Serpent wrote: Plot twist: I actually don't think it's the right time to add more languages Sorry, kuji. ... It specifically mentions challenges too. While you have other reasons to learn these langs, it does seem like the FLC is your main reason... and it shouldn't be ...
iguanamon wrote:I'm with Serpent (big surprise!). I don't think you should try the Free and Legal Challenge right now, sorry! Why? Irrational Exuberance. You have already proven that you can do the FLC, pretty much, with what you've done with Portuguese so far. You have nothing to prove.
Thank you for the posts, and I'm glad you two are still reading my sometimes complicated log!
As usual, you two are right. I got caught up in the excitement of the FLC against my best interests. Instead, I should figure out how to keep myself going with Japanese and Portuguese. I have a good thing going here; the past three weeks or so I've "found my groove again." I've gotten back into daily, consistent, high-quality time with my target languages, and adding another language is not a good idea at the moment. So... I'm out of the Free and Legal Challenge... before I even really started. There... that's done.
iguanamon, you mentioned getting Portuguese to B2. I'm going to learn Japanese to fluency because I can easily see the need for it; it's pretty obvious. With Portuguese, though, it's different. It's based on hopes and dreams. There is no clear and present need for me to learn Portuguese, or even clear hopes and aspirations as far as using Portuguese, so that sometimes challenges my motivation for learning it.
What do I want to do with Portuguese? I started learning Portuguese because I was interested in the music, the futebol and the culture of Brazil. Nowadays, though, I hardly watch any soccer at all, much less Brazilian soccer (which is quite hard to access). I don't listen to Brazilian music as much as I used to; my musical tastes often fluctuate and I'm currently into mellow jazz.
I guess what's left is that I'm still interested in the culture of Brazil and of the lusophone world in general. I want to get to the point where I want to read books and learn about the culture. I really have no clue as to which books by which authors I want to read; that would make things easier. However, I do hope that once I reach a certain level of Portuguese, I will have the ability to find out more about which books I want to read, which media I want to consume, and what aspects of the culture I really want to get into.
My hope is that the farther I get into Portuguese, it would become clearer what I want to do with the language. For now, though, I'm going to press through DLI and finish it up, and I won't worry yet about my future plans with the language.
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Like usual, the weekend was slow as far as language learning goes, although I did more than usual. I forced myself to read news only in Japanese, which was a bit difficult. The big story was a "power harassment" scandal involving a female wrestler named Icho and her coach, whom she accuses of harassment. I'm still not sure what "power harassment" means. The Japanese, パワハラ, comes from the English, but I believe we don't actually use the term "power harassment" in English, at least not in the United States. (Please correct me if I'm wrong.) The best I can infer is that the coach was verbally abusive to her, or perhaps made her train too much or without purpose and was pretty much harsher than necessary.
Other than, that, I watched some TV in Japanese, and I did Anki reviews for both languages as well as duolingo for Portuguese, Chinese, French and Korean. (Those will be the last things I do for Chinese, French and Korean for the time being.)