zenmonkey's multilingual adventures of a traveller

[zenmonkey]

Persian
Tough week focusing. Keeping it short today.
But I like how I'm more able to use the visualization of Persian orthography in vocabulary learning.

Coming up to 5 months of continued study.

: 45 / 86 Persian: Assimil 45
: 14 / 86 Persian: Assimil 2nd Wave 14
: 17 / 27 Persian: Teach Yourself 17
: 37 / 110 Persian: Chai and Conversation 37
: 1162 / 2000 Persian: Anki
: 1 / 50 SC: German Books
: 1 / 50 SC: German Films

[zenmonkey]

Every once in a while I come across music in French that reminds me of the purpose of this language.
Posting here for the language learning - of course.

[zenmonkey]

Well, I have not been keeping up much with the log these last few weeks.

I'm currently in Paris and getting ready to go back to the US. This trip has been tiring with time in Paris, Lille, and Frankfurt primary for work and family. These last weeks I've used mostly French, a bit of German and obviously the ever present English. Smatterings of other languages.

My youngest confirmed her interest for Korean so I bought her Assimil Korean and writing workbooks. She's been focused on her Abi-Bac and now just needs to get her orals out of the way. She hopes to study in Germany next year but that will depend on her Abi scores - currently she's been accepted into the French med. school program with a physics/chemistry specialisation which is also aligned with her desires. She's slowly winning me over to k-pop. Well, she's trying.

My second is in the "Metropole" for a few weeks and we've been catching up. She actually spent a night in Nairobi on her way here trying to communicate the travel changes to the other travellers from her flight - English -> French -> Shimaore and back. But since she only knows the most basic words in Shimaore, most of that was done by someone else. The lack of Shimaore learning material is amazing. We've been talking about this and how it might be addressed. Project, maybe?

Persian
Persian continues and is getting in the way of other work. I need to figure out if I still have space in my luggage for more Persian books before I go. Maybe one last trip to the bookstore before my flight.

Something worth mentioning about Assimil - As I approached lesson 50 I hit a wall. There is definitely an effect of building up the language from what has been learned in previous lessons. This is imperfect and obviously one also forgets some of what has previously been learned. This results in a curve of diminishing learning, increasing frustration and confusion. The wall of complexity where n+1 becomes n+many. So I've had to spend more time, re-reading old lessons, looking things up, going over material many more times. When I hit lesson 50, I went back to 42 and re-studied from there. But it's not like I've learned these lessons. I know I'll need to go back later and get them down. Right now, I'm sticking to trying to understand a majority of the material and I'll let the 2nd wave do its job.

Although there are only 35 lessons left, these cover more than half the book. It's going to get harder!

And I'm using scriptorium a bit more (as outlined here: https://youtu.be/Vo7_5CGcKek - @4-6min covers the core of that and then @7:50) on these lessons - with a purpose of slowing down!

: 51 / 86 Persian: Assimil (51)
: 14 / 86 Persian: Assimil 2nd Wave (14)
: 17 / 27 Persian: Teach Yourself (17)
: 36 / 110 Persian: Chai and Conversation (36)
: 1085 / 1500 Persian: Anki (1085)
: 1 / 50 SC: German Books (1)
: 1 / 50 SC: German Films (1)

[MorkTheFiddle]

currently she's been accepted into the French med. school program with a physics/chemistry specialisation which is also aligned with her desires.)

!Ay, chihuahua! Congratulations to her and her Pop!

[zenmonkey]

I’ve been away a little bit.
Still in daily contact with Persian but not quite as focused in the last week as I could be.

And I sort of stumbled across this concept.
Essential to my world view.

[zenmonkey]

Rough start to the year.

I was supposed to work on Portuguese this year and continue with Persian but I’ve done so very little.

Instead, since December we’ve had floods, torrential storms, immigration issues, mud slides, closed roads, my father in law passed away, my own father (84) has now developed further with dementia, he also fractured 11 ribs and was hospitalized. This morning he tested positive for COVID. 2023 has been quite busy with all that. Living out of a suitcase and dealing with this stuff has not been conducive to language learning.

And I feel the inertia of having stopped. Maybe tomorrow or this weekend I can report I’m back to work.

Maybe.

[zenmonkey]

I sort of listened to something in Portuguese. And my brother asked me to activate my Hebrew.
We bought Die Nase by Gogol

Language work? None.

[rdearman]

activate my Hebrew

I cannae do it, captain, I'm giving it all she's got, but she just cannae take it !!

[zenmonkey]

activate my Hebrew

I cannae do it, captain, I'm giving it all she's got, but she just cannae take it !!

Pretty much. Brother:"You need to get your Hebrew going again. The Rabbi will want you to say something." Me: [masheo masheo] ??? (something something)