#more motivation to learn croatian

[oliviax727]

I finally gotten to it, I am finally going to start learning a language (Spanish)

Wait, why should I care?

You don't need to care at all. I just want to keep a public record of my progress and see if I can pull off the effort for long enough to achieve my goals.

If you're not interested, there's no shame in scrolling past this post once a month. And dw, these posts will be at most monthly. So if you're here for something else, this won't clog things up.

If you're concerned about the physics, reminder this is my personal account, and there's another one exclusively for those who just want the science without the shitposting/personal/political stuff.

Though if you're like a linguist or something - or are interested in language stuff in general, I'm sure you can find some value in this post perhaps.

What language will it be?

tl;dr Spanish

Also I love putting all this colour in my post. It satisfies my autism so much.

Now, I've come from a very multilingual background. I learned mandarin between age 5 - 13, and latin in grades 7 thru 8.

Mandarin was a language I could never get the hang of.

It probably had to do with some child-like racism combined with a lack of motivation.

Buuuuut it most likely was a consequence of when I moved from Hong Kong to Australia, my new school did not accomodate the fact I was already experienced.

Nevertheless, I feel as if my Mandarin skills have been overshot, and I don't think I'd be motivated to re-learn it unless I overwhelmingly succeed in this.

Latin was just a dud - I decided to do it because I thought it would be interesting, but dropped it after I realised I had too much on my plate heading into 9th grade.

But Spanish on the other hand, well, there are three better reasons why I choose to learn it:

I never really got an opportunity. I stopped wanting to learn from my abuela when I was 3-5 yo, and my Australian high school also didn't offer it either (my high school's curriculum was dogshit)

A big portion of my relatives are tied to Argentina, with my mum being born from Argentine immigrants. She spent her high school years doing ESL as Spanish was her second language

Aspiring to do Astrophysics is likely going to land me in Chile, as the Andes is home to telescopes-a-plenty

I could've also gone with other languages I'm interested in, like:

German (because my abuela was born from German immigrants - no they were not Nazis, they actually fled in 1936 to avoid conscription)

Croatian (my abuelo was born in Yugoslavia and fled in the 1950s)

Greek (I don't know why it was my "latin is cool" phase, so I guess I wanted to do ancient greek but I don't know how much drift there has been over the last 2000 years thanks to the romans)

And thus I go with Spanish.

But what about regional dialects?

I am very aware that there are various dialects of Spanish within Latin America, and generally, most online methods of learning will teach you Spanish Spanish.

But I think it's more important to first learn a bit of basic vocab, and the grammar, before worrying about my regional dialect. I'm still pretty sure that the most common and important grammar conventions are still shared between languages.

And I already know that people will tell I'm a foreigner, because I'll have an "English"-like accent to it. Learning a specific dialect will only make it harder to tell, not eliminate being "language clocked" entirely.

So what's this going to look like?

Every month or two I'm going to personally report, to myself, via tumblr, my progress in learning. I'll list what I learned, what I still need to work on, and what I wish I could do next.

Effectively this is going to be a public journal of sorts, to make sure I feel like I'm doing this productively.

What's the weather like now?

Given that I've already attempted to learn Spanish twice previously, and being exposed to cultural influences, I already know a bit of Spanish.

Most of it is just random bits of vocabulary, that sound a lot less impressive if you were to try and make me say a sentence:

Custom greetings "Hola", "Buenos Noches"

Expletives "¡Ay caramba!"

The basic conjunction "y"

"Niño, niña, hombre"

Agua (with the "con gas" or "sin gas" tacked on too)

Counting from "uno" to "treinta-nueve"

Some month names like "Mayo" or "Diciembre"

Some colours like "Rojo"

Some utensils and tools like "Boligrafo"

Other stuff that I won't be able to recaly suddenly

And I mostly only understand the pronunciation, most of the spellings I had to look up on google translate. Extra I's like in December or thirty, or that there's no "ph" in pen.

There are other simple grammatical rules that I know of:

Gender i.e. words that end with a you tack on a "La" and for o's you tack on "El". More generally you have to pay attention to grammatical gender

As an educated guess from knowing a bit of Latin, I'm sure there are noun and verb declensions that interact with gender as well

Word order, much like English, is SVO

Clearly, I have my work cut out for me. But I also have a head start over a lot of people primarily because I have experience in other languages related to Spanish, which can help inform me on grammar and common vocabulary. I also have some (minor) knowledge in linguistics.

Another one is that I don't just assume that Spanish is a 1:1 translation of English, where you can just swap words for others. This seems like a trivial fact. But you'd be surprised at how much "English-speaking privilege" can blind people who don't require learning second languages.

It can be much more effective to learn a language when you know your expectations.

What are my Goals?

Well, in the spirit of a SMART goal, I don't really know. Because I don't actually know how long it will take me to get to a desired level of fluency.

Sometimes a language can take years to learn, sometimes it can be picked up in just one. And there are so many different "levels" of acheivement.

Which is why my goals in the long term will be more vapid:

At some point, I want to have a semi-fluent conversation with my abuela in Spanish

I want to be able to speak and understand a proper, unbroken sentence within a few months or a year

Now, what I mean by "Sentence" is really finicky. I don't mean "Las mujers leen; ¡Soy una de las mujers!" (see I'm already learning ha ha). I mean a sentence you'd normally say like:

"Hey X, I'm gonna go to the store, what do you need me to buy? Ok see you in half an hour."

That will be a bit difficult. It requires a lot more vocab to get to that level. But of course, I know it's do-able because millions of people have done it already!

What are my short-term goals? And how will I learn?

For the short term, my goals are a little more simpler. Primarily because there will always be a course or an app that will help me learn.

And for the first few months, my goals are most likely going to align with whatever the app has designed for me to do.

The problem is that I feel like most apps will act as if they can take you from no-knowledge to fluent speaker in like 5 months tops, which for an adult sounds a little fishy if you ask me.

When reading through the recommended applications, I came across two that were appealing:

Duolingo, which is more fast-paced and short-form. It gamifies language but may not be great for formal education

Rosetta Stone, which is advertised as better for natural language learning. And requires more effort.

I decided to use both, mainly because I'm lucky enough to afford it ... for now. I don't have much other means to spend my money regardless.

The reason I choose to use both is simply because I want the best of both worlds, and that I can't tell which one is better until I try it. Duolingo makes it entertaining, Rosetta Stone makes it serious. Sort of the balance I'm looking for.

At some point I hope to stop using at least one or the other. But for now I have nothing better to do.

Anyways, that's all I gotta say on the matter for now. Wish me luck!

[salvadorbonaparte]

Langblr Reactivation Challenge

Week 1 - Day 1 - Introduction

Hello! I'm trying to pressure motivate myself into studying with this :)

My name is Mack and you might know me from my folder of language learning resources but I'm also a translation student and really good at procrastinating my language studies.

I'm hoping to focus on Spanish, Romanian, Yiddish, Croatian and Korean for the rest of the year but I'm interested in more languages than I can realistically learn in a lifetime.

I technically have a degree in Spanish but I'm a bit rusty and I want to get my Spanish to a level where I can use it as a source language. I'm technically a beginner in Romanian but I understand more than I can use because of my experience with Romance languages and I have no idea what my Yiddish level is. I'm a complete beginner in Croatian and Korean.

I've been interested in Spanish for ages and studied it at uni. I got interested in Yiddish in high school because I thought the history was fascinating and I ended up writing my undergrad dissertation about Yiddish. Romanian I originally started learning for a job but now I want to stick with it and also eventually add it as a source language.

I'm starting Croatian because it might help me as a translator but I'm also interested in Croatian culture because I've travelled there once as a child. I'm starting Korean because I low-key thought about learning it for like seven years because I wanted to learn more about Korean history.

[arcadeyes]

My favourite language learning app for building vocabulary.

Drops has helped me to build my irish vocabulary because of the extensive catagories to choose from i can learn what I want to learn. I also find it helpful because in the free version you can only do five minutes a day. I find that for me it keeps me motivated and makes me pay more attention to the words as occasionally you will have to spell them. I personally find the app helpful for adding vocabulary to my knowledge but it does lack grammar and actual sentences.

Theres many different languages on drops and these are:

ainu, arabic, ASL, bosnian, catalan, chinese (cantonese), chinese (mandarin), croatian, danish, dutch, british and american english,

Esperanto, estonian, finnish, french, galician, german, greek, hawaiian, hindi,

hungarian, icelandic, igbo, indonesian, irish, italian, japanese, korean, norweigan,

persian, polish, brazilian portugues, european portugues, romanian, russian,

samoan, sanskrit, serbian, european spanish, mexican spanish, swahili,

swedish, tagalog, te reo maōri, thai, turkish, ukrainian, vietnamese, yoruba

[thequietsoliloquy]

20 questions for fic writers

Thank you for the tag @reggieblk. I know this blog is not known for my AO3 stuff, but I wanted to respond here anyway since NaNoWriMo is coming and I'll be writing fanfics for it. My fandom blogs are @deadfandomswriter for mostly things MXTX and @adeadlyobsession for mostly things Harry Potter

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

13

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

384 803 but a large chunk of it is from my co-author, I think on my own it's closer to 100K-150k at most.

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Mainly Mo Dao Zu Shi (Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation) and recently I started getting back into the very first fandom I've ever published for: Harry Potter.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

How My Life Changed At The Honey Bun Cafe (MDZS AU), The Hanged Man's Tale (HP), Floating, Style and Public Affection (MDZS)

5. Do you respond to comments? Why? Why not?

Most of the time. I think it's important to show appreciation for the comments received at the very least because I do appreciate them and I want people taking time to comment to know that.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

One I recently deleted cause I had a hard time writing it in chapters since I felt it would be better written as a long one shot instead, it's called The Choices We Make in the Mo Dao Zu Shi fandom.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

All of them XD I tend to write happy endings more often than not, or if not, my one shots are snapshots of a moment in time, most often fluff.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

So far no, although I have received some comments that confused me.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Yes, although so far I only have one fic with explicit smut on AO3, the rest is still being written. I like to explore all kind of stuff when writing smut so I'm not picky about the kind.

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

No, the most I've ever done is osmosis of different versions of the same story (mix up Mo Dao Zu Shi with The Untamed for example).

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of, but I legit pity fic thieves. You need a whole lot of delusion, abysmal self-esteem and an overactive need for external validation to steal creative work and pass it off as your own. What a sad life to live. Pitiful.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

No, but I welcome those!

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes! The longest one I've ever worked on with my wife and co-author Konnei.

14. What’s your all time favourite ship?

I don't have one really, I like multi-ships and I don't have forever OTP's, but I am very fond of Lingzhen, as proven by the amount of one-shots I wrote about them.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

I honestly think I'll finish them all in time! The only WIPs I am at risk of not finishing are those that are still just ideas and not started yet, and I don't really consider those wip since, you know, not yet in progress XD

16. What are your writing strengths?

I've been told I have a good flow in my writing.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Poetry is my main writing style, and I often struggle with just saying things as they are because of that. There are often sentences I write that have a clear meaning to me, but when others read them, they have no idea what I'm talking about because the meaning is more abstract. I think in images more than words, and that comes with its own set of struggles a lot of the time too.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I'm bilingual French-English so I have no problems doing that most of the time. I also tend to learn basics of languages I want to include in stories too, like Chinese for Mo Dao Zu Shi or Croatian for an OG story I'm working on. I like learning new languages in general, and adding them to my stories helps to motivate me to learn. That being said, when it comes time to read fics with other languages, my appreciation all depends on the writing style of the writer.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Inuyasha, back when I didn't even know what fanfics were, but Harry Potter was the first I ever published for once upon a time on FF.net

20. Favourite fics you’ve written?

Oh god, that's like asking me who's my favourite child... I think everything I end up sharing online is there specifically because I love it so much, even those that are written in a style that I have evolved from now. I'm at a point now where I prefer to publish fanfics only when they are finished, hence deleting two of my WIPs from AO3 recently, so I must feel happy with what I wrote to share it. Everything I upload online is a favourite of some sort.

Tagging: @arijensineink if you have fics to talk about, and if not I'd love to read your answers for your OG wips

[asterlearns]

Langblr Reactivation Challenge by @prepolyglot | 1.2

Write a list of goals you have for your target languages. Make both long term and short term goals. An overall goal could be to have the ability to talk with native speakers with ease and a smaller goal would be to finally learn that difficult grammar point that's been plaguing you for ages. How will you achieve them?

___

日本語

My main goal with Japanese right now is to be able to read/watch/play various Japanese media. A secondary goal is to be able to visit Japan and travel comfortably even in the less touristy spots. I'd especially like to be comfortable ordering food in restaurants since I am vegan and there can often be a lot of cultural differences that can make it hard to explain what I do and don't eat, even without a language barrier. I don't know when I'm going to get a chance to actually go to Japan, though, and if I do it definitely won't be frequently, which is why it isn't as much of a focus for me currently.

A more specific goal would be to read the manga series 下弦の月 by Ai Yazawa. It's one of her works that has never been localized into English, so the only way I'll be able to read it is in Japanese, and that's pretty motivating.

Some more short term goals include finishing all the currently available content on NativShark (a Japanese language learning site) by the end of the year, and watching all the videos on the Comprehensible Japanese YouTube channel. I've completed 85/296 lessons on NativShark so far, and if I keep up my current pace of 5 lessons a day, I should be able to complete that goal. For Comprehensible Japanese I've already completed the Complete Beginner playlist, and I should be able to finish the Beginner playlist by the end of the year as well. I think completing these two things will leave me in a good place to start next year, when I want to start doing more extensive reading and listening of native materials.

Español

I live in Southern California and Spanish is ubiquitous here, and it's a language I've always felt that I should learn so I can connect with more of the people in my community. It's hard to stay motivated about learning a language just because you feel you ought to, though, which is one of the reasons I haven't gotten very far with it. One personal goal I do have in this language though, is to be able to watch Guillermo del Toro's earlier films in their original Spanish.

Hrvatski

This is a very personal language for me, as my grandfather's family is from Croatia. My main goal is to learn about and be more connected to my personal history, and be able to visit with family there who don't speak English. I also recently stumbled upon the site croatian.film, and the idea of watching and reading about Croatian film is exciting. If you've noticed the theme, it's because I'm a bit of a film buff, so watching movies is a pretty good motivator for me.

[den-store-sovn]

Have a business and make a change

Hello community, This April turned out to be a truly amazinng milestone in my life. Being part of the Croatian crew, I joined the Erasmus+ project "Your Case for Success" put together by Let's Do It - Georgia. I got Georgian culture, spend time in beautiful Bakuriani for a week, and bumped into some of the most incredible people I've ever known. I must say that I came back super motivated and inspired to make a change through social entrepreneurship. We learned how and what it means to truly contribute to society while still having a business. This journey helped me see the value in social work, widened my horizons in self-improvement, and left me with a bunch of ideas for businesses I want to start some day! I recommend this experience to anybody who is from the EU and wants to learn more about European values... or just have an amazing time :D Cheers,

Ante P.S. some useful links to get you started: Let's Do it Georgia https://www.facebook.com/LetsdoitGeorgia/ Erasmus in Denmark https://www.facebook.com/groups/887943651765741

[lindsaywesker]

Good morning! I hope you slept well and feel rested? Currently sitting at my desk, in my study, attired only in my blue towelling robe, enjoying my first cuppa of the day. Welcome to Too Much Information Tuesday.

Most women prefer to have sex in the dark.

There’s a fountain in Italy that dispenses free wine 24/7.

Smiling is 70% more attractive than wearing make-up.

The average man has 11 erections a day and nine at night.

Other people are not having as much sex as you think they are.

Leonardo da Vinci could draw with one hand and write with the other.

Every Pixar movie contains a reference to the Pixar movie that comes after it.

For every $1000 a record company makes, the average musician gets $23.40.

Women are more influenced by how a man smells rather than how he looks.

Sex acts as a tranquilizer and can be up to ten times more effective than Valium!

Volkswagen's best-selling product isn't a car, it's their Currywurst Pork Sausages.

Singing helps form and strengthen the emotional bond between a group of people.

The Russians arrived 12 days late to the 1908 Olympics because they were using the wrong calendar.

The penis has about 4,000 nerve endings. The clitoris has between 8,000 and 15,000 nerve endings.

In 1932, a 56-year-old man named Thomas Earl was fired, mauled by a bear, and shot by the police, all on the same day.

Lonely people take longer, hotter showers or baths to replace the warmth they're lacking socially or emotionally.

No relationship is ever a waste of time. If it didn't bring you what you want, it taught you what you don't want.

Shakira was rejected for her school choir in the second grade because her music teacher thought she sounded "like a goat".

You have a second brain in your gut called the Enteric Nervous System. This is where the term 'gut feeling' comes from.

The actor John Cazale acted only in five films, all of which either won or were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture.

Respect people who find time in their schedule to see you. Love people who never look at their schedule when you need them.

In 2018, Munafri Arifuddin ran unopposed for mayor of Makassar, Indonesia. He lost the election to "None of the above".

The word ‘vulva’ and the brand name ‘Volvo’ come from the same Latin word ‘volvere’, meaning ‘to turn, twist, roll, revolve’.

A statue of Hercules in Arcachon, France, has had its penis stolen so often it’s been given a detachable one for ‘special occasions’.

Vaginas are only 3-5 inches deep. Anything more than that presses on other organs like your bladder, which can make you pee during sex.

You are under no obligation to be the same person you were a year, month, or even 15 minutes ago. You have the right to grow. No apologies.

Researchers at the University of California confirmed that when you are in love, everyone other than your beloved really does seem less attractive.

Masturbating regularly can improve focus and concentration by increasing neurotransmitters involved in learning, memory and motivation.

Studies show that slow music makes people shop leisurely and spend more, while classical music encourages people to buy more expensive items.

A study of Swedish jackpot lottery winners has found that, after a win, men are more likely to get married and women are more likely to get divorced.

In the 1990s, Denzel Washington stepped in and paid the fees for a kid who couldn't afford to attend Oxford's summer theatre program. That student was Chadwick Boseman.

It takes about 50 hours of socializing to go from acquaintance to casual friend, an extra 40 hours to become a real friend, and 200 hours in total to become a close friend.

In 2006, Croatian band Let 3 were fined for performing nude in public. Their defence that they weren’t naked because they had cork plugs in their anuses was not accepted by a judge.

In 1987, sales of Corona dropped because of a rumour that Mexican brewers were peeing in the beer before shipping it to the U.S. Against the odds, Corona was able to trace the rumour back to its source, a Heineken distributor.

George Miller had his wife Margaret Sixel edit ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’. She had never cut an action film before and Miller said, if it were edited by the usual guys, it would look like "every other action movie we see". She went on to win an Oscar for ‘Best Film Editing’.

Okay, that’s enough information for one day. Have a tremendous and tumultuous Tuesday! I love you all.

[languagedoor]

What Setup Do You Need to Learn a New Language Online?

In this advent of the digital era, the internet has made it easier for people to learn a new language from the comfort of their own homes. If you have a passion for learning languages like Croatian, all you have to do is enroll yourself in Croatian classes in San Diego; that’s it. Get yourself trained under professional language teachers and add a new skill to your resume.

However, opting for online classes without a proper setup can be challenging for every aspiring learner. You need to have some basic and essential equipment to ensure a smooth sailing experience. This blog is all about exploring the necessary essentials at a quick glance. Stay tuned with us and keep reading.

●      A Well-functioning Laptop or Computer

The first and foremost thing that you need for a successful online session is a laptop or computer which is in good shape. It is the medium that connects you with the language teacher- the device is not supposed to act as a barrier in your learning process. While you can definitely log in from your smartphones as well, a computer/laptop makes the procedure a lot smooth and convenient.

●      A Good Internet Connection

The next important factor to consider while enrolling yourself in language classes in Orange County is a reliable internet connection. To be honest, the stability of your internet connection can make or break your learning experience. Candidates often miss out on important details just because their connectivity isn’t up to the mark. It is definitely the key to staying ahead of the tough competition.

●      A Good-quality Webcam

It’s okay if your computer’s webcam isn’t too high-quality; you should be visible enough while interacting with your teachers. Also, the ease of seeing other candidates with similar passion for honing their language skills makes the overall process a lot more fun and exciting. When you get to know that there are so many other people on the same page, it only paves the way for healthy competition and growth.

●      A Microphone

Online language classes come with a lot of questions, queries and doubt-clearing sessions. However, if you are not audible enough to your teacher, your learning process might get hampered to a certain extent. That’s where the importance of a good-quality microphone lies. Consider investing in microphones that help you convey your concerns and make your voice clear and crisp.

●      Paper and Pen

Taking notes and jotting down important points become a lot easier when you have paper and pen by your side. Go old school, even if you are adapting to the new normal!

Enroll Yourself in Online Language Classes and Get Trained by Experts

Take your zeal toward learning a new language up to a notch by installing a proper setup at home. Whether you are looking forward to enrolling yourself in Japanese or Czech language classes in San Diego, these are basic equipment that you will require to serve the purpose. Be comfortable and sit with an open mind to grasp new concepts, knowledge and much more. At the end of the day, it’s your motivation and passion that matter the most- choose to stand out and enjoy a competitive edge.

[prettygirls-grave]

creating my dream life⋆ ˚｡⋆౨ৎ˚

(part 1)

why?

why do you want to change? why do you want this "dream life?' why do you want to become an architect, or have all A's, or change your mindset? why do you feel happy doing certain things? knowing the why is the key to life. go through things you love or things you hate and ask yourself why!

using myself as an example, i scroll for hours because it distracts my from my negative thoughts and replaces crying on my bed because i'm so lazy with living vicariously through people who are able to push past lack of discipline. this answers my "why am i addicted to my phone?"

another- why do i want to change my lifestyle? because i'm consistently dissatisfied and disappointed in myself for never reaching my full potential, and i yearn and anguish over the life i could be living which causes a spiral of depression (lol) i don't want to live a life i hate!!!!!!

what do you want?

establish what you want. you may have a clear picture, or not even the faintest idea. sit and reflect upon what truly makes you happy and brings fulfillment to your life. you can find shadow work or journal prompts online, or i'd be happy to make a list if you'd like!

→ me (current)

be proficient in tennis

learn to play the guitar

speak fluent italian, croatian, and beginner french

learn cyrillic alphabet

practice drawing, painting, designing, etc

write often

read often

journal often

exercise consistently

spent time outdoors biking, walking, skating, etc

practice meditating

improve on my anxiety (work on ignoring negative thoughts, not allow others to dictate how i feel, feel confident and relaxed)

create some sort of social media to serve as an outlet for my creativity

finish highschool with an IB diploma

build up my own creative portfolio

spend time researching and preparing university

win an essay competition

that's basically my master list of things i can accomplish in a foreseeable time frame.

manifestation

you can accomplish whatever you dream of. for me, i have so many future desires of what i want my life to look like, that i just need to get it out. these are basically just a ton of affirmations of my desires. some of this might seem ridiculous, but this post is more for myself to revisit more than for public use, but if it helps you, enjoyyy!

i am in my dream university with 100% paid scholarship

i am extremely well read and educated

i know exactly what i want out of my education and career

i love what i’m studying

i picked the perfect major for me

i have so many amazing opportunities in every aspect of my life

i have an amazing, fulfilling, affluent career

i attract wealth and money

i am part of so many creative projects

i am scouted for magazine/photo shoots, short films, music, interviews, modelling, movies, brands, career, travel, and academic opportunities

i am incredibly successful in everything that i am spontaneously scouted for

i am talented at everything i try

i am able to learn easily and am consistently motivated

i am naturally gifted in art, music, sports, cooking, dance, design, and all subjects

i take time and enjoy practicing things i’m passionate about

i am passionate about my studies, my career, and my passions

i have an it girl status and live an it girl life

i easily obtain and succeed in anything i desire

i attract people with similar ambitions, passions, morals, and interests

i am surrounded by people who lift me up

i have a healthy, exciting, and fun friend group

i am well liked by all

i attract my dream partner

i am totally unique

i have my desired appearance and body

my life is filled with many spontaneous and wonderful events

i use my platforms to inspire my following

i am praised for my originality and intellect

my personal creative work is published

i live in my dream city

i am effortlessly beautiful, intelligent, creative, inspiring, passionate, and healthy

i am able to have intelligent conversations in any language i like

i am magnetic and unforgettable

i have built my exact desired life by the time i’m 25

i can afford anything i desire

i receive everything on my pinterest

i remind everyone of my pinterest boards

i have a distinct, unique aesthetic that everyone associates me with

i am able to change and flow through life withe ease

i am fulfilled

i love myself and my surroundings

i am confident and free

i love the people around me

i am grateful and proud of my beautiful life

i attract anything i desire

i am free from anxiety and depression

i don’t chase, i attract

i find clarity easily when my path is not clear

i do not live in fear or stress

this is the end of this post, and it'll continue on part 2 which'll be up on my profile shortly!!! i felt like it's better to split it up rather than have one massive post

[rivertalesien]

A few months ago, or maybe longer, who can keep track of time anymore, the Comet network began airing reruns of Babylon 5. 

I loved Babylon 5. 

It was conceived and presented like a grand scifi novel, not at all like episodic tv of the time. As the show went along, it built an entire universe of complex characters with complex motivations whose loyalties and understandings would change organically throughout the course of the show. 

Years later, Lost would try to hold down something similar, but JJ Abrams’ revolving door of writers and producers could never master a coherent vision. And as polished as the 2004 reboot of Battlestar Galactica was (and it owed more than a little to B5′s operatic tone, though it was produced by a Star Trek alumnus), nothing could quite match the scope and originality of Babylon 5. 

J. Michael Straczynski may very well have made the greatest scifi series ever. 

While there were many wonderful and colorful characters on Babylon 5, I think many would agree the standout was Ambassador Delenn, a mysterious representative of the Minbari people, who would undergo a dramatic physical transformation (literally emerging from a chrysalis like a butterfly) so as to merge human and Minbari species. She was known as “the one who is” and provided a voice of wisdom and comfort, a true spiritual leader to those around her. 

No mere romantic foil, Delenn was something new in the presentation of female leadership: she may not have been a warrior, but she fought with wit and cunning, a diplomatic charm and charisma that won hearts and minds. Delenn was a character who understood sacrifice, for herself and for others and never questioned when it was necessary. Her strong belief in her purpose and, later, in her joining with John Sheridan, was an unbroken thread that held her world together. 

Straczynski wrote some of the best material for the show centering on Delenn and he couldn’t have cast a better actor to deliver his words.

Delenn was played with fierce intelligence and otherworldly gravity by Yugoslavian actress Mira Furlan. At 13 I remember being smitten with her accent and her smile, but mostly just carried away with her performance: while almost all of the human characters on the show were recognizable American stereotypes, Furlan made you believe Delenn was truly from Somewhere Else. Learning how her experiences during the Serb/Croatian War helped her in her interpretation of Delenn, only adds to the seamless intensity and soulfulness of her performance. She was one of a kind and there have been no characters to come close to Delenn and no performance like Furlan’s, either. 

This was posted on Mira’s Twitter earlier tonight:

Straczynski confirmed not long after that Mira has passed away, only 65 years old. 

Here is his memorial to Furlan (for convenience, I’ve typed it up below each passage):

When Mira Furlan came to audition for Babylon 5, her home country of Yugoslavia was in turmoil and shattering into two separate countries. During our first meeting, we spoke about her work and her life, and I learned that she had been part of a touring theater group that continued to cross borders of the disintegrating country despite receiving death threats from both sides in the civil war.

I expressed my admiration for her courage, but she shrugged and waved it off. “What’s the worst that could have happened? Yes, they could have killed me. So what? Art should have no borders.”

Very few people knew that side of Mira: the fiery, fearless side that fought ceaselessly for her art. She brought all those traits to Delenn, and in turn I tried to write speeches for her that would allow her to comment on what was happening to her homeland without calling it out by name. I guess I must have done it correctly because one day during the Minbari Civil War arc, she appeared in my office door, a cup of tea in one hand, in full makeup but wearing a pull-over robe from wardrobe, and said, “So, how long did you live in Yugoslavia?”

Her husband, Goran, has always been the rock of her life. He was an is a gentleman, quick to laughter, an accomplished director and as much an artist as Mira, which made them the ideal couple. I’ve rarely seen two people so utterly meant for each other. 

I remember the last time Mira appeared at a convention with me and some of the other cast. She didn’t quite understand what it was all about, but gamely did her part. When the audience question period came along, a fan held up his hand and said to Mira, whose Yugoslavian accent was much stronger in the beginning than it became with time, “Say ‘moose and squirrel.’” 

She had no idea what this meant, but she said “Moose and Squirrel” and the room erupted in one of the longest sustained laughs I’ve ever seen at a convention. We explained it later, but really, all that mattered to her was that the audience had been happy.

We’ve known for some time now that Mira’s health was failing...I’m not sure that this is the right time or place to discuss the sheer randomness of what happened...and have all been dreading this day. We kept hoping she would improve. In a group email sent to the cast a while back, I heard that she might be improving.

Then came the call from [actor] Peter Jurasik (Londo Molari). “I wanted you to know that Goran’s bringing Mira home,” he said.

“Do you mean, he’s bringing her home as in she’s better now, or is he bringing her home as in he’s bringing her home?”

“He’s bringing her home, Joe,” Peter said, and I could hear the catch in his voice as he said it.

And as a family, we held our counsel, and began the long wait, which has now ended.

Mira was a good and kind woman, a stunningly talented performer, and a friend to everyone in the cast and crew of Babylon 5, and we are all devastated by the news. The cast members with whom she was especially close since the show’s end will need room to process this moment, so please be gentle if they are unresponsive for a time. We have been down this road too often, and it only gets harder.

If you are a fan of Mira’s work, fire up those special moments when she shook the heavens and relive the art she brought to her work. For any actor, that is the best tribute possible: for the work to endure. As much as this is a time to grieve, it is also a time to celebrate her life and her courage. 

All of our thoughts tonight will be on the memories she left behind, the dazzling light of her performances, the breadth of her talent, and the heart and love she shared with Goran, and with all of you. 

Joe Straczynski

[xellandria]

Zmija Yilan was a temporary character I played towards the end of our Tomb of Annihilation campaign after my boy Alexus got petrified by a beholder somewhere deep in the bowels of the tomb itself.  We were able to “salvage” both him and Amara (who had also gotten petrified in the same fight) by shoving them into the Bag of Holding, but short of having the two of us sit on the bench while the remaining two party members waddled back to town, we had to roll some new characters.

I spent most of the week between the petrification and the new characters appearing being mad at myself for not remembering I had Inspiration I could have used to reroll either of my failed dex saves and not being able to do much beyond that, but with less than 72 hours left until she had to debut, I finally pulled an idea out of my butt, ran it by the DM because it involved Shenanigans™, got the OK and started designing her. Thus was born Zmija Yilan, whose appearance was based partly on an old photo that was semi-viral on Tumblr several years prior and partly on Xelloss from Slayers because when I’m in a pinch, that’s always who I fall back on, and have been doing so for like, 20+ years at this point lmao.  Personality-wise, there was a post floating around Tumblr that week about proverbs in various languages that, when translated literally or without context, made very little sense so she got a lot of that (and associated misunderstandings based on language mix-ups) mixed in with—again—Xelloss from Slayers, because I am a hack.  I would probably never play her again because she was so firmly entrenched in that campaign and also there’s some parts of how I designed/played her that I look back on and am like “ehhh I’m not sure I’m comfortable with the optics of this,” but I enjoyed playing her a lot more than I expected, and I look back on the end of our Tomb campaign very fondly because of it.

I haven’t been able to talk about her in public both for a lack of reason to do so and because I didn’t want to “spoil” my group in case they found my various social media posts, but as it’s nearly a year since she was introduced and nine months since the campaign ended, I’m gonna absolutely wall of text the shit outta this bitch, rofl (that said there’s baby’s first nekkid pin-up under here so assuming Tumblr lets me actually post it, fair warning for that under the cut)

Zmija Yilan - level 8-10 Human* Warlock (Great Old Ones/Pact of the Tome) (usually this is where my D&D character posts put stats but I don’t actually have access to her character sheet anymore, so let’s just pretend she had something ridiculous like maxed Charisma because I remember my spell DC being ridiculously high)

Zmija Yilan is a traveler from the far-off land of Zemlya, and a disciple of Matrymriy, one of the "family" of five gods in the pantheon of that region.  Matrymriy came to Zmija in a dream one night and told her to travel across the seas because She had a task for her, and that she would learn more once she reached her destination.  She's been traveling around Faerun for seven or so years—reaching one place, being given hints to go to a specific location, and upon reaching it, being told to travel on without seeming to do much more than just Be There.  Upon reaching Chult sometime within the last few months, her patron's hints indicated that she should travel to a place called Shilku Bay; she hired a guide (named Salida) and a bodyguard (a Fort Belurian mook) with what little locally-acceptable currency she had; they got separated after being attacked by a band of undead, and after failing to reunite with them, she was wandering around lost, trusting that Matrymriy will guide her where She desires her to go.

Part of her wandering had her end up in the Tomb of the Nine Gods itself, where she encountered our adventuring party (down two player characters) desperately trying to find their way out of the tomb in the hopes of returning to Port Nyanzaru to depetrify their friends.  Our barbarian’s player immediately distrusted her because I’d drawn her tabletop token with her back to the camera, which was an awkward feeling almost immediately returned in-game because both the barbarian and paladin aren’t hardcore RPers but they had to carry all the RP weight as they were introduced to this new character and explain that they were there to destroy a lich (both because it was the source of all the bad undead in the area, and because they’d been promised a reward—a motivation Zmija understood, as “a hungry bear will not dance.”)  Beyond the usual RP awkwardness there was an additional layer of awkwardness between the characters IC as at the time, Thokk was barely wearing more than a breastplate and loincloth, while Zmija was covered neck-to-ankle despite the heat and humidity of the region.  She claimed that in the culture of Zemlya, having strangers see your skin was a mark of great shame and that modesty was of paramount importance, so seeing so much of him was very off-putting and threw her off-balance for much of their initial interactions. 

Getting off on the “wrong” foot with the party and pushing as hard as I could into Zmija’s quirks (the weird proverbs, sprinkling in her Zemlyan vocabulary and making a point of her being from Very Far Away with Very Different Customs) meant I went a little too hard on them at the beginning, which is partly what I’d do differently and partly why the whole thing ended up working, so it’s a weird retrospective balance.  If my partymates had ever shoved (almost) any of the names or places Zmija mentioned into google, they probably would have twigged to the scheme pretty dang fast.

In reality, Zmija is not a human traveler from Zemlya, because surprise! she's actually Zsaksatyi, a Chultian Yuan-Ti Pureblood under the command of Fenthaza.  She worked as a bit of a double agent/interrogator within the Fane prior to her current assignment (hence her spell list's focus on information gathering, silent communication, and manipulation); she's been fleshing out her alternate persona for years and would occasionally pretend to be a captive and be thrown in one of those cells the party was in to get relevant information from the other prisoners, or assist others that were interrogating prisoners by more direct means (via Detect Thoughts).  In-universe, the language she pretends to speak is mostly made up, and something she's been working on for years at this point—it's not a fully-fleshed conlang and she only has a couple hundred words and phrases but it's enough to be consistent and believable when she sprinkles it into regular speech.  Since there's no real risk of running into anyone else from Zemlya (because it doesn't actually exist), it mostly didn't matter, and since there's actual meaning behind the words she does have, in theory it would have held up to a spell like Comprehend Languages as well. Out of universe, the language she speaks is an amalgamation of my own conlang stuff (which, like the in-universe version, is very limited and not complete) and various words and phrases pulled mostly from real-world Slavic languages (russian, croatian, hungarian, etc) with a little bit of Turkish thrown in when my English-only ear felt that it fit or when I had already used a word and needed another word for the same thing.  Zsaksatyi (pronounced dzahk sot-YEE) is the only name/word in the whole mess that doesn’t actually mean something somewhere, and was a combination of syllables from an online Yuan-Ti name generator that I kinda liked together. If she had ever been outed, I would probably have come up with something a little less cumbersome for me and my (almost certainly wholly monolingual) D&D group to say... but she didn’t, so Zsaksatyi it stays!

She very much looks up to Fenthaza and almost idolizes and worships her—if she ever had to choose between Fenthaza or Dendar, things might have gotten a little bit rough for her (possibly no matter which way she ultimately jumped, though I imagine Dendar's vengeance would be more immediate, if Dendar's a hands-on sort of patron).  Thankfully (for her), there was very little risk of that given that the party had left Fenthaza on reasonably neutral terms (having already helped her oust Ras Nsi from his position of power in the Fane and the party having essentially marked that dungeon as “cleared”). Fenthaza had sent her to scout the Tomb of the Nine Gods and locate (or steal) an artifact known as the Black Opal Crown, which will allow the Night Mother to emerge into the world.  The group actually came across the crown pretty soon after Zmija (and our other new character, a firbolg druid named Mei Ren who replaced our cleric, Amara) joined them, but the party couldn’t figure out how to get it out of the room it was in and Zsaksatyi was content that it would be safe from both our group and other adventurers there while she found her way back to the Fane (though she Sent the location to Fenthaza in case she wasn’t able to make it back).  That was actually like, halfway through the session right after she’d been introduced so having her sneak off that fast would have been absolutely wild, so I kept playing her as Zmija and while there were myriad opportunities for her to be discovered—including a hallway where any non-magical non-living thing got evaporated, up to and including clothing—she never was.  The fact that the only spells she ever used spell slots on were Hex, Counterspell, and Identify never really got commented upon, because prior to her joining the party we didn’t have a source for any sort of utility magic and we’d been feeling the lack for a while.  She was a lot of fun to play just as Zmija once I got the hang of her, but the hidden agenda that only our DM & I knew about was an extra layer of fun, too. It would have been neat to see how the party reacted to a reveal, but unless Jim wants to take us back to Chult to actually deal with the Night Mother’s return (because without having to keep up appearances and alignments, I’m pretty sure I could have gotten that crown out of there even before the weird teleport-defying magic of the Tomb got turned off), her story is over for us—taking her outside of the setting she was designed for would be weird... plus we already have two warlocks (well, one and a half) in a party of four PCs; adding a third would be a little bit bizarre, I think.

Her more Yuan-ti features include scales down her spine and across her shoulderblades, on the backs of her hands, and on her hips and thighs—mostly in reds, oranges, and browns, but as she increases in power and connection with the Night Mother, more of them are darkening to Her blue-black; it started right at that spot between the shoulderblades where you always picture being stabbed in the back, and has expanded from there; I imagine by level 20 all of her scales would be that blue-black and may have encroached further on the more human-y leather bits, probably encroaching on her face at the last, which would make being a spy a lot more difficult (even moreso than wearing as much clothing as she already does) but I guess at level 20, do you really need to be sneaking around pretending to be human?

In direct sunlight or other very bright light, her pupils constrict to slits, which is the real reason for her heavy eye makeup—between the distraction of it and the (somewhat exaggerated) squinting that such light induces, it often goes unnoticed, as it did with her character portrait (although to be fair to my party, Alexus also has slit eyes because that’s one of the traits of elves and half elves in D&D, and also I’m not sure if they ever saw her portrait any larger than 150x150 or whatever Roll20 shows them at). Both her top and bottom canine teeth are sharper, longer, and narrower than is typical for humans, and she is careful not to grin too widely and will cover her mouth when she laughs or yawns, whether she is in disguise or not.  That part I’ve never drawn though, so I can’t really point to that as something the party overlooked, heh.  In hindsight, I wish I'd given her more/heavier snake features but even the official art for Yuan-Ti player characters are very light on them and getting around the differences between human and yuan-ti racials without tipping off the party was hard enough as it was—I took the 120 feet of magic-ignoring darkvision invocation to disguise the fact that she innately had darkvision, I never used my racial spells and abilities unless I was willing to “use” a spell slot on them and had another plausible way to have obtained them, the one time I got hit with a poison ability (which she was immune to) I spent a lot of time “figuring out the math” on how much HP I had to drop, etc.  I also wish I’d given her darker skin, as she is supposed to be Chultian but she is significantly lighter than all the NPCs we came across.  Then again, I’m as white as a sheet soaked in bleach so there’s something weird about me RPing folks of colour regardless (especially given her fake backstory, agh agh agh) so yeah.  Really enjoyed her, don’t regret her, will not ever play her again rofl

In our very last session of Tomb of Annhiliation, the party—fresh off the victory over the big bad lich whose name I can never spell and his weird world-eating fetus—headed back to Port Nyanzaru via the Aarakocra village of Kir Sabal, which the previous variant of the party (of whom only Thokk remained alive and mobile enough to talk to them) had helped out significantly earlier in the campaign, unlocking a flying ritual that we were like “man we’re not coming back here if we’re gonna use it we gotta do it now” to get us the rest of the way to the port.  En route, Zmija tried to leave the group and rolled a secret 15 Stealth roll... contested by 17 and 18 perception rolls from Mei Ren and Thokk, but as she wasn’t carrying much of the party’s stuff and it was the end of the campaign, they kinda just let her give some line about seeing them again in the future maybe, the Mother’s will is unknowable, etc etc.  I think if Duf and Kattii didn’t know that I wanted Alexus back as badly as I did and that we were like twenty minutes (real time) away from actually getting him back, they might have considered that more suspicious than they did.

Pronunciations (and translations): (mostly C&Ped from her bio, which is the only part of her character sheet I can still access on Roll20)

Zmija Yilan: zMEE-ah yee-LAHN.  Because I'm subtle as hell, that's Croatian/Russian/Ukranian (first name) and Turkish (last name) for "snake/serpent," according to the internet.  What do you mean Remus Lupin is a werewolf?!

Matrymriy: mah-tRRuh mRREE (Rs are rolled).  Matrymriy is Zmija's claimed patron—one of five major Zemlyashan dieties—but she'll state that she doesn't know the name that she goes by in the local dialect.  That's only partly true, of course—мати мрій is Ukranian for "Mother of Dreams" (at least according to google translate), which is close enough to her patron's actual names and titles (Dendar, the Night Mother) that she can get away with it without actually raising suspicions about the true source of her powers.  She'll also do that thing where if someone tries to say the name back to her she'll "correct" them by saying it exactly the same four or five times and then "give up" and accept whatever "butchered" version the speaker comes up with, except she'll do it even if they're actually saying it perfectly correctly.  She may do this with her own name as well (sorry, Jim. And Duf. And Dustin. And Kattii. And Kattii's coworker, if he ever joins us and I'm still playing this character by then, lmao.) (2021 addition: and literally everyone who has a name that isn’t typically pronounced by us English-only plebians, I am so sorry I’m not better at your language)

Zsaksatyi: dzahk sot-YEE.  Zmija's real name, when she isn't pretending to be a human.  That doesn't mean anything as far as I know, it was just a combination of some of the syllables the random Yuan-Ti name generator was coming up with that I liked (which is also where "Itszella" was from), lol.  I may end up changing it to be less cumbersome at some point, unless it comes up before then and ends up written in stone, but I'm on a bit of a time crunch for the moment.

Zemlya: zem-lyah.  If pressed for more detail on where in Zemlya she's from (e.g. by someone pretending to know details about her country), her home town is Fal'shyva (fall-sheh-VAH), southeast of the capital of Hayali (HI-yah-LEE) and just north of the port city of Farazi (fah-ra-DZI), which is where she originally sailed from seven years ago. фальшива земля is Ukranian for "fake land," Hayali is Turkish for "imaginary," and Farazi is Turkish for "hypothetical," lol.

Proverbs & (approximate) Pronounciations: (if I recall correctly, asterisks indicate ones I had used, so I didn’t repeat myself too frequently)

Wziąć się w garść (zvun shih garsch): lit. take the self into the fist (polish), pull yourself together Галопом по Zemlya (gal-OH-pohm poe zem-lyah): lit. galloping across Zemlya (russian), to be hasty/haphazard. * У кого немає собаки, полює з котом (Ooh koe-hoe meh-MIGH-eh soe-BAH-kay, poe-LOO-yay koh-tome): lit. who does not have dog, hunts with cat (ukranian, original proverb is portugese), make do with what you have. Z choinki się urwałaś? (dzi hoink-E she urr-vahl-wash): lit. did you fall from a Candlenights(aka Christmas) tree? (polish), you are obviously not well-informed; are you dumb? * Mi o vuku (MEE oh voo-koo): lit. to talk of the wolf (croatian), speak of the devil. * Thalai muzhuguthal (tha-LIE MOOz-GOO-thal): lit. pour water over someone's head (tamil), cut off a relationship. * Хоть кол на голове теши (coat-coal nah gohl-ehvee teh-SHEE): lit. you can sharpen an axe on this head (russian), a very stubborn person.

Other Languages Are Hard Today, Let’s Just Proverb It In English:

Cat's Forehead (japanese): a tiny space, usually used humbly to refer to owned land. It fell between chairs (swedish): group work that everyone assumed someone else would do, and didn't get done as a result * It gives me a beautiful leg (french): fat lot of good that'll do me Drown the fish (french): avoid a subject by talking about anything and everything else, confuse the issue In a river with piranhas, the alligator swims backstroke (brazil): protect your weaknesses * Accusation always follows the cat (iraqi): it's easy to blame someone who can't defend themselves The honey only sticks to the mustache of he who licked it (arabic): he who smelt it, dealt it * A hungry bear does not dance (greek): the reward must be worth the cost (or at least exist) * The crayfish sides with the crab (korean): people who have a lot in common stay friends * If you can't live longer, live deeper (italian): get the most of your time * A spoon does not know the taste of soup (welsh): intelligence is not wisdom Examine what is said, not who speaks (arab): don't take things at face value * Turn your face to the sun and the shadows will fall behind you (new zealand): have a positive outlook He who does not travel, does not know the value of men (moorish): wide experience is gr8 Do good and throw it in the sea (arab): don't expect anything back from kindness * Shared joy is a double joy; shared sorrow is halved (swedish): friends make things better If you want to go fast, go alone.  If you want to go far, go together (african): strength in numbers, speed on your own.

[salvadorbonaparte]

Sry if you've been asked this before, but did you learn all the languages that you know on your own or through school programs?

Hello. First of all, I don't actually know that many languages. I know German and English and I terribly neglected my Spanish. The other languages I've learned or dabbled in I'm beginner level at most.

I English learned in school but I became fluent through a lot of additional self study and immersion. Moving abroad also helped.

I also learned Spanish in school/university. Again, I passed a C1 class but I haven't really spoken Spanish since the start of the pandemic and I'm pretty sure my language skills are awful at the moment. I can understand Spanish but I can't speak it.

I started self studying Yiddish but currently I'm taking a weekly class to really push me to get a good foundation in the language.

I started dabbling in Portuguese for a holiday, then took a class during my year abroad but the class was horrible and I feel like I learned more by self studying and just trying to talk to people. I paused my Portuguese studies at the moment but I will return to them.

I had to take about 12h of private classes in Romanian for my volunteering. I can no longer afford those so I'll continue with self study.

I wanted to take a Croatian class but it ended up clashing with my thesis deadline. I'll self study it instead.

In general I enjoy the freedom of self study but I often need the structure of lessons to keep me motivated. Ideally I'd love to have regular private or small group meetings as check points, reasons for motivation, practice sessions or opportunities to ask questions but also a lot of opportunities for self study and immersion between those.

[language-sanctuary]

Hi Karen. My name is Michael. I travel often and I love it. I have often tried to learn different languages. I find it extremely difficult to get past a little basic conversational opening and closing statements. Please help.

Hello, Michael!

You say you travel often, so I'm assuming your reason for learning languages is to make your travels more engaging. I'd say the first step in language learning is to figure out your why. Why do you want to learn it? When you are tired or feeling like doing something else, what will motivate you to pick up your notebook or listen to a song in your target language?

You didn't specify in your ask, but is English your first language or have you learned another ones? If not, how do you normally learn things? Are you a visual learner? Kinesthetic learner? Do you remember things after hearing them?

Your understanding of your interest in the language and how you normally learn things will allow you to find the method that bests works for you.

For example, I am studying Latin and Ancient Green to read classical texts, so I have to be mainly focused in the grammatical structures and forms. However, I am also studying Croatian so I can communicate with my Croatian friend, so my first approach to the language will be peppered with vocabulary lists, an introduction to the alphabet and pronunciation and some common words, but most of it will be through immersion: books, YouTube videos, podcasts, talking with natives.

It wasn't very clear if you couldn't get past a basic conversational level because of motivation, because you started learning a new language or because you didn't know how to approach it. I'll talk about those three assumptions here:

1. I wouldn't say that motivation or "your why" is enough. You have to build a routine that won't let you think about your choices, won't let you talk yourself out of them.

If you keep a diary, make it obligatory for you to write a short diary entry in the language ("Today I ate cake. It was good. I went to the post office") which will allow you to learn verbs and how to conjugate them in common forms.

Or listen to a song in your target language while getting ready in the morning.

If your relaxing time is watching YouTube (like me), make it a rule that for every three videos, you have to watch a video in your target language.

2. If you start learning a language and then quickly abandon it, I would ask you to be realistic. If we take your traveling as your main reason for learning languages, ask yourself what language will bring you the most joy and start learning that one (if you're traveling to a Spanish-speaking country in two months, that easily gives you time to reach A2 and to be more in depth with your conversations). I understand the hurry to learn all languages at once (which can definitely be done) but the progress will be so much slower. When you get to a level to the first language in which you can comfortably consume authentic material, start studying another one with aid of that language!

3. How to approach it? We have come full circle. Do an online quiz and find out how to best study something according to your prefer study method (visual, auditory, manual, or a combination). Language learning requires attention in four fronts: active (speaking, writing) and passive (listening, reading). You'll need to focus more on the active ones because your main focus is to keep a conversation.

Within the week I'll share a method that works for me, and maybe I'll do a post about auditory, kinesthetic and visual learners.

Learning languages doesn't have to be boring or hard, but that does mean it won't take work. It is an incredibly rewarding experience, however. I wish you the best of luck, don't give up! Tell me if I can do anything else for you.

[thatbanjobusiness]

Early 1920s Non-English American Records by OKeh

I’ve only begun researching the history of the early recorded music industry. From the beginning, I’ve been interested learning about certain series of records sold by OKeh, a company (of course not the only one) which sought out musicians from a variety of cultural and ethnic groups to appeal to North American and American immigrant demographics. OKeh was one of the first companies to regularly conduct field trips locating musicians in areas that previously lacked recording studio access.

OKeh is responsible for tapping into multiple demographics that had been underrepresented or absent from early commercial music records. In 1920 OKeh recorded Mamie Smith’s “Crazy Blues,” in which Mamie Smith was the first African-American female singer to lead a commercial recording. It was “unexpectedly” successful and broke open the doors for major recording companies to produce materials specifically for African-American audiences. This song alone is worth a ton of research, discussion, and analysis regarding its social background and its bold, hard-hitting lyrics like, “Get myself a gun and shoot myself a cop.”

The same individual who supervised Mamie Smith’s recording, Ralph Peer, is also credited with bringing us the first successful country music record, that of Fiddlin’ John Carson in 1923. It was almost the first country music record, too, but A. C. (“Eck”) Robertson recorded in the summer of 1922 for Victor and saw his music released in April of 1923; John Carson was recorded on June 13, 1923, and his music released August 3, 1923. Even though Peer considered either Carson’s singing or the recording quality “pluperfect awful” (different accounts say different things), this record sold like hotcakes.

To be clear: the motivations behind OKeh and Ralph Peer were that of profit, not representation. And Fiddlin’ John Carson, despite being an integral part of country music history, is no personality to celebrate. But it is nevertheless a unique and informative area of music history to explore for both the good and bad residing in it.

I’ve known the stories of Mamie Smith, Ralph Peer, and John Carson for some time, but I haven’t delved as much into OKeh’s early 1920s music in which they recorded many other cultural groups in North America. Today, I’m peeping into their early catalogue, which is excitingly available online, and contains occasional digital files of the old records.

From 1918-1934, OKeh designated entire catalog series numbers to music and comedy from many people groups and languages. These were, as designated by OKeh itself: Race [that is, African-American] (8000 and 20000), Italian (9000, 84000, and 86000), German (10000, 81000, and 85000), Polish (11000, 67000, and 87000), Hungarian (12000 and 86500), Roumanian (13000 and 83500), Finnish (13500), Jewish (14000), Porto Rican (14000), Russian (15000), Ukranian (16000 and 81500), Mexican (16000, 16400, and 88000), Bohemian (17000), Slovak (18000), Scandinavian/Swedish (19000), Danish (20000), Irish (21000), French (22000), Serbo-Croatian (23000), Slovenian-Krainer (24000), Croatian (25000), Norwegian (25000), Lithuanian (26000), Swiss (27000), Welsh (27500), Greek (28000), Portuguese (29000), Chinese (29000), Spanish (33000), West Indian (65000), Bulgarian (69000), Armenian (77000 and 78000), Hebrew (80000), Portuguese (80500), Greek (82000 and 82500), Turkish (83000), and Bohemian (89000). Think I got all that right.

I’m not here today to seek out the most famous songs that have come out of OKeh’s early 1920s, but I am here to have fun, and I hope it’s fun to share with you songs in different languages I’ve found, looked up, and listened to. Because what’s cooler than what American immigrant and minority populations listened to 100 years ago?

Do note: lots of the audio files are quiet, so you’ll need to crank up. Also note: since this was a hundred years ago, sometimes the record label’s language choices can get... wonky... from a modern perspective. I don’t think here anything’s weird, but I want to give warning because I’ve Seen Things before.

S-70969 OKeh 14054 Mein Griner Cosin / Ich Bin A Border Bei Mein Weib

Tenor Morris Goldstein, singing in Yiddish and backed by an orchestra, was recorded November 1922 in New York, New York. As you can see on the label above, OKeh has it labeled as a “Jewish Comic Song.” Both Morris Goldstein and the composer of this song, Morris Rund, have their names appear on many other records. In fact, looking at Morris Goldenstein, he appears on a large number of records from five companies (Victor, Columbia, OKeh, Brunswick, and Edison) between 1916 and 1929. I desperately wish I could find more information about him, especially given how well-recorded he was, and at such an early time, indicating some level of prominent singer, but regrettably the internet is turning me up dry. I will say, even with this audio being nearly 99 years old, his voice sings out wonderfully.

I actually just stumbled across a copy of this record on eBay, which is fun to see floating around. And reliable discogs has this listed, too, albeit to no surprise, there’s no copies for sale.

8440 OKeh 26024 Pamylējau Vakar / Vai, Varge, Varge

Lithuanian! I found a hundred songs in the OKeh matrices in this language. This recording by baritone singer Kastas Sabonis was recorded in Chicago, Illinois, in July of 1923. Unfortunately, I have less on Sabonis than I do Goldstein, but I noticed Sabonis reappears on Columbia in 1925 and Victor in 1926.

One of the things I am fascinated by is how the main label material (song title, performer) is in Lithuanian, but the rest is in English. In some ways, you could say this makes sense... non-Lithuanian consumers can understand the gist of what it’s about, and Lithuanian people can potentially recognize the title of a song they’re already familiar with. And like, it’s always better to keep the title of the song in its actual language.

Also ironically, one of these records was sold online in late January 2021. So these do float around, still.

S-7310 OKeh 4801 Kuu Pua Loke / Mauna Kea O' Hawaii

We have records of Prince Lei Lani between 1913 and 1928. He started with Victor and switched to OKeh in 1920. This song, Mauna kea o' Hawaii, is the second song he recorded with OKeh; he was recorded in New York, New York. It’s a beautiful recording.

He was born in 1887 in Hawai'i as Edwin Kaumualiiokamokuokalani Rose. Sometimes you’ll see his name as Prince Leilani, Edwin K. Rose, or E. K. Rose. He was in three movies: Waikiki Wedding (1937), Hawaiian Nights (1939), and Bird of Paradise (1951). Lest you forget how nascent the recording industry is, Prince Lei Lani died in 1971. I’ve found one blogger, a relative of his, who’s translated articles and advertisements from Hawaiian to English and collected information on him, in case you’re interested seeing photographs of him and learning more. There’s some fun stuff here.

73798 Odeon 18056 Prychod Z Krčmi Na Svite

Comedy! Slovak comedy! Although the database tells me this is a “Male vocal solo, with accordion,” there’s clearly two singers, and the majority of the recording is speech. The singing duet backed by accordion seems to be, to my untrained ear, an opener and a closer to the act. Comedy recordings are a fun element of early records I need to get more into, and while I can’t understand Andrej Gellert’s speech, the fact he’s intentionally interspersing his speech with hiccups makes it clear to me this is a humorous sketch.

This was recorded November 1925 in New York, New York.

There are more digital files of Andrej Gellert on this site. These ones are music. That’s probably why he got listed as “Male vocal solo.” You can hear Mlynské kolo tosa toci, from the same recording session as Prychod z krčmi na svite. There’s also Lístie opadlo (this one’s really cool) and Na ćo som na svete?, and Veselý pastier recorded May 11, 1925. Frankly his list goes on forever. He did quite a lot for Victor and OKeh between 1923 and 1928.

And to again emphasize these things can be found: there’s a copy of one Andrej Gellert record for sale on discogs for $7.67 + shipping.

That’s about all the time I have today to screw around with early recordings. If I come back around again with more tidbits like this, don’t be surprised.

[travelingthroughstories]

My journey to master a new language

History

When I was little I lived in Bosnia I Herzegovina until I was three. While my parents and two sisters spoke Croatian fluently, my brother and I have always spoken Dutch with the family. When we would have to interact with friends and acquaintances from Bosnia, my brother and I would ‘try’ to speak English and that was when I first interacted with the English language.

Vacation in England 1

My first vacation in England was in 2011. I was nine years old and did not have much experience with the English language. It was a family vacation and we went to a Hillsong London conference for a weekend. There was a kids program my brother and I went to, it was the first time I was at a place where no one understood me and I couldn’t understand much of the rest either. I did manage to make some English friends, as kids do, and they taught me a few words.

First English lessons

I had my first lessons in English in the first grade in Highschool. My English wasn’t very good yet, I watched English series and movies but always with Dutch subtitles. What I did see was that my English was better than a few of my classmates. Languages have always come easy to me and the fact that we watched a lot of movies in my family helped to give me a base. Those first lessons were harder than expected because of all the grammar rules. This made me realize I really had to study and I have been doing this so that I can communicate well with people all over the world. That was my motivation.

Vacation in England 2

The second vacation I spent in England was in 2014. In that year I was pretty active on social media and I would watch English YouTube videos. We went to the same conference we went to in 2011 but this year I could go to the teenage group. We were there with a big group from our church at home so I had more people to rely on. That vacation I could, somewhat, easily manage with my own knowledge of English. There were plenty of things I did not understand but I could manage and I still remember how proud I was of myself.

Further English lessons

In the later years of my English education my teachers saw that I had high grades with low to no effort. In the fourth grade I got the opportunity to study from VWO books, Cambridge English. Because I was in Havo I couldn’t participate in Cambridge English. My teacher was so kind to give me the books they used for Cambridge English so I could study some of it myself. The fifth and last year of high school I didn’t have to do much. In the beginning of the year I had to  take a test in reading, writing and listening and I had to take part in monthly tests, but for the rest of the class I got to read English novels or watch English movies.

Movies

In my family movies are a very important part of who we are. You could say that that is an exaggeration but believe me, we watched it all at home. Every weekend we had several movie nights. The movies were always in English because my parents said that was good for our education and later on they would turn off the subtitles or put English subtitles on. I am very grateful for this because I really think this helped me with my pronunciation and overall English.

Holidays

Since I was little I have been a very social kid and every summer vacation I would make lots of friends. My parents love traveling so we would go to different countries every year and to make friends, my brother and I had to speak English. Those vacations I learned the basics but because the kids I became friends with weren’t English either we all spoke very little English. This did, however, improve my speech. Some kids were more experienced and they would correct you on your grammar or pronunciation.

Current experience

Currently I am active on social media and I have a few online friends that I speak English with. My English is fine, but of course not perfect. I get corrected on my grammar all the time and I learn every day. This C1 program is a really great opportunity because I want to work in as much foreign countrys as I can and business English is required. I hope to learn as much as I can and will continue to do so.

[plum-studyblr]

19/02: skills I’d like to acquire / things I want to do by my 30th birthday to become a better version of myself

General Skills

Learn how to play the cello

Learn how to read music sheets

Learn how to compose a (good) song

Learn how to play the saxophone

Learn a magic trick

Learn how to drive a car

Learn about astronomy and how to use a telescope correctly

Take classes in Chemistry or Physics

Take classes in Biology

Grow an interest for astrology along with my so (in progress)

Improve my writing’s style (in progress)

Complete a poem

Write a short novel

Take a creative writing class

Publish a book or an article (very unlikely but why not haha)

Learn how to dance the waltz

Books and Arts

Read the entire Bible

Read the full work of Charles Darwin

Read the full work of Balzac (in progress)

Read the full work of Zola (in progress)

Read the full work of Guy de Maupassant (in progress)

Read the full work of Stendhal

Read the full work of Virginia Woolf

Read the full work of Emily Dickinson

Read the full work of Shakespeare

Read the full work of Marcel Pagnol (in progress)

Read the full work of Racine

Read the full work of Victor Hugo (in progress)

Read the full work of Flaubert

See a play of Shakespeare a the Globe Theater

I’d love to see a Midsummer Night’s Dream there

See representations of all Molière’s plays at the Comédie Fran��aise

Play Alceste in the Misanthrope once again

Go to a concert at the Philharmonie of Paris

Languages

Achieve a C2 level in English and become bilingual (in progress)

Reach a C1 level in Spanish

Reach a C1 level in Italian

Reach a B2 level in German

Be able to translate fluently from Ancient Greek to French

Be able to translate fluently from Latin to French

Engage in learning an Asian language (I’m mostly thinking of Japanese or Mandarin Chinese)

Engage in learning a Slavic language (I was thinking of Serbo-Croatian or Russian)

Degrees and Academic Life

Complete my master’s degree in History 

Complete my master’s degree in English 

Complete my master’s degree thesis 

Obtain my Agrégation (teacher qualification)

Obtain my Doctorat (Ph.D.) and become a Doctor

Personal and lifestyle 

Own a red cartridge pen (to grade papers with style and class)

Own a "Self-Love" ring, as a reminder to love myself a little more each day, for the rest of my journey on Earth

Own a BIG something (such as a house, or a car)

Live in the North of France...

...or as close to the sea as possible

Go to work biking

Develop a more eco-responsible lifestyle (This one includes a lot of things. I'm still struggling with recycling but I'm learning. I try to eat organic and local food when possible. Maybe as an adult, I could have a vegetable patch if I have a garden or solar panels on the roof...) (in progress)

Become fully vegetarian

Have a pet and make them as happy as possible

Do my best to keep a healthy, stable and loving relationship with my so;  a relationship that would continuously motivate us to become better and happier people, every day, for as long as possible

Keep waking up every morning by my <3′s sides and keep telling myself "Plum, you are the luckiest person on Earth"  

Maintain healthy and caring relationships with my friends

Develop a stronger, healthier, and brighter relation with my family

Tell my favorite teacher how much I admire and respect him

Ask my grandfather what he remembers about the war

Go back to the psychiatrist and ask for help fighting depression and anxiety 

Develop healthier coping mechanisms for mental illness 

(walking is one of them. I want to try and walk even more and not just by myself)

Have a diary

Run one hour a week

Go to the swimming pool once a month

Practice sports with my brother <3

Look at the mirror one morning and say: "Wow, you look good today"

Transition

Wear ties every day because ties are awesome

Grow a beard

Be the best teacher possible for the kids because kids deserve good teachers