nothing serious here

[Iversen]

I just find or ask for a brochure with a map of the underground network when I arrive. That's easy. Using the bus lines is more complicated, but there are some maps and brochures which have at least some of the routes marked,and the information at the stops is quite decent, so I haven't been totally lost yet. Besides I have been to London often enough to have some sense of the geography, at least of the central area (but of course not of all the suburbs), so I don't complain. And if I have to walk then I'm fine with that too .. I once walked from South Kensington to Euston just for fun.

There are places where the local transport system is much more confusing. A couple of years ago I visited Port-au-Prince in Haiti, and there you don't find many ordinary busses with a schedule and a route and all that. The locals use taptaps, which essentially are brightly painted old busses (often delapidated school buses from USA) or shared minibusses with or without doors - but for some weird reason the drivers refuse to show the destinations, maybe because they then can go other places than the intended one if somebody pays them to do so. And since the drivers' native language is some kind of French Creole it may be difficult to discuss prices and destinations with them. In such places you may be tempted to take walks where you in more orderly surroundings would have taken a bus, but then you run into another problem, namely that some nervous souls might have second thoughts about walking through downtown Port-au-Prince. Well, I never had any problems doing so, and many Haitians do speak ordinary French too if you need to communicate with them, but after Port-au-prince I would only be worried about one thing in London (except terrorism and crime), and that's the high price tags on things like transport there. Well, maybe also about the long tunnels and worn-out escalators and things like that ... but then I just think of places like Port-au-Prince. Or Varanasi. Or places like Nassau, where they had to drop the idea of an airport bus because the taxi drivers blocked the roads.

By then way, I got my luggage stored at British museum without any problems, and other museums sometimes also have a luggage service, but they have avoided boxes since the IRA almost bombed Maggie Thatcher. And the luggage services at the railway stations are all private and demand exorbitant fees for even the smallest piece of luggage - I would avoid them like the plague!

F5311a03_haitian-bus.jpg

[jeff_lindqvist]

You know you're a language nerd when... you see the name of the uploaded image, read it as Chinese (hai+tian, 海天), think for a second that the bus also looks Chinese and wonder if the bus route is from the sea to the sky. (海=sea, 天=heaven)

[Cavesa]

Some news after a longer time away.

I've got two huge exams left and I need to go to school just 20 more times. If everything goes unexpectedly well, I'll have the nightmare degree at the end of November. It is not too likely as I need a few miracles to make that happen (for example, I'd need to beat the record of passing the surgery final exam after the shortest preparation ever. I am just starting and have a week, as I passed another final exam last Thursday and then mostly slept for two days. "Vaření z vody", which translates as "cooking from water" ,is a normal exam strategy. The idiom means talking about something you actually know very little about and trying to be convincing. I am a Master in this game. But this time, I have't even got the proverbial water yet).

As far as languages go, I can only count in some hours of Italian listening (like 20 hours, I'll need to count it). The tv series Shadowhunters is not that bad, if you need to recharge some energy and already feel as if your brain had passed a few minutes in a blender anyways. There is a story, some ideas are really good, and the representation of mixed race/species couples and people with minority sexual orientations could be considered a good thing too. And a few of the characters are becoming my favourite thanks to sense of humour. The Italian dubbing is good but not that stellar. However, the series as a whole is not something I'd recommend to most people. I am not sure I'll continue watching till I feel really bad and stupid and exhausted again (that means at least for a few days). Really. It copies other modern YA fantasy stories so much, that the whole introduction of the main protagonist into the supernatural world happened like "all the legends are true". Literally. It was said this way.

And I've realised I'll need to review French again too, as my abilities not related to medical textbooks have been atrophying lately.

Basically, the plan is as follows:
1.get that horrible degree, while studying a bit for France at the same time (as those two sometimes go well together)
2.get into a good routine for the French medical exam, this is gonna be a huge challenge. December is gonna be tough.
3.return to my languages. Perhaps Kwiziq could be a good choice, and having fun with tv series in all my romance languages. German can wait now.

Anyone has watched some good original series in French or Spanish recently? Any genre, just nothing medicine themed.

[Xenops]

Basically, the plan is as follows:
1.get that horrible degree, while studying a bit for France at the same time (as those two sometimes go well together)
2.get into a good routine for the French medical exam, this is gonna be a huge challenge. December is gonna be tough.
3.return to my languages. Perhaps Kwiziq could be a good choice, and having fun with tv series in all my romance languages. German can wait now.

Anyone has watched some good original series in French or Spanish recently? Any genre, just nothing medicine themed.

I will pray that God grants you miracles so you can get that degree.

As for French shows, the first 1 1/2 seasons of Wakfu is fun. The second season ends with a literal deus ex machina.

[DaveAgain]

Anyone has watched some good original series in French or Spanish recently? Any genre, just nothing medicine themed.

I've been watching film length episodes of "Imogène" recently, which are based on some old pulp novels by Charles Exbrayat. I think they're fun, but it's low budget stuff.

[renaissancemedici]

Anyone has watched some good original series in French or Spanish recently? Any genre, just nothing medicine themed.

Your pain comes through. Hang in there!

Series in Spanish: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcJmo9dEwjkjOneRbmz7qfA
More than you'll ever need. You may already know it but I thought just in case you don't...

[Serpent]

Best of luck with your studies/career ❤

Have you seen "El tiempo entre costuras"?

[Cavesa]

Thanks for the tips, I'll try them out in just a few days!

I am probably the laziest person on earth. I have already accepted I am gonna fail on Monday (nope, this is not the usual fishing for compliments done by some of the hyper much studying people, this is the reality). It is hard to study with apathy. There are so many ways to procrastinate but I don't enjoy even those much now. The cardiologic symptoms that are about to be discarded as unfounded again in just a few days don't help either.

This is not bad for language learning.
I am planning to get back to my old MUD and I've written too parts of a fanfiction there. My English has really been deteriorating. I had to look up words I used to have no problem with (for room descriptions mostly).

And I have used the Halloween sale on Kwiziq and paid for a month of Spanish. I am trying to make the tests my reward but so far, I have done too many of them (procrastination).

I have never added images from my computer here, so I don't know whether this will work. But I'll try as I've taken two screenshots illustrating how much content has the Kwiziq team added to their Spanish course since I left with a full Brainmap. And why it was therefore worth it to me to pay for a whole month. Now I just must not forget to stop the automatic payments.

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[Cavesa]

I haven't been writing here much lately, even though I do a bit of stuff in my foreign languages. Not much, but still something.

French: my medical textbooks
English: I returned to my MUD game, I just need to keep my playing times reasonable. I've written a related fan fiction, which I'll continue with. It is obvious it helps my overall skills more than anything else, I've been losing vocabulary lately.
Italian: Daredevil and Shadowhunters.
Spanish: Kwiziq I am finishing all the new stuff in A2 (they've added so much!). It is easy in general but there are some bits I am glad to have encountered here. And it is great practice. By their tests, I should be focusing on C1. But the review is very healthy for me and I'd recommend everyone on Kwiziq not to skip the lower levels entirely, t.

Other than that: some new additions to my medical history, a lot of panic before the last but one exam, and so on. This school is killing me. Any success stories of people passing impossible exams in record times? I could do with inspiration.

[Cavesa]

Oh, and I should finally mention my pet peeve, which is far too common on many language learning forums: grammEr! Why on earth do so many natives write this extremely common and simple word wrong? They are usually the kind of posters: "well, I don't think you need to learn the grammEr much, why learn about the language instead of learning the language itself". Why? WHY?

/end of rant