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Inhaling Belgium | ||
Tags: Belgium | Super Challenge | Living abroad | Dutch | Total Annihilation Challenge (TAC) | French | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5007 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes  Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 41 of 116 02 September 2013 at 10:53pm | IP Logged |
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Yes, and it works nicely. Congrats on your progress. Is Gray's Anatomy fun? I considered watching it but given my recent hate towards anatomy, I am unsure :-D
You count hours for the challenge? Hmm. That means apprximately 100 epizodes. Sounds great! 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Suzie Diglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 4227 days ago 155 posts - 226 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Dutch | Message 42 of 116 03 September 2013 at 7:22pm | IP Logged |
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Thanks, Cavesa!
Don't worry about Grey's Anatomy - the name is completely misleading. It's about personal affairs - love, family issues, love, love - one could easily forget that the setting is a hospital ... No interference with your studies :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Suzie Diglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 4227 days ago 155 posts - 226 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Dutch | Message 43 of 116 04 September 2013 at 8:56pm | IP Logged |
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Just finished my daily video (a double episode of Doctor Who), and I was quite surprised that I understood quite a lot of the conversations held! Yes, I had seen these episodes before (in English), and no, they didn't exchange deep, philosophical or complex content....but still! I don't think I had ever understood as much as I did today!
Slowly, the immense input really pays off! 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Suzie Diglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 4227 days ago 155 posts - 226 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Dutch | Message 44 of 116 07 September 2013 at 11:54am | IP Logged |
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Well, it doesn't need saying that my experience described in the previous post was an exemption only...The following episode was quite the opposite....
No further progress here. Google at least seems to think that I could do with some additional training, and therefore decided to switch the language of its websites to French. I myself agree with Google. I am developping a undesirable routine on not listening to my counterparts anymore. I am observing this, for example, whenever I buy something: Clerk: Bonjour! Me: Bonjour! Clerk: (says something in French, sometimes adding the name of the supermarket) Me: Non, merci. (Just guessing that I am asked whether I have a client card.) Clerk: (says something in French) Me: Non, merci. (Normally, they either ask if I want to receive a client card, or if I want a bag.) Clerk: (says something in French, including numbers) Me: (looking on the display for the amount to pay, nodding and paying), or Me: (handing over a 50 Euro note, as I did not find the display, and being happy with whatever I receive in return) Clerk: Merci beaucoup! Me: Bonne journée! Clerk: (says something in French) The trouble here is not that I quite often still do not understand what the clerk says, but that I sort of get used to not understand anything. Maybe I should really push myself more into face-to-face conversations. When my university course is completed....sigh.... 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Suzie Diglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 4227 days ago 155 posts - 226 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Dutch | Message 45 of 116 01 December 2013 at 8:05am | IP Logged |
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Took me some time to find my log again...but here we go again...
I had intended to spend less time on my last home assignment for university. But then they offered me to write on my most favourite topic - an offer I really couldn't refuse. So I spent the last months with my course instead, learning a lot - unfortunately not any bit of French. I even stopped watching French TV and DVDs because I felt too overloaded and needed my head free to focus. Now, with the course being over, my French activities are to be restarted again, and will be given more attention. What had meant to be a monthly wrap-up, should rather be renamed to a "quarterly" one.... FRENCH 1) Words: 0 new words; total 38.67 % This is not going to change this year - I'll focus on the repetition of the new words, not more. 2) Phrases: none 3) Text book/exercise material pages: none 4) Reading: 53 pages of Inferno, adding up to 1.53 % in total Sigh....I did that bit in September, before starting the course, but it is really not much. As written three months ago, I'll finish Inferno by New Year's Eve, and I still believe that's feasible. 5) Listening: 2123 minutes, 22.03 % in total Before I stopped about six weeks ago, I had completed three seasons of Fringe and three seasons of Doctor Who. And since then, I have overheard hundreds of conversation at work. My overall listening skills have improved immensely in the past months - I would assume that I now understand about 50 % of what my colleagues say, matching my listening ability at TV. I'm quite happy about this progress :-) For the super challenge, I have still 27 films left to watch, which is also a good target for December. I have a DVD box of series 1 of 'Bones' waiting to be opened, and a couple of other DVDs of TV series I like. Did I mention I am extremely good at buying learning material? :-) [6) Writing: 49 words, 0.24 % in total No progress here - in 2014 I'll return to lang8. 7) Conversation: 195 min; 2.32 % Well. This is really not much for having spent three month in the country of your TL...And the utmost part was discussion with auhtorities and insurances about how to register my car in Belgium (which I fear is not yet over). At work, I still talk English to everyone. I thought I had a good excuse to do so. But now, with the excuse being gone, this is about to change now - from now on, I am going to talk in French. I already informed my colleagues in order to prevent myself to postpone this again... The trouble is that I am really too lazy to talk - it is so difficult and energy-consuming. But I have to start eventually, and this is the perfect day. ENGLISH 1) Listening: 4287 min since July; 18,77 % in total Ahem, this high figure is primarily based on the fact that I continued to watch a lot of TV and videos, though not in French. After completing the third season of Fringe in French, I was desperate to learn how it continued, but the French version was far too expensive. And I love to watch some BBC programmes. Especially the cooking shows have improved my vocabulary in that section - just love it. As I now also spend a lot of time in my car, I have started to listen to some audiobooks...I am done with Dan Brown's "Angels and Demons" as well as "Da Vinci Code", "The Bone Garden" from Tess Gerritson, and am currently listening to Robert Harris' "Enigma". Looking forward to the day when I can start to listen to French audiobooks just for entertainment. 2) Reading: 355 pages since July; 4,97 % in total I finished the crime novel from Elisabeth George. It is obvious that I have not added any work- or university-related material to this figure. Beside the fact that I do not want to spend my days with counting, I do not think professional material improves my language skills. Technical texts are quite limited in vocabulary, and you often cannot figure out if the author is a native speaker. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Suzie Diglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 4227 days ago 155 posts - 226 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Dutch | Message 46 of 116 07 December 2013 at 2:31pm | IP Logged |
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Phew, the completion of all my goals for 2013 turns out to be quite challenging...if not "super challenging" :-)
I am currently focusing on the videos - 40 episodes of TV series still left. I have spent quite some time in front of the TV this week, and have fallen in love with "Bones". Nonetheless I am surprised about the amount of new vocabulary needed for this series. I had assumed that "Fringe" had already provided me with a solid base on disgusting words. Turned out there is still much to learn. Though I like the series, I fear it won't help me to improve conversation with my colleagues during lunch break: "Putréfaction" and "mutilation" are surely not the best-chosen topics if you have a plate of food in front of you... Well, 40 episodes sound feasible until year's end...if....you don't stop every two minutes, look up a word and add it to Anki. But I can't stop doing that. And I know it's better to do that. While some people surely learn a lot during extensive listening, I am not an intuitive person but need to analyse and digest. And believe me....40 episodes at this pace IS a challenge! :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Suzie Diglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 4227 days ago 155 posts - 226 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Dutch | Message 47 of 116 08 December 2013 at 5:17pm | IP Logged |
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Celebrate with me - I have just passed the 7500 minute mark for listening to French - last 1500 min to go to complete the "Half Super Challenge"! I would like to complete it by Dec 21st, in order to have sufficient time to repeat the vocabulary and finish Inferno by New Year's Eve. Gosh, this would be 120 minutes per day! Time to let some unknown words go...sigh...
I have also signed up for TAC 2014 - to get my French to C1 level, and to re-activate my Dutch. 2014 will become my language year! And I have also identified two language projects that will also help me to get to know my new home: In the second quarter of 2014, there will be two important events: The elections for EU parliament, and the Football World Cup. (I was delighted to learn that Belgium will not only participate this time, but is even regarded as one of the stronger teams!) With my multilingual and multinational cable TV, I will be able to attend both intriguing events from the Belgian, German, British, French and Dutch perspective. What a feast to come! This of course also means proper preparation vocabulary-wise :-) 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Suzie Diglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 4227 days ago 155 posts - 226 votes Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Dutch | Message 48 of 116 15 December 2013 at 12:54am | IP Logged |
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Still busy with watching videos...there are still 15 h left. I am done with 'Bones' (watched it partly in English, though), and have now started to watch 'Gilmore Girls' (videos with subtitles). On TV, I watched some episodes of season 3 of 'Gossip Girl', but couldn't access the plot. This might not only be language-related, as I am not that familiar with that series. After several hours of listening to incomprehensible babbling I then shifted to 'Monk', which I can really recommend to any French learner, as it is nice and easy to understand. It also helps that the series lives by non-verbal communication, so I would probably also have some fun and get the message if watching it in Korean....
As mentioned in one of my previous posts, I have now started to speak French with my colleagues. Well...mostly....sometimes. The problem really is that conversations in English go on more smoothly for both parties (all my colleagues are fluent in English) and therefore 'just this time, just for this topic' we somehow switch back to English. We all do this far too often. I have to push myself and my colleagues much more to stick to French, even if it slows down communication. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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