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The drunk snail’s journey (TAC14)

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Gemuse
Senior Member
Germany
Joined 4080 days ago

818 posts - 1189 votes 
Speaks: English
Studies: German

 
 Message 17 of 161
14 January 2014 at 9:46pm | IP Logged 
Cavesa wrote:
but that would be too much chocholate :-D


Sacrilege!!!
There can never be too much (dark) chocolate.

You mentioned you took a gls course in Berlin, and had followed Themen Aktuell. Are
you redoing the book?

Are you also starting Assimil German from scratch?


Good luck with yout studies!!!



Edited by Gemuse on 14 January 2014 at 9:47pm

1 person has voted this message useful



Cavesa
Triglot
Senior Member
Czech Republic
Joined 5007 days ago

3277 posts - 6779 votes 
Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1
Studies: Spanish, German, Italian

 
 Message 18 of 161
14 January 2014 at 10:09pm | IP Logged 
That is an interesting question. And I apologize for having trouble being brief (as usual)

I had already a month or so of self study when I arrived to gls for my two weeks long stay. At the course, we went through lessons 5,6,7 and 8. I had the first 20 lessons of Assimil and five or six lessons of good czech based course ("German with a smile") under my belt. And some listening at the Deutsche Welle. I had probably the best pronunciation (apart from one student) of the group, the rest of students had obviously been catching the same mistakes from each other. I wasn't the best at grammar and vocabulary but I was among the very few students who were eager to really speak and practice. I learnt a lot from my Berlin stay outside the class. And I had too little time for German since! So, I got stuck at lesson 9 where I got on my own again.

So, now I need to do these things as soon as I can put time into German again (hopefully sooner than in the second half of 2014): Briefly review Assimil and continue. Continue where I left my TA last time with my "do everything!!! except for the obviously useless things" approach, which means lecon 6 in audio (I listen to everything a few times, until I understand all and can repeat comfortably) and lesson 8 exercises. I need to continue my anki reviews after the break as well.

I think it is realistic of me to think that I might get through the rest of TA1, whole TA2 and Assimil until the end of 2014. With the help of dark chocolate, everything is possible.

P.S. Yeah, there can never be too much. I even managed to lose weight without giving up this addiction ;-)
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Cavesa
Triglot
Senior Member
Czech Republic
Joined 5007 days ago

3277 posts - 6779 votes 
Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1
Studies: Spanish, German, Italian

 
 Message 19 of 161
14 January 2014 at 10:11pm | IP Logged 
My long postponed update:

ASCR: French movies: +6 =12 episodes of Lost Girl
still reading some books

too little time for languages, but I started catching up on my anki reviews!

busy with school (I hate it but I have no choice any longer).
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mrwarper
Diglot
Winner TAC 2012
Senior Member
Spain
forum_posts.asp?TID=Registered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5224 days ago

1493 posts - 2500 votes 
Speaks: Spanish*, EnglishC2
Studies: German, Russian, Japanese

 
 Message 20 of 161
21 January 2014 at 9:49pm | IP Logged 
Mmmmph. Earlier today I read somewhere that eating chocolate will get you slimmer and that it's all the stuff you eat it with what will turn you into a ball, so it's the last time I give you credit for losing weight AND eating chocolate :)

Seriously, I wanted to comment that Themen Aktuell 1 is part of the German materials that I found so inconvenient last summer, so I'm interested in seeing how you wade through it (or how you finally chuck it just like I did). To me it felt like one of those 'choose your own adventure' books where you keep jumping pages, except that I didn't have a choice in where I wanted to go.

How do you feel about interleaving material just to follow the course? I could do that when attending classes, but jumping from lesson 1 on one book to lesson 1 on another, then back to book 1, lesson n +1 on my own made me hate it...
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patrickwilken
Senior Member
Germany
radiant-flux.net
Joined 4531 days ago

1546 posts - 3200 votes 
Studies: German

 
 Message 21 of 161
21 January 2014 at 10:42pm | IP Logged 
mrwarper wrote:
Mmmmph. Earlier today I read somewhere that eating chocolate will get you slimmer and that it's all the stuff you eat it with what will turn you into a ball, so it's the last time I give you credit for losing weight AND eating chocolate :)


Dark chocolate is seriously healthy: Health benefits for dark chocolate. If it's on the Internet is must be true. :)

mrwarper wrote:

Seriously, I wanted to comment that Themen Aktuell 1 is part of the German materials that I found so inconvenient last summer, so I'm interested in seeing how you wade through it (or how you finally chuck it just like I did). To me it felt like one of those 'choose your own adventure' books where you keep jumping pages, except that I didn't have a choice in where I wanted to go.


Funny I was quite fond of the Themen Aktuell books. I got them from the Goethe course in Berlin as well, and later when I was restarting my German I not only added all the word lists to Anki, but also every sentence from each lesson as a separate card. It worked well but after A1, and part of A2 I started reading books and couldn't be bothered to go further with the course.

My wife and used to crack up about the stories in the books. Heinz in Hamburg ? with his mohawk not getting unemployment benefits, or the little boy that suddenly wakes up alone on an autobahn rest stop and gets forgotten by his father etc. I think because I had these as sentences in Anki that I kept drilling the stories strangely stuck with me, as each sentence from different lessons would suddenly pop into my head. Good times...


Edited by patrickwilken on 21 January 2014 at 10:44pm

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Cavesa
Triglot
Senior Member
Czech Republic
Joined 5007 days ago

3277 posts - 6779 votes 
Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1
Studies: Spanish, German, Italian

 
 Message 22 of 161
24 January 2014 at 4:38pm | IP Logged 
Sorry for long time without answering. One thing at a time:

Dark chocholate is awesome! It's nearly as miraculous as coffee ;-) And nearly so awesome are milk chocholates with high % of cocoa powder (many people say it's nonsense but they are just proving their ignorance about chocholate). And as I buy quite expensive chocholate, I can afford smaller amounts and no extra sweets, which is great. I apply the same on high quality cheeses which I love (nearly all of them!).

Hmm... I find TA to be a high quality material, especially the exercise book (where the grammar explanations and vocab lists are as well). I do the jumping between material but I don't do it that way. It's more like "hey, past tense in this lesson? I should look up past tense in my grammar book". Jumping between full courses is more like "Got stuck at lesson 8? Why not continue with the other textbook where I got stuck at lesson 5 last time because of material I have learnt here since?". That way, I can give myself a more fun approach than when I tried to directly tie lesson 1-lesson 1, lesson 2-lesson 2 in past.

Yeah, I agree the authors of TA show quite a sense of humor. That is quite rare. And I like that TA isn't as filled as the multi-culti propaganda as other books. I am all for travelling, choosing where you wanna live and existing together no matter your origins. However, I find it quite cheesy how many textbooks today show multi-culti at the expense of actually teaching you about the culture itself, despite what they claim to do. Based on some textbooks, there are nearly no Germans in Germany :-D

I have one complaint against TA 1 actually. There is a page dedicated to various kinds of beer. Very informative and awesome. But! THe Pilsener kind of beer, which is of czech origin, is portraied with wrong glass. The glass there is served only in really high class (or snob) restaurants and social events. In almost all the usual restaurants and pubs, you get a kind of a glass beer mug, which istraditional and much more convenient. (Especially when you're having your fifth ;-) )

About my languages:

ASCR: French +6,5 movies, third season of Lost Girl. I love the show. The only thing I hate is that now I need to continue in English because I am so curious! And, strangely, I liked some of the characters more in the French dubbing than the original, which I find totally weird of course.

SPANISH!!!!!

Began reviewing, adding vocab to anki, basic grammar. Finding my way through it as painlessly as possible while not missing anything. My active Spanish is nearly nonexistent.

I finished Broken Sword in Spanish! I had played the game years ago and now again. And despite a few new words, I understood everything quite without troubles. It was fun and I didn't notice it was in Spanish at times. It was funny to hear Spanish with French accent (including moments when the characters mentioned they were speaking in English :-D ). And a few more accents, the creators and dubbers really did a good job here.

Edited by Cavesa on 24 January 2014 at 4:45pm

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Cavesa
Triglot
Senior Member
Czech Republic
Joined 5007 days ago

3277 posts - 6779 votes 
Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1
Studies: Spanish, German, Italian

 
 Message 23 of 161
24 January 2014 at 4:43pm | IP Logged 
Btw I'm a barbarian! I spell chocolate wrong al the time!

So, let's get it straight:
English: chocolate
German: die Schokolade
French: le chocolat
Italian (just in case I get to Italy and my life depends on it: ) cioccolato
Spanish: chocolate (masculin, i believe)
Swedish: choklad (u)
Czech (just in case you get here and your life depends on it: ) čokoláda
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patrickwilken
Senior Member
Germany
radiant-flux.net
Joined 4531 days ago

1546 posts - 3200 votes 
Studies: German

 
 Message 24 of 161
24 January 2014 at 5:38pm | IP Logged 
Cavesa wrote:

Yeah, I agree the authors of TA show quite a sense of humor. That is quite rare. And I like that TA isn't as filled as the multi-culti propaganda as other books. I am all for travelling, choosing where you wanna live and existing together no matter your origins. However, I find it quite cheesy how many textbooks today show multi-culti at the expense of actually teaching you about the culture itself, despite what they claim to do. Based on some textbooks, there are nearly no Germans in Germany :-D


My guess is that the multi-culti aspect of some textbooks is because they are designed for foreigners learning German in Germany. Apparently Americans/English/Australians aren't seen as a big market segment.

I also find some of the other textbooks just too PC in general. They have some single mother with a child, who goes school, gets a broken leg so they need to go to the hospital, goes to a party and listens to music etc. It's so booooring. It's really like an episode of Lindenstraße.

Cavesa wrote:

I have one complaint against TA 1 actually. There is a page dedicated to various kinds of beer. Very informative and awesome. But! THe Pilsener kind of beer, which is of czech origin, is portraied with wrong glass. The glass there is served only in really high class (or snob) restaurants and social events. In almost all the usual restaurants and pubs, you get a kind of a glass beer mug, which istraditional and much more convenient. (Especially when you're having your fifth ;-) )


Could that be a north vs south or east vs west thing? I have had these glasses quite often - see here - especially when I've gone to visit relatives in NW Germany. I've mostly had tankards like you said in Berlin.

I loved that chapter. I had every sentence of the Beer Lexicon as a separate Anki card. Different cards would pop-up on different days, along with the lost autobahn boy, the overstressed baker, and the poor wife who does everything. Good days!

Edited by patrickwilken on 24 January 2014 at 5:40pm



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