tastyonions Triglot Senior Member United States goo.gl/UIdChYRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4663 days ago 1044 posts - 1823 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish Studies: Italian
| Message 17 of 70 21 December 2012 at 1:19pm | IP Logged |
Yeah, those Tintin books look really entertaining. I believe I'm going to buy Le Lotus Bleu.
Glad to hear Assimil is going well for you, too.
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Quique Diglot Senior Member Spain cronopios.net/Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4680 days ago 183 posts - 313 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: French, German
| Message 18 of 70 28 December 2012 at 12:57pm | IP Logged |
The last few days I hardly did any study, because of XMas. I'll try now to resume my French studying habits. So, back to logging!
Assimil: I did lesson 32, and took dictation from lesson 2. Dictation seems to be really helpful: it urges me to pay attention to details, both when listening and when writing.
Tintin: I read L'île noire. I noticed that, thanks to this comic, I've already become familiar with a few words (gaillard, plaisanterie, gredin). Of course there were many other words that I didn't know but I could understand in context, and that I would not yet recognize by themselves.
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Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5332 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian
| Message 19 of 70 28 December 2012 at 1:23pm | IP Logged |
I learned a lot of my French from cartoons as well. I used Asterix (which I still love) but I am sure Tintin works
just as well - they both have a rich vocabulary and lots of jeux de mots.
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Quique Diglot Senior Member Spain cronopios.net/Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4680 days ago 183 posts - 313 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: French, German
| Message 20 of 70 01 January 2013 at 10:49pm | IP Logged |
Assimil: today I did lesson 33, and took dictation from lesson 3. Lesson 33 from El nuevo francés sin esfuerzo seemed to speed up; I had to listen to it quite a few times.
Yeah, I'm falling a bit behind, despite I don't have to work these days. Probably that's actually the reason: even though I have much more time, I don't have a daily routine.
I'll spend the next few days in my hometown, but I'm bringing some of my studying materials with me, and I'll try to study a bit every day.
Next week everything will be back to normal.
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Quique Diglot Senior Member Spain cronopios.net/Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4680 days ago 183 posts - 313 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: French, German
| Message 21 of 70 03 January 2013 at 11:56pm | IP Logged |
Assimil: I did lesson 34 and took dictation from lesson 4.
I learned that celui-ci, celui-là, celle-ci and celle-là are
variable
demonstrative pronouns, which refer to a previously-mentioned noun.
On the other hand, ceci and celà
are
indefinite demonstrative pronouns, do not have a specific antecedent and thus do
not have different forms for gender and number.
Linguaphone: Did Lesson 5. I mean: I listened the audio a few times and read
the transcript looking for a couple of words I didn't get. I didn't even take a look
at the grammar notes.
There was a thread about odd things in learning materials. This lesson had this
conversation:
- Oh! C'est un beau bebe. II est adorable! II est beau comme son pere, n'est-ce pas?
- Nicolas est beau comme moi? II est vilain comme un singe!
Edited by Quique on 03 January 2013 at 11:57pm
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Quique Diglot Senior Member Spain cronopios.net/Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4680 days ago 183 posts - 313 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: French, German
| Message 22 of 70 08 January 2013 at 2:59pm | IP Logged |
Holidays are over :-(
I will miss sleeping up to 10 hours, but my French studies will be now better served.
Assimil: I did lesson 35, and took dictation from lesson 5.
I'm a bit confused about `si' and `aussi' (both are `tan' in Spanish).
After reading this thread, I think that `si' means `so', and `aussi' means `as'. Thus:
- Ne soyez pas si curieux. L'air est si pur ici.
- Je suis aussi grand que toi.
Am I right?
But then, FWT has:
- Est-elle toujours aussi amusante?
On the dictation I had a mistake with the genre of a word. For most words, the genre is the same in Spanish and French, so it's easy for me to overlook the cases when it is different.
I've been googling for a list of such words, but I didn't find any. So maybe I'll have to do it myself :-(
These are some words I came across:
une assiette - un plato
le beurre - la mantequilla
la dictée - el dictado
le dîner - la cena
le dos - la espalda
une épaule - un hombro
un escalier - una escalera
le genou - la rodilla
la glace - el helado/el hielo
le lait - la leche
le miel - la miel
le mot - la palabra
la poitrine - el pecho
le poivre - la pimienta
le sel - la sal
le soir - la tarde
un sommet - una cumbre
le veau - la ternera
Edited by Quique on 08 January 2013 at 3:04pm
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geoffw Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 4686 days ago 1134 posts - 1865 votes Speaks: English*, German, Yiddish Studies: Modern Hebrew, French, Dutch, Italian, Russian
| Message 23 of 70 08 January 2013 at 3:50pm | IP Logged |
My general sense is that "aussi" always has a suggestion that a first something is being compared to a second
something else, whereas "si" merely indicates that a first something has a certain quality to a notable degree, but
does not include a connotation of comparison.
Those who are more knowledgable than I are invited to chime in.
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Quique Diglot Senior Member Spain cronopios.net/Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4680 days ago 183 posts - 313 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: French, German
| Message 24 of 70 08 January 2013 at 4:33pm | IP Logged |
geoffw wrote:
My general sense is that "aussi" always has a suggestion that a first something is being compared to a second something else, whereas "si" merely indicates that a first something has a certain quality to a notable degree, but does not include a connotation of comparison. |
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That's what I think. But then I'm puzzled by that sentence in FWT (Est-elle toujours aussi amusante?).
I just noticed that the English translation reads `Is she always as amusing?'. `As'???
Maybe my English-fu is failing me here :-/
How do these English sentences differ?
- Is she always as amusing?
- Is she always so amusing?
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