Modern Greek: avalon

[avalon]

I met a fabulous Greek tutor on Skype yesterday! She's animated, fully bilingual, an experienced language learner, and familiar with both my textbook and the Ελληνομάθεια exam as well. As long as negotiations pan out, I'll begin working with her in January in an effort to improve my speaking skills. Crossing my fingers.

I haven't gotten as much Greek time in as I wanted since my last update, unfortunately. A friend of mine had enlisted my help in translating a one-page, 200-year-old document from German to English, and it's thoroughly kicking my butt! I may be asking for help (here at LLORG, perhaps?) from German natives...

Greek For You A2
Spent an hour with my study buddy today at the donut shop, once again with The Labradoodle in tow, working on material in Ch. 2. (These chapters are rather long and dense!)

TY Modern Greek
Reviewed pp. 130-132 (passive participles)

Pimsleur Greek II
Unit 6

Hotel Atlantis
I read Chapter 5, half of it with the dear old lady who leads the weekly language sessions at the church.

[avalon]

I've decided to keep track of my weekly time spent on Greek study, and to post every Sunday evening (or Monday morning) with a quick recap. I have found in the past that I tend to increase my time on task if I know I'm monitoring it

So, for the week of Dec. 17-23: 14.5 hours

The vast majority of that time was spent on the Greek For You A2 textbook, which I finally received in the mail this week. I didn't realize how many readings and exercises I had missed when I was mooching off my friend's copy. There are 42 listening exercises in the first two chapters alone, all spoken at top speed, so these kept me busy. I plan to wrap up chapter 2 quickly in the next few days and move on to chapter 3. With the holidays here and an upcoming trip to Chicago around the corner, I don't expect to hit 14 hours again this week.

I also finished my Hotel Atlantis easy reading app and downloaded a second one, titled το περίπτερο στην Αριστοτέλους. We'll see how it goes.

I found a long-lost box of old language books buried among my stored Christmas decorations, which triggered a short bout of Wanderlust. Old copies of Teach Yourself Serbo-Croat and Srbocharvátština pro samouky (written in Czech) were the main offenders. After listening to a few episodes of Easy Croatian on YouTube, I'm proud to say I managed not to succumb to the siren call of Croatian for the time being and return to focusing on Greek!

Ugh. I had more thoughts but I'm out of time. Work beckons.

[Daniel N.]

Old copies of Teach Yourself Serbo-Croat and Srbocharvátština pro samouky (written in Czech) were the main offenders. After listening to a few episodes of Easy Croatian on YouTube, I'm proud to say I managed not to succumb to the siren call of Croatian for the time being and return to focusing on Greek!.

If you ever succumb, send me a PM and I'll send you few links

[avalon]

Old copies of Teach Yourself Serbo-Croat and Srbocharvátština pro samouky (written in Czech) were the main offenders. After listening to a few episodes of Easy Croatian on YouTube, I'm proud to say I managed not to succumb to the siren call of Croatian for the time being and return to focusing on Greek!.

If you ever succumb, send me a PM and I'll send you few links

Believe me, your fantastic site would definitely serve as my primary resource at the beginning!

[Neurotip]

Hi avalon! I'm taking on Greek this year and will be following your log with interest - so don't stop posting!

[avalon]

Thanks for dropping by, Neurotip! I'll be sure to follow your log as well. We Greek students must stick together!

For the week of Dec. 24-30: 6.5 hours.

As (easily) predicted, my time with Greek plummeted this week compared to last. But that's okay. The tradeoff? I had much more time than usual with my grandkids.

I wrapped up chapter 2 of Greek For You A2 this week. The main communicative themes were describing events/accidents in chronological order, transportation, and descriptions of consecutive events during a visit in the city. The grammar point -- deponent verbs -- wasn't new at all for me. As I may have mentioned in a previous post, most of the readings (and accompanying listening exercises) dealt with tragedy: 1) a hit and run accident in which an elderly lady was run over; 2) a woman who tripped and fell while shopping, breaking her foot; 3) a car accident in a busy intersection in Greece; 4) a bloody skiing accident involving an unfortunately-placed tree; 5) a home burglary in the upscale Athens suburb of Εκάλη (even the family dog was stolen!); 6) a truck consumed by flames on a Greek highway; 7) a fatal highway accident on the Εθνική Οδός, stopping traffic for two hours; 8) a complaint letter to the mayor, describing how someone tripped on a poorly-maintained sidewalk, breaking her foot; 9) an informal letter to a friend, in which the writer describes how she heard a horrible "crack!" when she fell and broke a bone at the shopping mall; 10) a man who fell off a ladder while changing a light bulb in his house, thus breaking his right hand and 11) a driver who lost control of his motorcycle, crashing into the tables on the sidewalk outside of a cafe.

This chapter was so relentlessly dark it's actually humorous. Other, non-tragic readings/listenings dealt with a trip to Paris, a family trip to a wedding, a guy who chased a woman through the airport because she mistakenly took his luggage, and two readings about the famous Greek filmmaker Theo Angelopoulos. (I've said before that the chapters in this text are rich in content!)

Each chapter ends with a famous Greek song, like Φραγκοσυριανή (1935) or Το πεπρωμένο (1993), complete with links to YouTube and readings/listenings about the composers. I really, really appreciate this textbook. I can now confidently say it's one of the better ones I've experienced in my 40+ years of language nerding. Too bad there's no B1 book in the series.

I'm having some trouble keeping up with the tsunami of vocabulary (this A2 book teaches 2,225 words and expressions, and the A1 book taught somewhere around 2,000), so I broke down and downloaded Anki on my phone. I guess I have a love/hate relationship with Anki. Many, many moons ago when I was playing around with Irish for a couple of years I created a deck with over 1,600 words and expressions, and I started to feel like Anki was ruling my study time. I'm committed to having a more balanced relationship with the program this time around.

Now I'm missing Irish dearly.

Anyway, thanks for reading.

[avalon]

Dec. 31 - Jan. 6: 11.0 hours.

My 11 hours this week were split more or less evenly, I think, among the following activities:

1. The first 11 pages (of 17) of Lesson 3 in my textbook. I also returned briefly to a previous chapter to review the listening exercises and readings on Maria Callas as well as Leonidas Kavakos, the acclaimed violinist, in order to shore up all that vocabulary.

2. Easy Greek on YouTube. I'm happy to report that the host -- as well as most of his interviewees -- have slowed their speech considerably! He must have gotten feedback from viewers. The episodes are much more enjoyable for me now (especially number 7, in which we talk to donkeys and meet many of the host's family members). I think I'm up to episode 11. I always replay them multiple times and take copious notes on the language.

3. I wrote two real-life letters! One informal and one semi-formal. Conveniently, my textbook taught a lesson some 35 pages ago on what kinds of salutations and closings are appropriate, depending on the formality of the letter. One of my letters was to express my appreciation for the scholarship I was granted a couple of months ago. I made sure to spend extra time getting everything right!

4. Easy reader app: I finished Chapter 1 and started on Chapter 2. So far this story (Το περίπτερο στην Αριστοτέλους, The Kiosk on Aristotelous Street) is much more difficult than Hotel Atlantis was. There is a lot of highly idiomatic, colloquial dialogue.

5. I found a random article online which gave important advice on how to maintain your privacy and protect your personal data on social media. It's good to get out of the learners' materials and "into the wild" once in a while. I mined a great deal of B-level vocabulary from it.

I worked on Greek at least 30 minutes a day every day, so my score in the 365 Day Language Challenge is 6.

[avalon]

Jan. 7 - Jan. 13: 9 hrs 15 mins

1. Finished Lesson 3 (of 13) this week, and I'll start 4 later today. I also finished all the Easy Greek episodes. Did they really slow down as I reported in my previous entry, or is my ear more attuned to Greek? I'm not entirely sure.

2. I read chapters 3-5 in my current Easy Reader app.

3. I wrote up an island about what my typical morning looks like, and had it checked by a native (only one error!). It was actually more like a small continent than an island; I crammed it full of details and tangents in order to practice. I'll edit it later to make it a true island for speaking purposes.

I worked on Greek at least 30 minutes a day every day, so my score in the 365 Day Language Challenge is 13.

[avalon]

Jan. 14-20: 8 hrs 10 mins

I worked on Greek at least 30 minutes per day, so my score in the 365 Day Challenge is 20.

[avalon]

Jan. 21-27: 7.0 hrs

I finished my second Easy Greek reader this week, and did tons of reading "out in the wild," as well as vocabulary work. But very little speaking, listening, or writing, unfortunately.

Score in the 365 Day Challenge: 27.