Даваи изучать по-русский
After finding this site I decided to take up Russian again – and start learning Spanish, as I wanted to do for a couple of years.
Motivation:
I don’t really know why I want to brush up my rusty Russian. Perhaps just because I like the language, or maybe only because I feel it’s a waste that я очень много забыл.
Or I maybe I really will read Russian literature – in my twenties, I loved reading Turgeniev, Gogol, Gorkij, Lermontov, and many others (in Danish translations) – never read Tolstoy or Dostoyevski, though.
I don't really know if I want to see the country again. Siberia, for sure, I was never there and always wanted to go. But Moscow? I think I might want that some day. Maybe perhaps possibly.
I do not expect to use my Russian very much, except for browsing the web. Motivation might be my weak point. I’ll see. Can you be motivated and still not be conscious about what motivates you?
Goal:
Reach basic fluency before August. Or, at least, be able to speak as much as I once was, and have a vocabulary that makes me able to understand most of a web page with non-specialized content.
Here’s the plan:
As I’m beginning Spanish at the same time, I don’t want to move too fast. I don’t want to confuse the languages.
Do about one chapter of Ruslan 3 each month. Listen to the audio several times, and when merely listening doesn’t bring me any further, I’ll read the textbook and use my dictionary.
Besides this, I'll listen to music I find and like. I'll try to figure out what is said (or sung - it's only in Turkish you "say the songs"), and if I'm not successful I'll cheat myself to a translation by an online translator.
What I’ve done so far:
On a trip to London in October, I bought the Ruslan 3 course. I'll be working with it the next months. I chose this one because
- It had an appropriate level of difficulty
- It’s set in Siberia, and Siberia always fascinated me
- Following advice on this site, I went for lots of audio
I’m through Chapter 1, working on Chapter 2. We’ve now arrived in Irkutsk, but I still miss some dictionary work in Chapter 1.
I’ve installed Russian keyboard support on my Windows PC and found Programs > Accessories > Accessibility > On-Screen Keyboard, thanks to 24karrot in the thread Russian keyboard layout. Recommendations.
I’ve found a lot of songs and their texts on the Internet. I listen and choose which to work with. Up till now it has been:
- Песенка о капитане, wonderfully sung by Загадка – it's not the pop singer who sings этим летом, is it?
- Анна Каренина by Алла Пугачева
- Течет река Волга, a well known song from the Soviet days, performed by Людмила Зыкина
- Молитва by Окуджава. For many years I've kept a little book with Russian and Danish texts for his songs. They are very well translated, and for some reason I especially liked the lyrics for this one.
- САМЫЕ КРАСИВЫЕ ГЛАЗА by Планка, I asked about a word in the song in this thread. Must remember to think of English loan words, there was no such thing in the seventies!
What else? Well, I got my grammar book down from the attic and bought a new mp3-player. Just a cheap one, I won’t pay 150€ for a name, not even a nice name like Ipod.
I’m going to make a post of links and tools and keep it updated – for my own sake, and it might help somebody else, too.
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