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Korean/Deutsch/Hindi - My journey | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| nekouma Triglot Newbie Germany Joined 4658 days ago 23 posts - 30 votes Speaks: French*, English, Japanese Studies: Korean, Hindi, German | Message 1 of 22 21 April 2012 at 4:35pm | IP Logged | ||
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안녕하세요?/Guten Tag/नमस्ते to everyone reading this log :)
I'm not sure yet what I'll write here and how often as I'm always pretty busy, but I'll try to keep track of my progress. I'll also use this log to write how many hours I'm studying each language, even though I sometimes think it could be useless. I just like statistics. Korean is my *main* language right now. I'm roughly studying 3 hours before going to work and 1 hour after work. I've been doing so since October (I already had a high beginner level before that). I know that it's going to be a long long way before being able to understand and speak correctly. I'm pretty happy to be on that long road. Along the way, I chose to take on German one month and a half ago cause I've been living in Germany since June and it would be a shame if I couldn't learn the language while I'm here. I'm learning around one hour after work. As a few of my neighbours are Indian and that I would like to talk with them in their language, I've also started to learn Hindi. For now, this is really just like a *side* project as I can only learn 30 minutes a day. I didn't write it in the title, but I'm also reviewing some Japanese, mainly kanji and I only work on the writing part. I don't think I'll ever forget how to read it but writing is another problem. Just playing with my kanji game 30 minutes, also after work. I wasn't sure about learning several languages at the same time. But, now, I know, for sure. That's a good choice... *for me*. I've found out that I cannot learn more than 4 hours a day of the same language and I don't like to stay idle. That's for my languages intro. I haven't written about my *system*. I have also found out that it works best for me if I only work 30 minutes for each activity. So, for example, for Korean, I study grammar from 5AM to 5:30AM, then from 5:30AM to 6AM, reading comprehension (textbook), then from 6AM to 6:30AM, I read a Korean book. After that, I need to rest, so I stretch, have a breakfast and then study again, listening comprehension for 30 minutes, etc... For me, it also works best if I study with different material. I've both a Japanese and an English textbook. That way, I can also review my Japanese :) For German, I've been using Assimil. I listen to the dialogue a number of time, shadow it a couple of time, then try to write it *before* reading the actual dialogue. Then, I listen to the dialogue while reading the text at the same time, then I listen while reading the French text. Then, I read again, but without listening to the audio. Then, I correct my mistakes. I usually remember mistakes. "Mistakes are good! Please make a lot of mistakes!" :D And mistakes are good... if someone let you know you have made a mistake. For Hindi, I'm using a Teach Yourself book. I bought myself the "Complete Hindi" package. I'm a bit upset that there are some noises on the recording (at least for the first few tracks). It makes the same noise as when a CD-Player cannot read a CD. Strange... Still, I've listened almost 200 hundred times to the first dialogue. I couldn't grasp it at all first (Except for a few words I already knew... "Namaste", "Shukrya" - not sure about the romanization -, "Aacha"). Now, I know every bit of it, even though I cannot yet tell the difference between the different "hai". That's all for now. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Ojorolla Diglot Groupie France Joined 4966 days ago 90 posts - 130 votes  Speaks: French*, English | Message 2 of 22 23 April 2012 at 12:13pm | IP Logged | ||
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4 hours a day for each language looks like a lot of time to me. I could never allot as much time because it would hinder the study of my major(and partly because I'm lazier than you). Currently all I do for my English is passively read a couple of posts or articles each day. I envy you:) Anyway, good luck with your studying.
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| nekouma Triglot Newbie Germany Joined 4658 days ago 23 posts - 30 votes Speaks: French*, English, Japanese Studies: Korean, Hindi, German | Message 3 of 22 24 April 2012 at 9:29pm | IP Logged | ||
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Ojorolla,
I wrote "I've found out that I cannot learn more than 4 hours a day of the same language" but that doesn't mean I study each language 4 hours day. That's what I found from my own experience. When I was studying Japanese, I used to study it up to 8 or 10 hours a day, but it was pretty useless (plus, I got some awful headaches at the time). Now, I study Korean between 3 and 4 hours a day (depending on the hour I wake up, as I don't use an alarm clock, it can vary). For the other languages, I only study German one hour, Hindi 30 minutes and review my Japanese (30 minutes). As I work, I cannot spend more time on language learning (even during the weekend, I study about 8 hours a day, at most). When I was still studying at university, I couldn't learn Korean for the same reason you mentioned, because it "would hinder my Japanese studies". Now, it's different :) 그리고 지금은 로버트처럼 공부하고 있어요. 매일 매일 꼭 언어를 배워요. 그런데 한국말은 아직 잘 못해요... 잘 못하니까 더 공부하고 싶어요 ㅎㅎ... 그건 무슨 악순환이지요? You know, I wasn't studying that long at first. Like "body training", it seems like I'm now "train" to study for hours. If you have time, you can try to just study one more minute every day/week/month and one day, you'll be able to study longer without knowing it :D Anyway, thanks a lot! :) 앞으로도 열심히 공부할 거예요. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Warp3 Senior Member United States forum_posts.asp?TID= Joined 5536 days ago 1419 posts - 1766 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Korean, Japanese | Message 4 of 22 25 April 2012 at 10:58pm | IP Logged | ||
Was that a spelling guess or have you seen "robot" written that way before? I can only recall seeing it written as "로봇" myself, but it wouldn't be the first loan word I've seen with multiple spellings. Is that 3 - 4 hours of Korean active study or does it include immersion (watching Korean video, listening to Korean audio, etc.) as well? I know I personally spend plenty of time on Korean if you count time I spend watching TV in Korean, listening to Korean music, etc. but I spend nowhere close to that much time on actual active study. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| nekouma Triglot Newbie Germany Joined 4658 days ago 23 posts - 30 votes Speaks: French*, English, Japanese Studies: Korean, Hindi, German | Message 5 of 22 26 April 2012 at 10:19pm | IP Logged | ||
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Warp3,
Thank you. I think I've heard in one of the "Talk To Me In Korean" lesson that in the past "로버트" was used but recently "로봇" is used. I just tried to type "로버트 robot" in Google and a few pages popped up. I had a look at the Wikipedia's article and it seems there is a song named "로버트". Maybe that, at some point, people were just trying to guess what could be the correct pronunciation and "로봇" finally won the battle. I don't usually include watching Korean videos in my "count". And I'm not sure that "reading a book can be considered as "active study", but I include it in my total number of hours. I usually study grammar everyday (+grammar exercises), read *actively* (I really concentrate on what I read), I do shadowing and or listening/writing. I also try to *compose* but I need more time, so that's during the weekends. All in all, it could be 3 hours without videos and 4 hours with. I think that if you really try to understand what is said in a TV show, it could be considered as "active listening", though (?). The funky part is that even though I'm studying kind a lot, I'm progressing rather slowly. When I try to talk with my friend on Skype, I can understand, let's say more than half of what she says, but I need a long time to reply. I remember it was like that with Japanese too, at the beginning, and that I had to talk each and every day one hour with my friend during one year to be able to handle basic conversation. So, I know I've to be patient. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| nekouma Triglot Newbie Germany Joined 4658 days ago 23 posts - 30 votes Speaks: French*, English, Japanese Studies: Korean, Hindi, German | Message 6 of 22 28 April 2012 at 11:26pm | IP Logged | ||
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오랜만이야, 친구!
Week 28 I will maybe do a summary of all the previous weeks some day, but this my 28th week of intensive Korean study. I must say that I didn't study as much as I want for a few reasons... I woke up at 6AM instead of 5AM usually, on Monday, was a bit tired on Friday evening and talk with my landlady about Hindi history and language until 10PM, so couldn't study German and Korean (but, I learned a lot about India, so, that's fine). Today, I met a Korean friend I hadn't seen for years. We talked using Japanese, Korean and English, and it was a lot of fun. I wish I could do that more often. I didn't get the time to study with my books, but in exchange, I got to talk, which is good. I have also noticed (I already knew about it) that I'll need a few more hours of listening/talking before being able to converse in Korean :D (few more hours==hundreds if not thousands). So, for this week: Korean: 12 hours and 30 minutes. German: 4 hours Hindi: 2 hours Japanese (kanji review): 2 hours. I'm still happy with my German memory retention. I still feel like I'm able to remember without learning it (by learning, I mean, by making lists or similar things). Assimil has been working well for me. For some reasons, the word "Pech" is coming to my mind now. I think the sentence was something like "Das ist wirklich Pech" in the lesson. I also made the same mistake twice when writing "Onkel", so now I can remember it. There was also this work "Verwandte" that I wasn't able to recognize while listening to the conversation. From now, it should be all right. Oh, and today, while walking in the streets, I was able to recognize a few words from people conversations, which made me happy. About Hindi, I was wondering why, in the dialogue, the man says something like "Rhâlî", whereas the women clearly says "Khâlî", which is how I would myself pronounce "ख़ाली" (empty). She told me it could be because one of the speaker is pronouncing the work the Arabic way, and the other (Khâlî) is the Hindi way. Oh, I've just noticed that I don't know how to type characters with the "point" below, like "ख़ा". I had to enter it with the virtual MS keyboard... (If someone read this and now how to do it, I would be grateful if he/she could help me^^). I'm still listening and trying to write the first 2 lessons of Teach Yourself. It doesn't really look like beginners lessons for me, actually. But after 200 times (or more?), I can recognize about everything. Just need to write everything down correctly now. I'd like to try it this way. Slowly but well, rather than fast but half done/understood. Anyway, I think that meeting my friend today and enjoying the (rare) sun will act like a boost for the next few weeks. Gute Nacht aus FFM. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Tenebrarum Groupie United States Joined 5407 days ago 84 posts - 115 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi | Message 7 of 22 29 April 2012 at 4:13am | IP Logged | ||
The dotted consonants in Hindi (ज़, फ़, ख़, क़, ग़) are used in loanwords from Persian/Arabic/Urdu and, in the case of the first two, English. They are pronounced za, fa, xa (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless_velar_fricative), qa (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiceless_uvular_plosive), and ɣ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiced_velar_fricative), respectively. In your example, both would be correct. In my experience ज़ and फ़ are used by most speakers (at least those in urban areas), while Kha vs. Xa depends on the speaker - I personally prefer using Xa (when appropriate), but many of the Hindi speakers I've met just use Kha. And as for the last two, I personally don't hear these used often by native Hindi speakers, but of course it would not be incorrect to use them! I know your question was pertaining only to the one sound, but I thought I'd throw the rest in as well! Enjoying your log - keep up the good work! Edited by Tenebrarum on 29 April 2012 at 4:15am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| nekouma Triglot Newbie Germany Joined 4658 days ago 23 posts - 30 votes Speaks: French*, English, Japanese Studies: Korean, Hindi, German | Message 8 of 22 06 May 2012 at 6:33pm | IP Logged | ||
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Hi Tenebrarum,
Thanks for the explanation and for the links! It'll surely help me when I meet those other characters/sounds at some point. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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