Language Refresh

I went to World Market a couple of weeks ago and bought two diaries in which to attempt to write the old-fashioned way: one for Portuguese and one for Bulgarian so far (I would definitely like to get better at handwritten Cyrillic).

Romanian Love

I was looking at my Berlitz Romanian phrasebook this morning and thinking how much I love that language.  *starry eyes*

Dutch and Deutsch

I went to the library this afternoon and checked-out a country profile book about the Netherlands called Holland by Mies Bouhuys. It's pretty dated, copyright 1971, but it's written in English, Dutch and German, so I couldn't resist. Though there are whole pages with text, most is in the form of photo captions, making it a good way to read some Dutch in small doses.

Here's a random example, showing English, Dutch and German...

~Giethoorn is a true water village.

~Giethoorn is een echt waterdorp.

~Giethoorn ist ein echtes 'Wasserdorf'.

It's interesting to be able to compare these three related languages, even if the translation is nearly never as straight-forward as the above.

You Say What I Say

I've been making Slavic vocab lists. When learning languages that share a family (and even those that don't), it's helpful to look for alike words and phrases. That is, instead of thinking in terms of a single language, condense and conquer. ;)

Adeus, inverno!

I thought I would write some quick sentences alluding to the warm temps we've been experiencing. These sentences are pretty basic, but it's been a long time since I've attempted to write anything in Portuguese.

O tempo tem estado agradável esta semana.  O sol se põe mais tarde e nasce mais cedo agora que a primavera está praticamente aqui.  Quando está outono no Brasil, está primavera em Portugal e nos Estados Unidos.

The weather has been nice this week.  The sun is setting later and rising earlier now that spring is almost here.  When it's fall in Brazil, it's spring in Portugal and the United States.

An Ear for Languages

Since I thought Polish was Icelandic (of all things), I decided I should hone-up on my listening skills - an area I slack on in all of my languages. I brought along all my Polish books to my sister's and have worked out a plan for the dialogues:

~Listen 5x w/out looking at the transcript (to get a feel for what the speakers are saying).

~Listen and repeat 5x while this time looking at the words (to visually match sounds to letters).

~Listen and repeat 5x again w/out looking at the words.

I also like to do the reverse. Instead of waiting for the speaker, then mimicking them, I'll speak first and see if they match me.

A New Learning Idea

I love languages, but I've never been the type to dive head-first into the learning and it's a very frustrating trait to have. I listen passively, I read a paragraph (or worse yet, a sentence) and figure, "That's enough for today," I attempt to write once in a blue moon...oy vey! :)  Honestly though, I don't think it's that trait so much as it is I don't make use of what I've learned, no matter how small the amount, which is a great segue into the next topic...

One thing I've tried a couple of times is to write words, phrases and even brief grammar notes on a dry-erase board. I have a small one on my fridge and really should use this tactic more often, because once the books are closed, I rarely look again at the notes I took that day, but this dry-erase thing causes me to see those writings everytime I walk in de keuken. I can picture myself subconsciously repeating these new words/phrases throughout the day. As they enter into my lexicon more readily, I can erase them from the board, write them in a notebook (for safe keeping, in case they do fade from memory, although I hope enough repetition will make this event unlikely), then move on to the next set on a new day. I'll give this a more serious whirl and report back on whether it worked for me.