, hvala, samo imam dojam da nisam ništa postigla odkad sam posljednji put napisala nešto ovdje!

Basically I've been hiding because I haven't really done anything and I'm not sure what my excuse is :lol:

Well, work has ended up being significantly busier in May than I expected. I had a narrative in my head that February and March were going to be my worst times and that after that everything would be fine, but somehow I forgot that one of my biggest clients actually have their audit in May and it requires vast quantities of work and several trips to London. Add into the mix that there are two public holidays in May, so two lost days of productivity, and that I am on holiday for the first week of June and suddenly there seems to be an awful lot to do and not a lot of time.

That explains why I've been working late, though not necessarily why I haven't been making use of my commutes/evenings/weekends to study. Well, if we brainstorm* ideas, the explanation could be tiredness, laziness, lack of motivation and/or lack of clear goals. I had hoped the 6WC was going to give me a real boost to get back into active Russian studying in particular, but it hasn't (although I did reach Memrise zero eventually!). Sometimes I worry that I don't have enough motivation to learn Russian. I mean, I think it would be quite nice to speak Russian but I don't have the all-consuming desire that I had to learn German and Croatian.

If I've learned anything over the past couple of months anyway, it's definitely that I am not one of those happy people who can make progress without goals because they are naturally inclined to do the things they enjoy/which are good for them. Without goals I am naturally inclined to browse Twitter :lol: For the first two/three months of this year I had a really clear list of things I was supposed to do each day (like spend 15 minutes on Russian Memrise every day, study my Russian textbook for 15 minutes every other day etc) and I was making clear progress forwards. Then I couldn't keep it all up during March when I was under pressure at work, so I somehow managed to give up on the whole thing and kid myself that I'd naturally get back to doing it all in April when I had more spare time. But that clearly didn't happen. So I need to go back to making rules for myself again!

What I have done since my last post...

  • I finished reading 'Kod sivog konja' by Agatha Christie in Croatian. That was my first 'book' for this Super Challenge (237 pages)
  • I read another novel in German. Well, a translation of an English novel into German. It's called "Die Farbe der Träume" and it's about a girl who emigrated to New Zealand during the gold rush in the 1860s. It was quite exciting, and very easy to read, although I did have a crisis of confidence at one point when a relation of one of the characters was described as being pecked to death by "Strauße" and it took me several hours to remember that those are ostriches. I guess ostrich isn't a word which comes up too often, even in fiction. I realised I do know the Croatian word for ostrich (noj) but have no idea what it is in Esperanto (edit: I looked it up and it's 'struto'). Anyway, that was 459 pages and I've read 17.5 books towards my German SC.
  • In total I read 653 pages for Tadoku, which was lower than I hoped, but never mind.
  • Since the SC started, I have watched a bit more Croatian TV than I was doing previously. I've watched 12 episodes of my current telenovela this month.
  • Like I said, I did get both Croatian and Russian Memrise reviews down to zero but I haven't logged in for about a week so they've probably gone back up again :oops:

I also went to Lithuania for the weekend :) This was my third trip to Lithuania and I still feel like it must be in my top 5 favourite countries. If you haven't been to Lithuania, you should go; everything is just so nice :) And it's really good value if you're coming from a country with western prices; I paid €35/night for accommodation, €4 for my dinner on Sunday night, €4.80 for a train ticket between Vilnius and Kaunas... I'm hoping this somehow balances out my expensive trip to Iceland in September! I am woefully ignorant about Lithuanian and feel like I need to make more effort before I go again. A lot of people do speak English, and a lot of Polish and Russian also seems to be spoken at least around Vilnius. I got some Russian reading practice at least, because there were quite a few buildings in Vilnius with bilingual Russian/Lithuanian plaques explaining who had once lived in that house etc, and also the apartment I stayed in on Sunday night had a Russian washing machine :lol: If I spoke better Russian, it would definitely be useful for trying to communicate in Lithuania when English fails. We were in a bar in Trakai on Monday and my boyfriend ended up trying to order drinks in Croatian after the barmaid asked whether he spoke Polish. It worked :)

There is of course also an Esperanto connection in Lithuania, with a Zamenhof Street in Kaunas. I can't pretend to have found this one accidentally this time; I found it accidentally during my first visit to Kaunas in 2015, but went to see it again deliberately when I was there on Saturday :)

Image

I'm also very excited because on Saturday I'm going on my first proper (=having time off work) holiday of the year. I'm off work for a week, so have got 6 nights in the Azores followed by 2 nights in Lisbon on the way home. My new favourite hobby is telling people I'm going to the Azores and watching their face as they weigh up whether to ask me where that is or pretend they know and agree it's going to be lovely :lol:

I'm going to pack my Russian textbook in case being away from work and catching up on some sleep means I feel unexpectedly virtuous about studying. We shall see.

*I was told by HR at work that brainstorming is no longer politically correct and instead we need to have idea showers, but you'll note that I still haven't quite got the hang of it.
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Re: Radioclare's 2018 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Radioclare » Tue Jun 12, 2018 9:45 pm

I'm back in the UK now after an amazing week away in the Azores. One of the great side effects of being on holiday is that I have so much more free time to read, so I've got through quite a few books.

I read three books in German in total:

  • 'Elanus' by Ursula Poznanski. This one was technically young adult fiction, but I don't mind reading young adult books (at least they're normally easy!). It's an exciting story about a rather arrogant genius-child who gets a scholarship to a prestigious private university and spends his free time spying on his acquaintances using his self-made drone, Elanus. However, soon he finds all isn't as it seems behind the scenes at the university and, having seen something which he shouldn't have with the drone, he finds himself in increasing danger as various shady characters try to knock him off. Would definitely recommend if you want something that's not too challenging to read.
  • 'Mord am Deich' by Klaus-Peter Wolf. This was a collection of short stories which were loosely crime-related, but some of them strayed into the supernatural (which I didn't enjoy so much). I'd never heard of this author before, but it seems like he's written a big series of crime novels set in Ostfriesland. Maybe I'll add the first one to my wishlist. I've never been to that part of Germany so it could be interesting to learn more about it.
  • 'Die Nacht von Lissabon' by Erich Maria Remarque. Wow, I love this book. I first read it more than 10 years ago... probably closer to 15 years ago... I can't remember exactly, but it was probably one of the first five books I read in German, having found a copy in one of my local libraries. At the time, I know my German was so bad that I couldn't follow it very well and that it took me several weeks to get through it, but that despite that I really enjoyed it. In the meantime my German has obviously improved but I completely forgot about this book until I was in Lisbon with my boyfriend last September and he ended up buying a copy in Portuguese. He then bought me a German copy for Christmas, and as we had a few days in Lisbon at the end of our Azores trip we decided to save them to read until then. There's not actually a lot in the book about Lisbon, but it still felt cool to read it there :) The story is set during the Second World War and opens with a refugee standing on the docks in Lisbon, watching a ship to America which is due to leave within the next day or so and desperately wishing there was some way he could achieve the impossible and get tickets and visas for him and his wife. Then a figure steps out of the shadows and offers him just that, on the condition that he spends the night with him listening to his life story. The rest of the book is this character telling his tale of escape from Nazi Germany with his wife. It's a really powerful and harrowing story, and also desperately sad. I definitely recommend it, but it isn't one which will give you a happy feeling at the end.

I also finished one book in Croatian: 'Kafkin prijatelj' by Miro Gavran. I think Miro Gavran is a really good choice of author to read for people with mediocre Croatian :lol: He writes beautifully, but manages to do it in short, clear sentences. In this book, some of the chapters were literally only a couple of pages, which made it so easy just to pick up and read a few pages of even if I didn't have a lot of time. The novel is about Max Brod, his friendship with Kafka from their days studying together in Prague up to Kafka's death, and then his efforts to get Kafka's works published after his death. I chose this book in Dubrovnik last year, partly because I've already read and enjoyed several books by Miro Gavran, and partly because I didn't know very much about Kafka (and felt I ought to because my sister wrote part of her doctoral thesis about one of his books). It didn't disappoint and I would definitely recommend it; I think it's translated into English as well. The cover of my copy listed all the languages it had been translated to and said it had been partially translated into Esperanto, which was news to me!

I've started a second Croatian novel - 'Knjiga žalbe' by Ivica Ivanišević - but I'm only partway through, so I'll write more about it when I've finished.

Otherwise, I did zero Russian while on holiday, although I did pack my Russian books. My Russian books are now very well-travelled, even if they are not very well-used :lol:

I got back from holiday to find that one of my favourite Croatian bands - Brkovi - had just released their new album. I love all the songs I've listened to so far, but so far the couple I've seen that have proper music videos both feel a bit too obscene to post here. So I'm sharing this one - Ljubavni rat - which doesn't have a video yet, but which is one of my favourites at the moment. You can definitely hear more of their 'folk' side than their 'punk' side in this one.

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Re: Radioclare's 2018 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Radioclare » Wed Jun 13, 2018 8:40 pm

Radioclare wrote:I also finished one book in Croatian: 'Kafkin prijatelj' by Miro Gavran...The cover of my copy listed all the languages it had been translated to and said it had been partially translated into Esperanto, which was news to me!


I found it :) Or, at least, I found the first 9 chapters, which are on pages 10 and 11 of this pdf. If you have a look, you'll be able to see what I mean about the chapters being very short!
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Re: Radioclare's 2018 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Daniel N. » Tue Jun 19, 2018 11:00 pm

IronMike wrote:Kako ste? It's been a while.

A small comment from a native speaker: I would never address Clare as 'vi' online. I would address only people who are clearly hierarchically above me in the real life (e.g. presidents, members of government). 'Ti' is much more common online than in the real life (that is, in speech).
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Italian, 1L/2R (DLPT IV, 2019)
Esperanto, C1 (KER skriba ekzameno, 2017)
Slovene, 2+L/3R (DLPT II in, yes, 1999)
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Re: Radioclare's 2018 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby IronMike » Wed Jun 20, 2018 12:23 am

Daniel N. wrote:
IronMike wrote:Kako ste? It's been a while.

A small comment from a native speaker: I would never address Clare as 'vi' online. I would address only people who are clearly hierarchically above me in the real life (e.g. presidents, members of government). 'Ti' is much more common online than in the real life (that is, in speech).

DLI is famous for teaching absolutely every student to use the formal you first. And I'm old school and with Russian as my first language, until the woman asks me to use the informal you, I'll use the formal.
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Re: Radioclare's 2018 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Daniel N. » Wed Jun 20, 2018 8:47 am

IronMike wrote:DLI is famous for teaching absolutely every student to use the formal you first. And I'm old school and with Russian as my first language, until the woman asks me to use the informal you, I'll use the formal.

Of course, in a real life meeting. Or when talking over the phone with someone you're not familiar to. But you're both forum members for years, and had virtual conversations many times. I never met Clare, and had less conversations with her, and I would never ever use 'vi' with her online.

An example. A year ago a became a Facebook friend with a Croatian who lives in Italy. I didn't know much about her but we have similar political views, and some interests; she looks about 40-50, which is roughly my age. Later I found she occasionally writes articles in newspapers, both on Croatian and Italian politics, and is actually somewhat a public figure. From my first Facebook comment below her post (or was it the other way?), we were on 'ti'. But if I met her in the real life before meeting on FB, we would be on 'vi' for sure.

I'm also friends online with some other people who appear on TV from time to time, work for the government, teach at university etc but we were immediately 'ti' online. It's hard to explain why it's so, but it is. This is, of course, not essential, but it's quite interesting.
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Re: Radioclare's 2018 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby aaleks » Wed Jun 20, 2018 5:53 pm

Daniel N. wrote:
IronMike wrote:DLI is famous for teaching absolutely every student to use the formal you first. And I'm old school and with Russian as my first language, until the woman asks me to use the informal you, I'll use the formal.

Of course, in a real life meeting. Or when talking over the phone with someone you're not familiar to. But you're both forum members for years, and had virtual conversations many times. I never met Clare, and had less conversations with her, and I would never ever use 'vi' with her online.

An example. A year ago a became a Facebook friend with a Croatian who lives in Italy. I didn't know much about her but we have similar political views, and some interests; she looks about 40-50, which is roughly my age. Later I found she occasionally writes articles in newspapers, both on Croatian and Italian politics, and is actually somewhat a public figure. From my first Facebook comment below her post (or was it the other way?), we were on 'ti'. But if I met her in the real life before meeting on FB, we would be on 'vi' for sure.

I'm also friends online with some other people who appear on TV from time to time, work for the government, teach at university etc but we were immediately 'ti' online. It's hard to explain why it's so, but it is. This is, of course, not essential, but it's quite interesting.


On the Russian forums I have been participating it's "вы" by default. If you want to use "ты" you need to ask the permission one or another way. In most cases that's just a formality but you should follow the "protocol". Especially, because sometimes an unapproved "ты" might be taken as an insult. So that's not too different from a real life communication.
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Re: Radioclare's 2018 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Radioclare » Thu Jun 28, 2018 10:18 pm

Thanks for the interesting discussion about ti vs vi, everyone :) I always think my log is most interesting when I don't participate in it :lol:

It's a while since I last posted, but I still don't feel like I've achieved very much.

I finished reading 'Knjiga žalbe' by Ivica Ivanišević. This was another short one, so gave me a mere 157 pages towards the Super Challenge. It was quite a cool book, though. It was about four writers of different nationalities, who went on a residential writing retreat in the Romanian countryside, and the tensions and relationships which formed between them. My favourite bit about the book was a trivial point; the small place in Romania where the action took place was described as being 'vukojebina' (a rather colourful Croatian expression for a place in the middle of nowhere). I only knew it because of media coverage last year, when Croatian newspapers were trying to translate an expression used by Donald Trump.

I went camping last weekend which gave me a lot of free time to read a novel in German: 'Spiel der Zeit' by Jeffrey Archer. I felt a bit reluctant to read this book because, well, Jeffrey Archer :? But I begrudgingly have to admit that it was a really gripping book and perfect for a light, holiday read. It was also quite long, so I'm nearly at 50 books for my German Super Challenge already. I guess that proves that reading in German isn't really a challenge for me!

I was reminded the other day of how nice it is to be able to come to this forum and talk about languages without people thinking you are odd, when I accidentally bumped into one of the senior partners on my way to work. Or, rather, he walked past me, and rather than pretending he hadn't seen me - which would have been what I'd done if I'd seen him - he felt the need to strike up a conversation. I was walking with my earphones in so he asked me what I was listening to. I was listening to the new Brkovi album, so I had a moment of panic while I debated what to say. Part of me was trying to think of something 'normal' I could be listening to from the charts... but then I realised I have no idea what normal people listen to these days, so in the end I had to admit that it was Croatian punk music. I stopped short of trying to explain the whole turbofolk thing :lol: We then had a really awkward and insincere conversation where he commented how that was really interesting and he really must get around to listening to some sometime :roll:

What else? I found some motivation for approximately two days and started doing Russian Memrise again. Then work went into overdrive once more and I ran out of energy to continue.

Oh, and I'm going to Croatia in just over a week. Well, I'm going on holiday for two weeks on Saturday, and a few days of my trip involve Zagreb. I'm starting in Bratislava (as a convenient place to fly to), then travelling to Budapest followed by a few days by lake Balaton (which I'm very excited about - I went there 10 years ago as part of an Esperanto event and have always wanted to go back). From there I'm going to Zagreb for three nights, which should be a nice opportunity to buy some books, and then spending the rest of the time in Slovenia. I wish I had had some time to learn a bit of Slovak and Slovene - particularly as I have lots of resources for Slovak - but unfortunately it hasn't been possible :(
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Re: Radioclare's 2018 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Radioclare » Wed Jul 04, 2018 7:57 pm

I'm on holiday in Hungary at the moment, which means I've got lots of spare time for reading :) So far I have got through two novels in German and one in Esperanto.

In German, I've firstly read 'Die Leopardin', which is a translation of Ken Follett's 'Jackdaws'. It's an exciting adventure story, set in occupied France in 1944. I'd previously listened to it as an audiobook in Serbian but hadn't actually read it in any language, so this was fun :)

After that I read 'Aquila', which is another novel by Ursula Poznanski. This one is about a girl who is studying for a year abroad in Italy and wakes up one morning to find that she's lost two days of her life and has absolutely no idea what happened between Saturday evening and Tuesday morning. What's worse is that she's lost her phone, keys and passport, her flatmate has completely disappeared, she has a weird scratch on her face and someone has written a threatening message in toothpaste on her mirror. Again it's probably supposed to be young adult fiction, but I found it a really exciting mystery story and I had absolutely no idea where the plot was going until I got right towards the end.

Those books were both quite long, so I'm on 69 'books' for my German super challenge now.

In Esperanto, I've just finished reading 'Idoj de la imperio. La rusoj en Baltio' by Kalle Kniivilä. It's a non-fiction book about Russian speakers living in the Baltic countries - so I guess best not to discuss the subject matter in detail here - but I really enjoyed it. The author travelled from the north of Estonia to the south of Lithuania, interviewing a variety of Russian speakers in each country as he went. As with his book on Crimea, I thought the subject matter was really well presented, making sure that differing views were represented and that readers weren't pushed towards any particular conclusion. Definitely well worth a read if you are interested in Lithuania/Lativa/Estonia.

Otherwise, all I can say is that I watched a couple of football matches in Slovak while I was in Bratislava and understood a bit. Travelling in Hungary is completely different; there's no way I can guess a single word of anything! I have had two Esperanto-related experiences today, though.

First of all, there was this street in Eger...

Image

..and then a few hundred metres from where I've been staying in Budapest, I found this plaque marking the home of the famous Esperanto writer, Julio Baghy.

Image
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