Back to the beginings

Starting where I left of...
So yes, all journeys have periods of time when we take a break. I had one few months long. That's ok. Today I realized that I can sing in Spanish and it made me so nostalgic of my language journey. I had to take a break because of huge concentration on writing. But now I am back to all the things that I promised to do. And it's a lot...

It's like some saying that I read couple weeks ago on Pinterest goes something like:
"Whatever you do, don't quit, because starting over is even harder" and that's completely true with everything in our lives. Either it's fitness, writing, learning or whatever. If it is self motivated, it's really hard to start and even harder to start over even after a couple of days of a break. I am not speaking about couple of months :).

Only good thing that happened during these months is that I got hold of some books that are in Japanese, German and Spanish. So I have more material to work on :).

Anyways... Good luck for me. I am learning Polish today :).

Polish Friday

Król Karol, kupił królowej Karolinie, korale koloru kolorowego.

Yes, polish language is much easier when you listen to native speakers. But when you try to do it yourself out loud... Man... That's just some clownish mess.

And the word of the day is...

chrząszcz

Though maybe starting to learn from the hardest words isn't the best idea. It might take my motivation away :D. But at the same time it's very challenging. I need to start reading more in polish and out loud :). 

W Szczebrzeszynie chrząszcz brzmi w trzcinie

I Szczebrzeszyn z tego słynie.

Wół go pyta: „Panie chrząszczu,

Po cóż pan tak brzęczy w gąszczu?"  

And translation for those who don't understand yet:

In Szczebrzeszyn a beetle sounds in the reeds

And Szczebrzeszyn is famous for this.

An ox asks him: “Mister beetle,

What are you buzzing in the bushes for?”

Source: Wiki

Some tongue twister that is :).  

Russian Tuesday

Repeating what I learned last week during Russian tuesday. It might be easier to learn Russian when you are a Lithuanian. I heard this language all around since I was born. But to learn writing and reading it, is a completely different thing. Russian alphabet writing system uses Cyrillic script. And it's not only very different from Roman script but also sometimes very confusing.
I am fortunate that there are so many different helpful tools out there in the internet. Like these youtube.com lessons to pronounce and write Russian letters: russian alphabet made easy.

I want to share another thing that I understood over process of learning seven different languages at once. It is very good to use as many similar tools as it is possible. Like for speaking and understanding I have Pimsleur listening lessons for every single language. That way I can learn same phrases in all those different languages. Sometimes I even try to repeat those phrases in my head not only for the one language I am listening at the moment, but also for all of those that I already heard the same material.  But I also try to dedicate specific day to specific language. Like reading material, watching movies or listening to music in dedicated language for the day.

Somebody asked me how I don't get confused with all those different languages at once. Before beginning I also thought that it will be confusing (like I was always confusing Polish and Russian words while trying to speak), but it isn't. Somehow everything falls into places every single day I learn new things. And I get excited when I manage to learn something new. Like today while learning Russian I managed to pronounce some words in much clearer way that I couldn't before. I felt proud of myself and this feeling is the best motivator for anything in our lives :). 

Good luck for anyone who is learning languages, it is a very hard but rewarding thing to do :).

До свидания :)

Chinese Saturday

Just like I wrote in the first post, each day of a week has it's own language to learn. I was learning Polish yesterday and with a help of my friend I even got to practice my writing. Of course I still needed help from dictionaries, but as I said in the first post, I am not going to put pressure on myself otherwise this journey will turn into a nightmare :).

So Saturday is for Chinese. Just for clarity it's Mandarin Chinese. The hardest language that I set out to learn. But it isn't just challenging it's also very beautiful language. For the moment I am only practicing understanding and speaking, though I am reading articles about writing too. One really interesting and helpful site that I found is http://www.writtenchinese.com/ .
Articles are written in easy to follow and also fun way. It helps to relax a bit while thinking of how many hours I will need to really get into Mandarin language. But I try to be positive. The process is the most fun part in it.

Good luck to everyone who is learning this difficult yet beautiful language :).

Just the beginning

Every journey has a starting point and a finish point. With this journey I want to share how I am learning or broadening a knowledge of my old dream - knowing different languages for different reasons. 

How it all started?

When I was just a child I still lived in Soviet Union Lithuania. So at this point I have to mention my mother tongue is Lithuanian (not English - excuse me for my mistakes). Television, radio most of it was in Russian. After a while my parents were surprised by the fact, that I started to understand Russian just by watching TV. 

After declaration of freedom broader choice of TV came our way. Including Polish shows for kids, American cartoons and movies, Spanish soup operas. All those things were new not only to me. It was new to my parents and brothers. Television took big part in our exploration of the new world that opened up for us after occupation. 

And having young brain I was taking it all in. I was learning languages even without noticing it. After a while I could understand original language next to translation. But it wasn't an end. Cable TV allowed us to reach even more. I got to see German channels. That was the moment when I fell in love with Japanese anime. Though at that time I was still watching it with German dubbing. But with rise of internet I was able to watch anime in their original language - Japanese. So around 10 years ago I already understood:

Russian

Polish

Spanish

English (had it in school too)

German (had a little bit of this in school)

Japanese (just a bit, because it was so far away from anything I knew until that point)

Hindi (just bits and pieces from loving Bollywood movies). 

But to that list I always wanted to add Chinese and French. Why? I always loved the sound of French. And Chinese - well we all know that this is a language that you are ought to know in this new world. 

I could say I know a lot of languages, but I can't do that. I only know my mother tongue and English. Most of other languages I only understand, because I never got to talk with TV :((... So I can't say I know a language until I can have a normal worry free conversation with native speakers and read books and magazines without a self doubt. And I really can't at this point of time. 

But that is why it's only just the beginning of my journey that I started this week. My plan might sound crazy to some, but what I understood over the years waiting for the right moment in my life to learn those languages properly. It might never come. I just have to do it now. Without any pressure - just start doing it. Bit by bit, every single day, every free second I have. 

What is my plan?

Monday - Spanish

Tuesday - Russian

Wednesday - French

Thursday - Japanese

Friday - Polish

Saturday - Chinese

Sunday - German

I have listening material for all those languages and also internet is full of help with videos, apps and other helpful ideas. So far I had no trouble of satisfying my need of little pieces of knowledge for each of those languages. Some of them need less because I know them from the heart. I only need to practice my speaking. But others require my full attention. You know what I mean - Chinese. Japanese too, but it is easier because I already have some understanding of it. On the other hand Chinese is completely new to me. Just like French, but French is at least in the same Indo European Family of Languages as my mother tongue :). And after starting this journey I already understood one thing about Chinese - it's very beautiful language and worth all the challenge that I put on myself to learn it :). 

What is the end point of this journey?

Even though I believe, that you can't ever fully learn any language, even you mother tongue, but this is a journey and it would be hard to travel without knowing where you are going. And I set up a goal I felt very happy about. As I love reading books (watching TV wasn't all I was doing as a child and teen) I decided that upon knowing each language I will read books in their original language. 

The list:

Don Quixote

Hundred years of Solitude

Anna Karenina

War and peace

Little Prince

Beauty and the Beast

Romance of the three kingdoms

The art of war

The Wind Up Bird Chronicle

Woman in the Dunes

The Sorrows of Young Werther

The Castle

Quo Vadis

Sir Thaddeus 

(Hopefully soon enough I will be able to write down this list in their original languages ;),

So I have a long journey ahead of me. I believe some of those books aren't easy to read in languages that I know well let alone their originals. But isn't life interesting this way? We can challenge ourselves to be better each day.

Why writing the blog? So it can work as one of the motivators. I don't lack motivation just yet, but in case I ever will :D. Writing down all my steps might remind me later why I even started.

Wish me good luck on my traveling. Or even better - join me in :) and we can do it together :). 

Au revoir for now :).