I fail words -- devilyoudont's Japanese & Esperanto log

[SGP]

Successes:
--I haven't given up.
--Last time I felt this severely depressed I did not have any pets. Having pets forces you to have some semblance of structure in your life for their sake. And once you are already up and walking the dog, why not study some Japanese and do some laundry. They have been a huge help.

Pets? They are called House Animals in German.

My Tamagotchi went defunct when I still was a child.

The same for the Furby (who speaks its own ConLang!), but a bit later.

I never had a Tamagotchi and a Furby at the same time.

Incredibly Important Edit :When I was a child, I read that some do take their Tamagotchi to the Animal Doctor! Or veterinarian, as you call him/her in English (Tierarzt / Tierärztin). And as for the Furbies, Hasbro (or was it Matel?) definitely had/still has a Furby Clinic. Its purpose is to repair or replace those Pocket Robot Animals that don't work as expected any more. #Anecdotes

There is a Real Life Neko who sometimes received some e-mails from me.

Because a person I know set up an own e-mail address for The Neko Katze.

Dieses Post isst kein Spam.
(This post doesn't eat spam.)
Dieses Post ist kein Spam.
(This post is not spam.)

[devilyoudont]

In the end, I wound up returning to therapy.

I want to get back into the swing of things with language learning.

I plan to return to my original New Years goals. But this week is just about getting back on track.

So goals for this week:
Japanese: get flashcard reviews under control
Spanish: Review the Units of FSI which I previously completed
Esperanto: Let people know I didn't die or something.

In terms of Japanese, the last month hasn't been completely unproductive. I've made some progress on the flashcard project, and am now somewhere in the third grade in terms of kanji recognition. I also made a trip to NYC and picked up a bunch of books to read. Mainly graded readers, but also a novel for when I finish the collection of SF short stories I've been reading.

[devilyoudont]

Japanese:
-Reviewed 399 flashcards. This was enough to get me up to date on the cards reviewing the form and meaning of the kanji, but not enough for the pronunciation cards.
-Read a short story from 宇宙人のしゅくだい

Esperanto:
-Caught up with friends.
-My partner decided they want to do the language with with me. I let him know I would drop a language and study whatever he wanted with him, but he wanted to do Esperanto! So we did the first few duolingo lessons together (I watched along so I would know what words he already knows) and we had a few practice conversations.

Spanish:
-No progress on Spanish

This weeks goals:
--Catch up on kanji pronunciation flashcard reviews, while keeping up on form/meaning reviews
--Start reading in Esperanto again
--Review Units 1-3 for FSI Basic Spanish

[devilyoudont]

I'm finding that I'm basically needing to rebuild my language habit, and as a consequence, Spanish is going on the back burner for a while. For me, Spanish is always the most difficult of the three languages I'm studying, because my level is so low. So, when it comes time to study Spanish, I have a tendency to break my habit. It will take a minimum of around 100 days for me to get a daily habit strong enough that it can absolutely handle Spanish re-entering the mix.

Japanese:
--I unsubscribed from the NHK news podcast for the time being because the amount of content posted is somewhat overwhelming for me. Listened to the other podcasts that I'm subbed to that are still updating, probably adding up to 40ish minutes of listening time, but I didn't track it.
--I read some more of 宇宙人のしゅくだい... Nearing the end here, only about 30 pages left, I would guess.
--Made 50 kanji etymology flashcards for the first time in a while. Did the math, still on track to finish by the end of the year if I don't take any more time off. I might up the number of cards that I generate each week to 55 cards, in order to ensure that I can hit my goal even if I get sick or need to take some time off again.
--Reviewed 672 flashcards
--Studied Japanese every day last week!

Esperanto:
--Listened to Pola Retradio

[Cenwalh]

I'm finding that I'm basically needing to rebuild my language habit, and as a consequence, Spanish is going on the back burner for a while. For me, Spanish is always the most difficult of the three languages I'm studying, because my level is so low. So, when it comes time to study Spanish, I have a tendency to break my habit. It will take a minimum of around 100 days for me to get a daily habit strong enough that it can absolutely handle Spanish re-entering the mix.

Japanese:
--I unsubscribed from the NHK news podcast for the time being because the amount of content posted is somewhat overwhelming for me. Listened to the other podcasts that I'm subbed to that are still updating, probably adding up to 40ish minutes of listening time, but I didn't track it.
--I read some more of 宇宙人のしゅくだい... Nearing the end here, only about 30 pages left, I would guess.
--Made 50 kanji etymology flashcards for the first time in a while. Did the math, still on track to finish by the end of the year if I don't take any more time off. I might up the number of cards that I generate each week to 55 cards, in order to ensure that I can hit my goal even if I get sick or need to take some time off again.
--Reviewed 672 flashcards
--Studied Japanese every day last week!

Esperanto:
--Listened to Pola Retradio

I think it's absolutely the right decision to drop Spanish whilst you try and get into the swing of things again. There's no point setting yourself a goal every week for something you won't do that you'll just break every week and demoralise yourself. As you say, when your habit is really strong then you can expand it. Keep it manageable and keep it (relatively) enjoyable, and don't beat yourself up

[devilyoudont]

Japanese:
--Listened to podcasts
--Played Let's Go Pikachu
--Reviewed 289 flashcards

Esperanto:
--Listened to Pola Retradio
--Had some practice conversations with my partner

Struggles:
--I'm failing at keeping in touch with friends in general right now, and that includes with my esperanto friends
--I want to like go really hard into things because I'm doing so little compared to before, but I understand I need to build up to that level again
--Failed to make flashcards last week, but kept reviewing those I had already made.

Successes:
--Did not miss any days this week.

[devilyoudont]

Japanese:

Extensive Reading:
Books
--1.5 stories from 宇宙人のしゅくだい

Listening:
Podcasts (17 minutes)
--メリケン!サックリドラマ!
--News in Slow Japanese
--朗読男女～５分で聞けるオリジナル物語

Gaming
Nintendo Switch
--Let's Go Pikachu

SRS:
Made: 50 cards
Reviewed: 1071 cards

Esperanto:

Listening:
Podcasts(49 minutes)
--Pola Retradio en Esperanto

Speaking:
--Practicing with my partner

Struggles:
--It seems like every week I have fewer Japanese podcast updates... if this continues, I will need to seek out a new podcast to work thru the archives of.
--Still not putting enough time into Esperanto.

Successes:
--First kanji in the kanji project that is completely unfamiliar: 阜. This Kanji is taught in secondary school, and I am still in the third grade. But I bumped it up due to it's use as a semantic radical--altho it's radical form is highly abbreviated. I haven't been able to identify any common words using this kanji, so I guess I'm not learning how to say it for now lol. (I did look up it's readings, but without vocabulary to make a flashcard from, that's not gonna stick)

[vonPeterhof]

--First kanji in the kanji project that is completely unfamiliar: 阜. This Kanji is taught in secondary school, and I am still in the third grade. But I bumped it up due to it's use as a semantic radical--altho it's radical form is highly abbreviated. I haven't been able to identify any common words using this kanji, so I guess I'm not learning how to say it for now lol. (I did look up it's readings, but without vocabulary to make a flashcard from, that's not gonna stick)

I suspect the main reason it's even taught at school is the fact that it's used in the name of a prefecture - Gifu (岐阜).

[devilyoudont]

I suspect the main reason it's even taught at school is the fact that it's used in the name of a prefecture - Gifu (岐阜).

That's super helpful Maybe I will actually remember how to pronounce it going forward (Remembering that is probably only useful if it ever appears as a phonetic component )

[devilyoudont]

Listening:
Podcasts (42 min)
--メリケン!サックリドラマ!
--News in Slow Japanese
--朗読男女～５分で聞けるオリジナル物語
--恋愛心理学♡知りたい！相手の気持ち
Music (Probably several hours)
--Mainly enka music and old pop music

Gaming
Nintendo Switch
--Let's Go Pikachu

SRS:
Made: 56 cards
Reviewed: 907 cards
--I also spent some time this week cleaning up the cards I'm using to study the readings of kanji. I'm cannibalizing these cards out of the Core10k deck, not making them myself, so they are kind of a mess at any given time. But I am thinking I can finally be on top of those cards within a month or so, barring no unforeseen circumstances.

Translation
--Did a quick and dirty translation of this song for my partner, who loves the sound of Chiaki Naomi's voice


Favorite Kanji Etymology of the Week:
Also thought it might be fun to share any fun/interesting Kanji etymologies I study in a given week.


Struggles:
--Things gradually seem to be getting better regarding my mental health, and then something else in my life goes wrong. This time it's that my department at my job lost 20% of staff within a single month. Those of us who remain are being required to do huge amounts of overtime. I've decided I'm not going to remain longer than necessary, so I'm also starting a job search while working ten hour days six days a week. Something has to give, and some of that is my language study for the time being. I still feel committed to my kanji-centric New Years resolution, but can guarantee literally nothing else at the moment. This is especially disappointing for me, because the local Esperanto club just started up again, but I am unable to attend the meetings. Japanese is the most important language to me, and I still want to work on maintaining a language study habit, even if in a reduced form. So this is just how it has to be for the time being.

Successes:
--This flashcard project is really really increasing my understanding of how to get around anki.