Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

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

Postby IronMike » Sun Aug 04, 2019 9:44 pm

Radioclare wrote:... So I definitely learned something today. Perhaps one of these days I should actually make time to read my boyfriend's Esperanto textbook :lol:

Yes, you should! His book is great.

Are you guys doing Paralela Universo this year?
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Radioclare » Mon Aug 05, 2019 8:11 pm

IronMike wrote:Are you guys doing Paralela Universo this year?

No, I confess I've never even heard of this so had to google it :oops:

5 August
I had high hopes for how much work I was going to get done today, but I was thwarted by a succession of people who just wanted to ask me "quick questions" that turned out not to be quick at all.

Russian
As predicted, the Memrise reviews this morning were pretty hideous. I only got through them by using the speed review function.

On the way to the office I completed lesson 19 of Pimsleur 3. There was lots of practice of the instrumental case in this one.

This evening I finished making notes on verbs of motion from chapter 10 of 'Colloquial Russian'. Never mind mastering when to use which verb of motion, I can't even reliably remember the difference between вести and везти. I think there should be a Russian spelling rule that completely different verbs should differentiate themselves by more than one letter.

The final grammar point of the chapter was about saying "to go" when speaking about vehicles. I figured this should be a straightforward thing at least.... hahahaha, no :cry: It turns out that you use ходить/идти when you're talking about forms of transport like trains, buses, boats and trams (as the subject of a sentence). But you have to use ездить/ехать when talking about cars. The example sentences given were "Вот идёт поезд" (Here comes the train) vs "Вот едет машина" (Here comes the car). Seriously?! It is now abundantly clear to me why I never made it to chapter 11 :lol:

It probably won't surprise you to read that I didn't do the exercises on these grammar points tonight. I'm saving them as a special treat for tomorrow. Tuesdays are the worst day of the week anyway!

Total time = 68 minutes. Streak = 216 days
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby vonPeterhof » Tue Aug 06, 2019 5:17 am

Morgana wrote:
Radioclare wrote:... вести and везти. I think there should be a Russian spelling rule that completely different verbs should differentiate themselves by more than one letter.
Annnd according to Forvo they're pronounced exactly the same? Even the stress is the same?

Only the infinitives are (pronounced) the same, the conjugations are completely different: веду/везу, вела/везла, веди/вези, etc.
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Teango » Tue Aug 06, 2019 7:24 am

Radioclare wrote:
IronMike wrote:OMG! You discovered time travel?!?! Holy crap, please share!

I wish - I'd like to time travel forward to a point where I can already speak Russian and don't have to spend all my time learning it :lol:

Former HTLAL member Jozen-Bo was ahead of us all - behold the Mind Portal Language Project!!! :?
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Serpent » Tue Aug 06, 2019 2:04 pm

Radioclare wrote:[The example sentences given were "Вот идёт поезд" (Here comes the train) vs "Вот едет машина" (Here comes the car). Seriously?!
These don't sound very natural to me :? If you're waiting for the train, you say Поезд пришел. If you're watching it in motion you say Поезд едет/проехал/уехал/etc. You can certainly use ехать about other vehicles than cars, just not vice versa.
At the station they say прибыл I think.

When you're waiting for a bus, I'd say Автобус пришел/приехал are interchangeable. Прибыл is formal (just like with trains) but possible, especially for long-distance buses.
I'd say a train's arrival/departure is seen as more of a process, while for smaller vehicles it's a point in time.

Also, there's an idiomatic expression Поезд ушел, which means missing out on something (can be used literally if you missed the train too)

edit: oh and Автобус едет normally means "the bus is coming/approaching". it implies it hasn't arrived to the bus stop yet. It's interchangeable with идет (unless you're a child who's excited about the speed :D)
So ultimately it's also about understanding the perfective/imperfective. I hope this gets easier when you've had more exposure to real idiomatic Russian and not textbookese translations. Hmmm you may find it helpful to compare some example sentences for Russians who are learning to use the English tenses. and note how you said it's about the word "to go" but English actually uses "here comes" which is also kinda idiomatic. ;)

What does the book say about taxi? it's fine to say Такси идет or Такси пришло about a specific taxi that's been ordered, or I guess if you're waiting at a taxi station. You say Такси едет when you're also driving (usually with a descriptor of location, speed etc), so in a context where you kinda don't care about the taxi's function as a means of transport, but just as one of the many cars on the road.

Honestly this is where it gets totally murky for me as a native speaker, and what makes me hesitant about the Colloquial series. and I think they're making this unnecessarily complicated by focusing on идти/ехать.
Now that I think of it, ходить is much more common than идти about public transport, meaning something like run on a schedule or even just connect A and B.
Здесь ходят автобусы. an instruction how to get somewhere
Здесь ездят автобусы. a warning to be careful
Здесь ходят поезда/трамваи. i can't explain why ездить is so wrong when rails are involved :oops:
Здесь проезжают трамваи. I'd say this only about a narrow street like those in Lisbon, or if the transport really passes and doesn't stop.
If you're speaking of availability you can even say Здесь ходит только такси, meaning taxi is the only way to get somewhere. (bonus: Здесь ездят/возят только частники, if there are no official taxis but only private cars :lol: )
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Radioclare » Tue Aug 06, 2019 8:04 pm

Thank you everyone for the comments :)

Morgana wrote:How do you find Colloquial by this point, aside from the language I mean. For example, I don't think they provide English translations for the dialogues and the like. You seem to be doing alright with that aspect?

I like Colloquial Russian; I think it's better than some of the other Colloquial books I've tried in the past. In general I find Colloquial too hard for a first textbook (as in, too much of a steep learning curve for me if I'm a complete beginner) but I think that's because I'm not really a lover of grammar. I started with 'Teach Yourself Russian' initially, because I tend to find the TY books are pitched at a slightly lower level, and then I'm trying to use Colloquial as revision/adding more layers to my knowledge.

There are lots of dialogues and texts in the book (dialogues have audio, texts don't which is slightly annoying) and the vocab lists are pretty comprehensive, so although there are no English translations of the dialogues I don't think I've ever not been able to figure out what something means. There are plenty of exercises towards the end of each chapter, which I'm finding really useful practise at the moment, and all the answers are in the back of the book. In general the grammar is presented in a way that's fairly understandable so I feel like I'm making progress with it. I'm on a mission to finish the book as quickly as I can (which in reality is a maximum of one chapter per week!) because for last Christmas, my mom bought me the sequel (Colloquial Russian 2) and I feel like I need to have at least started working on that before next Christmas :lol:

Serpent wrote:What does the book say about taxi? it's fine to say Такси идет or Такси пришло about a specific taxi that's been ordered, or I guess if you're waiting at a taxi station. You say Такси едет when you're also driving (usually with a descriptor of location, speed etc), so in a context where you kinda don't care about the taxi's function as a means of transport, but just as one of the many cars on the road.

It doesn't mention taxis! It's only a very short part of the chapter.

Image

Thanks for all the information about transport! It feels like a bit too much for me to absorb all the nuances this evening, but I've earmarked it to come back to at a later date :)
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Radioclare » Tue Aug 06, 2019 9:19 pm

6 August
Yesterday I thought it was going to rain so I wore my raincoat to work and it turned out to be a really hot sunny day. Today I decided not to make the same mistake again, so I went to work without my coat and got absolutely drenched :cry:

Russian
My Memrise reviews weren't too bad this morning so I had plenty of time to learn new words. The theme of today's vocabulary was furniture and I only knew basic furniture words like "table" and "bed" before, so that was useful.

While walking in the pouring rain, I got through lesson 20 of Pimsleur 3. It was another of those lessons where I'm not sure what I learned, but overall I still feel like it's good practice.

This evening, as promised, I did the exercises on verbs of motion from chapter 10 of Colloquial Russian. It went about as well as I expected :lol: The problem wasn't so much choosing the correct verb to use, because the examples were all quite basic in that respect, but more conjugating the verbs correctly. I did try quite hard to learn the conjugations yesterday, but they haven't properly sunk into my memory yet. I could probably benefit from doing the same exercises again tomorrow, but I'm not sure whether I'll be able to find the enthusiasm :lol:

Total time = 99 minutes. Streak = 217 days
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby rdearman » Tue Aug 06, 2019 9:21 pm

Radioclare wrote:Yesterday I thought it was going to rain so I wore my raincoat to work and it turned out to be a really hot sunny day. Today I decided not to make the same mistake again, so I went to work without my coat and got absolutely drenched :cry:

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

Postby Daniel N. » Tue Aug 06, 2019 10:34 pm

vonPeterhof wrote:Only the infinitives are (pronounced) the same, the conjugations are completely different: веду/везу, вела/везла, веди/вези, etc.

SImilar pairs exist in Croatian/Serbian, but only as perfective verbs with prefixes, and their meaning is different:

dovesti, dovede, doveo, dovela = bring (someone)
dovesti, doveze, dovezao, dovezla = come (by a vehicle)

Russian is here much more archaic...
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Re: Radioclare's 2019 log (Croatian/Russian)

Postby Radioclare » Wed Aug 07, 2019 9:52 pm

7 August
I been getting a cold since Saturday and today it was at a really annoying stage. So I don't feel like I've been as productive today as I should have been.

Russian
I worked from home but had lost motivation by about 6pm so stopped and did some Memrise. Lots of reviews again today, so I didn't learn any new words.

I was feeling virtuous now that the 6WC is back on again and decided to check my Croatian Memrise to see how many reviews I have waiting for me there. Anyone want to guess a number?! It was so high that I immediately closed the tab again and decided it definitely needed to wait for a day when I have more energy :lol:

In the evening I watched a new Russian Progress video three times (it was only a short video). I watched once without subtitles, once with the subtitles, and once while reading the transcript. I still can't decide which way is most useful.

I decided to have a day off from Colloquial Russian. If I feel more energetic tomorrow, I'll start chapter 11.

Total time = 46 minutes. Streak = 218 days
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