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

[devilyoudont]

Spanish Log:
I did a bad job tracking individual activities this week. I can say I listened to around three hours of podcasts, but otherwise I was lazy and I didn't note what I did. I went thru all my Spanish flashcards and made sure that the example sentences on them were useable, and this ate a lot of my time this week.

Language Exchange:
The girl I was supposed to do a language exchange was a no show... I wonder if it makes more sense for me to just try to work with tutors instead of going thru the bother of trying to find language exchange partners.

Struggles:
-This week's duolingo podcast was in Rioplatense Spanish... so my comprehension was way lower than usual. Frustrating because SH is probably my favorite sound, so I love the sound of this dialect.
-I really enjoy using FLTR for Japanese, so I wanted to make my Spanish experience with it more similar to my japanese. I thought it would be great if there was some way the program could understand that new word "leerlo" is actually not a new word, it's just leer + lo. I tried messing with it a while, but nothing I came up with was useable, so this turned out to just be a waste of time.

Successes:
-I recognized a word that I learned from reading (afueras) in this week's duolingo podcast!

Esperanto:
Just did some chatting with some friends. A friend gave me a lot of books in Esperanto. I'm not sure what I want to read first.

I found that three of the books that were given to me are considered to be within the Esperanto Literary Canon by Auld, who was the only esperantist ever nominated for a Nobel Prize in Literature. An additional book is by an author who wrote other works that are included in Auld's Canon.

The three in the canon are:
Vojagxo al Kazohinio (A Trip to Kazohinia)
Kiel Akvo De L' Rivero (Like Water From the River)
La Stranga Butiko (The Strange Store)

And the other is:
Virino Cxe La Landlimo (Woman at the Border)

I hope to choose a book to start before next week lol.

[devilyoudont]

Japanese Log:

Reading:
成田空港　「土用のうしの日」に食べるうなぎが着く

Listening: (2hrs 6mins)
エッチな女子会
朗読男女～5分で聞けるオリジナル物語
Japanese LingQ
News in Slow Japanese

SRS:
Made 16 flashcards.
Reviewed 247 flashcards.

Struggles:
The folktales I've been reading are getting longer and harder. I tried two different ones and they were both too hard for me. I might just resign myself to taking longer to read thru the story, and so not being able to read as many of them in a given time frame.

Successes:
I unexpectedly had less free time than usual, but I still got some studying in anyway... In the past I probably would have only managed to study on Monday of this week. But I got something done each day, even if it was only something very small.

[devilyoudont]

Spanish Log:

Reading:
¿Qué producto está inspirado en el camaleón?
Crean diccionario de la segunda lengua mas hablada en Chiapas.
Empieza la sexta extinción masiva de especies.

Listening:(2hrs 36min)
Cienciaes.com
SER Historia
SpanishLingQ
Duolingo

SRS:
Made 67 flashcards.
Reviewed 170 flashcards.

Gaming
Played some Fire Emblem Heroes

Struggles:
I was apparently asleep at the wheel when I was modifying the Spanish flashcards I had previously made. I had to recorrect about 10 of the "corrected" cards, due to small errors.
I've just been feeling very exhausted this week, and it's been hard to maintain my focus.

Successes:
I recognized another word from my reading in a podcast. In the podcast it was "Sin vergüenza" and in the reading it was: Sinvergüenzas. Knowing that "Sin" is without and "Sinvergüenzas" is "scoundrels," and with the additional context provided by the podcast, it could reasonably be concluded that "Vergüenza" is "shame."

[devilyoudont]

Esperanto:

Reading:
Virino ĉe la landlimo (15 pages)

Speaking:
Esperanto Club (probably a total of 1 hour in Esperanto)

Writing:
Chatted with friends online as always.

Struggles:
Esperanto literature is always a little annoying to me, because it doesn't make sense to me that there should be a written literary register that differs substantially from the more regular day-to-day Esperanto. I suppose that this is somewhat the case for all languages that the written form uses some different words from the spoken form. But given that Esperanto is intended as an auxiliary language... The most hated words within Esperanto literature are of course the mal-words, meaning that the required vocabulary to read a "good" book in Esperanto is substantially larger than what is used in normal Esperanto communication, and these words are basically never actually used in conversation. I guess this means that I probably lean more towards the views in Claude Piron's "La bona lingvo" instead of towards Jorge Camacho's "La mava lingvo," tho I have not read either yet.

Successes:
I think I am getting better about the pronunciation of vowels in Esperanto-- hopefully something that will trickle over to other languages as well. Somehow, the use of a different script in Japanese, helps me keep track of what the vowels are supposed to be without as much effort as in Esperanto or Spanish.
I'm finding reading aloud prevents me from "translating" as I read. I still understand what I've read, but it silences that inner voice which insists on English.

[devilyoudont]

Japanese Log:

Reading:
NHK Easy
--避難所にいる人のために段ボールのベッドを届ける
--３００年前から続く「赤福」の店が新しいお菓子を売る
--動物園のカピバラに冷たいすいかをプレゼント

Listening:
Music (Around 45 mins)
--The Blue Hearts
--Jitterin' Jinn
Podcasts(3hrs 37min)
--エッチな女子会
--昔話の朗読と歌　お話しロニカ
--News in Slow Japanese
--Japanese LingQ

SRS:
Forgot to note how many cards I made
Updated 203 cards.
Reviewed 285 cards.

Struggles:
Trying to pick my way thru one of the folktales that defeated me last week (百姓じいさんとテング). I still haven't made it all the way thru the story, but I didn't exactly prioritize reading it either. I want to make it thru both stories that I gave up on previously, but there were so many unknown words in both that I will probably continue to somewhat sideline them, and continue reading easier material in order to keep giving myself "wins" and avoid getting discouraged.

Successes:
I really learned what pitch accent numbers in Japanese dictionaries mean this week, by adding a number for pitch to all of the cards I have generated out of FLTR... It is my hope that this is my last major modification to the flashcards that I am making when I read. Anyway, in the past, it would trip me up to se ちゃっかりin a dictionary followed by the number 3 because, what do the small letters count as?! Well now I can say confidently that small y letters do not count for this butっ does.

I finished Japanese LingQ! The other podcast I started also has a folklore focus (昔話の朗読と歌). So far things are going great for me with this podcast. For some reason the fact that they slip songs into the narratives makes it a lot easier for me to continue focusing on it.

[devilyoudont]

Spanish Log:

Reading:
El huevo de chocolate
--El calderero de Salamanca
--El capellán y el palomino

zonaele.com (in English)
--Read 5 entries about use of articles in spanish.

Watching:
Netflix (50 mins)
--Juana Inés episode 2

Listening:
Podcasts(3hrs 49mins)
--SpanishLingQ
--Cienciases.com
--Duolingo

Speaking:
Locally some people from the NextDoor app are trying to put together a conversation club, which I definitely want to try out.

SRS:
Made 46 cards.
Reviewed 157 cards.

Struggles:
El capellán y el palomino was a tough story for me. Lots of verb forms I don't understand. Some words about church stuff I don't even understand in English.

Successes:
This time my comprehension of Juana Inés was much higher. I probably understood the outline of every scene. However, I of course missed some nuances. Still, I was able to enjoy watching it even not understanding everything.

[devilyoudont]

Esperanto:

Reading:
Finished reading the play Virino ĉe la landlimo (about 10 pages)

Writing:
Just chatting with friends. Maybe less than usual due to UK.

Virino ĉe la landlimo is actually a collection of short plays. So I will try to read 1 play a week going forward, rather than just stoping wherever I please. The play which the book takes it's name from was kind of a downer, so I didn't feel like reading anymore after that. I feel like the story was very "esperantoeque," which was kind of an interesting reading experience. It's a one act tragedy about a senseless war that divides two lovers.

This is the first piece of Esperanto literature I've ever actually finished! I only read a few pages of Gerda Malaperis.

Japanese Log:

Reading:
NHK Easy
--オウム真理教の６人が死刑になる
--岐阜県　飼っていたエミューが逃げて１７日あとに捕まえる
福娘童話集
--百姓じいさんとテング

Watching:
Netflix (About 45 minutes)
--伊藤くんAとE episode 3 + 4
YouTube (In English)
--Dogen's Japanese Phonetics Course episodes 1-9

Listening:
Podcasts(2hrs 20min)
--朗読男女～５分で聞けるオリジナル物語
--昔話の朗読と歌
--News in Slow Japanese
--エッチな女子会

SRS:
Made 65 cards.
Reviewed 175 cards.

Struggles:
The end of the month is always kind of hard to for me because we do a lot of overtime at my job. I don't feel like I got enough done in any category this week. But I'm so exhausted so it is what it is.

Successes:
I finally finished 百姓じいさんとテング which I had been struggling thru for several weeks. Dogen's Phonetics course has been kind of mindblowing for me so far, and only about two of the episodes have contained info that was new to me. I'm really looking forward to going thru the entire series--particularly looking forward to verbs.

[devilyoudont]

Spanish Log:

Reading:
El huevo de chocolate
--Las princesas delicadas
Wikipedia
--History of the Spanish Language

Watching:
Netflix (with Spanish audio and Spanish subtitles)
--Juana Inés

Listening:
Podcasts (3hrs 13mins)
--Cienciaes.com
--SpanishLingQ
--Duolingo Spanish

SRS:
Reviewed 148 cards.
Made 26 cards.

Struggles:
Still recovering from end of the month overtime... it seemed like I didn't have energy to do anything this week.

Successes:
I went back and reread Caperucita. I feel like the flashcards generated from this story have really upped my comprehension of the total story.
I read about the history of the spanish language. It is my hope that by understanding sound changes that occurred in spanish, I might recognize cognates between Esperanto and Spanish more easily. Plori and Llorar is one such pair I realized from reading this.

Esperanto:

Reading:
From Virino ĉe la landlimo
--Iluzio (16 pages)

Listening:
Podcasts (32 mins)
--Kern punkt
--Pola retradio en Esperanto

Writing:
Just chatting with friends again.

Struggles:
I was hoping to do some work on translating a bot to Esperanto or on adding more ice breaker questions in Esperanto to that bot, but I just didn't have energy for that.

Successes:
I enjoyed Iluzio a lot more than I enjoyed the previous short play. Maybe not a surprise because Iluzio isn't a tragedy. There were a few parts where I did laugh a little bit, and I felt like the ending really paid off, which is not something I usually think about such a short work. Also, I was feeling lazy, and didn't look up any literary words I didn't know, but this didn't impede my understanding of the play.

[brilliantyears]

I notice you're listening to Japanese podcasts. Are there any fictional ones that you would recommend? I'm currently listening to マイドリーム大作戦！ Each episode is essentially a 5 minute commercial for タマホーム but it's quite amusing.

[devilyoudont]

I notice you're listening to Japanese podcasts. Are there any fictional ones that you would recommend? I'm currently listening to マイドリーム大作戦！ Each episode is essentially a 5 minute commercial for タマホーム but it's quite amusing.

I'll check that one out I mainly am currently selecting podcasts for children or learners. 朗読男女オリジナル物語 does short stories. I can't comment on the quality of anything-- I mainly am still at a level where I enjoy things just because I understand the gist of the story