#basque:reflections

[guillemelgat]

I'm only a month late but here's the yearly review! These goals were actually quite reasonable, and though I didn't hit most of them, they were good guides to have.

For Catalan, I did manage to find a Catalan speaker in this city (WILD story but we don't have time for that), who confirmed my suspicions that there just are no Catalans here by the fact that they know exactly two other Catalans. But I also might have an in on two professors who might be Catalan, and could also talk to, which would be exciting. Meanwhile my Catalan is quickly atrophying, but I did at least find people, which I'm very happy about. In terms of reading, I had a feeling I would read way less than 30 books, and I was right about that: I read 7 (I would have read way more if I was capable of finishing a book; alas, that skill is escaping me at this moment). But I still think that the challenge was absolutely worth it, and I'd like to do it next year, too. I'll write up a longer post about that, though.

In terms of Welsh and Basque, I wouldn't say that I followed these goals at all. But for both of them, I think I did put in a lot more effort and kind of got a reality check on how I should go about studying them. For Welsh, I started listening to a whole bunch more music. For Basque, I got to go to the Basque Country for a weekend and stay with a friend and speak in Basque the whole time, which was a huge challenge, but also really made me understand what I need to work on (comprehension/vocabulary/more advanced grammar). I didn't end up watching much Rownd a Rownd or Eskamak kentzen, but I think that I've had a lot of problems with attention span (and also realistic expectations) this year, and I'm slowly starting to figure out how to create a language routine that works with what I've got.

For Malayalam, I did start taking classes, and this is one of the few goals that has really worked out. Malayalam has gone from being something really frustrating and emotionally taxing for me to a language I feel like I'm starting to have a grasp on. The class has been very intensive (we learned the alphabet and all the noun cases in the first semester, and were reading simple texts by the end), but it's been good for pushing my limits. Unfortunately the time is a little rough, especially with a full class load and TAship, but it's so rewarding that I think I'm going to stick through this semester as well.

Alas, I didn't get to try Russian immersion. I still think this would be really funny, though.

As for Anki, I tried pretty hard at the beginning of last year to get into it, but unfortunately it takes so much time to make your own cards (if you're silly like me - I could probably put them together in a less complicated way) and eventually I just decided to stick with Memrise for now. We'll see, though. Maybe I can simplify my template or something - I just need a quicker way to set up large amounts of cards.

This year was a long and very heavy year for me personally, but also a very meaningful year in some ways, and I think it taught me to think much more about what matters to me, and to clear away what doesn't. I've been studying all four of these languages for a significant amount of time now, and I want them to continue be a part of my life and my world. Hopefully 2025 will be yet another year in which I continue to grow into them, and them into me.

Language Goals 2024

Another year, another set of goals! This year, in the actual spirit of my very reasonable 2022 language goals, here are my plans for language study.

Catalan

First and foremost, my goal is to find Catalan friends in my new hometown, because I really need to speak Catalan with people at minimum once a week or I get very sad, and currently I’m not speaking it with anyone at all. This goal is pretty chill though—I just have to actually sit down and put in the time to find people.

My main goal is to read 30 books in Catalan. I’ll make a proper post about it with a list of books that I’m thinking of and how the challenge itself is going to work, but overall I’m trying to pick a mix of styles and genres, so expect anything from medieval literature to YA novels to academic texts. I have a lot of books that I’ve been meaning to read for a while, so hopefully this will give me a chance to chip into some of them. 30 books is less than other versions of this challenge that I’ve seen, but it’s also many more books than I’ve read in Catalan possibly ever and I think it’s more reasonable in conjunction with a full class load. Hopefully it ends up being just the right amount!

Welsh & Basque

This year I really want to work hard to actually get these two to an upper intermediate level, because I’m so close if I put in the work. For both of them, I have two main goals: (1) go through the textbooks/workbooks that I started going through casually last semester (Basic Welsh: A Grammar and Workbook by Gareth King and Standard Basque: A Progressive Grammar by Rudolf P.G. de Rijk) so that I can continue to review and learn new grammatical structures, and (2) watch one episode of a TV series each week in each language. For the TV series, I’m going to be watching Rownd a Rownd on S4C (which is available outside Wales/the UK! Huge win!) and Eskamak kentzen on EITB. If I have time, I’ll try to go through episodes more thoroughly and note down new vocabulary and such, but the main goal is to make a routine of it and watch consistently so I’m trying to keep it simple. I’d also like to use both languages with other people more often if I can, but I think finding a consistent language partner will perhaps be a goal for another year.

Malayalam

I’m planning to focus the first half of the year on Welsh and Basque, and then next fall, I’m hoping to be able to take the Malayalam classes offered by my university and to get into studying my home dialect (or rather, my extended family’s home dialect, since I didn’t speak it at home) as well. Since this will be later and also classroom learning rather than self-study, I’m not going to go into details, but overall, after my trip to Kerala (which I have stuff about, it’s on the docket!), I’m generally feeling much less alienated and much more motivated to study the language. I’m also looking forward to being able to take real classes, which I think will help keep me focused and on track.

Russian

This is a minor goal, but at my friend’s house over the summer, her mom was joking that if they just spoke to me in Russian while I stayed at their house, I’d probably be able to understand it by the end. That led us to concoct a plan where I study a bit of Russian vocab, then go there and do intensive Russian immersion for a weekend or so. This is more of a silly goal, but I’d like to try it because I think it could be fun.

Anki

This isn’t a language goal per se, but rather a general resolution to spend this year learning to use (and tweaking and configuring) Anki. Anki has a notoriously high barrier to entry, and from everything I’ve seen it should be treated as a long-term, intensive project—I’ll hopefully reap the rewards later if I take my time and set up everything right in the early stages. With that in mind, I’m hoping that by the end of the year I’ve figure out a set up for my decks and cards that really works for getting me to remember and be able to use vocab and grammar. I’ll focus on the languages here for the start, but I’m hoping that with habit and time, if I get a good system going I can use it with other languages too.

And that’s it! It’s been a bit since I was systematic about studying languages, but I’ve found that I really miss it and want to go back. I feel like I’m at a really good place with all of these, and I’d like to continue to make progress, so I’m really trying to focus on consistency and hitting the sweet spot of just challenging enough to get myself out of my comfort zone while not burning out. Hopefully I’ve set this up in a way to build habits and make me excited to keep immersing myself with these languages in the coming years, which is really the key to learning any language in the long term—I've realized that I speak Catalan so well because it's fully integrated into my life, and I'd like all these others to be as well. Here’s to a good 2024, and I wish all of you luck with your own goals as well!

[guillemelgat]

Reflexions (Setmana 8 del Repte Idiomes Estiu 2021)

Sí, he fet el càlcul i tinc la setmana correcte...benvinguts i benvingudes a la vuitena setmana del repte! La cosa va bastant bé, heus aquí els números:

basc* (1129/1903 mots = 59%)

gal·lès* (477/1632 mots = 29%)

romani (355/715 mots = 50%)

amhàric* (687/1646 mots = 42%)

Tot i el progrés que he fet, no crec que arribi al final dels cursos abans que acabi el repte. Dit això, mai he passat la fita de mil paraules en un curs de Memrise, així que ja ha valgut la pena. I penso seguir, si puc, durant l’any. Però primer, cal enfocar-me en les quatre setmanes que em queda, perquè amb això ja hi puc fer bastantes coses.

També estava pensant, i crec que estic en el moment ideal per fer un “level up” amb el gal·lès i el basc. És a dir que gairebé els sé parlar – no dominar, però simplement que em comencen a sortir frases i paraules sense haver-les planejat abans. Per això, vull tenir més hores d’estudi amb aquests dos, perquè si començo a entendre sèries/cançons/converses/et cètera, ja tindré més hores de pràctica i que no em faci mandra. Perquè amb el català ja tinc més de 100 hores aquest any (i amb la resta dels idiomes, menys de 20), només perquè miro sèries i vaig a hores de conversa i tal. Per tant, aquest és el meu repte per finals d’any.

Yes, I did the calculations and I have the right week...welcome to the eighth week of the challenge! It’s going pretty well, here are the numbers:

Basque* (1129/1903 mots = 59%)

Welsh* (477/1632 mots = 29%)

Romani (355/715 mots = 50%)

Amharic* (687/1646 mots = 42%)

Despite the progress I’ve made, I don’t think I’ll make it to the end of the courses before the challenge ends. That being said, I’ve never passed the milestone of a thousand words in the Memrise course before, so it’s already been worth it. And I think I’m going to continue, if I can, during the year. But first, I need to focus on the four weeks that I have left, because I can still do a lot with that.

I was also thinking, and I think I’m in the ideal moment to “level up” my Welsh and Basque. What I mean is that I almost know how to speak them – not master them, but just that words and phrases are starting to come to me without having planned them beforehand. Because of that, I want to have more hours of study with these two, because if I start understanding series/songs/conversations/et cetera, I’ll have more hours of practice and that won’t bore me. Because with Catalan, I already have more than 100 hours this year (and with the rest of my languages, less than 20), just because I watch shows and go to conversation hours and stuff. Therefore, this is my challenge for the end of the year.

[guillemelgat]

Crec que havíem passat el punt del mig alguna setmana per aquí, no n’estic segur perquè fa tant de temps que no faig un post sobre el repte que ni sé en quina setmana estem (crec que la sisena però no us ho sabria dir segur). Però vaig estudiar molt durant el viatge, probablement perquè no tenia Tumblr per ocupar-me, i vaig avançar bastant. Aquí els percentatges i els números:

basc* (982/1903 mots = 52%)

gal·lès* (327/1632 mots = 20%)

romani (239/715 mots = 33%)

amhàric* (578/1646 mots = 35%)

rus* (455/4995 mots = 9%)

He deixat de banda el rus perquè el curs té àudio, cosa que m’és molt útil, com que no llegeixo bé el ciríl·lic, però que em fa molta mandra :P La resta em van bé, he après gairebé (o potser més de) 200 paraules cadascuna. I no hi ha cap curs amb un percentatge de menys de dues xifres! Així que estic bastant content amb el progrés que faig.

He canviat una mica alguns objectius per a finals d’any però ja us ho explicaré més endavant.

English below cut :)

I think that we’ve passed the middle point some week in here, I’m not sure because it’s been so long since I’ve made a post about the challenge that I don’t even know what week we’re on (I think the sixth but I’m not 100% sure). But I studied a lot on my trip, probably because I didn’t have Tumblr to keep me busy, and I advanced a fair amount. Here are the percentages and the numbers:

Basque* (982/1903 words = 52%)

Welsh* (327/1632 words = 20%)

Romani (239/715 words = 33%)

Amharic* (578/1646 words = 35%)

Russian* (455/4995 words = 9%)

I’ve set aside Russian because the course has audio, which is very useful for me, since I don’t read Cyrillic very well, but also annoys me :P The rest are going pretty well, I’ve learned almost (or maybe more that) 200 words for each. And there’s no course with a percentage under 2 digits! So I’m pretty happy with my progress.

I’ve changed some of my goals for the end of the year but I’ll explain that to you guys later.

[guillemelgat]

Well, needless to say, this set of goals did not actually follow in the spirit of 2022's extremely reasonable ones. Still, 2023 was not an entirely lost cause language-wise, although I feel like very little of my language study actually showed up here. I didn't actually read the entirety of any of the Catalan books that I'd hoped to, but I did do a lot of (very basic) historical research in Catalan at the beginning of the year, including reading the whole of the late 18th/early 19th c. volume of Història: política, societat i cultura dels Països Catalans. I also did write a short thing or two in Catalan—not as much as I'd been hoping, but still something! As for Welsh, I did a bit of review and watched Solomon a Gaenor, and I was surprised how comfortable I'm starting to feel with it, even though I'm still very much Not Good. I've messaged with a friend in Basque every day for the last several months, so that's starting to feel like a part of my routine, though I'd love to find more spaces to use Basque in the coming year. I didn't have time to properly study Malayalam before going to Kerala, but even then, I was shocked by how much I could understand—I could get the gist of conversations even from just a few words, which is much more than I could have done 10+ years ago when I was last there. That alone was really motivating, because it shows that I have actually put in work and that it's paying off.

For the rest of my language goals, I did not make any particular progress, although I did listen to lots of music from all around the Iberian Peninsula for the playlist that I shared here, and also continued to listen obsessively to Galician music. I think that in the future I'll need to think about how to come at these goals in a less overwhelming way, but 2023 was not the year for them.

Overall, I'd say that despite not really reaching my goals as set out here, I'm feeling pretty good about the year anyways. It was pretty chill but also surprisingly productive. I didn't push myself to study languages, but I just sort of followed the current, and it's nice to see that it still moved me forward even without too much concerted effort. I think that it was a good break from previous bouts of intensive study, and helped me prove that I really do like studying languages and they do bring joy to my life, and I'm looking forward to seeing what 2024 will bring.

Language Goals 2023

In the spirit of last year’s very reasonable and achievable goals, here are more reasonable and achievable goals for 2023!

Catalan - I’d like to get the C2 this coming year. I’d also like to read more; specifically Ausiàs March and Vicent Andrés Estellés, and possibly El Canigó and/or El comte Arnau. And if I can, I’d like to write one creative piece in Catalan that I can feel proud of!

Welsh - I’d like to listen to more of Pigion, watch more Hansh videos, and also to find more spaces to use the language in. I really want Welsh to start feeling like a language that I can do things in, because I’m at a level where I can.

Basque - I want to watch at least one or two things in Basque, and, the same as Welsh, for it to be a language that I can use for things, not just a language I’m learning.

Malayalam - I would like to get to a really basic home heritage speaker level of Malayalam by the end of the year—understanding conversations when I visit family, and being able to answer when spoken to. My goal is to watch one Elikutty video per week, and to try to integrate the language into my thoughts and routine more.

Spanish, Galician, Aragonese, Asturian - I’d like to brush up on Spanish for academic purposes, and also to learn a bit about the grammar of the other three. I’d like to start remembering to actually watch A escampar la boira, and to start listening to more music in Aragonese and Asturian. As for Galician, I’d like to go into breaking down lyrics for the many songs I already listen to in it, and maybe watch more videos in it as well. In general, I’m aiming to go into the sphere of Iberian studies, especially Iberian minoritized languages, and so I want to be more familiar with the larger panorama.

Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Cornish, Manx, Breton - Same as for the others above, I want to have somewhat of a functional understanding of more Celtic languages so that I can interact with speakers and media production without needing a translation. I also just listen to a lot of music in at least Irish, and it drives me crazy not to be able to at least superficially understand it. I think the Celtic cultural sphere is really interesting, and so I’d like to be able to learn more about it and talk to more people within it without needing to make them translate to English.

Russian - I really want to be able to understand what people are saying at my friend’s house, and I think that if I put in enough Russian listening practice and vocabulary study I’d be able to piece it together, at least partially; I can already figure it out sometimes with just a few words and context. So I’d like to actually put in some time on that, in the hopes that maybe afterwards, if I spend a few days at her house, I’ll come out understanding Russian sdfhksdhf

Amharic - I’d like to be able to speak some basic Amharic, so my goal is to learn a few basic sentence patterns and some vocabulary, and maybe be able to say one or two things by the end of the year. Nothing big, but just a bit.

I have no idea if I’ll even get close with any of these languages to the goals that I’ve set out here, but I think that if I do, it’ll pay off! And if I don’t, then at minimum, my goal is to learn one thing for each that I can feel good about in a year’s time, and I hope that at least I can do that.

[guillemelgat]

End of Month Reflection: April!

The end of April is upon us, and even though the entire 30 days challenge hasn’t come through my queue yet, I did just finish it today, and I thought I’d post this now because posting it a week later would just be kind of awkward. Anyways, I finished the challenge, all 30 days are complete, and I’m really happy that I was able to stick through and get it all done. I feel like I’ve learned a lot in Basque, albeit maybe not reached a B2 (or even gotten close, let’s be real here), but regardless I think that the work that I put in this month will show in the future and has given me a good foundation in the language, forcing me to put in the effort I need to reach a higher level. The challenge was really fun, although a bit above my level at times, but that being said, it never actually got as bad as I was afraid it would get. I feel like I put in work, but didn’t strain myself, and I’m coming off this month feeling really positive about it!

The other language I’ve been working on, Malayalam, has slowly but surely been getting better, and I actually just filled up my notebook for it today. Flipping through the pages, it’s kind of wild how much work I’ve done, because it’s hardly felt like anything at all, but I think I am getting a lot better and I’m excited to try talking with my dad when I get home for the summer. I haven’t been posting a lot, but I’m mostly just trying to lay a foundation and work on my studies, so I haven’t had much time to post stuff (the silence is not due to me not having studied it). I’m reflecting a little less on it because I’m not actually stopping here; I plan to continue my studies for all of May as well, just to make sure the work from this month doesn’t go to waste (and also because I haven’t finished the currylangs lessons yet and I won’t stop until I have). I’ll update more on that tomorrow when I post my May goals, though.

All in all, this month was really successful and I’m feeling really good about where I’m at. Hopefully April brought you success in your language studies as well, and if not, then let’s knock it out of the park in May!

[guillemelgat]

Basque month update

Everything going pretty well, starting to understand stuff, and I wrote the Biography section for Ilargipean today, it’s terrible but at least it’s long and in Basque…

Also for extra motivation, I told my dad that I would pay him $1 if he could understand Spanish before I could understand Basque and $2 if he could understand Romanian (not planning on paying either of these, since Romanian was an offhand joke and he doesn’t spend much time on Spanish anyways, also he has a job that pays him much more than that so he probably could care less about my puny $3).

Anyhow, we’ll see if there’s an improvement by the end of the month, praying for one because I’ve sacrificed too many hours listening to Glaukoma.

[guillemelgat]

IT WORKS!

I’ve been talking for a while about how with Basque I’m trying to use a few traditional learning materials as possible, just listening a lot and translating and speaking. I had some doubts early on. My learning wasn’t going that fast, I could barely understand anything, and it just seemed to difficult. But I’ve managed to push myself out of that initial rut and suddenly I’ve been racing along at breakneck speed.

What I’ve discovered is how to stop worrying about being a perfectionist, just translate everything and focus on the little things. If I understand one line of an Esne Beltza song, that’s one more line than I understood before. I’ve been going on word sprees, translating everything in sight, and using a dictionary that requires root forms has been very helpful in learning to take apart the parts of the word. I’ve been speaking without too much worry of whether or not I’m grammatically correct, just pushing myself to the boundaries and trying to go a bit farther than I could the day before. With that, I’ve seen myself improve a lot. I can pick out words on TV shows. I can understand sentences in Esne Beltza songs. I can talk about something without having to go to the dictionary (too often) to look up words.

This is language learning in its essence. Whether you use Rosetta Stone or learn by talking to the guy next to you on the train, language learning is about pushing yourself to understand just one more sentence, to get that feeling of satisfaction when you do something you couldn’t have done yesterday.