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Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 7157 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish
| Message 49 of 62 24 August 2012 at 5:01am | IP Logged |
It's good to read that you had nice time there. It's been a while since I was in Croatia but I too recall that being on the coast felt more like being in Italy than in some Slavonic country. It wasn't just hearing all of the Italian around me but also what I usually ended up eating for dinner: pizza or pasta. I usually had the Balkan / Croatian stuff only at breakfast (often burek and yogurt) while for lunch I was happy to live off ice cream bars and water as it was over 30C during my time on the coast.
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| hribecek Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5350 days ago 1243 posts - 1458 votes Speaks: English*, Czech, Spanish Studies: Italian, Polish, Slovak, Hungarian, Toki Pona, Russian
| Message 50 of 62 24 August 2012 at 8:46pm | IP Logged |
Chung wrote:
It's good to read that you had nice time there. It's been a while since I was in Croatia but I too recall that being on the coast felt more like being in Italy than in some Slavonic country. It wasn't just hearing all of the Italian around me but also what I usually ended up eating for dinner: pizza or pasta. I usually had the Balkan / Croatian stuff only at breakfast (often burek and yogurt) while for lunch I was happy to live off ice cream bars and water as it was over 30C during my time on the coast. |
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You're right about the food, I had pizza 4 times, pasta twice, lasagne plus lots of ice cream.
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| hribecek Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5350 days ago 1243 posts - 1458 votes Speaks: English*, Czech, Spanish Studies: Italian, Polish, Slovak, Hungarian, Toki Pona, Russian
| Message 51 of 62 08 September 2012 at 6:50pm | IP Logged |
I have a bit of free time so decided to write an update while I can.
The main thing for me to say this time is that I've been reading a hell of a lot in Czech. Probably at least 3 or maybe 4 hours every day. I've recently been reading the 'Twilight' series and have just finished the last book of 4. My Czech student has now lent me the 3 books from the 'Inkheart' series and I've also just bought the 9th book in the series of 'House of night' to read.
In English some of these books would probably be too silly for me to enjoy them, but, as with soap operas, in Czech I enjoy them a lot more, because I feel like I'm getting something from them (language).
I still write a fair bit in Hungarian and try to do something every day.
I planned to start studying and using Spanish more often from September, but I'm just too interested in Czech and then Hungarian, so Spanish will have to wait indefinitely.
I remember a few years ago (before I found this website and therefore other language geeks), I didn't know what my limits were and I planned to study 100 languages to a B1 level! I can't believe I was so naive. I now realise that reaching B1 in just 3 languages is more than difficult enough for me (and I'm arguably not even that in Hungarian, which is the 3rd one). Maybe I started too late (properly at age 26) or my brain just doesn't have enough space for more good level languages.
My current language plan is to maintain my Hungarian at the same level until November and then give it another big push in the next 6 week challenge. Czech is a never ending pursuit of native-like level, which still feels as far away as ever. Spanish is still alive and kicking and I still use it a little bit passively every day, but for study time it's a victim of the other 2.
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| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 7157 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish
| Message 52 of 62 04 October 2012 at 11:38pm | IP Logged |
I don't know if you'll get around to Northern Saami in the forseeable future but I stumbled upon a collection of handouts used at Masaryk University in 2011 for its beginners' class in Northern Saami. They have Czech as the intermediary language which shouldn't be a problem for you. Judging by how the instructors use this portal for course material, I suggest that you get your hands on this material as soon as possible since the other courses that I checked on this portal have nothing hosted with the material presumably having been removed once the term ended.
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| hribecek Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5350 days ago 1243 posts - 1458 votes Speaks: English*, Czech, Spanish Studies: Italian, Polish, Slovak, Hungarian, Toki Pona, Russian
| Message 53 of 62 05 October 2012 at 4:23pm | IP Logged |
Thanks for the tip, looks like some really good material there. I had no idea a university here taught Northern Saami, otherwise I might have looked into enrolling.
I'm still interested in Northern Saami and always read your phrases from it, but I'm not working on it at the moment.
If I didn't have to waste so much time working and being a husband then it would have a permanent place on my study schedule. :)
EDIT: Forgot to say that I have saved all of the files on my computer for later use.
Edited by hribecek on 05 October 2012 at 4:24pm
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| hribecek Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5350 days ago 1243 posts - 1458 votes Speaks: English*, Czech, Spanish Studies: Italian, Polish, Slovak, Hungarian, Toki Pona, Russian
| Message 54 of 62 13 October 2012 at 1:35pm | IP Logged |
I’ve been really lazy with my updates recently, but I’ve finally forced myself to start and hopefully finish this.
CZECH
The main focus of my last month has been Czech. Since my last update I’ve finished the 9th book in the House of Night series and have now read over 200 pages of the first Inkheart book. Having done so much reading in the last 6 months, my reading speed is about the same as my English speed and my understanding a bit weaker.
My main problem in Czech is my active confidence, so I’ve been trying to deal with that by speaking to myself a lot more in Czech(instead of in Hungarian).
Another hopefully big step I’ve implemented is to hire a teacher! I’ve never had a Czech teacher before, I’ve only ever really had conversation exchange partners who very rarely corrected me and knew next to nothing about Czech grammar and teaching. My teacher will be my wife! She’s a teacher by trade but has always more or less refused to help me or been very reluctant to before, because she teaches all day and wanted a break from it at home. The difference now is that I’m paying her for the lessons as a proper student and I’ve come up with a detailed plan of what I want – 5-10 minutes of me reading aloud with her correcting my pronunciation and then the rest of the time will be me describing stories to her from our lives and from films and books etc. and she will correct me and take notes.
We’ve had one lesson so far and I’ve already learned a few things and realised a few bad habits that I hadn’t been aware of before.
HUNGARIAN
I only have time for skype lessons in the evenings now, which means that I can’t have any for the time being, because I’m both too tired and lazy to talk to someone for 1 or 2 hours, plus we live in a small flat, so my wife would have to listen to our conversations. I will find a way again though, hopefully during the next 6 week challenge or at least during the christmas holidays.
I still write about 100-200 words a few times a week and chat to myself at least for a few minutes every day and look up grammar and vocabulary issues when I encounter them.
SPANISH
Nothing much to report, apart from a few emails and a couple of shortish conversations with a Chilean and a Costa Rican.
I might be attending a Spanish conversation class soon; it depends on the level of the class. Usually Spanish classes here are at a very low level (I do live in a small Czech town after all) and so very boring for me. My Chilean friend, who is the teacher, will let me know about the level next week.
ENGLISH
My English is really deteriorating! I very often struggle to remember quite normal words and I often find myself using Czech grammar for my English sentences. For example reported speech – I find myself saying things like „he said that he will come“, instead of „he said that he would come“. I also say stuff like „Ihope yes“ or „I think yes“, instead of „I hope so“ or „I think so“.
Our little English speaking community has its own little Czechlish dialect, we say things like „nevím“, „škoda“, „ach jo“, „ty vole“, „panelák“, „kino“, „pekárna“, „pivo“, „čau“ and many more Czech words and short phrases in our normal English conversations. There are only about 5-10 native English speakers in the town (we’ve all been here for at least 5 years) and we spend most of our time surrounded by and speaking to Czechs of course (both in Czech and Czechlish). Most of us are English teachers too so most of the day we have to speak very slowly in English and use simple vocabulary, so this too has a big impact on the quality of our English.
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| maxval Pentaglot Senior Member Bulgaria maxval.co.nr Joined 5074 days ago 852 posts - 1577 votes Speaks: Hungarian*, Bulgarian, English, Spanish, Russian Studies: Latin, Modern Hebrew
| Message 55 of 62 25 October 2012 at 9:41pm | IP Logged |
hribecek wrote:
My English is really deteriorating! I very often struggle to remember quite normal
words and I often find myself using Czech grammar for my English sentences. For
example reported speech – I find myself saying things like „he said that he will come“,
instead of „he said that he would come“. I also say stuff like „Ihope yes“ or „I think
yes“, instead of „I hope so“ or „I think so“.
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:-)))
This doesn't happen with me using Hungarian, I use always correct grammar (because I
use Hungarian every day in my work), however sometimes I find myself using non-existent
proverbs in Hungarian - mostly literally translated from Bulgarian.
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| hribecek Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5350 days ago 1243 posts - 1458 votes Speaks: English*, Czech, Spanish Studies: Italian, Polish, Slovak, Hungarian, Toki Pona, Russian
| Message 56 of 62 31 October 2012 at 3:59pm | IP Logged |
maxval wrote:
This doesn't happen with me using Hungarian, I use always correct grammar (because I
use Hungarian every day in my work), however sometimes I find myself using non-existent
proverbs in Hungarian - mostly literally translated from Bulgarian.
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:))
I do that too in English. It's got to the stage where my family in England (when I talk to them on skype) ask me what I mean and then I realise that it's a translation from Czech.
ps. I hadn't noticed your message before now.
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