Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

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Brun Ugle
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Brun Ugle » Sat Jun 15, 2019 6:08 am

Meddysong wrote:
Brun Ugle wrote:Doesn’t your boyfriend read your log? I think you just spoiled the Christmas surprise.

I do but if there was something posted above that I'd be better off not knowing, the good news is that I can't remember what it is and I'm not going to scroll up. And the good news for Clare about living with me is that she'll be used to the snorting and so shouldn't be bothered about it in Peppa.

It turned out that I had misunderstood and she was the one supposed to be surprised, not you.

I like this idea of buying one’s own Christmas presents and then giving them to the giver to give back to you. It saves all the trouble and annoyance of getting stuff you neither need nor want and not being allowed to return it for something else because that would hurt someone’s feelings. It also makes it pretty easy on the gift-giver since they don’t have to wrack their brain guessing what you might like.
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Meddysong » Sun Jun 16, 2019 5:30 pm

Brun Ugle wrote:I like this idea of buying one’s own Christmas presents and then giving them to the giver to give back to you. It saves all the trouble and annoyance of getting stuff you neither need nor want and not being allowed to return it for something else because that would hurt someone’s feelings. It also makes it pretty easy on the gift-giver since they don’t have to wrack their brain guessing what you might like.

Yes, this is all correct. Mind you, we wouldn't have got any had I not gone to an assistant and said something like "U vas knjigi Agata Kristi?" because we'd tried to find them in this mammoth store in St Petersburg and failed. Fortunately, he understood and led us to them. It later became clear why we hadn't managed to find them when scouring the shelves; the name on the cover was written in cursive and looks impenetrable! (Off the top of my head, there was an 'm' for 't'. Yikes!)

The only flaw with this plan is that Clare never buys things for herself and so after a couple of books thinks that's enough. I then have to force her to buy lots more! "Nah, go on, grab some more. Eh, that's not enough." And I sometimes pick up some for her whilst she's looking too to make sure she gets enough :)

There was a time when we went to a bookshop in Dubrovnik and bought some stuff, although the choice was poor. Within minutes we'd found another bookshop and this one was great, so we loaded up some more. At the end of the holiday we were in Podgorica and found another bookshop. Clare banned me from getting any more because our suitcases were full but I'd set my eyes on a trilogy for her. Well, you can always create a little bit more space, can't you?

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I think it ended up with me throwing away some of my clothing but I managed to get all 3000+ pages in!
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Brun Ugle » Sun Jun 16, 2019 5:47 pm

Meddysong wrote:
Brun Ugle wrote:I like this idea of buying one’s own Christmas presents and then giving them to the giver to give back to you. It saves all the trouble and annoyance of getting stuff you neither need nor want and not being allowed to return it for something else because that would hurt someone’s feelings. It also makes it pretty easy on the gift-giver since they don’t have to wrack their brain guessing what you might like.

Yes, this is all correct. Mind you, we wouldn't have got any had I not gone to an assistant and said something like "U vas knjigi Agata Kristi?" because we'd tried to find them in this mammoth store in St Petersburg and failed. Fortunately, he understood and led us to them. It later became clear why we hadn't managed to find them when scouring the shelves; the name on the cover was written in cursive and looks impenetrable! (Off the top of my head, there was an 'm' for 't'. Yikes!)

The only flaw with this plan is that Clare never buys things for herself and so after a couple of books thinks that's enough. I then have to force her to buy lots more! "Nah, go on, grab some more. Eh, that's not enough." And I sometimes pick up some for her whilst she's looking too to make sure she gets enough :)

There was a time when we went to a bookshop in Dubrovnik and bought some stuff, although the choice was poor. Within minutes we'd found another bookshop and this one was great, so we loaded up some more. At the end of the holiday we were in Podgorica and found another bookshop. Clare banned me from getting any more because our suitcases were full but I'd set my eyes on a trilogy for her. Well, you can always create a little bit more space, can't you?

Image

I think it ended up with me throwing away some of my clothing but I managed to get all 3000+ pages in!

Wow! I don’t suppose you have a brother...
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Radioclare » Sun Jun 16, 2019 8:38 pm

Meddysong wrote:I think it ended up with me throwing away some of my clothing but I managed to get all 3000+ pages in!

Haha yes, all your toiletries and some of your clothes :lol: I think it was a weight problem as much as a space problem, because we were flying back from Podgorica with Ryanair and only had 15kg.

15 June
I didn't update yesterday because we went away for the weekend, but I did keep my streak :)

Russian
I spent 33 minutes reading TY Russian Grammar, which got me through a pretty heavy chapter about tenses. I think the book is really well written, because when it introduces a new grammar point it starts by giving you examples in English, and often there is then an exercise to identify that particular point of grammar in an English paragraph before it moves on to Russian examples. But with this chapter, I was struggling to understand even the English examples and exercises :( Although I had had quite a bit of wine by the time I was doing this, so I may not have been at my best!

Total time = 33 minutes. Streak = 166 days

16 June
I've had a very relaxing weekend, which is what I wanted after Russia. Russia was many things, but relaxing wasn't one of them :lol:

Russian
I finally finished reading TY Russian Grammar! I got through a third chapter on verbs, which dealt with verbs of motion and also the conditional. Neither are my favourite topics, although I don't think the conditional is actually that hard. I may have skimmed a little bit through the final chapter, which was about prepositions, because prepositions are just so boooooring!

Anyway, it's exciting to finish the book because now I can finally take it off my "currently reading" list on Goodreads and also because I'd told myself that I had to finish it before I started Colloquial Russian. Or, more accurately, re-started Colloquial Russian because I've definitely used it before but my Russian-learning is all such a blur that I can't remember whether it was earlier this year or some point last year when I had a fit of virtue and did some proper studying. I remember really liking the book and finding it useful, then getting to a point where it became too difficult and giving up. I'm hoping that this time, since I've already got to the end of TY Russian, I'll find Colloquial less challenging and that it will be good revision/consolidation of grammar for me. Also, if I can finish it, I can then start Colloquial Russian 2, which has been sitting and gathering dust on my bookshelf since my last birthday.

Total time = 65 minutes. Streak = 167 days

Croatian
I watched another episode of my series. I've just done episode 139 and it looks like there are only 169 episodes, so I'm getting close to the end. I'm struggling to see how the series is going to finish because there doesn't feel like there's any coherent storyline that's working towards a conclusion. The main plot point at the moment is about one of the characters who is in love with a priest so it's possible the series will end with him ceasing to be a priest. Do we have a verb for when someone stops being a priest in English? If we do, I can't remember it right now :? Croatian has the verb "raspopiti se" which seems to express this concept, if I'm understanding correctly.

German
I'm reading a novel called 'Der Seelenbrecher' by Sebastian Fitzek for the new Tadoku test round. I'm 178 pages in and I'm still not really sure what it's about. Well, on the face of it, it's about a guy with amnesia who is confined in a private hospital over Christmas. There's a massive snowstorm and the hospital is infiltrated by a dangerous criminal who specialises in traumatising female victims and leaving them in a comatose state. The electricity is down and no one can escape because of the snowstorm, so the action at the moment is mainly various characters creeping around the hospital in the dark and trying to avoid the psychopath, who has stuck a knife in his own throat (really!) and so can now be heard coming by the strange wheezing noises he makes. Yes, a little surreal! But the novel is written as a series of patient case notes (though it's not clear who the patient is), as well as being interspersed with flashbacks from the guy who has amnesia (and who possibly seems to have known the psychopath in his former life). This is further complicated by the fact that every so often there is a scene where the case notes are being read by a group of students participating in a psychological experiment, although it's not clear what the experiment is. So I have no idea where it's going at the moment... and I'm going on a residential training course tomorrow, so I have to decide whether to pack this or Colloquial Russian to read on the train :lol:
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby IronMike » Mon Jun 17, 2019 12:21 am

Meddysong wrote:Yes, this is all correct. Mind you, we wouldn't have got any had I not gone to an assistant and said something like "U vas knjigi Agata Kristi?" because we'd tried to find them in this mammoth store in St Petersburg and failed. Fortunately, he understood and led us to them. It later became clear why we hadn't managed to find them when scouring the shelves; the name on the cover was written in cursive and looks impenetrable! (Off the top of my head, there was an 'm' for 't'. Yikes!)

You've seen this, right?

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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Serpent » Mon Jun 17, 2019 12:45 am

Yeah this was covered back when Clare was learning Serbian cyrillics, I think :lol:
Radioclare wrote:"raspopiti se"
Omg, this sounds hilarious to a Russian ear :lol: :lol: :lol:
Meddysong wrote:"U vas knjigi Agata Kristi?"
This too, tbh :oops: The omission makes it sounds like you're speaking of THE books, so for example accusing them of stealing your books or something :lol: But it got the job done :D
On the other hand, if you had said it like "U vas jest knigi Agata Kristi?" (without the soft sign in 'jest') it would mean "Does Agatha Christie eat books in your [shop]?" :lol: But you would still be understood :D
The 100% correct version is "U vas jest' knigi Agaty Kristi?" :) (У вас есть книги Агаты Кристи?) Or if it's a large store and you know they must have them, Извините, где у вас книги Агаты Кристи? :)
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Meddysong » Mon Jun 17, 2019 3:42 am

Serpent wrote:Извините, где у вас книги Агаты Кристи?

I think I probably did say that, to be honest. Outside of Russia I'm back to not knowing any of it but I started every conversation with an apology for interrupting (I'm English!) and used 'gdje' in other conversations ('gdje tualet?', 'gdje metro?').
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Radioclare » Mon Jun 17, 2019 9:19 pm

17 June
I am on a residential training course. I hate residential training courses. I am not a flip chart and role play kind of person at the best of times and not being able to go home at the end of the day adds insult to injury.

Russian
I had a long journey to my destination this morning. I did nearly 30 minutes of Memrise reviews on my first train, then spent a similar amount of time on my second train working on Colloquial Russian. I'm at the end of the second chapter now; obviously the first few chapters are rather easy :-)

I haven't been able to do anything else this evening because I've had to work, trying to get through some of the things I should have been doing today if I hadn't been decorating flip charts with pictorial representations of the importance of audit. If I don't post tomorrow, assume I lost the will to live during a role play!

Total time = 57 minutes. Streak = 168 days
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Radioclare » Mon Jun 17, 2019 9:21 pm

Serpent wrote:
Radioclare wrote:"raspopiti se"
Omg, this sounds hilarious to a Russian ear :lol: :lol: :lol:

Is there any particular reason? I mean, does it just sound odd or does it mean something rude? :?
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Serpent » Mon Jun 17, 2019 10:49 pm

Well, as you may know попа means ass :lol: (Romanian surname Popa is also funny to us, though it also just means priest)
It also reminded me on a slang word вразжопицу, which was on a page from a slang dictionary that went viral :lol: I don't know anyone who uses this, but it was supposed to mean something like living separately (of spouses). zhopa is more vulgar than popa, but a theoretical mild version of this word would be *враспопицу.
some useful related words are вразброс (randomly), вразвес (sold by weight - I personally use на развес only), вразнобой (chaotically/each on their own - usually describing a cacophony of voices, noises etc)
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