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| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5376 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 129 of 668 03 June 2012 at 7:58pm | IP Logged | ||
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As expected, I did not use FSI this week. I did, however, spend quite a bit of time with Spanish. I finished Piense y Hagase Rico (Spanish audio w/ English text) and now I am more than a third of the way through it Spanish/Spanish.
I think the narrator of the Da Vinci Code really spoiled me and got my hopes quite high for every other audio book. The narrator in the current book does not have too much emotion. The recording is not crystal clear and the audio does not always quite follow the text. I am very satisfied with the audio book, but it is certainly not perfect. I would say there is at least one place on every page where the audio is slightly different than the text... verb conjugation, extra phrase added, changed word, etc. I am not sure if it is because the translation is bad or if the narrator is simply saying something that feels more natural to him. These are really very minor comments as I am really quite satisfied with the book and audio. One of the reasons I am doing this book is because it is the type of book you can read over and over again and not get sick of it and always get something new out of it. One very good positive of the audio is that if I ever want to shadow it, it is of a very constant speed and rhythym that would be good for shadowing. I must say, however, that with the Spanish/Spanish I am noticing that there are still quite a few words I don't know. With the Spanish/English I felt like this was very easy, but I must have not really noticed how many words I was missing. It is still quite easy for me to follow, but it makes me think about how I really do need to improve my vocabulary. On a long drive for work I listened to the entire abridged audio book of Padre Rico. It is a bit over three hours (note: it is free online on youtube). I must confess that for about the last hour I was mostly daydreaming and not really paying too much attention. I have never read the book and this is only the second time I have listened to the audio and I found it fairly easy to follow. I wish there was a full length audio libro that I could use with text. I did a meetup. It was really great! There were a bunch of new native speakers and I think the native speakers outnumbered the people like me. I had a number of long talks with a few of the native speakers and it felt very good. One thing that seems to be confusing me more and more is when to use tu and usted. It seems the customs in different countries are very different. I tutear everyone and I am beginning to think that may not be appropriate in some circumstances because a number of the native speakers are responding with usted and others respond with tu. It really makes me feel strange because I don't have a clue. One of the native speakers corrected someone else in the group and said we should not to use tu with a certain older/distinguished member of the group. I am very much on a first name basis with this person so I don't know why I should not use tutear. I guess it is just one of those things you need to get the feel of as time goes by. I finished watching the first volume of The Practice. It felt nice to finish it even though it is only 13 episodes. I do not believe I had ever seen any of the episodes before, but I was familiar with the show and characters. I must have watched later seasons. Anyway, it was somewhat discouraging at times because I could not follow a number of the dialogues. I am sure I missed a number of the key points of some of the episodes. They speak fast. I do like using dubbed TV shows and I will keep doing it. I had a couple short skype talks. These are helpful and it helps my confidence when we switch to Spanish in order to make sure we are understanding each other... because my Spanish is pretty good now. I missed several days in a row of Anki... man, that screws things up... the cards just pile up and pile up and it turns into a big snowball. When I went back to it after a five day break I was so overwhelmed how many cards there were to review that I basically just quit. I really do need to work on vocab so I am determined to get caught up this upcoming week. I tried watching a couple online newscasts. One of the interviews I could understand quite easily. They were interviewing two congressmen about the upcoming presidential election. The other interview I watched I was completely and totally lost. They were interviewing two young Mexicans about some sort of demonstrations going on (I think... based only on the pictures they were showing). One of the young guys was speaking a mile a minute and I could not even pick up any real words. That was discouraging. I read some more of Breaking out of Beginner's Spanish. As usual, it is quite enjoyable... particularly for times when I don't really feel like reading, listening or speaking Spanish. I do feel quite bad that my other hobby (self study of economics) has suffered quite a bit over the last several months as I have completely neglected it and have put all my free time into Spanish. Hopefully I will be able to work the two hobbies together again or spend some more time on economics. That is it for last week. Now on to next week... and back to FSI. Only two more lessons left (unless I go back and do lessons 1 and 2 which I skipped). 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5376 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 130 of 668 10 June 2012 at 11:34pm | IP Logged | ||
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I only did half of FSI lesson 54 this week. I will finish it Mon and Tues.
I have been thinking about FSI a bit and why I think it is so good. Many people say it is "boring" when you are doing it or have some sort of other similar complaint. That may be true. It is quite exciting, however, when you are using the language in the real world after doing FSI. It is when I go to meetups or talk on skype that I really enjoy FSI. I also finished Piense y Hagase Rico. I did about 2.5 hours today to finish it and I would not have finished it without this log... I just felt like I would love to finish it this week. In actuality, this last time through the book I found it not too exciting. I think I have read it too many times and also, perhaps, the fact that it is non-fiction made it a bit harder to stick with. I did space out a bit during this last run through. The recording was not bad, but it had some obvious problems... there were a few times where the narrator screwed up and then went back and re-read the sentence and they did not edit it out. Not a problem, but certainly worth a chuckle. There were also a few places where paragraphs were either added or deleted... mostly, however, it was very good and I am happy I did it. I will certainly read it again sometime. I had a long drive for work and listened to most of Cajas de Carton on the ride... about 2.5 hours out of 3.5. It was quite enjoyable and very easy to follow. My Spanish has noticeably improved since the last time I listened to it. I had a few very good skype long skype talks. I am developing a couple new good partners and that is good. I have quite a few good partners now so availability and my schedule is not as much of a problem. I went to a meetup. It was ok. The presence of native speakers makes a huge difference for me. I don't think I watched any Spanish TV shows this week. I did find out that both La Reina del Sur and El Cabo are both available in their entirety (unabridged). I would like to start doing native telenovelas soon. I really wanted to do Tropico (I seem to be most drawn toward Dominican Spanish), but I do not believe it is available unabridged. I have been thinking more and more about another trip. I am really broadening my horizons and going to try to consider all options instead of just the ones closer to home. There are an incredible amount of amazing places to go in the Spanish speaking world. I am thinking about places in South America for this trip... but I am really just brainstorming at this stage. Now that I am done with Piense y Hagase Rico and almost done with FSI I need to think about what I will do next. I think I will likely tackle Atlas Shrugged, but I am not yet sure. The audio is 60 hours and it is a major committment. I know the book, which is helpful (I don't read much fiction). I fooled around with the audio and the text a bit and it seems harder to follow than the other books I have done becauseu the sentences seem longer and the Spanish switches the order around quite a bit. Also, the English uses a lot of detailed vocabulary that does not seem to really be fully translated into Spanish. There will be an obscure English word that I know I don't know in Spanish and then when I see how they translate it, it is clear they just translated it as a simpler word. Anyway, I am never going to run out of material. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Random review Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5784 days ago 781 posts - 1310 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German | Message 131 of 668 11 June 2012 at 10:54pm | IP Logged | ||
Good point, I never really thought of it that way, but it makes sense. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5376 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 132 of 668 18 June 2012 at 2:54am | IP Logged | ||
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OK, I finished FSI lesson 54 and did most of lesson 55. The only part I did not realy "finish" of lesson 55 is the last monster response drill. I read through it because in addition to testing your response it tests your memory of the facts of the FSI "story." I have no way of remembering the "answers" to many of the questions they pose. Anyway, it is pretty cool to be almost finished with FSI. I will certainly finish it this upcoming week and maybe even tomorrow.
In actuality, this past week and the past few weeks have been somewhat slower Spanish weeks. The other thing I have been doing this week, other than FSI, is trying to finish Breaking out of Beginner's Spanish. I read a few more chapters this week. It is very well worth it. I did some skype talking again this week which was good and helpful. I also did a meetup with a few native speakers and we just chatted for hours... probably about 2.5 hours of chit chat in Spanish. It was great. Boy, I cannot think of any other Spanish I did this week. It has indeed been kind of slow. I have not watched Spanish dubbed TV for weeks. I really need to get back into that. I was in a good groove. I think I will watch another season of CSI and then try La Reina del Sur. I wish I could find the audio book of La Reina del Sur, but I have come to the conclusion that it is basically impossible to find now. I will, however, get the English version of the book and read that before going through the telenovela. I think reading it in English will give me plenty to make certain I can follow the TV program. I definitely want to finish Breaking out of Beginner's Spanish. That should not be too hard as I am almost done. I have been thinking more and more of doing a fast active wave of both Assimil courses (without toil and with ease). I have noticed that I have forgotten a lot of the vocabulary I learned in those books. For example, there will be some word that I know I know from Assimil, but I just cannot recall it. This has been happening a lot to me lately. I think whizzing through Assimil will really give a good needed boost to my vocabulary. I think I need to get more "hungry" for a challenge before I move on to Atlas Shrugged. I'd like to relax a bit after finishing FSI before embarking on a 60 hour audio book. My thought to broaden my horizons a bit with my search for another trip has really gotten me excited. Opening up South America as a possible destination has been awesome. I should be able to take two weeks this time. Tickets seem cheap now and some of the countries seem to have very affordable Spanish schools. Hopefully pretty soon I will make the plunge and buy tickets. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| ajackso3 Newbie United States Joined 4554 days ago 29 posts - 52 votes Speaks: Spanish | Message 133 of 668 18 June 2012 at 5:57am | IP Logged | ||
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Do you have any specific thoughts on where you'll be traveling? Somewhere in continental SA or are you including
Central America and the Caribbean in your search? My advice would be to avoid the typical tourist cities/countries, as it will be too easy to fall back on your English. Good luck with your studies! It looks like you've made tremendous progress so far! Andrea 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5376 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 134 of 668 19 June 2012 at 2:13am | IP Logged | ||
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Thanks for your advice, Andrea. I agree with you. I have very little interest in going to traditional tourist locations. For this trip I am open to going anywhere in Latin America. The biggest factor for me is safety/security. I don't want to go somewhere that is unsafe. I went to Santo Domingo for a week. It was a great trip, but I did not feel particularly safe there. The other factor is overall cost. Because I will likely have two weeks for this trip I am thinking of going to SA simply because I may never get two weeks at once ever again. It also feels like going to SA in November would make more sense than going to the Caribbean (plus, my last trip was to the Dominican Republic). Right now I am thinking of Ecuador, but I could really go anywhere.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| ajackso3 Newbie United States Joined 4554 days ago 29 posts - 52 votes Speaks: Spanish | Message 135 of 668 19 June 2012 at 3:12am | IP Logged | ||
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Safety is always important to consider when traveling. In addition to reading up on what the State Department has
to say about a given destination, I would also invest some time in reading up about what other travelers have to say about safety concerns as well as the country's current events--you could even get more language practice reading the local newspapers. I think I remember reading somewhere that Ecuador is set to have presidential elections early in 2013--this could potentially affect your sense of security in the country. The people in many Latin American countries are much more politically average than the average person in the US--demonstrations, protests etc--which most often do not result in significant violence, but can affect how comfortable you feel. I have a friend who spent a couple of weeks in Ecuador after a semester in Peru and she enjoyed her time there. If you start considering Central America feel free to ask me if you have questions--I spent a semester in Nicaragua and also spent some time in El Salvador and Costa Rica. Good luck with your decision--I'm sure you will have a great experience wherever you go! 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Random review Diglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5784 days ago 781 posts - 1310 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German | Message 136 of 668 20 June 2012 at 2:45am | IP Logged | ||
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If I had two weeks in Latin America I'd pick two different bases in very different
cultural areas. In a big country like Columbia you can do this without ever crossing a border. Also, I know you are concerned about safety but don't forget the element of adventure! 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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