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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5209 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes  Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 177 of 217 03 July 2015 at 10:29am | IP Logged |
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Well done on the exam and good luck with Russian! I dabbled in it a few years ago, fascinating but definitely a big commitment, although with your native Czech and your language learning experience I'm sure you can tackle it. Maybe I'll come back to it someday, but it won't be any time soon.
I remember there was a "Russian phonetic" keyboard layout, I think it was called, where the Cyrillic letters were matched with Latin equivalents where possible. That might be the one you're thinking of. I didn't really get far enough to do much typing, although I had fun experimenting with the handwriting. Sounds like a sensible decision to leave Italian until your Spanish is more advanced. And I'm impressed by your French result: even if the writing let you down, your speaking score is no mean feat. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6599 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 178 of 217 03 July 2015 at 12:00pm | IP Logged |
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Oh yeah, I kinda focused too much on the negative. The speaking score is impressive!
Hmm I'm kinda starting to understand why it can be a good idea to delay Italian (or Portuguese) until one's Spanish is better. I guess you have enough awesome content in Spanish and aren't eager for anything specific in Italian? My situation was the opposite, hehe. My interests in Italian and Portuguese are more "specialized", and then I learned Spanish for the more "general" stuff :D 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| PeterMollenburg Senior Member AustraliaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5478 days ago 821 posts - 1273 votes Speaks: English* Studies: FrenchB1 | Message 179 of 217 03 July 2015 at 1:04pm | IP Logged |
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I know you were stating similar things with regards to my study hours early in the 6WC but, I'm not sure how
'you' manage it, your life that is. You do so much and still manage to do a decent amount of language learning, pass a French C2 exam, pathophys, deal with illness and fatigue, and take on learning Russian. Congratulations on all that you manage Cavesa. PM 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Cavesa Triglot Senior Member Czech Republic Joined 5011 days ago 3277 posts - 6779 votes Speaks: Czech*, FrenchC2, EnglishC1 Studies: Spanish, German, Italian | Message 180 of 217 03 July 2015 at 1:33pm | IP Logged |
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Thanks to everyone for responding, it is an honor you are with me!
Well, I cannot compare much with the DELE, as I haven't tried it yet, but only with the Cambridge exams, and my problem with French writing tasks had three parts: 1.I am too used to writing in other languages which means different styles. And the French are much more strict about the writing styles in general than the british are. And I should have writen even more in French as a preparation. The trouble is the exam being on March (the other option in June), which meant spliting my time between French and my university exams. But I could have done more, that is simply true. 2.The task was quite different from all those tasks I went through in my preparatory book. The instructions in the exam were a bit more free which left me unsure how creative should I be vs. how much should I stick to the dossier. 3.My grammar and such things. When it comes to French, I really need to reread things after myself, preferably after a bit of time, which is a luxury you are never gonna have in such an exam. I barely finished my task. Well, the ending was far from ideal, truth, that could have been a factor in my low grade as well. I had no time, had to shorten the last paragraphs, that is not a good combination. 1e4e6, I don't know that much about DELE, I am only considering the exam for November (no clue which level, certainly not C2 in my case). But making tons of mock papers (at least parts of them) is one of the common approaches to all the exams like these, no matter how many cons it does have. I still remember vividly my fellow candidates at the CAE in 2010, who spent all the breaks with their preparatory books open, complaining to each other the actual tasks weren't similar enough :-D I think writing a lot of practice writing tasks for any language is more fun and more challenging than drilling for multiple choice and such tests. On the other hand, I didn't find reading or listening tasks in my preparatory book to be that awesome, I mostly skipped those entirely. And certainly it is possible to pass without being an extreme driller, I am a proof. I'd say the balance between other ways to study and test drilling is a matter of individual style. Thanks, you are being too kind, inspiration is quite a strong word and I feel very flattered :-) C2 doesn't mean near perfect, that's what we tend to think when we look at it upwards from the lower level, I guess. One does not simply stop learning a language. Ever. THe oral exam was quite ok. I was prepared for the worst, given my previous experience with delf B2, which I described a few times in my logs. Really, I was prepared for the worst and the examinators were actually a pleasant surprise. They were interacting non verbally during my monologue parts (knowing the examinator is actually listening is always a good thing, such a thing as a nod is actually a huge gift in such a moment), asked lots of questions, gave me opportunity to correct my obvious mistake or two (a grammatical one and one "mistake" concerning the topic), they made me feel like I was being examined of the enviromentalism and my overall education instead of just French, which was actually great. I tend to forget about being nervous when I get in a good discussion :-) I found a tip on a forum for Russian learners about the keyboard, but the links were dead. I will google it. You can get a file that will turn your Russian keyboard into one ordered to mirror the latin ones (don't know which one since there are a few minor differences between those as well, I suppose the English one). Ah, now that I am reading further, Serpent remembers it as well! Thanks! I'll find it. Or I might just put stickers on my keys. Or wait a bit until I am able to, and then find a course of writing with all ten fingers for russians and just get used to the regular russian keyboard. I haven't decided yet. Yeah, Cyrillics is great! I still feel like a cartographist adventurer but I can actually read somehow already! Amerykanka, that's why I am trying, from now on, to use an active email for service I depend so much on! I was stupid. Hunger Games sound good but I'll save those for the moment I may try a language with fewer intermediate books available. If I ever get to one, I've just started Russian. But Polish was very tempting too. Elenia, I haven't studied patopsychology :-D Thanks, you've made me smile. You're not the only one confused with all those patosomethings. Actually my own head might be an example of patopsychology by the end of July, now that I think of it. My heart cried a bit about Swedish as well. Thanks for reminding me of my tablet, the keyboard is really well thought out there, it should help at least in the beginnings, thanks! Thanks for your encouragement, Garyb, I might have a bad habit of not looking enough on the bright side. Italian is a language I am extremely looking forward. But there are good reasons to postpone it. My huge advantage, when it comes to Russian, is not only my native language. It is my primary goal. First of all, I want to be able to read those sci-fi authors I love and as well those I haven't found yet. That is much easier than speaking and something I will surely enjoy. Truth be told, I am still torn a bit about speaking Russian as my country's history and some of today's politics make it a bit problematic culture. However, it is the trouble with every language. You cannot learn the language of Lukyanenko without Putin, Dumas without Hollande or Čapek without Zeman. That is a bit of a price that comes with understanding another language and culture, you don't get just the pretty parts. I remember stopping to like a Spanish music band when I understood their lyrics. Well, that's the life. But as long as I keep my main Russian goals on sight, I should be fine. :-) Time to study. 1 person has voted this message useful | |
| Nieng Zhonghan Bilingual Tetraglot Senior Member Antarctica Joined 3673 days ago 108 posts - 315 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, Japanese*, Spanish, Galician Studies: Finnish, Icelandic, Armenian, Mongolian Studies: Old English, Russian, English, German, Korean, Mandarin | Message 181 of 217 03 July 2015 at 2:05pm | IP Logged |
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I am using this keyboard:
http://softcorporation.com/products/cyrillic/klaviatura.html Some people prefer the following one: http://softcorporation.com/products/cyrillic/cyrillic-ru.htm l It will be interesting to see how easy Russian it is for a Czech native speaker. Good luck in your studies! PS: don't forget to delete the spaces in the links above. Edited by Nieng Zhonghan on 03 July 2015 at 2:06pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Via Diva Diglot Senior Member Russian Federation last.fm/user/viadivaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4236 days ago 1109 posts - 1427 votes Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German, Italian, French, Swedish, Esperanto, Czech, Greek | Message 182 of 217 03 July 2015 at 3:39pm | IP Logged |
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I join in to wish you luck, patience and everything you'd need to tame Russian :) I'm really glad to be among your sources for inspiration.
As for troubles with cyrillic handwriting I can recommend looking at some fonts, one called Ludvig van Bethoveen, for example. Oh, and be aware of this :D 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6599 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes 4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 183 of 217 04 July 2015 at 2:50am | IP Logged |
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Haha yeah these are hilarious :D
btw I recently found out that херня actually comes from Latin hernia. The rich would get a fake hernia diagnosis for their sons to avoid the army, and страдать хернёй ended up meaning "doing nothing". but to a modern Russian speaker it looks like "suffer from bullshit", because хер used to be the name of the letter x, which is the first letter of one of the main swear words, and often used in place of it. When the old name fell into disuse, it became almost as offensive as the real one. edit: and колготки was a borrowing from Czech, the o appeared as a hypercorrection. more cool etymology here :D Edited by Serpent on 04 July 2015 at 3:02am 3 persons have voted this message useful | |
| 1e4e6 Octoglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4292 days ago 1013 posts - 1588 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Norwegian, Dutch, Swedish, Italian Studies: German, Danish, Russian, Catalan | Message 184 of 217 04 July 2015 at 3:45am | IP Logged |
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I find it very intersting that you started Russian almost same time as I did, I guess
we are part of the club now. Interesting about the language and the politicians, though. When I learn Norwegian right now, I personally would not vote for Erna Solberg, nor when I study Dutch do I want to vote for Mark Rutte, and no way in hell do I think about voting for Rajoy when I do my Spanish studies. But I suppose that that, that is just the way it is. Actually I got interested in Russian mostly because I want to read and watch RT in Russian, which I usually do in Spanish, which has a major growing popularity base both in Spain and Latin America (especially Cuba, Venezuela, Ecuador, Argentina, and Chile), where it is shown regularly as part of their national television packages. About DELE, also with me, I am not committed to that exam yet either, definitely not right now (too much stress already!). I think that you could try at least the C1 though. Your writing is very good and the grammatical errors few, but it depends of coourse if you want to do through another stress to do one of those CEFR exams again :) Personally when I live in Manchester, there is a Instituto Cervantes right next to the city centre, so when Igo back again, I would be tempted someday to try the C2 there. And how convenient, it was just two blocks away from a Spanish restaurant where I ate probably at least 30 times before: Instituto Cervantes Manchester They have one surely in Prague? But you still doing this C2 and passing whilst doing simultaneously what I call one of the big three of academics, i.e. 1) Medicine, 2) either pure biological (biology, physiology, oncology, stem-cell, etc.) or pure physical science (chemistry, physics, astronomy, hydraulics), or 3) engineering (chemical, biochemical, civil, aeronautic, mechanical, electric, etc.) at the same time is seriously difficult, so you basically did what many people would find stressful. I was going to jump straight into the C2 DELE as the first language exam when I am ready, and see what happens. I have a friend who had no formal teaching/tutouring in chess, he went from being just around average in 2008 and now is literally in the Top 100 in the world rankings, just by self-study. No one thought that he had a chance in hell. His philosophy: Do your best and see what happens, and you shall be surprised. I always believe that anything is possible, and this my being a pessimist. Edited by 1e4e6 on 04 July 2015 at 4:26am 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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