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Rdearman Super Challenge Log

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montmorency
Diglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 4642 days ago
2371 posts - 3676 votes 
Speaks: English*, German
Studies: Danish, Welsh

 
 Message 57 of 158
29 August 2014 at 11:21am | IP Logged 
rdearman wrote:
montmorency wrote:
Have you thought of trying the Inspector
Montalbano books, if you can get hold of them? Could be interesting. There are (at
least some) English translations as well.


I have the whole series in Italian and I started to read the first one, but brother it
is a HARD SLOG! It was so difficult on the first page I decided to park them until the
end of this year. I'm hoping with enough exposure to some young adult books I can get
enough vocabulary under my belt to start again.

My tutor, who has read them, told me to wait before I start them. There are apparently
a lot of Sicilian slang and dialect not used normally on the mainland. But I do want to
read them, I love the TV show. I actually preferred the "Young Montalbano" series. That
one is really good, don't know if the BBC will show it again though.

Oh! Thanks for reading my log BTW. :)


Ah, right. That, I can understand. Do you have or would you get the translations? I
noticed there were a lot of English titles in amazon.co.uk, but whether you can get the
whole series in translation is another matter. Yes, the TV series is great. My wife
really liked the Young Montalbano ones. I think I prefer the "old" ones. :-)
2 persons have voted this message useful



rdearman
Senior Member
United Kingdom
rdearman.orgRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5050 days ago
881 posts - 1812 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Italian, French, Mandarin

 
 Message 58 of 158
29 August 2014 at 11:57am | IP Logged 
I probably wouldn't get the translations. Not because; "I want to read the original Italian" snobbery, but more because; "I paid for the bloody things, I'm damn well going to use them!" sort of mentality. :)

I just want to read more fluidly before picking them up again, this is why I decided to wait until the end of the year. Even at my abysmal reading rate, I'll have another 13 books under my belt before dipping into Montalbano in January.

Last night I was thinking; it is interesting for this challenge in French & Italian I have been reading mystery novels and horror books, two genre which I never normally read. So if nothing else if has made switch it up a little in the genre department.




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rdearman
Senior Member
United Kingdom
rdearman.orgRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5050 days ago
881 posts - 1812 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Italian, French, Mandarin

 
 Message 59 of 158
04 September 2014 at 1:02pm | IP Logged 
--- Weekly Update ---
I've concentrated on reading Italian this week and not a lot else, I've read a few pages of "Le Flèau" in French, but for the most part I only wanted to complete the "Doppio Misto" book in Italian and start on the Hardy Boys mysteries in Italian. So last week I read two books. The Hardy Boys is a much easier book for me, and compared to some of the other stuff I have been reading in Italian I've been flying through it! I've not watched any film due to lack of time, and where I have had time to listen or watch it has been Mandarin.


--- SC Statistics ---
French : 22.4 books : 60.3 films
Italian : 15 books : 64.1 films

Reading Averages Change
French: 1.238 books per week --> 1.178 books per week (slight decrease)
Italian: 0.738 books per week --> 0.789 books per week (slight increase)

So at my current rate I will be successful in French with 103.74 books and fail in Italian by 30.52 books.

French
Only about 5 pages of "Le Flèau".

FILMS
No films or audio books this week.

BOOKS

Books I am reading are:
"Le Fléau" - Stephen King

Italian
"Doppio Misto" is done!!! Let the angels sing. It is a pretty good book, but I didn't get the jokes so for me it was very hard going. I've moved on to the Hardy Boys books in Italian and they are much nearer my level. Still dipping in and out of the LWT to read a few pages of "Io Sono Leggenda" only 2-5 pages a week though. I watched only one film this week, Mediterraneo. I have this on DVD and I've watched it 3 times so far. It was really easy to understand everything this time around.

FILMS
"Mediterraneo" - Bunch of Italian soldiers forgotten on a small greek island in the middle of WWII. Very good film.

BOOKS
"Io Sono Leggenda"
"Doppio Misto" - Claudio Bisio & Sandra Bonzi
"Il Marchio di Fuoco" | Hardy Boys Mystery - Frank Dixon

Conclusion

Not much to report, but I'm a lot more hopeful of being able to complete the challenge in both languages, given the right set of books. I'm going to slow leak the French for one more week, while trying to zip through some Italian books. THen I need to get back to a better balance of languages.

Good luck to everyone in the super challenge, and anyone learning a language.
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rdearman
Senior Member
United Kingdom
rdearman.orgRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5050 days ago
881 posts - 1812 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Italian, French, Mandarin

 
 Message 60 of 158
11 September 2014 at 1:30pm | IP Logged 
--- Weekly Update ---
Change to the format (making it shorter) this week since I've only really read two books and watched a couple of movies. I've read "Le Flèau" in French, my ongoing Stephen King book and I've continued reading "Il Marchio di Fuoco" a Hardy Boys Mystery in Italian. I watched an hour of "Cinema Paradiso" in Italian and "Captain America" in French. I've spent a lot of my time on Mandarin (50+ hours in the 6 week challenge) this last week, and because of the shortage of staff at work I've had to work thruogh the lunch when I normally read. Still the Hardy boys is much closer to my current level and I'm progressing well with it. With French I continue to find it easier to read, but my pronounciation (according to my tutor) is poor, so I'm planning to do some reading & listening to some librox books. Jules Verne most likely.

The ANKI decks for French has helped me a lot with reading, and the 5000K headwords EMK gave me. I'm falling slowly down the list as people shoot past me with both books and films, but I will get there eventually.

--- SC Statistics ---
French : 22.8 books : 61.6 films
Italian : 16 books : 64.7 films

Reading Averages Change
French: 1.178 books per week --> 1.140 books per week (slight decrease)
Italian: 0.789 books per week --> 0.800 books per week (slight increase)

So at my current rate I will be successful in French with 100.32 books and fail in Italian by 29.60 books. So this is the last week I can ignore French & work on Italian. Now I need to buckle down and do both. I need to be reading at least 62 pages per week in Italian and 57 pages per week in French.

Good luck everyone with the super challenge and with you're own language learning.
1 person has voted this message useful



rdearman
Senior Member
United Kingdom
rdearman.orgRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5050 days ago
881 posts - 1812 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Italian, French, Mandarin

 
 Message 61 of 158
18 September 2014 at 12:18pm | IP Logged 
--- Weekly Update ---
I'm still reading "Le Flèau" in French, and I've completed "Il Marchio di Fuoco" in Italian and I've moved on to another Hardy Boys mystery in Italian called: "Pericolo in Mare". I'm finding it easier to read the young adult books in Italian and with the daily infliction of ANKI cards in French of the most frequent words (top 5000) my reading rate in French has doubled from when I started the Super Challenge. I set myself a goal in my post in June to
Quote:
try to get my reading speed up into the 2-3 minutes per page in the next few months.
Last night I timed my French reading at a little under 3 pages per minute. Basically I can now read ~20 pages per hour in French of "Le Flèau". I'm not sure how much of this is familiarity with Stephen Kings style, having read the book in English previously and how much is actual improvement. So I did a little test read of a French newspaper article which is 348 words which I managed to read in 3 minutes 18 seconds. So I believe the speed improvement is legitimate. I might try the reading comprehension test again soon.

I watched a Brazilian movie (dubbed in French) called "Basouro" which has to be among the top 10 worst movies I've ever seen in my life. And I've watched some really crap B-movies. The blurb on the IMDB is: "Based on the life of a legendary capoeira fighter from Bahia, "Besouro" spins a fantastic tale of a young Brazilian man of African descent in search of his mission." If this was based on his real life, then this fellow was on some serious hallucinogenic drugs! He sees naked water nymphs and invisible warriors. So my recommendation: Best avoided.

Haven't watched anything in Italian this week, but I've seen a couple of series which I like the look of so I might begin to ratchet up the film watching.

Bit depressing that I'm falling slowly down the rankings as people shoot past me with both books and films, but I'm in it to complete, not win.

--- SC Statistics ---
French : 24 books : 62.6 films
Italian : 17.3 books : 64.7 films

Reading Averages Change
French: 1.140 books per week --> 1.142 books per week (slight increase)
Italian: 0.800 books per week --> 0.823 books per week (slight increase)

So at my current rate I will be successful in French with 100.57 books and fail in Italian by 27.50 books.

Good luck everyone with the super challenge and with you're own language learning.
1 person has voted this message useful



rdearman
Senior Member
United Kingdom
rdearman.orgRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5050 days ago
881 posts - 1812 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Italian, French, Mandarin

 
 Message 62 of 158
25 September 2014 at 2:56pm | IP Logged 
--- Weekly Update ---
I'm still reading "Le Flèau" in French, and I'm halfway though a Hardy Boys mystery in Italian called: "Pericolo in Mare". Lots of life getting in the way this week, so not much to report. I watched last half of "Captain America" in French but nothing in Italian this week other than a couple of podcasts.

--- SC Statistics ---
French : 24.3 books : 63.4 films
Italian : 18.3 books : 65.3 films

Reading Averages Change
French: 1.142 books per week --> 1.104 books per week (slight decrease)
Italian: 0.823 books per week --> 0.831 books per week (slight increase)

At my current rate I will fail in French with 97.19 books and fail in Italian by 26.80 books. But although I'm scheduled for failure I'm not overly concerned because I can literally read at twice the speed I could in French as when I started, and I think Italian is not far behind. So if 22 weeks of reading can double my speed will another 22 weeks double it again? I hope so! I've got 66 weeks to increase the amount and speed at which I read and it should be achievable. Also some of the "life hits" I've been taking are levelling off and I'll be able to get out and read a lunchtimes again, 5 hours a week which I lost over the last month.

I've done some charts based on the amount I've done so far just to compare weekly averages. Unfortunately I didn't start recording from the beginning so I've only got a limited amount of data.






Good luck everyone with the super challenge and with you're own language learning.
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Jeffers
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 4723 days ago
2151 posts - 3960 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German

 
 Message 63 of 158
28 September 2014 at 11:27pm | IP Logged 
Nice progress, rdearman. I'm especially impressed by the statistics and charts you use. I agree with you that your reading rates will improve over time, so it looks like you will definitely meet your goals.
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rdearman
Senior Member
United Kingdom
rdearman.orgRegistered users can see my Skype Name
Joined 5050 days ago
881 posts - 1812 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Italian, French, Mandarin

 
 Message 64 of 158
29 September 2014 at 12:11pm | IP Logged 
Jeffers wrote:
Nice progress, rdearman. I'm especially impressed by the statistics and charts you use. I agree with you that your reading rates will improve over time, so it looks like you will definitely meet your goals.


Thanks, I'm a bit of a chart geek so I like looking at the numbers! Love the pretty pictures. :)


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