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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| HermonMunster Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4634 days ago 119 posts - 211 votes  Studies: Spanish | Message 65 of 154 09 June 2013 at 5:46pm | IP Logged | ||
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Good Morning everyone,
A great way to learn faster is to try to live your life in the language. I just completed a survey from Lowe’s hardware store in Spanish. There were 8 words that I didn’t know. The phrasing was pretty different too. It was one of those things that brings you back to reality. I was sort of feeling like, "I'm the king of Spanish!" then I took that survey and couldn't answer some of the questions. :-( haha. The good thing about doing something like that is that the language is purposely simple and straight forward. If you can complete those surveys you should be able to communicate with most people. My Colombian buddy works for the health department and he has to do a lot of translating and explaining in Spanish. He mentioned how some of the immigrants from Mexico and South America have Spanish as their second language with an indigenous being their first. It important for him to be able to simplify his speech to the point where he can be understood. I think a person really must know a language well to decide what parts can be stripped out while still conveying the point. I used to work with a Japanese owned company and I would have to do that with some of my older Japanese colleagues. Some people would call it baby talk, but I think that is condescending. Working in engineering made it easier because we were working more with concrete things and not ideas. A basic sentence could get the message across such as, "harness drawing wrong. Length big connector make 100mm. Turn right 45 degree push." Speaking of the Japanese company, I have an awkward experience to tell. While I was working there I went to on a business trip and I went to a store selling a bunch of bandanas. There was one that had the rising sun and some writing in Japanese. I bought it and brought it home. One of my roommates at the time was learning Japanese so I asked him what the writing say. He told me that it was, "No one can beat me!" I was thinking sweet, I'm going to put this in my cube! So I was working late, Aside… (this is a good trick for younger people, stay late at the office, even if you're just reading a magazine or playing on your phone. The big bosses usually have to stay late for meetings and if they need some emergency help, you get to be the hero.) and a Japanese coworker saw my bandana, stopped dead in his tracks, and came over to talk to me. He asked, "Do you know what that means?" Like a big dummy, I smiled and chuckled, "Yep, No one can beat me." Then he asked me if I knew who wore that. I answered no and he proceeded to tell me that it was what the Kamikaze pilots wore on their final flight. I was sitting there open mouthed for a while and then apologized for being so disrespectful and took it down. Moral of the story: always ask what does something say, and what does it mean. I’ve also started picking up more of the Spanish newspapers. They’re free and they have tons of advertisements that are filled of important words that don’t necessarily come up in everyday speech. I’m pretty sure an ad for new gutters will have a few words that I’ve never seen before. Looks like the Christmas time trip to Mexico is a go. My wife and I are looking to spend about 7 days in Queretaro. It’s close to Mexico City. It should be an awesome trip. We won’t be there for the actual holiday because that makes the tickets go up another $250 a piece. I'm very excited about it. It's giving me even more fire to practice/study hard. I'm also somewhat proud because the lady whose hometown we are visiting said to my wife, "We don't' have to spend all of our time together because Herm knows the language." Weeeeee that made my day. It's pretty cool that my hard work for the last almost 18mo has paid off in this trip. It should be a fantastic time. Now all I have to do is pay for it. :-( Looks like there will be a lot of beans and rice dinners from now until December. But it will be well worth it. Edited by HermonMunster on 09 June 2013 at 5:47pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| HermonMunster Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4634 days ago 119 posts - 211 votes Studies: Spanish | Message 66 of 154 09 June 2013 at 6:02pm | IP Logged | ||
What!! That might have ended the trip for me. After seeing something like that I'd probably be thinking, "I have GOT to get out of here." I totally agree with you on the drug legalization. It's not like everyone would become a crackhead on the first day. It would just make the price of drugs collapse and probably keep people off of the harder stuff. If there were a menu for drugs showing the expected high and the side affects, very few people would chose crystal meth. I think a semi rational person would think. " Says here that the high is out of this world, but it will make my teeth melt and I'll start scratching all my skin off... No thanks." But when it is the cheapest high because the price of marijuana has been artificially increased by prohibition, it doesn't look so bad. Because for an addict some high (no matter the consequence) > no high 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| HermonMunster Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4634 days ago 119 posts - 211 votes Studies: Spanish | Message 67 of 154 13 June 2013 at 12:08am | IP Logged | ||
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Last night I had another Spanish meetup. It was a great time! I met a Columbian and a Peruvian along with 5 non native speakers and the regulars. We had a really great time talking about everything and helping teach English. It's nice to see people struggle. I know that's a weird thing to say but I feel better about my struggles to form a sentence that makes sense when I see others doing it. I'm very grateful for my job working with Mexicans. Several of the new people were commenting on how good I am for only 16 months of study. They thought I was a super genius after first, but I just explained how much time I'm exposed to the language and they understood how I could progress so fast. A few of us spoke about going somewhere together to hang out in the future. There's something special about a person who wants to go to a meet up. They're already more of a go-getter and fun person than most. I'm really enjoying getting to know everyone. I noticed yesterday that there aren't too many men who are showing up. It was almost 3 to 1 yesterday. I wonder why that is. I'd like to speak with more guys to get more of a feel on the sounds and intonations of trash talking in Spanish. It is really nice to be around people that are as excited about the language as I am. Also it's a great social outlet. My job is fairly boring so the meetups are one of my ways to blow off steam, relax, and just be myself.
With the Peruvian lady I really had to focus because she was talking soooo fast. Normally during a conversation I try to make eye contact but I had to zero in on her lips to try to keep up and even then she left me behind several times. I found myself doing the smile and nod more often than I expected. It's all good though. I need to be pushed. Speaking of pushing, I've deleted all the slow audio I downloaded from news in slow Spanish. I'm getting the full speed treatment. Believe it or not I'm keeping up fairly well. I need to work on letting something go if I didn't quite catch it. Focusing on one word will get you hopelessly lost. I'm still running into about 75-100s a week that I don't know. I'm just adding them to my Anki and continuing to practice ever day. I have been trying to learn 30 new words a day but I think that's too many. I think I will cut it down to 10 and probably have a better chance of them staying with me. Ohh yea, Looks like I found myself a new Skype partner. My buddy whose nickname is Peludo (hairy) was mentioning to me that he wants to improve his English. (I have a better understanding of the phrase lead by example. My Mexican buddies have noticed how much better I am at Spanish and it's motivating them to work on their English) He's a good guy and really funny so I'm sure our sessions will be great. His English isn't even that bad, but he could definitely use some refinement. Last thing, to thine own self be true. A lady I met last night is a super free spirit and has been all over the world. She told me about how her ex-fiancé wanted to settle down and stay in one place and they broke up. I congratulated her for having the courage to do what she wanted and not settling for something stable and being miserable. She's with a new guy who actually shares her life's passions and seems like a much better fit. cya! 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| HermonMunster Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4634 days ago 119 posts - 211 votes Studies: Spanish | Message 68 of 154 20 June 2013 at 10:03pm | IP Logged | ||
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Hello,
I have another Skype partner who will be coming online as soon as she saves up for a computer. My program manager called me and said, "ok, we need to get her English up to speed." The lady is a good person but she's painfully shy. I've had the chance to get to know her over several visits to Mexico so she is comfortable talking to me in general (only in Spanish). I've tried to get her to talk to me over the phone, but I think too many people are around and she gets nervous. (some of the people don't have a desk phone so they have to sit at someone else's desk to talk, and that other person is all in their business.) I think Skype would do her a lot of good. Plus it's more practice for me. I really feel good when I'm helping my co-workers learn English. Of course learning Spanish will help me in my career, but not to the same extent that English helps out my Mexican buddies. Knowing English changes everything for them. Looks like I will be going to Hermosillo again towards the end of July. I'm kind of conflicted about the trip. Traveling makes me get so far behind in my normal duties that I'm starting to not like it. But I can't sneeze at another opportunity for immersion. It should be a good time as far as learning Spanish goes. I'm looking forward to seeing my buddies and meeting some of the new guys that have joined the team. I think that I will really try to only speak English to the Americans that are coming with me and to the folks that are trying to learn English. The best part is that the customer will only be there for 1 day so I will have several nights where I'll be free to hang out with the guys and do my favorite thing when I'm in Mexico, try to blend in and be just be a regular guy doing regular things. I mentioned it earlier but I want to work on my trash talk and also listening/speaking skills when I'm in a group of people. Unfortunately it's looking like the Christmas trip to Queretaro is in jeopardy. I hope everything works out and we're able to go, but as of right now, doesn't look good. Ohh I forgot to mention that last week was my first Salsa class. A while back I posted about how I went with a buddy to hear a Samba band and everyone was dancing up a storm. Well that inspired me to start learning something. I had an awesome time. There were 3 guys and 1 woman trying to learn with 2 instructors. I was partnered with the main teacher. I did pretty well. We had to keep switching dance partners so it was a challenge to catch the new person’s rhythm and adjust for height differences. This is a super beginner class so they have us counting our steps. I've been practicing around the house. 1,2,3 5,6,7. In case you're wondering 4 and 8 are slight pauses. I think I'll be confident to go to a dance after about 4 lessons. They told me that there is usually a shortage of guys at the parties so even though I'm a novice; I shouldn't have any problems with dancing all night. I'm trying to get my skills good enough so I can go dancing with my wife. She's a trained dancer so it's not really fun for her now especially when I'm supposed to lead and she knows more than me. We took some classes before and they ended up increasing our stress so we agreed not to go together until I'm better. I’m still listening to news in slow Spanish every day for an hour and trying to do more self talk. I'm also reading the lesson plans/trascripts at lunch (when I have time) I also make up crazy sentences during the day and check them in google translate. It’s a fun way to help me remember my vocab words. Today I typed, “Don’t make me crush you like a fly.” I was pretty pleased that I knew how to put that sentence together. Don’t know when I’ll have to use it, but when I do, it’ll be ready. cya 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5376 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 69 of 154 23 June 2013 at 1:47pm | IP Logged | ||
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Yes, Salsa is cool.
Your comments about Latinos learning English has really hit home for me a few times. The times it has really hit home for me have been at the end of meetups. A few times I have had very nice chats with native speakers in Spanish and then when the meetup is over I will just launch into something in English assuming the person can understand me. A few times I just get a blank stare and it hits me...this person cannot understand a single word of English. Then it hits me even more... holy cow... this person lives here and life must be very difficult without ANY English. Good luck with the Spanish... you keep me motivated... especially seeing how many hours you are logging in. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| HermonMunster Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4634 days ago 119 posts - 211 votes Studies: Spanish | Message 70 of 154 03 July 2013 at 6:08am | IP Logged | ||
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Hey James,
It's amazing sometimes how much you think someone understands when they smile and nods. I've been guilty of that serveral times. For instance, last week was my meetup. I got paired up with a Peruvian lady again and she speaks soo fast in Spanish and English. I was just sitting there smiling and acting surprised when she did. It was pretty funny when she was done with the story and I told her that I had no idea what she was talking about. Then the guy whose wife is from the Dominican Republic started speaking and the Peruvian ladies couldn't understand what he was saying. It was like the table of babel or something like that. I had to translate for the ladies and hit them with my favorite saying, "You don't know Spanish?!?" hahaha. It was another good meetup and I had a bunch of fun teasing this guy who missed the last meet up. One older lady said, "did you have a date?" and we all started chanting 'cita, cita, cita" which means, date, date, date. We all had a good laugh about that. Last night I took my wife to a Mexican restaurant in the town next door. We had a groupon so we took a drive out there. The food was so-so but the wait staff had thick Spanish accents so I was loving listening to all of them speak. I didn't feel like I was getting a welcoming vibe so I didn't bust out any of the ole español on em. I've been listening to more and more radio and I'm getting the hang of it. I'm still having alot of trouble with remembering numbers. 1-800-555-1234 is wayyy out of my reach for right now. I get to thinking about the first few numbers and then I miss out on the rest. I've toyed with the idea of calling into the radio station to try to win some tickets. That would be pretty awesome. It's that time of year so I'm buying a bunch of company branded items for my buddies in Mexico. It's a pain to do this, keep everyone's order straight (they keep changing them), and front them the money, but they work hard and it's good to see people who take pride in the product they help make. My inconvenience will be worth it once I see the looks on their faces when they get their gear. As usual I'll let them know that if someone doesn't have my $$ by the time I leave Mexico, operation Santa Claus will end. I have a few presents for co-workers who just had babies. I hope customs doesn't give me trouble for bringing this stuff. I'm pretty confident thought that I could talk my way out of a situation if I needed to. Today I got my second ever request for a translation. It felt really good to be asked to do it. There was one word that I had to look up, but other than that it was fairly easy. Hard work pays off. Today I remembered something that I thought about a while ago. I contacted the plant manager's assistant and asked who is in charge of the English classes at the plant. Long story short, I'm signed up to help teach the classes while I'm down there. Class is every day from 7am - 8am. The HR guy was really excited that I volunteered. I think it will be alot of fun. Who knows what they'll have me do. I'm imagining just going through basic greetings and stuff with people. The good thing is that I have enough Spanish to really mess with anyone that's being too timid. No seas gallina. (don't be a chicken) will be my first joke. I'm really happy that I've changed my approach to work this year. I would have never thought to try this before. Now I'm taking the bull by the horns and just volunteered before checking with my boss or anything. Kind of thinking, "this is my time and I'll do what I please with it. If you have a problem you can talk to me about it at 8am." ohhhhh! I want to help the guys out down there because there aren't many opportunities for them to speak with a native speaker. Also this will be my first opportunity to speak Spanish to a group of people in a professional setting. Plus this will be a great way to get my name out there even further in the company. I once had a supervisor who was lamenting the difficulty of motivating people. Showing that I'm a self-motivator will serve me well. Ohh yea, I’ve been learning a lot of new words. I’m very lucky to have so many people that I can ask for help at any time. “How to you say to vomit”, “what’s the word for “wow” “how do you say greedy.” I need to keep on getting while the getting is good. take it easy 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| HermonMunster Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4634 days ago 119 posts - 211 votes Studies: Spanish | Message 71 of 154 08 July 2013 at 2:08am | IP Logged | ||
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Hey Everyone,
The last few days have been full of Spanish. My wife and I hung out with the couple that does the Spanish meetup on the 4th of July. We had a great time tailgating and watching fireworks. My wife and I also went to the lake to go canoeing and swimming. We heard several families speaking Spanish but they were too far away to strike up a conversation. On Friday we had a special edition meetup. A few of us met up at a bar to hang out. Several people had requested a different venue ( the restaurant where we hold the meetings has terrible acoustics). About 8 people showed up. It was a really good time. I learned a lot of new words and taught a few to the Peruvian sisters. One guy caused some trouble at the table because he brought up politics and another guy and I had a small debate about free markets and socialism. I need to work on getting out of these conversations. Maybe just saying, "I'd be happy to debate you, let's set a date for it." The only good part about it was that the debate was all in Spanish. Over the course of the long weekend I've read 3 Spanish newspapers. I've been kind of hoarding them so I figured now was as good a time as any to read them. (I still have one more to go and I'm picking up another today). I've picked up tons of new words, probably about 30 per paper. I found myself laughing a lot when I was reading, just kind of thinking, "I can't believe that I'm understanding all of this." Ohh yea, I'm reading out loud so I can get more practice speaking and with my pronunciation. I think reading the newspaper is one of the best investments in time a student can make (once they achieve a basic understanding and can figure out most words through the context) The best part about the papers are that they are free. Since I've been studying Spanish I have kind of noticed the ignorance of my fellow Americans quite a bit more. I was in a cafeteria waiting for my order when a lady that I chat with saw me and asked how I was doing in Spanish I responded. The guy next to me in line asked me, "Are you Puerto Rican?" I laughed and said, "Nope, just a regular ole American." Then he asked, "What were you speaking," "Spanish." "Well, that sounded like Puerto Rican to me." I debated whether to tell him that Puerto Ricans speak Spanish, but I just decided to be nice while he gave me tips on how to study. "You should get some of those tapes and listen to them... that'll help you learn." "Thank you sir that's a great idea. Have a good day." I just hope someone is kind to me when I'm an old man. Today I was riding my bike around the park and I ran into one of the Peruvian ladies and her kids. I slowed down and said, 'Hola" and she responded, "Hola." Then it sunk in that she knew me. (I ride with a helmet and large sun glasses so it'd be pretty easy to not recognize me). We had a brief chat and I spoke to the kids alittle bit. I'm really glad they have joined the group. The accent is a little difficult for me to grasp but it's great for me. I need to be pushed. I'm feeling really good about my Spanish endeavor. Learning a language is all about wanting it. A new guy joined our group and showed up to the bar on Friday. We all welcomed him in English and a then started to welcome him in Spanish. The organizer asked him, "Cómo estás chico" to which he replied, "whoa, whoa I'm not that far yet." WTF!!! This guy is in his fourth semester of Spanish and a pretty good university. His lack of Spanish skills made me ask how to say the word, "refund"," because he needs his money back if he passed 3 Spanish classes and can't do a simple greeting. This started a debate about the value of online college courses and I had a very strong opinion. People will learn if they want to learn. This guy has probably spent $3200 on Spanish classes and can't say, read, or listen to anything. I've spent maybe $100 (including food, going out of my way to find a Mexican restaurant to have someone to talk to) and I'm pretty functional in the language. I kinda feel bad for the guy because I wasn't the most motivated guy in college either. If he has enough guts to come to another meetup and struggle till he gets better, I will try to help him. I hope I'm not sounding like I think I'm the King of Language Learning, I just can't get over the fact that he knows nothing. Zero! Nada! When I was in college my mother impressed upon me that I'm the customer and the professors are the vender and that I needed to get my money's worth. According to my Anki program I know 2801 words. I checked my study log and I have been studying for 1331 hours. Both of those numbers are probably vastly underestimated. I've been studying for about 16 months. 2 more weeks until my next trip to Hermosillo I'm getting excited/anxious about volunteering with the English class. Ohh yea, if anyone cares to know, I’ve been practicing my Salsa and I’m getting better. Still not good enough to attend a dance, but better. I’m almost able to move w/o counting my steps. One last thing. I read another article regarding retiring in other countries. I guess this is really going mainstream. Folks with relatively meager savings and language skills could make a nice life in South America if they can embrace the cultural differences and teach some English under the table. I'm not so sure I'd want to do it but who knows. As my Granny says, "In life all you want is a chance and a choice." Cya 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| HermonMunster Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4634 days ago 119 posts - 211 votes Studies: Spanish | Message 72 of 154 08 July 2013 at 9:46pm | IP Logged | ||
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Just a quick post that shows what I can do in 16 months. I wrote the following email in Spanish off the top of my head.
men, The attached deviations were rejected by the responsible engineer (see below). He said the supplier before us was able to do it without changing wires sizes. I guess the next step is to take pictures of the wires are not fitting into the connectors or terminals so they can make a decision to accept full responsibility for problems that may arise through not implementing these deviations. Regards, Also I got an instant message about this email. Here's our exchange, (it was in Spanish) Juan : Herm, regarding your email that you just sent. Everything is out of the specifications. Me: I know it but we need pictures to show how bad the situation is. Juan: I don't think that we need pictures because the drawings indicate that the wires are out of spec. Me: Well, the engineer told me that he's not going to sign them. We need evidence to prove that we need those changes. Juan. We can't run with terminals that are out of spec. What do you suggest? Me: If we give him the pictures he can say in the deviation that the customer is ok with the components being out of the specifications. Juan: Ok we will try to send them today. I'm extremely pleased with how I was able to just reply real time on the chat. All my efforts are really starting to pay off. I think I will be able to achieve my goal of being fluent (what ever that means) by the time I'm 35. (I have about 14 months to go until then). To any one who may read this; Don't quit. Things get easier and more fun in time. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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