Tickets are bought and our trip is set... well, at least the start and end dates and locations are set. As for the in-between, I realistically have maybe two plus weeks to figure it out.
Two months for one day.
Two weeks for one month.
There's something a bit off about that.
These last two months of planning marathon that culminated in a day + a few was really just a few droplets in the pond. Excited there's lots more ^o^ to come!
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
why cjk (+i)?
So what's the goal of this CJK (+I)? Does there have to be a goal? What's the point of people watching reality TV shows? Or movies? Or playing basketball? Or playing video games? Or anything else anyone does for fun? I guess I just find this non-standard activity of languages fun ^o^
I might have some very long-term, way-way-way-in-the-future goals, maybe...
C... to eventually be able to read and understand 西遊記, 紅樓夢, 水滸傳, and 三國演義. I loved all the TV-adaptations of 金庸's books, so I'd like to read those, too. And according to my dad, I should attempt 金庸 before something like 紅樓夢, which may take me forever to read, especially if I want to actually understand it.
J... to eventually be able to read manga and understand anime, in their original (non-fansubbed, of course).
K... I initially had the goal of just "survival Korean", but it's supposedly easy to get around Korea with English. So, there's really no goal there... it really is just because the KClass podcasts are fun to listen to.
I... whenever I get back to it, I'll finish 'Le avventure di Pinocchio'.
Ok, so those aren't really 'goals' in the traditional American this-will-help-me-climb-up-the-ladder kind of way. They're goals towards doing other things that I find 'fun'. I'm odd, I know.
I might have some very long-term, way-way-way-in-the-future goals, maybe...
C... to eventually be able to read and understand 西遊記, 紅樓夢, 水滸傳, and 三國演義. I loved all the TV-adaptations of 金庸's books, so I'd like to read those, too. And according to my dad, I should attempt 金庸 before something like 紅樓夢, which may take me forever to read, especially if I want to actually understand it.
J... to eventually be able to read manga and understand anime, in their original (non-fansubbed, of course).
K... I initially had the goal of just "survival Korean", but it's supposedly easy to get around Korea with English. So, there's really no goal there... it really is just because the KClass podcasts are fun to listen to.
I... whenever I get back to it, I'll finish 'Le avventure di Pinocchio'.
Ok, so those aren't really 'goals' in the traditional American this-will-help-me-climb-up-the-ladder kind of way. They're goals towards doing other things that I find 'fun'. I'm odd, I know.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
read to your kids and take them to the library
I went to the library to pick up my LINK+ hold today. That was the goal. But as usual, I came out with five more books than that. The path is analogous to my mental association paths... I'm thinking about k and I end up at w through funky leaps in the mind.
So, the path today... I walked over to the hold section to pick up a couple of other non-LINK+ holds, both of which weren't there, so I walk towards the circulation desk to inquire about them. In the corner of my eye, I noticed they moved the specific-language books next to the CDs (the library collections were re-organized recently). Go over to browse... for? I don't know, just to browse. Chinese cookbooks, nope, all out. Japanese section. Children's books in other languages. So, in addition to my LINK+ hold, I walked out with some Chinese and Japanese picture books.
I think it was a leftover impulse checkout from my trip to the Sunnyvale library the other day. I went there to get HP1 in Chinese (only got to Chapter 5 before having to return it to Palo Alto). It was missing, even though the computer catalog said it should be on the shelf. However, I did pick up HP2 and 3... which were in the same children's Chinese section. Of course, I browsed the children's books in other languages while I was in the section. But, I stopped myself from taking any; I was already leaving with eight more books that I didn't originally intend to get.
It's one of the benefits of learning another language... I get to read children's books. I think children's books have a special allure for me because I didn't get enough of them when I was a kid. Actually, I don't think I had any. Nor was I one of those kids checking out 10 picture books from the library every week. My parents worked all day every day and they didn't know about the library. I remember buying books at the yearly school book fair in 2nd and 3rd grades and read them many times over. But that was already post-picture book stage, "J" section material. I think I discovered the local library in 5th or 6th grade. And well, here I am now.
So, the path today... I walked over to the hold section to pick up a couple of other non-LINK+ holds, both of which weren't there, so I walk towards the circulation desk to inquire about them. In the corner of my eye, I noticed they moved the specific-language books next to the CDs (the library collections were re-organized recently). Go over to browse... for? I don't know, just to browse. Chinese cookbooks, nope, all out. Japanese section. Children's books in other languages. So, in addition to my LINK+ hold, I walked out with some Chinese and Japanese picture books.
I think it was a leftover impulse checkout from my trip to the Sunnyvale library the other day. I went there to get HP1 in Chinese (only got to Chapter 5 before having to return it to Palo Alto). It was missing, even though the computer catalog said it should be on the shelf. However, I did pick up HP2 and 3... which were in the same children's Chinese section. Of course, I browsed the children's books in other languages while I was in the section. But, I stopped myself from taking any; I was already leaving with eight more books that I didn't originally intend to get.
It's one of the benefits of learning another language... I get to read children's books. I think children's books have a special allure for me because I didn't get enough of them when I was a kid. Actually, I don't think I had any. Nor was I one of those kids checking out 10 picture books from the library every week. My parents worked all day every day and they didn't know about the library. I remember buying books at the yearly school book fair in 2nd and 3rd grades and read them many times over. But that was already post-picture book stage, "J" section material. I think I discovered the local library in 5th or 6th grade. And well, here I am now.
Sunday, April 27, 2008
cjk
Knowing the characters from Chinese helps a bit with reading Japanese. For the most part, they keep the same meaning, or similar meaning, or at least helps with the Japanese meaning. I have not yet come across 'fake friends', but there probably are some. The nice thing about the Assimil dialogs is they're in full kanji with furigana. (Now, if only they didn't have the romanji that distracts the eyes!) It's strange... I now know some characters in the Japanese context but not the Chinese context -_-
The earlier start with Korean helps too, like today. Some time over the last several Assimil lessons, I started encountering what seems like the Japanese equivalent of Korean 하다 verbs. I was having a bit of trouble wrapping my mind around it, until today, when it clicked... 'these are like 하다 verbs!'. (I become excited easily.) It's really weird... 하다 verbs were fine for me when I learned them in Korean, but the Japanese version just didn't sit well until I made the connection.
After using Heisig's 'Remembering the Kana' to learn hiragana (katakana soon, too), I picked up his 'Remembering the Kanji' from the library. It seems like a nice system to learn kanji, except I think it's missing something vital for me. It's all in English! I want to also have the Chinese pinyin and context (I might as well learn it for both and skip the English step). I think for me, a cross between it and McNaughton's 'Reading & Writing Chinese' would be ideal.
The earlier start with Korean helps too, like today. Some time over the last several Assimil lessons, I started encountering what seems like the Japanese equivalent of Korean 하다 verbs. I was having a bit of trouble wrapping my mind around it, until today, when it clicked... 'these are like 하다 verbs!'. (I become excited easily.) It's really weird... 하다 verbs were fine for me when I learned them in Korean, but the Japanese version just didn't sit well until I made the connection.
After using Heisig's 'Remembering the Kana' to learn hiragana (katakana soon, too), I picked up his 'Remembering the Kanji' from the library. It seems like a nice system to learn kanji, except I think it's missing something vital for me. It's all in English! I want to also have the Chinese pinyin and context (I might as well learn it for both and skip the English step). I think for me, a cross between it and McNaughton's 'Reading & Writing Chinese' would be ideal.
Monday, April 21, 2008
2008: International Year of Languages
It would have been nice if I didn't drop the ball on Chinese after the semesters of Streamlined in college... seems like those four semesters were basically a waste since I forgot it all during the last seven years. Ok, it wasn't a total waste; I probably could re-learn characters a lot faster than if I had to learn them from scratch. Anyways, that's the past.
Chinese... is not at the forefront of my language studies at this moment, but it hasn't totally dropped off. The occasional ChinesePod (yay cpod!) and "reading" HP in simplified... well, while listening to it on audio since my characters knowledge is still quite limited.
Italian... was only supposed to be for the Europe trip. It took a while to get myself to let go, but finally it was forced off a couple of months ago from other priorities and lack of time. Is it really? Well, for the most part at least ^_^''.
Korean... started late January. It made me realize that I don't really like Pimsleur. It's too... boring? It was good for starting out, but I really had to force myself to do the lessons each day after a while. I was transcribing the beginning dialogs in Hangul and then posting on the htlal forums to check for correctness since what I thought I was hearing wasn't always exactly what was said. I eventually ended up directly emailing someone I met on the forums. Both the forum and email really helped because I couldn't really slack off haha. The person made an interesting comment at the end of the 30 lessons... that she was 'inspired by my conviction'. Anyways, all KClass101 now... yay for fun podcasts! But it's fallen off a bit too :-/
Japanese... is the culprit for the fall off of Korean and Chinese. Started a few weeks ago, the last day of March. It's easy to keep track of the start because I've done one Assimil lesson a day since then. There's 99 lessons total and it's entirely "passive" learning until lesson 50, i.e. only listening and understanding and no production. It's kind of an interesting concept since any classroom-centered class makes you speak right away (and also the exact opposite of Pimsleur). So, Assimil and JPod101, from the same people who started KClass101. Or rather, I should say that KClass101 is from the same people who started JPod101, since jpod came first ^_~
Apparently 2008 is the UN-proclaimed International Year of Languages... an appropriate coincidence ^o^
Chinese... is not at the forefront of my language studies at this moment, but it hasn't totally dropped off. The occasional ChinesePod (yay cpod!) and "reading" HP in simplified... well, while listening to it on audio since my characters knowledge is still quite limited.
Italian... was only supposed to be for the Europe trip. It took a while to get myself to let go, but finally it was forced off a couple of months ago from other priorities and lack of time. Is it really? Well, for the most part at least ^_^''.
Korean... started late January. It made me realize that I don't really like Pimsleur. It's too... boring? It was good for starting out, but I really had to force myself to do the lessons each day after a while. I was transcribing the beginning dialogs in Hangul and then posting on the htlal forums to check for correctness since what I thought I was hearing wasn't always exactly what was said. I eventually ended up directly emailing someone I met on the forums. Both the forum and email really helped because I couldn't really slack off haha. The person made an interesting comment at the end of the 30 lessons... that she was 'inspired by my conviction'. Anyways, all KClass101 now... yay for fun podcasts! But it's fallen off a bit too :-/
Japanese... is the culprit for the fall off of Korean and Chinese. Started a few weeks ago, the last day of March. It's easy to keep track of the start because I've done one Assimil lesson a day since then. There's 99 lessons total and it's entirely "passive" learning until lesson 50, i.e. only listening and understanding and no production. It's kind of an interesting concept since any classroom-centered class makes you speak right away (and also the exact opposite of Pimsleur). So, Assimil and JPod101, from the same people who started KClass101. Or rather, I should say that KClass101 is from the same people who started JPod101, since jpod came first ^_~
Apparently 2008 is the UN-proclaimed International Year of Languages... an appropriate coincidence ^o^
Thursday, April 17, 2008
chinese tmnt
I'm always amazed when I encounter a non-Chinese person whose Chinese is better than mine (not that it's hard to do since my Chinese is on the relatively poor-side right now). I've listened to John on cpod's Intermediate and Upper-Intermediate podcasts for a few months now, but I still can't get over his Chinese abilities! Of course, it helps that he's lived in China for 7+(!) years and is married to someone Chinese ^_^
I came across his Sinosplice blog recently... the Chinese translation of the TMNT theme song as well as his comments on it were quite fun to read. Sometimes, translations from one language to another are like when books get made into movies, something inevitably gets lost in the translation.
I came across his Sinosplice blog recently... the Chinese translation of the TMNT theme song as well as his comments on it were quite fun to read. Sometimes, translations from one language to another are like when books get made into movies, something inevitably gets lost in the translation.
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