Neurotip 2020: Greek, Icelandic, things like that

[Neurotip]

Apologies for the lack of posts recently - super busy with work and Things in general.
In the meantime, had some fun this afternoon with handwriting practice and taking pretentious photos...

[Neurotip]

A slightly more helpfully formatted sample of my Arabic handwriting. Text copied from Shuwayya 'An Nafsi. There are a couple of copying errors, but I really, really enjoy this!

Comments welcome, especially comments of the form 'your [letter X] is consistently a bit wonky in [respect Y]'

[MrsStarez]

Now that’s pretty. Both the writing and the pen. What is it? (The latter).

[BalancingAct]

Impressive, beautiful work.

Nothing pretentious.

[Neurotip]

Now that’s pretty. Both the writing and the pen. What is it? (The latter).

Thank you kindly! And thanks @BalancingAct too.
Actually not an expensive pen at all: Nemosine Singularity with stub nib. Classic impulse buy a few months ago when I heard the company was going out of business.

[MrsStarez]

Humph. I was in the market for a new fountain pen as part of “going eco” - refilling a pen rather than using a new plastic biro. But I still like my cheapo one and cartridges were on promo.

And re: the pretentious photo... a bit of pretension never hurt anyone

[Neurotip]

Humph. I was in the market for a new fountain pen as part of “going eco” - refilling a pen rather than using a new plastic biro. But I still like my cheapo one and cartridges were on promo.

And re: the pretentious photo... a bit of pretension never hurt anyone

Merci
If you're interested, I can direct you to a fountain pen forum not dissimilar to this one, where you can find information aplenty on inexpensive but good quality writing paraphernalia. You may have trouble finding a nib as excellent as this one though

[MrsStarez]

You may have trouble finding a nib as excellent as this one though

I see what you did there

[Neurotip]

Long time no post, again. Work has been super busy for the last few months, or at least there have been various things on the go at the same time and I've got out of the habit of posting. Sorry!

Greek and Icelandic. I've been keeping up with the 366-day challenge, more or less. As before this is 80% listening, 20% reading of which about half I do as scriptorium, plus a bit of self-talk now and then.

Listening is to and from work as before, mostly the same podcasts - in Icelandic I've branched out into Matarspjall and Ástarsögur as well as the usual Í ljósi sögunnar (which in comparison to the others is relatively carefully enunciated). Although any progress feels excruciatingly slow, there have been nice moments, such as coming across Ólafur Darri Ólafsson (from Trapped) as a guest on Matarspjall. These are the moments when I feel I'm getting something back from language study that I couldn't have got otherwise.

Icelandic reading remains Snjóblinda, now about 140 pages in, and I've also been having fun reading the Saga of Heidrek the Wise in Christopher Tolkien's parallel translation. I can't exactly claim to be able to read the Old Norse, but I can make a fair stab at many of the sentences, and once I know what it means I can see why it means it. Have also discovered Æfingar which is a super simple little script to practise inflections, but makes it much more palatable. I have to say though that I'm not convinced I'm really making progress in Icelandic.

In Greek, again still listening regularly to the usual podcasts (The Brain Hacking Academy, Γιατί Όχι) and reading the same book (Κάτι θα γίνει, θα δεις), now on page 89. Somehow I do feel I'm making gradual headway with Greek, not sure why, just feels a bit less effortful as time goes by. Could be illusory though.

Other languages. I really haven't had time to do any significant language learning outside the half hour a day, and in particular I haven't touched Arabic for several months. It doesn't seem like the sort of thing you can expect to get very far by picking it up now and then. However I did read another Scerbanenco book in Italian as holiday reading (I Ragazzi del Massacro) and like the others in the series I devoured it in a week or two - I just seem to get on really well with his books.

Plans. It's been OK doing alternate weeks, but I feel like I need one main language to be my main focus if I'm really going to make any progress. I also have hobbies I've neglected in the last few years, pushed out of the way by language learning. I'm also negotiating for slightly reduced hours at work which should make it easier to strike a better balance.

The draft plan for the New Year is as follows. Assess progress in Greek and Icelandic with Dialang tests in mid-late December 2020. Keep Greek going as main study language and 365-day challenge, primarily through podcasts (and who knows, maybe a trip to Greece). Also pick up Egyptian Arabic again seriously - this should be doable as it will occupy a different niche in my routine, namely evening and weekend reading and writing, with listening only in time spare after daily Greek. No particular goal in mind though, just to lay the foundations. Icelandic to join French and Italian as maintenance languages, with the specific goal of reading the whole of Krabbaveislan by end 2021.

In other words - 2021 plan:
To actively study: Greek (main), Egyptian Arabic (secondary)
To maintain: Italian, Icelandic, French

I guess my next post may be the end-of-year post with Dialang outcomes. I'm quite nervous about that, since if they aren't significantly better than last year then I'll have spent an awful lot of time for no measurable results! Fingers crossed.

[Neurotip]

It's gradually been dawning on me that if I enjoy reading or listening to something, I'm more likely to read or listen to it. This may sound like a fairly basic insight, but I haven't really been applying it properly.

Combining this with the fact that I'm going to need a lot more Greek material if I'm going to make Greek my main language next year led to the happy arrival of a package on my doorstep this morning. Splurge!

Petros Markaris: Νυχτερινό δελτίο - detective fiction
Nikos Kazantzakis: Ταξιδεύοντας - Αγγλία - Kazantzakis' views on England when he travelled here in the 1940s
George Dertilis: Ιστορία της νεότερης και σύγχρονης Ελλάδας - a history of Greece; gulp this is enormous

We're going to need a bigger bookshelf.