#also Portuguese is just very easy in terms of writing and pronunciation

[villanele]

Portuguese and Spanish are really the best languages. Not too beautiful like french but also not too weird like Italian.

[atthebell-moved]

Hi, i hope you dont mind this ask, but i noticed that in your bio post you mention you speak 4 languages and are learning 2 more, and thats honestly so cool and inspiring!! Do you happen to have any language learning tips you used so far that you like? Im in the process of learning french as my 3rd language and while i have the structural knowledge of how to learn a language, i have hit somewhat of a wall in my learning process rn i think. So while i know language learning varies a lot from person to person id still apreciate knowing other peoples process if youd be okay with sharing :] hope youre having a nice timezone

hi! i definitely don't mind, glad to hear you're learning a new language :D big reminder at the top that i'm just some a guy who's way too into languages and linguistics. you want to ask me about jewish theology on the concept of knowing, go right ahead, but in terms of language pedagogy, this is just my personal experience from learning a lot of languages and spending a lot of time thinking about this stuff, though i do have some experience in education. take everything i say with the grain of salt of my personal context!

my initial tips kind of revolve around your goals; do you want to get generally better at the language, or are you specifically looking to strengthen certain areas? if its the former, i recommend doing anything and everything, but most of all practicing, and practicing with french speakers (or speakers of whatever language you may be learning). it might be embarrassing, especially if you're trying to speak with native speakers, but it is hands down the best way to learn, and it means you get very hands-on practice.

if you want to strengthen certain areas, it can depend on which, and it can also depend on your learning styles and what works best for you. for a couple examples: if you want to improve pronunciation, flash cards can be really helpful, and i know quizlet has ways of including pronunciation. if flashcards aren't your thing, i recommend listening to native speakers (i.e. youtube videos, podcasts, etc. etc.) and repeating after them to try to get down their pronunciation, and i recommend a variety of them so you pick up on how pronunciation varies by accent and region. another example: if you want to improve comprehension/listening ability, again, i recommend listening to native speakers and getting the hang of what theyre saying; this is particularly helpful if you can watch something with subtitles in the language as well in your own native language(s) so you can pick up on exactly what they're saying. i do this sometimes when i'm watching cellbit-- instead of putting stream captions on english, i put them in portuguese so that i can see what he's saying along with hearing it. this works well for me though bc i read pretty well in most languages i speak/am learning and i already speak spanish, which makes reading portuguese very easy. again, it depends on your own learning styles and what works for you, so find something that really clicks with your brain and run with it. and this goes for any goal you might have-- if it's being able to read books in french, you can practice reading kids' books and move up to something more advanced; if it's translation specifically, you'll want to look a bit into translation studies and look at professional and amateur translations to see how it's typically done.

there's also the context of the language itself-- yiddish literature is a HUGE part of yiddishism, and translation is also a really important factor for a lot of people, so we read a lot of books and poems and did full translations of texts as practice, but for some languages, there's far more emphasis on song, oral storytelling, writing, or any number of things. if you've previously focused on some elements while learning other languages, it can be strange to switch to something new with another language, but it really helps round out your understanding of the diversity of languages and how cultural context has an impact on it all.

my big big big tip is to practice as much as possible and, if you think you're plateauing at kind of an intermediate-advanced level, that's very normal. every language i've studied, you reach a point where you have a pretty decent grasp on a lot of technical things, but you still don't necessarily feel super confident in the language. i recommend studying new vocab, as that will make you feel more like you can speak it at any opportunity, and engaging in media in the language, like i said above. when i got into advanced yiddish, we read and practiced and had conversations constantly, and it helped me gain a lot of confidence that i was able to open a text and know a lot of what was being said, including vocab, without having to reach for a dictionary all the time or ponder exactly which auxiliary verb was being used, or to be able to express myself really clearly to my peers.

i think it's easy to feel railroaded after you've got a lot of grammar and structure down, so you need to find new ways to gain knowledge and confidence in the language so you don't get stuck at that level. also find a crew to speak french with!! i wouldn't have learned yiddish nearly as well as i did if i hadn't had friends in my classes and built connections in the yiddish community at large, and i think that's a really meaningful way to engage with a language. language is about human connection, so finding ways to build that really does help. and don't forget to review!! you will, if you're like me, get caught up in some element of the language and then may misremember some basics, so it's always good to review those and keep up with anything that might start to slip your memory.

one last thing! if you learned another language as a kid or a teen and now you're learning as an adult and finding its not quite as easy, this is also really normal. kids' brains are so, so good at absorbing information, particularly languages, and it's very normal to get into your twenties and thirties and be like "why can't i learn this as fast as i could as a kid?!" the easiest time to learn a language is as young as possible, but you are not late to the game or slow. you just came at it at a different time, and you're still going to be able to pick it up. especially if you're trying to learn in between other classes and work and just general adult life, it's just going to be a bit harder, and that's okay! for thousands and thousands of years people have been learning new languages at every age and you are not alone in that. may we all have a decent time at it, and best of luck to you. bonne chance!

[marcmaccoy]

”LA DIVERSIÓN EN IDIOMAS”

The title above is translated as, “The fun in languages”, something that I never really felt and had at the beginning. Ever since the quarantine started, I really did not plan to do anything nor to improve myself in any of my hobbies at all. Maybe it’s because I expected that all these crisis will be over in a week or two, which obviously and sadly, did not happen. Before, I just like to play my musical instruments, paint, and I got into Korean Dramas as well because of my friends. Sometimes, I bond with my pets and do cooking experiments too. All of these are done in order for me to avoid boredom. However, as time goes by, those things became a bit dull to me and I felt the need to discover something new.

Let me share a bit of my journey first.

As I watch Korean Dramas, I got this tendency to copy what they say and it became a habit of mine whenever I want to express something. So instead of saying, “Salamat” or “Thank you”, I often say, “감사”(gam-sa) which is an informal way of saying “Thank you” in Korean. Also, “안녕”(an-nyeong) which means “Hi”, “네”(ne) which means “Yes”, “아니”(ah-ni) which means “No” and many more. At that time, I didn’t know how to read their alphabet yet but because of my curiosity, I’ve thought of studying it. Surprisingly, I learned “한글”(han-geul) or the Korean Alphabet in just a day! Nine total hours to be exact. I was dumbfounded by how I was able to understand that in just a short manner of time. This inspired me to continue moving forward until I decided to finally learn the Korean language.

In the middle of my journey learning the said language, I began to encounter a lot of interesting facts about it. Such as it wasn’t the writing system of Korea before and how it only existed at about 578 years ago during King Sejong’s reign. It is said that “한글”(han-geul) was created in order for people with little to no education could learn how to read and write. Because before, many Koreans are illiterate due to their very complex Chinese-based writing system called Hanja (漢字) which is difficult to understand. Meaning to say, it was created by the King for the purpose of literacy. Also, the shapes of the letters in 한글 was based on the surroundings and how you say it. These are among the facts that I knew while I became deeply interested in Korea’s traditions, history, and cultures. I was so excited to be fluent that time. I even made flashcards to enhance my vocabularies, watched a lot of tutorials on YouTube, surfed many websites on the Internet, and proceeds to watch Korean series. Little did I know, I was going to unexpectedly give up studying this language. Why? Well, when I got into its grammar, I was surprised by how complicated it is. I also saw videos on YouTube about Filipino learners of the Korean Language that aren’t still fluent after years of studying. So I got a bit down and frankly, I lost my motivation.

Even so, my language learning journey did not stop there. I still want to learn a foreign language that interests me other than the ones I already know which is Filipino, my native mother-tongue and English, my second language. I tried Japanese because of Animes but it was a bit complicated too. They have three kinds of writing systems and the grammar is similar to Korean. French because I have a French uncle and a Filipino cousin and aunt which speaks fluent French but when I knew how it sounded and how the words were pronounced, I already lost hope. French pronunciation is too complicated for me. I also dig up about German because my main to-go-to country in the future is Switzerland and of course, I would want to communicate with people there. However, German is laborious too! The words, the combinations of letters, and the grammar is too confusing. Until I finally encountered the language that’s spoken by the first colonizer of my motherland and it is no other than Spanish.

I started by memorizing basic phrases such as, “Gracias”, “De nada”, “Hola”, and a lot more. I was, once again, amazed by how easy this language is spoken. It is because Spanish is a phonetic language. Meaning, the words are pronounced exactly the way they are spelled. Also since Spain colonized my country for about 333 years, we adopted a lot of words from them which are now considered as loan words. It is estimated that about 4,000+ Tagalog and 6,000 Visayan words came from Spain. Some of the examples include baso(vaso), lamesa(la mesa), tinidor(tenidor), kutsara(cuchara), bumbilya(bombilla), and banyo(baño). As well as the number system, the names of the months, days, expressions, greetings, and many more. For this reason, I was determined to continue learning it because unlike in the other languages, there is no need for me to struggle in memorizing new vocabularies.

I did the same things I did to Korean and just added some new tactics. While my school is on a term break after the first semester, I enrolled at a Spanish Beginner course online where we are taught by a Filipino teacher who is fluent in 5 languages: English, Tagalog, Spanish, Portuguese, and Italian. My cousin from France, who’s also fluent in Spanish, gave me books like Spanish dictionaries and grammar textbooks for writing and reading purposes. I was also able to use my Netflix binge-watching skills and started to watch a lot of Spanish series for listening purposes. And on YouTube, I began to discover facts about Spain. Their rich culture, history, and traditions, and how their language was influenced by Arabic as well. Additionally, Spanish is the 2nd most spoken language in the world, surpassing the English language, having over 460 million native speakers located in Spain and in Latin American countries. It is also the 3rd most used language on the internet. That’s a lot of people to talk to!

Furthermore, did you know that being multilingual gives your brain several remarkable advantages? Some of it can be seen such as higher density of the grey matter that contains most your brain’s neurons and synapses. It also helps our brain engage in more activities in certain regions where that language is spoken. And although not yet definitively proven, learning many languages decreases the rate of having dementia by 5 years! In addition, more businesses nowadays are seeking applicants who can navigate the modern global economy. It can be seen that in the 21st Century, knowing a second language is not only beneficial, but necessary for success in life. The continual globalization of the world’s economy is bringing diverse cultures and communities into more frequent contact with each other.

Looking back in time, I was nothing like this way before the quarantine started. Learning languages was never really included in my interests. But now, it is! In fact, I am even determined to shift my college course to something related to languages and pursue a master’s degree about linguistics. Indeed, it changed my life. It changed how I see things from a monolingual perspective and it opened a new horizon for me. Gladly, I was even able to have Spanish speaking friends! I have this one friend from Peru who speaks fluent Spanish and I happily encountered Spanish native people here in Facebook who are trying to learn a different language as well.

Overall, my experience was a blast! There are times that I became tired and almost lose my motivation because of how slow my progress is. But even so, I will not give up. I am not fluent yet and I still have a lot to know but I will keep on practicing until I become one. I believe that in the near future, it will open new opportunities that will be helpful for me too. Moreover, It has always been my dream to travel and I truly think that language learning will be an aid to that. Hoping that I’ll be able to talk to that nearing 500 million people soon!

Before I end my blog, I just want to share this quote from Charlemagne, also known as Karl and Charles the Great, a medieval emperor who ruled much of Western Europe during 768-814, “To have another language is to possess a second soul.”

Bueno. Eso es todo. Gracias por su tiempo leyendo mi blog. Espero que encuentres algo interesante. Además, a aquellos que están aprendiendo otro idioma, nunca perder la esperanza! Pronto seremos fluidos.

Truly, there is fun in languages.

[hijinae]

                     KANG JINAE — TASK OO1.

          ❝ maybe the journey isn’t so much about becoming anything. maybe it’s about                unbecoming everything that isn’t really you, so you CAN be who you were                                                       meant to be in the first place.

GENERAL INFO

full name: kang jinae. nickname(s): jiji. nae. ( and jenni was her english name ). gender & pronouns: cis-female / she & her. sexual & romantic orientation: pansexual / panromantic. age & dob: twenty-six. 311092. birthplace/hometown: léon, france, tho she was only there for the first two months of her life, until the doctors gave her the all clear & her father moved them for the first time of many. parents/siblings: kang jaejin ( father, alive, currently lives in chile and hasn’t seen his daughter since she came back to korea ). kim nari ( mother, deceased ). no siblings. pet(s): one sphynx KITTEN named juju !! astrological sign: sun: scorpio. moon: sagittarius. rising: virgo. dominant hand: she writes with her right, but does literally everything else like a left handed person. handwriting style: very neat and organized. language(s) known/spoken: she’s currently fluent in: french, english, spanish, mandarin, japanese, korean and portuguese. she wants to learn: german and russian. religion: wiccan. current living arrangements: lives in a relatively high end penthouse-like apartment. ( FLOOR PLAN | MASTER BEDROOM | LIVING AREA | KITCHEN | RECORDING STUDIO ) occupation/major: retired idol / recording artist.

PHYSICAL

picture reference: HERE. blood type: a. nationality: korean. skin tone/color: normally, her skin is very milky. birthmarks & scars: she has a couple scars from childhood that came along with being a little adventurer, but nothing major. she has a strawberry shaped birthmark that’s about three or four shades darker than her skin tone that can be found the back of her left shoulder. she also has one on the outside of her right wrist. height: ~158cm ( 5′2″ ) build: lean, slim. hair color: normally, it’s black. right now, she has it dyed purple, tho. hair length: just a few inches short of being all the way to her hips. eye color: brown, naturally, but she’s known to wear a lot of colored contacts. diet: she eats what she wants, when she wants, however much of it she wants. as an idol, she had to do a lot of dieting and she’s over it. people should be able to enjoy themselves without worrying too much; of course, they should take care of their health ( both physical & mental ), but they don’t have to be a size 00 in order to do so. exercise & level of fitness: she does light cardio and weight lifting, along with some yoga. it’s nothing too serious because she mainly does it to keep herself feeling good and flexible. it also helps her endurance, which is a plus. she’s a runner, tho, so she does that the most and on the daily. how’s their posture ( or lack thereof )?: when she’s working, it’s normally very proper out of habit. when she’s just relaxing, she can be known to slouch a bit. typical style of dress: when she’s at home, sweatpants and a sports bra is what she’ll always be in. she’ll throw on a tank top if she has a guest ( depending who it is ).

her street style varies. sometimes she’ll wear a dress or skirt, sometimes it’s jeans & a tee, sometimes it’s something baggy. and she’s always seen with either a hat or face mask. body modifications: piercings: each lobe is pierced. she has an industrial in her right ear & three cartilage piercings in her left. she’s looking to get a venom tongue piercing, she just hasn’t decided when.

tattoos: THIS ONE on the underneath of both wrists. THIS ONE between her boobs. THIS ONE on her back. THIS ONE on her right thigh ( nsfw ). and THIS ONE on her right rib. a waning crescent on her right ring finger ( to represent @ofdaeseong‘s moon phase when he was born ), her zodiac symbol on her right pointer finger, three dots on her right middle finger, middle knuckle. a waning crescent on her left pointer finger ( to represent @ofazcmi‘s moon phase when she was born ), three dots on her left middle finger, middle knuckle, and saturn lineart on her left ring finger ( bc get it ?? marriage, left ring finger,,, saturn,,, the only planet with a ring ?? no ?? ok then. )

MANNERISMS

how does your muse walk?: normally, it’s sorta soft and airy, like the summer breeze. she’s really shy, tho, so if she’s walking alone, she’ll try to make herself as small as possible in hopes of bringing the least amount of attention to herself. how does your muse talk?: very clear and concise with her words and pronunciation. she’s also very animated, so she talks with her hands and makes a lot of facial expressions. what accent/dialect does your muse talk with?: thanks to her training, she primarily speaks with a seoul dialect. how would you describe the tone of their voice? are they loud or quiet?: she’s definitely on the quiet side, but her vocal tone is sorta low. raspy at times, too, which is why she prefers to sing the r&b / soul genre. she feels it fits her vocal style much better. what does their laugh sound like?: she doesn’t make a lot of noise when she laughs ( or does much of anything tbh ), it’s just slight wheezing depending how hard she’s laughing. if she gets to laughing too hard, tho, it’ll sound like she’s crying.   how does your muse typically smell?: roses !!! it’s a light scent if it’s during the day time and she normally mixes it with a hint of vanilla if she’s going out at night. what kind of air do they carry?: sorta timid, maybe a little standoffish if she doesn’t smile. when she smiles, tho, it’s very warm and sweet. do they have a(ny) catchphrase(s)?: not really ?? i mean, she says i love you a lot, but that’s about it. what are their nervous ticks?: shakes her legs, bites her lip / cheek, crackles her knuckles, pinches herself.

PSYCHOLOGY

what makes your muse happiest?: roses. her kitten. her friends. bubble baths. night time. music, most importantly her guitars. art museums. banana milk. ice cream. deep conversations. filming / photography. cooking. gloomy days. clean bed sheets. body pillows. cuddles. warm tea. smiles. surprises. learning. losing herself in a good book. scented candles. holding hands. what upsets them the most?: herself. impatient / rude people. forgetting things. nightmares. does your muse have any quirks?: she has a tendency to talk to herself ? mainly bc it helps get a handle on her thoughts and everything. what are their hobbies? how frequent do/can they do them?: making music, primarily and she does it daily. reading, which she does every night before she goes to bed; at least a chapters worth. photography, and that happens usually only when inspiration strikes. cinematography, primarily only becomes a thing when she’s making a b-roll to be used to make a lyric video or something for one of her songs. cooking, whenever she feels like doing it. do they have any guilty pleasures?: she doesn’t do anything that she feels guilty about, so no ?? is your muse an extrovert or an introvert? neither?: she’s definitely much more introverted, unless she’s comfortable with you. do they have high or low self-esteem? what about confidence?: she has low everything tbh are they easily stressed and how do they normally respond to it?: normally, she just tackles the situation head on and focuses on getting it done. then, once it’s not an issue anymore, she’ll freak out. what is your muses worst fear?: losing the people she loves. what is your muses biggest dream?: to become a good mom, daughter, friend, and someone her people can be proud. is your muse a morning person or a night dragon?: she’s both; just depends which one she needs to be. how intelligent is your muse? do they acknowledge it?: she’s a lot smarter in a sense of street smarts than school smarts ( but she’s always been a straight A student ), but she definitely doesn’t acknowledge it. there’s so much for her to still learn and room for growth; she’s never going to consider herself intelligent. to her, she’s dumb, but she’s not stupid. describe their sense of humor: it’s really easy to make her laugh considering she laughs at everything. her favorite thing, tho, is when someone mispronounces something.

RELATIONSHIP TENDENCIES

are they currently in any sexual or romantic relationships?: they are in neither at the moment. what is their experience with relationships?: she’s been in one official relationship with @hwvngahri, but they’ve broken up for various reasons. however, they’re still unable to completely let go of one another. how does your muse view the idea of friends with benefits? have they ever had one? would they ever?: she doesn’t really have a view on them. so long as both parties are single, it’s really up to them, isn’t it ? and she hasn’t had any friends with benefits nor does she think she’d ever have any, but then again, life works in mysterious ways so she’s not completely closed off to the idea. how important is sex to your muse?: it’s not the most important thing, but it’s still really important. after all, you should be with someone who you enjoy and who enjoys you. what are their biggest turn on and turn offs?: in her own words: “i can get behind everything except the nasty stuff that involves bodily liquids or feet.” in terms of non-sexual things, she likes honesty, kindness, loyalty, the usual stuff. and she’s primarily turned off by disrespect. does your muse find it easy to make friends?: not,,, terribly. as i mentioned before, she’s shy. like,, really shy, so she finds opening up sort of difficult. but at the same time, she just wants to spread love and warmth to everyone, so she’s always very nice. how important is friendship to them?: it’s Very important. quantity or quality of friends?: quality will Always beat quantity any day of the week. how important is family?: i mean, it’s important, but more so the family she’s chosen for herself along with her maternal grandparents. the relationship between her and her father is VERY strained. are they close to their family? why or why not ?: they aren’t, not really. besides her maternal grandparents, as i mentioned above, who took care of her when she moved back to sk. her dad just hasn’t really been able to form much of a bond with her — jinae thinks this is bc he blames her for his wife’s death — and it’s something she’s carried with her throughout her whole life.

FAVORITES

activity: playing guitar / singing. animal: cats !! and owls beverage: warm tea or banana milk. book: when breath becomes air. color: purple !! designer: doesn’t have one; prefers not to wear them. food: anything with chicken. sweet stuff. flower: roses !! lilies !! gem: ooooh, she has a collection of these and she likes them for different reasons, but if she had to choose a favorite, she’d probably go with moonstone or opalite. holiday: all of them, especially halloween. she just likes having an excuse to either dress up or shower the people she loves with affection. mode of transportation: @ofdaeseong‘s bike or walking. movie: the craft. and if you didn’t see that coming, i,,, don’t know what to tell you. musical artist: she has Multiple, so i’ll list a few that she listens to regularly: emotional oranges, jay park, the rose, tinashe, kiana lede, kehlani, just to name a few. quote / saying: “if it harms none, do as you will”. it’s the basis of her beliefs and pretty much dictates how she goes about everything in life. scenery: she Loves the woods in the dead of winter. or spring sunsets. scent: roses !! and pretty much everything floral. she also likes the smell of pine and the earth after it rains. weather: gloomy and cold. vacation destination: she’s been to a lot of beautiful places, but she’s never been able to experience the caribbean; which is where she’d like to go before making a final decision about her favorite vacation spot. as of right now, tho, canada is in the lead.

ATTITUDES

greatest dream: she just wants to become the best person she can be. both for herself and the people who are important to her. greatest fear: losing the people she loves. most at east when: when she’s with her best friends, @ofazcmi and @ofdaeseong and / or when she’s playing her guitar. least as ease when: she’s put on the spot. worst possible thing that could happen: she doesn’t make her mom proud or loses her friends. biggest achievement: helping make her mom’s dream come true; even if she didn’t last as long as she would’ve liked. biggest regret: she doesn’t have any. everything happens for a reason and nothing in the universe is coincidental. most embarrassing moment: pretty much every day of her life tbh. biggest secret: she’s a survivor of abuse which is why she has nothing to do with her dad anymore. top priorities: her friends. her music. life.

EXTRA TIDBITS

001. she gives everyone a nickname, and i mean Everyone ------ usually pokemon related ------ she may not call you by said nickname, but it helps keep her from forgetting.

002. the most sentimental person you’ll ever meet; she keeps everything. you two went to see a movie 10 years ago ?? she’s still got the ticket stub. you gave her a birthday card 19 years ago ?? she’s still got it. and every gift from her usually includes something she’s made herself.

003. her camera roll is Filled with funny animal pictures. she looks at them anytime she needs a laugh.

004. her personality does a complete 180 after she’s had a few drinks. the veil is dropped, along with all of her insecurities, & she finally shows the woman she really is.

005. everything she does is very light. her touch, her steps, the way she writes, etc. she’s just very soft; so much so that sometimes it’s hard to tell if she’s actually touched you or if you just imagined it. sorta like if you have your phone in your pocket & you think you feel it vibrate, but you can’t actually tell so you have to check ? yea, like that. bc of this, it’s also rly easy for her to sneak up on you.

006. watches a lot of asmr videos ://////

007. there’s only four people in this entire world that she would actually throw fists for and that’s @ofazcmi, @ofdaeseong, @rhyominnie & her daughter.

008. she has an ear for accents, so if she listens to it a few times, she can ( usually ) mimic it perfectly. and sometimes she thinks it’s fun to use one of those accents when she takes a trip & meets someone new. it sorta gives her an opportunity to get out of her own skin for a bit, which she, strangely, finds therapeutic.

009. it took her a long time to actually enjoy her birthday / halloween. for the longest time, she always felt guilty that she was the one here instead of her mom, and that she had the ability to have fun, but over time, she slowly began to realize ( with the help of her friends ) that she was allowed to enjoy herself; that it’s what her mom would’ve wanted. now, it’s her favorite and she also uses it as a way to pay respects.

[ellie-mnop]

Hey! Sorry if this is bothering you or anything but I was wondering how you are learning? And if it’s online do you mind linking me to some?🙏🏻

Hi! I’m using several different tools and methods and resources to learn! I’m not sure whether you mean for Portuguese in particular or if you are looking for stuff that can be applied to other languages you’re trying to learn, so I’ll give you everything I have!

Grammar/Guided Practice:

Duolingo: This is the first thing I started using. Most people have heard of it already. It teaches grammatical concepts along with vocabulary and stuff, in a sequence made up of various themes, and the “Clubs” feature provides more open ended questions to practice writing skills. It doesn’t provide much in the way of explanations of new concepts, but every sentence has a comments section where you can ask questions and look at explanations other users have written. It doesn’t have speaking practice for Portuguese, although I think I have heard that it does for other languages, or used to, or something. https://www.duolingo.com/

LingoDeer: This is one I just started using and I’m really enjoying it. It works in a way that’s similar to Duolingo, although it provides more actual explanations of things instead of hoping for you to figure it out yourself, which is nice. It also has speaking exercises, which you record and play back to compare your pronunciation to an official example, which I find really helpful. It was designed with Asian languages in mind, and the website hasn’t been updated to point out that they very recently added betas of some other languages, but don’t worry, Portuguese is available. The activities are more interesting than those on Duolingo, but the sentences are less so, and there are no comments sections. https://www.lingodeer.com/

VerbSquirt: I installed this app because I needed more practice with verb conjugations than Duolingo was giving me. You choose the category and tense you want to practice, and it gives you some verbs, and you conjugate them as fast as you can from a multiple-choice list. You get more points for going faster. I don’t usually like or do well with games that rely on going as fast as you can, but I’m okay with this one because nothing bad happens if you don’t get a high score. It also teaches you the meanings of the verbs you’re working with, so it’s an alright way to get a little extra vocabulary too. The paid version is the same but with more words available. I think it’s based on European Portuguese (it includes conjugations for “tu” and its icon resembles Portugual’s flag) but I haven’t been confused by it even though the rest of the resources I’m using are Brazilian. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.jandaya.vrbsqrtenptfree&hl=en_US

Conjuga-me: This one is not an app for practicing anything, but I’m putting it in this category anyway because it’s still grammar. You put in a verb, and it shows you all of the conjugations in all of the tenses, and emphasizes, through text color, which forms are irregular or use special spelling rules. It helps, if you’re not sure about a conjugation you need and want to look it up. http://www.conjuga-me.net/

Explanations and Information:

Transparent Portuguese and Street Smart Brazil: These are two different websites, but I’m listing them together because they way I use them is very similar. They are blogs with interesting articles about various aspects of the language, such as grammar concepts, the usage of certain words, regional variations, or cultural concepts. They also have various resources to practice. For example, Transparent regularly posts articles to listen to and read, and sometimes posts songs with explanations of the lyrics, and Street Smart Brazil does articles with links to things, like movies in Portuguese on Netflix. Transparent has a Word of the Day every day, too, which is neat, and Street Smart has a YouTube channel. https://blogs.transparent.com/portuguese/ and https://streetsmartbrazil.com/blog/

I also sometimes use explanations of things on YouTube, but I mostly find those individually, I can’t think of any channels to recommend or anything.

Vocabulary and Dictionaries:

Reverso Context: This is a very helpful resource to look up words, because when it gives you a word, it also gives you a whole bunch of examples of that word used in various sentences. That way, you can see if the word has the connotation you want, what prepositions are used with it, and so on. http://context.reverso.net/translation/

Wiktionary: This one can be a little unwieldy to use, because all of the pages have so much information, but it’s very helpful. The lists of translations that are on the page of any given English word specify which definition they are translating, so that if a word has multiple meanings, you can find the one you want, and it has pronunciations in audio and IPA. (I can’t read IPA, but it’s helpful in finding out more about a particular sound I’m having trouble with.) https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Wiktionary:Main_Page

Wikipedia: Specifically, the menu on the top or side of any Wikipedia article that allows you to view the version of an article in any language it has been written in. The title will be translated too, and so you can find out what that concept is called in the language you select. This is helpful for finding translations of titles or multi-word terms that might not be translated word-for-word, like “data storage” or “The Land Before Time”. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

TinyCards: This has all of the vocabulary lists from DuoLingo, if you’re looking for a way to practice the vocabulary you learn from there. It’s just a flashcard app, but it’s a pretty nice one, I like it. https://tinycards.duolingo.com/en

Talking To Native Speakers:

HelloTalk: Initially, when I had questions about what I was learning, I asked my friend Sofia, because she is a native speaker and offered to help and stuff. Unfortunately, I cannot send you a link to install her. However, the next thing I did to find more people to talk to was install a language exchange app, where the point of it is to talk to people who already speak the language you are trying to learn, and who are trying to learn a language you already speak. There are many such apps, and I mostly just installed HelloTalk because it was the first one I heard about, but I like it a lot. I have met several lovely people there, and it’s easy to find people to talk to – I actually get more messages than I can answer. https://www.hellotalk.com/

Media And Content To Practice With:

Radiooooo: Useful for finding songs to listen to. I use it by choosing a country that speaks Portuguese, and a decade with a style I enjoy. Then, when it gives me a song I really like, I screenshot the title and artist so that I can find it again to add to a playlist or use other ways. Doesn’t work on Firefox. http://radiooooo.com/

Letras.com: A lyrics website, useful in conjunction with Radiooooo or with any other method of finding songs. Looking at the lyrics while listening to the songs helps with focusing on the words, and with building reading and listening skills together. https://www.letras.com/

Turma da Mônica: Comics are a nice way to practice reading, because the pictures help with figuring out what’s going on and confirming your understanding of what they text says. These comics are pretty cool and cute, and there are a lot of them. The ones at the link are free online on the official website, and there are also many that have been published in print if you can get those somehow. http://turmadamonica.uol.com.br/quadrinhos/

Games: I went through and checked the menus of the games on my phone and the store pages of the ones in my Steam library, to find out which ones I could play in Portuguese, and I recommend doing that, to find choices that correspond to your taste in games. Some of the ones I found include Battle for Wesnoth (a partial translation, you have to edit your preferences file to get it), Bridge Constructor, Game Dev Tycoon, Knights of Pen and Paper (this one was developed in Brazil, actually), Stardew Valley, Terraria, and on the phone Galaga Wars, and My Tamagotchi Forever. I haven’t tested all of them yet.

YouTube: I don’t have an overarching method or anything of finding YouTube videos to practice with, I just put in search terms that sound interesting in Portuguese. I’ve watched news clips, interviews, sing-along videos of kids’ songs, videos about Pokemon, videos where kids try different foods, all sorts of things. I don’t understand most of what I watch yet, but I repeat the videos however many times I need to try to catch what I can.

I’m sure I’m forgetting some things, but this is most of what I use and do.

[chesterexchange-blog]

5 English Habits To Make This Year Epic

“Be the change you wish to see in the world.” ~Gandhi

2019 has arrived! It’s a new year with new opportunities to not just learn English, but to live it!

If you are like most people, you spent the end of December reflecting on how the past year went.

You thought about the lessons you learned, the relationships that you developed, the opportunities that you had, the progress you’ve made, and how you can become the best version of yourself in the upcoming year.

You may have even taken a break from practicing English during this holiday season in order to celebrate the progress you made with your English skills over the course of the year and to spend time with your family and friends.

I hope that you spent some time to treat1 yourself during the Holidays as well. You deserve it!

However, now is the time to get back in the game and start taking the steps to make the new year an EPIC one.

It’s time to continue your journey to English fluency, and ride the momentum2that you built last year into 2019.

Around this time of year it’s common to focus on creating resolutions or goals that you want to achieve for the new year.

Although I think goal-setting3 can be useful to understand the direction you want to go in throughout the year, it’s more important to focus on your habits.

I like to imagine goals as the destination you want to reach along your journey.

If your goals are the destination, then your habits form the map that allows you reach your destination.

Instead of just focusing on your English goals for this year, start to focus on building the habits that will help you achieve your long-term goals as an English learner.

Consistent daily habits and routines in English can be formed easily with the right strategy.

In this article, I’ll break down4 five simple habits that will completely transform your journey to English fluency this year.

1. Guided Meditation in English

Whether you are just getting started with learning English or have been studying the language for a while, meditation is a very beneficial practice to add to your day.

Along with helping you grow as an English learner, it has numerous benefits that will help you perform better at your job and be more present in your relationships with your family, friends, and loved ones.

Research shows that a daily meditation practice improves your mental capacity, enhances focus, relieves stress, and cures depression.

If you also do them while being guided by an English speaker, you can improve your listening skills and expose yourself to new vocabulary by immersing yourself in the language.

It is a win-win5 opportunity for you. Not only will you improve your overall health and well-being, but you will also become a better English speaker.

If you want to make meditation a consistent daily habit, then you want to make it as easy as possible when you first get started.

Make it simple. Don’t try to complicate things.

Before or after an existing part of your morning routine, such as eating breakfast, start creating this habit by scheduling five minutes to just focus on taking deep breaths and relaxing before you go to work.

Science shows that it’s easier to create new habits if you stack6 them with your existing habits and make them easy to perform.

You can use YouTube videos or you can find apps that can guide you through the process and help you keep track of your results.

Here are a couple of resources that can help you make meditation a part of your morning routine:

Insight Timer is a good app to get started. It has thousands of guided meditations in English, as well as other languages. Make sure to join the “RealLife English Meditators” group when you download the app.

Learn more about the benefits of meditation throughout the process of learning English.

2. Sing Along to Music

I’m a big believer that music is the key to mastering your speaking skills in any language. It is an important part of my daily routine.

When I sing in Portuguese in the morning, I feel more positive because the music usually puts me in a good mood. Also, it’s the perfect moment to practice the language by trying to imitate my favorite singers.

Singing along to your favorite songs is a fun way to improve your pronunciation, intonation, as well as your rhythm and flow in English. Also, it teaches you a lot of slang expressions and gives a lot of insight into the culture that the song comes from.

One way to significantly improve your English fluency is by creating a habit of singing every day. You can make singing in English a part of your routine by doing it while you take a shower, get dressed, make breakfast, and commute7 to and from work.

These are just a few examples of how you can start practicing your English while doing other routine tasks. Singing during your existing routine tasks makes it frictionless8, which helps make this new habit last for a long time.

If you would like to use music to take your English to the next level, you can even do it in a more deliberate9 way. In the video below, RealLife Fluency Coach Ethan explains a very useful, effective way to learn English with songs.

3. Watch TV Series and Movies

You’ve probably heard this a million times, but this is an awesome way to learn. TV series and movies are so effective because it makes the learning process a fun, real, and permanent part of who we are.

While this is so obvious to those who have learned this way (even if they can’t explain it), it does not occur to most people to use their favorite TV shows or movies as a learning tool.

With Netflix, today there are a variety of shows and movies to choose from, all at the tip of your fingertips. Although you need more time to finish a movie, you can easily schedule 30 minutes a day to create the habit of watching an episode of your favorite TV show in English, after work when you are eating dinner, or before bed.

The series “Friends” is a great option. Honestly, there seems to be a correlation between people who LOVE friends and high levels of fluency.

Why is this the case?

Friends not only represents a whole generation, but people all over the world still love watching it. Also, the characters are all likeable, it’s hilarious, a great gauge10 for American Culture, and there are 10 seasons (236 total episodes)!

4. Morning Pages

If you want to improve your writing skills in English, you have to write every day. Your writing won’t magically improve itself on its own. A simple way to practice writing in English every day is by keeping a journal.

The American author, Julia Cameron, has a journaling exercise called “Morning Pages,” that has become widely known for its ability to help people improve their writing skills and how they feel every day.

The Morning Pages exercise starts when you wake up and are getting ready for the day. She explains that you can start the day off strong by writing three pages in your journal. If three pages sounds intimidating11, try to write one page to start and work your way up to12 three pages.

On your Morning Pages, write down anything that is on your mind. It could be things that you have to do today, dreams, how you are feeling, what you are grateful for, something you are worried about, something good that happened yesterday, or any other thoughts that you can’t stop thinking about.

The purpose of this exercise is to practice writing down all your thoughts, both positive and negative, in order to clear your mind and help you think in English,instead of your native language, when you wake up. Writing down negative thoughts and feelings allows you to leave the negativity on the page instead of carrying it around with you and spreading it to other people.

Go the extra step and type your Morning Pages on the computer, and then use an app such as Grammarly to get feedback on your writing mistakes. After you edit and make corrections to your writing, share your favorite parts with a friend or English coach, and ask them to give you feedback on ways that you could improve.

You could even use your Morning Pages to start writing articles for a blog and see how your audience responds to each article that you post.

If you take about 15 to 30 minutes a day to write in English, you will soon see major improvements in your writing ability. Creating a daily writing practice such as the Morning Pages will help you take the vocabulary and grammar that you learn and use it in a practical way that will help you improve your self-awareness13 every day.

5. Listen To Podcasts

One of the easiest ways you can improve your English skills this year is by creating the habit of listening to podcasts on your commute to and from work every day.

They can help you refine14 your listening skills and learn new vocabulary in English. They are also a great opportunity to dive deeper15 into questions you are curious about exploring.

You can use them as a resource for learning more about subjects that you are interested in.

There are many practical podcasts available online for English learners such as the RealLife English Podcast. More adventurous learners can even explore podcasts on business, personal growth, health, relationships, politics, sports, or news. There is a limitless number of podcasts to choose from.

Listen to RealLife English Podcasts: Apple | Android

It is really easy to start using podcasts to improve your English during your daily commute, especially if you take public transportation.

First, choose a podcast episode that you find interesting and want to use to practice for the week. Once you choose a podcast episode, try to listen to it the first time at normal speed, without taking notes.

Afterwards, go back and listen to it again. If it was too fast the first time, trying slowing down the audio speed and taking notes. After listening  to the podcast the second time, try to write a summary of what you heard . Finally, listen to the podcast at normal speed again and check to see if your summary makes sense.

If you find it interesting, and are feeling brave, feel free to share the summary with a supportive community of friends that are also learning English, or with your English coach. You can use the podcast episode that you listened to in order to spark16 a new conversation.

Here are a few favorite podcasts from the RealLife Team:

The Tim Ferriss Show

The School of Greatness with Lewis Howes

Aubrey Marcus Podcast

The Science of Success Podcast

Oprah Winfrey’s Super Soul Sunday

If you would like to listen to these podcasts on your way to work, you can download them on iTunes (iPhone) or Stitcher (Droid).

Are you ready for an EPIC year?

Hopefully your year is already off to an amazing start. The habits that you are able to form as an English learner will impact your ability to reach the goals that you set for yourself.

Instead of trying to create big, complicated English goals or habits that will be hard to accomplish and maintain this year, focus on creating small habits that are fun, natural, and convenient.

Over time the benefits of those habits will compound17, and you will see a huge difference in your ability to speak and understand English.

The habits you form today will allow you to live your English and become the best version of yourself in 2019 and for the years to come.

Make this year your best year ever by making a commitment to yourself to create habits that will help you achieve success and grow as an English learner.

[lauriewatsontech]

Pimsleur vs Rosetta Stone

Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone are two popular learning courses for teaching foreign languages. They each offer a wide range of languages through a series of lessons at varying levels.

However, Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone have a few differences, primarily in their course style and methods. The former is solely audio lessons, vs the latter focuses on visual learning through pictures and interactive lessons.

So, Pimsleur vs Rosetta Stone, which is the better option for learning a language? To help you select the right course for you, I’ve covered everything you need to know about each course, including their learning style, enjoyability, cost and how effective they can be.

Pimsleur Range of Languages Available

Pimsleur provides an impressive amount of language lessons, even more niche ones.

Here’s a full list of what Pimsleur courses are currently available at the time of writing:

Albanian

Arabic (Eastern)

Arabic (Egyptian)

Arabic (Modern Standard)

Armenian (Eastern)

Armenian (Western)

Chinese (Cantonese)

Chinese (Mandarin)

Croatian

Czech

Danish

Dari Persian

Dutch

Farsi Persian

Finnish

French

German

Greek

Haitian Creole

Hebrew

Hindi

Hungarian

Icelandic

Indonesian

Irish

Italian

Japanese

Korean

Lithuanian

Norwegian

Ojibwe

Pashto

Polish

Portuguese (Brazilian)

Portuguese (European)

Punjabi

Romanian

Russian

Spanish (Latin American)

Spanish (Castilian)

Swahili

Swedish

Swiss German

Tagalog

Thai

Turkish

Twi

Ukrainian

Urdu

Vietnamese

English (ESL)

Rosetta Stone Range of Language Lessons Available

Rosetta Stone offers a hefty amount of languages, but not nearly as much as Pimsleur currently do:

Arabic

Chinese (Mandarin)

English (American)

English (British)

Dutch

Filipino (Tagalog)

French

German

Greek

Hebrew

Hindi

Irish

Italian

Japanese

Korean

Persian (Farsi)

Polish

Portuguese (Brazil)

Russian

Spanish (Latin America)

Spanish (Spain)

Swedish

Turkish

Pimsleur Range of Learning Levels Available

A typical Pimsleur course comes in various learning levels. For example, Spanish 1 and Spanish 2. The lower learning levels are targeted for beginners while the higher levels are designed for more advanced language learners.

All Pimsleur courses contain 30 lessons and each one is around 30 minutes long. This means it’ll take you around 15 hours to complete each learning level. If you’re a beginner to a new language, then the most effective approach using Pimsleur would be starting with the first level and progressing onto the higher learning levels once you’re ready.

Each language has varying numbers of learning levels, but the more popular ones like Spanish have around 4 to 5 levels of lessons. Less popular languages like Irish and Haitian Creole usually only have one level of lessons, so if you’re considering Pimsleur check the length of the language you are considering — you may find its one of the short ones and might not be worth the money.

Rosetta Stone Range of Proficiency Levels Available to Learn

Rosetta Stone’s language learning courses are split into 3 to 5 learning levels. Similar to Pimsleur, beginners to a language start at the first level lessons and progress onto later levels as they learn.

Each one of the lessons in a course can take anywhere from 5 minutes to 30 minutes to complete, depending on the type of activity included. I like this approach much more vs a fixed lesson lengths as it helps keep things varied and enjoyable to learn. The number of lessons in each learning level is different for each language course, but on average, it would take between 40 to 50 hours to complete a level.

Most of the popular languages like French have 4 or 5 levels, whereas the less popular languages like Turkish only have 3. Unlike Pimsleur, all of Rosetta’s Stones language learning courses offer a minimum of 3 different learning levels, even for less popular languages. This makes a big difference in how effective it can be to use Pimsleur vs Rosetta Stone for these less popular courses. But, as always, you get what you put into it.

Pimsleur use of Lesson Structure, Length, and Teaching Style

The Pimsleur approach is audio-based. They use words or phrases in the language you want to learn, and then repeat them in your mother tongue so you can translate them into your target language.

Each course comes in 30 different half-hour lessons, or in 10 different half-hour lessons. Some languages come in shorter lengths, like Hungarian, which is only 15 hours long.

As the system is mostly audio based, very little of the course involves reading or writing. Some language learning courses include reading material, but this is mostly for you to look at when you’re listening to the audio.

This type of teaching style is much more effective at encouraging you to learn the spoken language through audio, which is helpful for ensuring correct pronunciation. However, if you learn best through visual methods, then this might not be effective for you.

Rosetta Stone Review of Lesson Structure, Length, and Teaching Style

Rosetta Stone’s teaching style focuses on pictures and audio. For the most part, you’ll be shown a collection of pictures with one or more words or sentences spoken by a native speaker in your chosen language. This method to learning a language is called Dynamic Immersion.

It’s designed this way so you can associate words with a picture to help you understand their meaning, similar to how you learned your native language. It’s surprisingly effective for such a simple method, I really liked this approach and I found myself getting 10 mins in on the bus or waiting in line.

All Rosetta Stone lessons are taught in the language you want to learn, which allows you to quickly understand the written and spoken side of it. They use various activities and tasks in each lesson like speaking and writing exercises for correct pronunciation and spelling of words, and you even get a mode to recreate the natural pacing of a real-life conversation in your target language.

The length of a course varies for each language and how quickly you progress, but one level doesn’t take much longer than 40 to 50 hours to finish. Single lessons would take anywhere from 5 to 30 minutes to complete.

Rosetta Stone also offers paid live tutoring lessons. The tutoring lessons are run by an experienced tutor of your target language in a small group setting. You only speak and listen in your target language to help you develop your skills and build your confidence with words. The only downside is that the slots for the tutoring sessions can be at inconvenient hours for certain time zones and one might not get the schedule one want.

Pimsleur Gamification (How Enjoyable is It?)

The Pimsleur approach to language learning can be boring, especially as the software is entirely audio-based. This means there isn’t much variety in the program’s teaching style or lesson content.

For the most part, you’ll be listening to words and phrases in your target language and mother tongue, and then repeating them. It’s the same for all the lessons at all levels.

Over time, this can be incredibly tedious and could impact how effective the course can be to use. When it comes to keeping me engages, the Pimsleur vs Rosetta Stone grudge match falls in Rosetta Stone’s favor this time.

Rosetta Stone Gamification (How Enjoyable is It?)

Rosetta Stone features audio and visual teaching lessons, which are split into different activities, such as reading and writing activities. This adds variety to the lesson content and structure as you won’t just be doing the same task over again.

Additionally, Rosetta Stone also offers different games to help you learn your target language. These typically come in the form of bingo and guessing games. You can also play multiplayer games live with another learner of your target language, or even someone learning your mother tongue. Rosetta Stone offers much more variety in terms of lessons vs Pimsleur.

As someone who is a visual learner, I really like how Rosetta Stone’s course (unlike Pimsleur courses) prioritizes visual learning through pictures and written words. Using games to help individuals learn a language is also a great feature, particularly for younger audiences who might not want to sit down and ‘study’ a new language. This makes Rosetta Stone’s courses a much more enjoyable and light-hearted experience vs Pimsleur.

Pimsleur Pricing

There are two subscription tiers for Pimsleur. The basic version costs $14.95 per month and gives you access to all levels of one language, as well as extra features like a Driving Mode and the ability to install the software on up to 4 devices.

The premium version costs $19.95 and comes with all the features in the basic tier, as well as some extra ones. These include Flash Cards, Speed Round, Speak Easy, Lightbulb Moments, and Quick Match lessons.

Rosetta Stone Pricing

A lot of Rosetta Stone reviews forget to mention that it offers a subscription service with the option to include a tutor. This is a nice addition vs Pimsleur that is a much more independent course. The length of time you subscribe for and whether you choose to use a tutor alters the cost of the software. The minimum amount of time you can subscribe to Rosetta Stone is 3 months (though you’ll likely want a longer subscription to get good at a language).

Without the tutor, Rosetta Stone costs roughly $21 per month if you subscribe for 3 months, $19 per month for 6 months, $17 per month for 12 months, and $13 per month for 24 months.

If you decide to use one, then the cost of the software drives up considerably. Again, if you want to subscribe for longer it does reduce the price each month.

With a tutor, Rosetta Stone would cost around $43 per month for 3 months, $41 per month for 6 months, $32 per month for 12 months, and $21 per month for 24 months.

Unless you subscribe to Rosetta Stone for 24 months, its a lot cheaper each month to go with Pimsleur vs Rosetta stone. You also only have to commit to the software for one month, which is ideal if you later decide it’s not the one you want.

The minimum amount of time you can subscribe to Rosetta Stone is 3 months, which would cost you around $63 without a tutor and $129 with one. The more budget-friendly option between Rosetta Stone vs Pimsleur would be Pimsleur by a landslide.

Pimsleur Platforms Available

You can access all of your Pimsleur audio lessons via the Pimsleur Language Learning app on desktop or mobile. The mobile version can be downloaded for free on iOS and Android devices.

The Pimsleur app is compatible with most Mac and PC computers, as well as most smartphones (iOS 11 or greater, and Android 7 or greater with a least a 1280 x 720 screen). You can also play the audio courses through an Amazon Echo device.

Rosetta Stone Platforms Available

Rosetta Stone audio courses can be accessed through a free desktop and mobile app called Rosetta Stone — Learn Languages, provided you have an active subscription. You can also use the app on Kindle Fire and Amazon Echo devices. However, the offered languages on Amazon Echo devices are limited, which would get Pimsleur another point in the Rosetta Stone vs Pimsleur slug match if you’re an Alexa geek like me!

The Rosetta Stone: Learn Languages app is compatible with Android 5 or greater, Fire OS 5 or greater, and iOS 12 or greater.

There’s not much between Rosetta Stone vs Pimsleur when it comes to learning platforms. You get desktop and mobile apps with both, which is ideal for learning languages on the go. You also get audio lessons for the two, which can be accessed through Amazon Echo devices.

However, Rosetta Stone can be used on the Kindle Fire, which Pimsleur doesn’t appear to be compatible with. If you want to use a Kindle Fire to play language lessons on, then Rosetta Stone is the clear winner.

Pimsleur — How Natural is the Language Taught?

A select few of the languages taught by Pimsleur can sound artificial, particularly for the more niche ones. The voice actors in some of the Pimsleur recordings don’t always sound like native speakers in their language. This can cause issues with correct pronunciation of words and trying to get the dialect right in your new language.

Rosetta Stone — How Natural is the Language Taught?

Similarly to Pimsleur, Rosetta Stone has a few problems with how some of its languages are taught, namely Korean and Japanese which use honorific words and vocabulary based on who you are and who you are speaking to.

For example, a young child talking to their friends would use a different style of speech than they would if they were talking to their grandparents. Rosetta Stone doesn’t fully explain this, which would make some of the content in its lessons incorrect and feel unnatural. This can be a bit embarrassing in practice but generally won’t get you into trouble. Most honorific cultures understand that new language learners will get this wrong. This is another reason why choosing between Pimsleur vs Rosetta Stone is very dependent on the language you want to learn.

Pimsleur — How is Customer Service?

You can get in touch with a Pimsleur customer support advisor via telephone or email. Their phone lines are open 24/7, which is really helpful if you require an immediate response.

To get in contact with Plimsluer via email is simple as you can simply fill in the form on their ‘Contact Us’ page. However, it’s not clear how long it takes for an advisor to respond to your query.

Rosetta Stone — How is Customer Service?

Like Pimsleur, Rosetta Stone’s customer service can be accessed via phone and email. For US customers with a Personal or Homeschool account, their phone lines are open Monday to Friday from 9am to 10pm EST, and Saturday/Sunday from 11am to 8pm EST.

If you require Spanish support, their phone lines are open Monday to Friday from 10am to 11pm, and 11am to 8pm on Saturday/Sunday.

Emailing Rosetta Stone involves filling out a form on their ‘Support’ page. They promise to reply to your enquiry quickly, but an exact time frame isn’t specified.

If you need a swift reply to your query, then Rosetta Stone also offers live chat support so you can talk to one of their agents in real-time. The live chat is available 24/7 and has an average wait time of just 3 minutes.

Although Pimsleur has phone lines that are open 24/7, when you look at Rosetta Stone vs Pimsleur customer support I think Rosetta’s Stone is slightly better due to their live chat feature. The wait time for the service is around 3 minutes, so it’s a much quicker and more convenient way to contact an advisor than email or phone.

So what’s the verdict on Pimsleur vs Rosetta Stone?

Overall, when weighing up the choice between Pimsleur vs Rosetta Stone, both are effective learning courses for foreign languages. However, I think the Pimsleur approach is a slightly better option due to its affordability and the number of languages it offers.

Pimsleur provides courses in an extensive range of languages, all of which are split into 30 half-hour lessons. The price of the basic version of the software is only $14.95, making it a very budget-friendly choice in vs Rosetta Stone.

The teaching style of the Pimsleur course is completely audio-based, so it isn’t ideal for individuals who learn better visually. This can also make the lessons a bit dull as there isn’t a lot of variety in their structure.

I prefer Rosetta Stone’s teaching style for this reason, which focuses on a visual teaching method. I also like how Rosetta Stone features gamified lessons and an online tutoring service to add some diversity in how you learn.

Both Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone have similar customer services and can be reached through phone or email. Pimsleur offers a 24/7 phone line, vs Rosetta Stone offering a 24/7 live chat. They’re also available on apps for desktop and mobile devices.

Rosetta Stone has some problems with some of their language courses, particularly Japanese and Korean lessons, which don’t fully explain honorific words and vocabulary. It is also very pricey and requires at least a 3-month subscription to the service, which is why I think Pimsleur is a better choice for foreign language learning.

This post first appeared on medium.com/best-software

Pimsleur vs Rosetta Stone was originally published in Best Software on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

[elephantyes]

14 most widespread and popular languages ​​of the world Few people know that in the modern world there are from 3 to 7 thousand languages. Many of them are considered endangered, since the number of native speakers of these languages ​​is getting smaller every day. Other languages ​​are spoken by hundreds of millions of people and millions more study them as foreign. Language is the main way people communicate and in this article the most popular, widespread and popular languages ​​of the peoples of the world are presented.

14 French French. Although this language is not among the ten most widely spoken languages ​​in the world, in our small presentation it takes an honorable 14th place, opening our rating. The French language, in addition to being one of the most widely spoken, is also one of the most beautiful languages ​​in the world, which is often called the language of love, just like the capital of France, the city of Paris is called the city of love. This language is part of the Romance group of languages, has the status of an official language in 29 countries, in particular in Canada, Switzerland, Belgium, Monaco and, of course, France. It is one of the six official languages ​​of the UN and is distributed in a number of African countries, former French colonies. According to some reports, about 250 million people around the world speak French, but it is native to 75 million.

Many people learn French because of its beauty, others learn it because it is a popular language in Europe and knowledge of such a language will be useful for work and travel. This language is not very difficult to learn as a foreign language. Of course, for some people the French language will be easier, for someone more difficult, but many agree that it is somewhere between German and Spanish because of the complexity of the study.

13 Korean Korean. Korean is the mother tongue of approximately 78 million people, is the official language of South Korea and the DPRK, and is partially spoken in China, Japan, the United States, and Russia. This language is not very popular and not many people study it in other countries. However, in terms of the number of native speakers, it occupies an honorable 13th place in our ranking of the most common languages ​​on earth. Most researchers attribute it to isolated languages, that is, to languages ​​that do not belong to any known language family. However, some believe that the Korean language may be part of a hypothetical Altai family. According to some linguists, the Korean language may have some degree of kinship with the Japanese language.

Some find Korean to be easier to learn than Japanese and Chinese, but the grammar, in their opinion, is still more complicated in Korean. Chinese and Japanese are studied mainly for romantic reasons, because of a desire to get closer to the culture of the east and to learn the centuries-old history of the region. Korean is taught mainly for money.

12 German German. German is the most popular and demanded language in Europe after English and many learn it not for cultural reasons or for traveling, but specifically for doing business and business negotiations. German is the official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Liechtenstein and Belgium. This language is native to 100 million people, and its speakers, there are more than 120 million. German is part of the Germanic group, as is English, but German is considered much more difficult than English, like some other languages.

Those who begin to learn a language are scared by words that are 2-3 times longer than their counterparts in other languages, many tenses, conjugating regular and irregular verbs in different ways, the presence of a definite and indefinite article, and not always matching nouns. Nevertheless, the German language cannot be called one of the most difficult languages ​​of the peoples of the world, since with the proper approach it is studied without any problems, like any other European language.

11 javanese Javanese. How many languages ​​in the world, but not many of our citizens, in principle, know about the existence of this language, not to mention the fact that the Javanese language is among the most common. This language is spoken by about 105 million people and is spoken mainly on the Indonesian island of Java and several neighboring islands. This is the largest number of speakers of the Austronesian language. This is a fairly developed language, which has a rich literary tradition with different genres of poetry and prose, many varieties of theatrical genres. Despite the fact that almost half of the population of Indonesia actively uses Javanese in everyday life, it, like all other existing languages ​​in the country, does not have an official status. 10 Punjabi Punjabi language. This language belongs to the Indo-Aryan languages ​​of the Indo-European language family and is one of the official languages ​​of India. Punjabi is the language of the Punjabis and Jats, ethnic groups in India. The language is common in eastern Pakistan, as well as in parts of India. There are about 112 million people who speak Punjabi in the world. About 105 million native speakers live in Pakistan and India. While the rest lives in countries such as the United Kingdom, Canada, the United Arab Emirates, the United States and others. Among the features of the language, it can be distinguished that it is a tonal language. In tonal languages, the height of the stressed syllable changes its meaning. In punjabi, the stressed syllable can have three different tonal heights. For Indo-European languages, this is very unusual.9 Japanese Japanese language. The ninth place in our list of the most widespread and popular languages ​​in the world is occupied by another language from Asia. Native speakers of this language are 130 million people. Japanese is studied mainly for two reasons. Firstly, the language is studied for doing business, since Japan is one of the strongest economies in the world. Secondly, Japan has a rich and interesting culture that attracts thousands of people and sooner or later makes them interested in the language of the country. Japanese can not be called an easy language. One of the main difficulties in learning this language is the hieroglyphs that came from Chinese, but have changed a bit over time in the process of language development.In Japanese, almost all hieroglyphs have not one, but two or more sounds, depending on what words they are used in. Today in Japan, about two and a half thousand hieroglyphs are the most common, while in China at least 3 and a half thousand hieroglyphs are used. Japanese is simpler when compared with Korean and Chinese, but the grammar of Japanese is very complex. There are no tones in Japanese, but there are two alphabets. The Hiragana alphabet is the main one, it is used for purely Japanese words, grammar markings, and ending sentences. Katakana is another Japanese alphabet, it is used for words of foreign origin and names.8 Russian Russian language. Russia is one of the most important countries in the world, occupying a vast territory on which many peoples live. The rich, vibrant and rich culture and the most beautiful cities of the country attracts many foreigners who are also interested in the “mighty” Russian language. There are about 160 million people for whom the Russian language is native. In total, there are about 260 million speakers of Russian. The Russian language is official in Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. This is the most common Slavic language in the world and the most common language in Europe in the number of speakers for whom it is native. Russian is one of the UN working languages. It is rather difficult to study, its grammar is complex, but logical. Russian can be called one of the simple “complex” languages.Many foreigners choose French or German because they are common in Europe. Russian is chosen when they want to learn Russian culture, when there are Russian friends with whom you want to speak their language, when you move to live or work in Russia. Basically, they learn Russian because they like it, like, in general, any other language. You can’t learn a language through power, it should interest and attract, there should be a desire to learn it.7 Bengali Bengali. The language of the Bengalis, one of the languages ​​of the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European language family. Spoken and official language in Bangladesh and India. There are about 190 million people for whom it is their native language and about 260 million people who speak it. Some aspects of the language are often different in India and Bangladesh. Writing in most cases is fully consistent with pronunciation. The written language is based on Sanskrit and does not always take into account changes and fusions of sounds that have occurred in the language over time. The history of the Bengali language is estimated at least a millennium, as evidenced by both the dating of the first literary monuments and the data of linguistic reconstruction.6 Portuguese Portuguese. Portuguese is the mother tongue of approximately 230 million people, and the total number of speakers is approximately 260 million. It is an official language in Portugal, Brazil, Angola and some other countries. Most native speakers live in Brazil. The Portuguese language in terms of complexity of study is comparable with Spanish, French and Italian, since it is in the same group of Romance languages ​​with them. There are two main variants of the language, European Portuguese and Brazilian, as well as a number of varieties in Africa and Asia, which differ from each other at the level of phonetics, vocabulary, spelling and grammar. 5 arabic Arabic language. Arabic is spoken in 60 countries, such as Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt and Libya, and in 26 of them it is official. One of the working languages ​​of the UN and belongs to the Semitic branch of the Afrasian language family. The number of native speakers exceeds 245 million people, and the total number of people speaking it is more than 350 million. Arabic plays an important role in the political and economic spheres, in the field of energy and security. This is a very popular language and people who know it can always find a good job. Arabic is one of the five most complex languages ​​in the world, there are many dialects of Arabic that are significantly different from each other.4 hindi Hindi language. This language is one of the 23 official languages ​​of India, and is also distributed in Pakistan and Fiji. The native language is for 260 million people, and the total number of Hindi speakers is approximately 400 million people. At a colloquial level, Hindi is practically indistinguishable from another official language of India, Urdu. The latter is distinguished by a large number of Arabic and Persian borrowings, as well as the fact that it uses the Arabic alphabet, while the traditional Hindi script is the syllabic alphabet of Devanagari. English is one of the official languages ​​of India, but, nevertheless, according to some sources, Hindi is quite a promising language and it may become one of the most popular languages ​​by 2050.3 English English language. Three of our list of the most popular and common languages ​​is opened by the English language, which is the most common language for learning as a foreign language. This language is native to 350 million people, and the total number of speakers is about 1.4 billion people. English is one of the UN working languages, the official language of Australia, New Zealand, USA, England, Canada and some other countries. English in the modern world plays a huge role in many areas of life from politics and business, to culture and travel. This is due to the colonial policies of the British Empire in the 19th century and the current global influence of the United States of America.English is also considered one of the easiest languages ​​to learn, if not the easiest. Nevertheless, this language has its own difficulties. In many countries of the world, English is taught in schools from almost primary school as a foreign language.2 spanish Spanish language. In second place is a very beautiful language, which is official in Spain, Mexico, Costa Rica, Cuba and most countries of South America. Spanish is very similar to Italian and Portuguese, as it is in the same romance group with them. Spanish is spoken by approximately 420 million people, and around 500 million people speak it all over the world. This is the most common language of the Romanesque group, 9/10 of whose speakers live mainly in the western hemisphere. This is a fairly easy language to learn, which in addition to the Spanish culture and the beauty of the language adds a desire to foreigners to learn Spanish.There are several dialects of the Spanish language, however, Castilian is considered the real, original Spanish language. Castilian, Catalan, Basque, and Galician dialects are common in Spain, while in South America there are five main groups of dialects. The first group is used mainly in Cuba, in the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Panama, Colombia, Nicaragua, Venezuela and Mexico. The second in Peru, Chile and Ecuador. Third in Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama. The fourth group is the Argentine-Uruguayan-Paraguayan variant, which includes East Bolivia. The fifth group is conditionally called the Latin Hispanic Mountain. This language is spoken by the inhabitants of Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Rica, belonging to the Andes of Colombia and Venezuela, Quito (located at an altitude of 2800 m in the capital of Ecuador), the Peruvian mountain range and Bolivia.1 Chinese Chinese. The Chinese language is a combination of very different dialects, and therefore is considered by most linguists as an independent linguistic branch, consisting of separate, albeit related, linguistic and dialect groups. In fact, Chinese is made up of many other languages. But at the same time, the characters are one. Writing the main characters from the middle of the 20th century, after the reform in China, has become much simpler. The unified Chinese language is called Mandarin or just Mandarin, which in China is called Putonghua. In Chinese, there are 10 dialect groups and seven major traditional dialects.

[superkrispypeanutstudentstu-blog]

The History And Evolution Of Banana Hybrids

Surprisingly, many of the self catering holiday villas in Portugal are there for bookings all yr and are generally of a really excessive normal. Incidentally, on Deserta Grande, the largest outcrop in the Ilhas Desertas, you could find the one poisonous animal that inhabits the Madeira Archipelago. With out regulation of uniform accessories, nevertheless inconsequential it might seem, students would inevitably reap the benefits of the chance to put on objects that are inconsistent with the college uniform policy. For households there's a water park and a few great parks like "Terra Nostra" and excellent museums to go to too. Uruguay went down in the history books by profitable the primary World Cup within the history of football. There are, however, some features of travelling in Thailand that it is best to contemplate so as to make your vacation not solely memorable, but a safe and glad experience too. It's presently the principle language spoken in Portugal, Brasil, Angola, Guinea Bissau, Mozambique, Inexperienced Cape, Santo Tomé and Príncipe, Oriental Timor, Ecuatorial Guinea, t can also be spoken in Macao and in some areas of India that former Portuguese colonies together with the areas of Goa, Daman and Diu, Dadra and Nagar Haveli. Barcelona is understood for among the most unimaginable seashores in the surrounding areas, The Aquarium, Maritime museum and Zoo. Summer season in Portugal is dry and clear whereas winter is reasonably cool and liable to thunder showers. Since cork may be very elastic and impermeable, it makes an incredible bottle stopper; for cork, just like for many people, wine was destiny. Algarve options the most enticing and highest-high quality beaches in Europe. They don't seem to be required to get separate visas for all of the (Schengen) European nations they want to visit. The costs of a meal are costly due to the major city being close to the harbour where most of the cruise ships come in to dock, so this commerce has inflated the prices. This is one other famous vacationer spot the place you'll get to see the great College of Coimbra. Once you get to the hill where the citadel stands, be ready for the view of town and the river under you. Beaches are essential for the majority of holiday makers, and Faro has some nice seashores to supply. This takes a bit of getting used to, and requires a lot more time, but it's value it in the long run. Portugal borders only one nation, Spain, which makes up the remainder of the Iberian Peninsula. The coastal area, generally known as Ribeyra, has many slim twisting streets with homes, colourful façades and fidget energy of working individuals. An old good friend of mine once said that Portugal was 'a chilly nation with a hot Sun'. As soon as Portugal had solved its drawback, it was time to seek funding elsewhere, perhaps with a competitor. Algarve is the right vacation spot for many who love nature and sports activities. Travelers can even make use of a automotive and driver, if their budgets enable it. Additionally it is advisable to investigate about airport shuttles and travel options offered by inns and resorts. From right here on in from a comparatively small toe hold in the South west tip of Spain Islam begins to broaden over nearly all of Iberia together with Portugal. The Algarve area of Portugal, located in the south of the country, is the right spot to visit at any time of yr. In every town or city, there may be one "underground" night spot you just have to visit. There are plenty of alternatives to have a great time during the winter and there are much less folks to take care of. This could inevitably get rid of wardrobe battles with your children concerning the proper clothes to put on to high school, save time getting ready for varsity in the morning and make your purchasing expertise for college attire a a lot easier and less anxious process. A current research ranked Lisbon in forty first place of world cities with very best quality of dwelling. Buying property in Silver Coast Portugal is at present standard with Europeans, however as of yet, not so much with the British property consumers. The Euromillions lotto, or the Euro loto as it is continuously known, gathers the stakes of all nine taking part European nations presenting a mammoth Euro lotto prize. Fish is considered to be a weight-reduction plan staple of locals and vacationers alike. You may always use the condo as a base from which to stage wonderful weekend jaunts to either the wine country or to the sport parks. The nation's second largest metropolis has at all times rivaled Lisbon in economic power. A number of nations have performed nine World Cups. Lisbon is a place the place it's nonetheless easy to flee the crowds and enjoy a peaceable way of life. This is the so-called Venice of Portugal as a result of it additionally boasts of its personal canals and bridges wherein you may take a leisurely journey on their moliceiros, which are corresponding to the Venice's gondolas. Many vacationers also succumb to the temptation of visiting the pleasant Sinatra and Cassias which are both easily accessible from Lisbon. The town is inside easy attain of some nice beaches. For years, Joe's Storage has been such a place in Lagos. In the summertime, France is almost as fashionable as Spain is within the winter for these on their European motorhome tour. Out to the west of Son Bou you will see an space for nude bathers. In case you're searching for easy seas with huge, sandy seashores, it's best to visit the Sotavento region of Algarve Portugal, which is its japanese part. Columbus' terms - the place of Admiral, governorship for him and his descendants of discovered lands, and ten % of the profits for all journeys made by Spain to the new lands, for all time. The gem scam business is nicely established and ready to prey on travellers who are on the lookout for an excellent deal. Portuguese tourism has flourished over time as foreigners are enthralled by its cultural variety and age-outdated civilizations. Over time necessary alternate relations have developed between the hunter-gatherer Baka and the neighbouring Bantu cultivators. Instead of huge concentrations of people arriving in a single location in July or August the unbiased traveler will enterprise elsewhere decreasing the environmental footprint and serving to the economies of more rural economies. He has visited Madeira on quite a few occasions and always discovered it useful to have the helpful free vacationer Madeira map available which is available by free downloaded. Some people wire together wine corks and make sizzling pads whereas others counsel gluing sliced wine corks to the underside of vases and knickknacks, as a means to keep these items from scratching tables and cabinets. From May to October, the roads close by are lined with pilgrims - many on foot - visiting the famed shrine of Fatima the place three shepherd youngsters claimed to have seen visions of the Virgin Mary. Nonetheless, individual insurers could at any time decide to vary their territorial limits or boundaries based on the quantity of claims they receive for those destinations in relation to the number of insurance policies sold. Nightlife centres mainly on the previous riverside space of Cais da Ribeira, the student bars of Cordoaria and in addition the extra stylish bars, clubs, Artwork Deco cafes and sensible eating places. Thus, in Portugal, the purchaser of real estate is supplied with a level of protection that's present in very few different countries all over the world. For backpackers that prefer to get out and see totally different places, this makes Europe a golden destination. This problem has come beneath scrutiny lately relating to cover for Turkey and Egypt, and whether or not the international locations are categorised as part of Europe for travel insurance coverage purposes. Portuguese is a member of the Italic subfamily which in turn is a part of the Indo-European family of languages. Porto is maybe most famous for Port wine, which is produced and shipped from this space. Alternatively, additionally, you will find people who find themselves drawn right here to try out a spread of activities and energetic adventures in this balmy and solar-blessed space. But inside the relative brief time span of just some three score years and ten all the territory has been recovered to be under Visigoth control. Now is a perfect time to make resort reservations, buy aircraft tickets and find nice procuring bargains due to the weakened euro. For example: though Turkey is in Europe, it's not a part of the European Union (on the time of writing) and therefore the EHIC is not valid. There are many roadside cafes along the best way, a fantastic place to stop off for a drink is at the Esplanada Santa Marta which overlooks Santa Marta Seashore and lighthouse. The world boasts full-bodied, aromatic red wines with glorious alcoholic content material: the wines of the south (castas Camarate, Periquita and Tinto Miudo) are energetic when younger, intense but well balanced and with an beautiful bouquet when aged. Upon his failure, he landed undetected at the southern point of the Rock from current-day Morocco. There are some glorious trails that take you through lush green forest where you may see hordes of untamed flowers blooming to full glory. Do not miss the market on Saturday mornings the place you should purchase regional specialities and freshly harvested fruit and vegetables earlier than heading down to the fish market for the days catch. While the Portuguese language spoken in Portugal differs from that spoken in Brazil as regards to some areas of pronunciation, grammar, and vocabulary, the variations are minor. Based on specialists, this trend of shopping for gold will continue within the coming years. Say you're in Morocco and you need to go to the architectural heritage of Morocco however simply have no idea the place and tips on how to go, finding a local journey company such because the Morocco Travel Agency to sign up for a day tour around the lovely sights of Moroccan buildings can leave you with joyful memories to final. Muslim invaders from North Africa through the eight-century have additionally enriched the architecture in southern Portugal. With three lovely seashores - Praia da Rainha, Praia da Ribeira and Praia da Conceicao - you will be spoilt for selection. Most tourists are shuttled off to the central Algarve leaving the most lovely and unspoiled areas in the east and the west for unbiased vacationers. The peace and quiet of the calm lagoons is indeed a special technique to take pleasure in your seaside holidays in Portugal. You can both do so with your travel agency such because the Morocco Travel Agency who specialises in Morocco or with native tour firms during your vacation. In addition the region offers a number of thermal baths: Vimeiro (digestive system, circulatory system, respiratory system and pores and skin), Cucos (metabolic and endocrine systems, rheumatics, muscular and skeletal methods) and Torres Vedras and Caldas da Rainha - the oldest in Europe (respiratory system, rheumatics, muscular and skeletal techniques). There are some small beaches in Sao Miguel providing water sports like swimming, diving and browsing in the summertime months between June and October, but usually the world is understood for its lush green hills and ultimate climate for walking and trekking. Strolling is a popular pursuit right here, particularly alongside the coastal route from Cascais to the Boca do Inferno which is nice enjoyable throughout a storm or at high tide, but not for the faint hearted! I always make an effort to grasp what type of leisure actions interest my golfers before reserving a golf holiday. Be reassured that flying to South Africa has grow to be rather more economical all through the years with flights originating in European airports. Portuguese tourism is nicely developed and is a serious supply of income for the country. Town's life and traditions from earliest until present days are described in the Museum of History and Ethnography. The weak Australian foreign money, coupled with a low season for accommodation that began in late January encouraged some vacationers to the warmth of the Australian Gold Coast for their winter. In addition to the coastal areas of Portugal, many international nationals have taken to buying residences in rural communities. Within the East head to Tavira a shocking outdated metropolis with a fort and lots of historic churches, at one time the capital of the Algarve. Our first afternoon was spent exploring the Fortress of St George on the heart of Lisbon's Alfama district, the oldest and most picturesque part of the city. cheap hotels cork There are many condos accessible for rent alongside the attractive, scenic coast, principally between Cape City and Port Elizabeth that cost in the vary of $ 1500 - $ 1900 a month. Low cost flights to Portugal have truly changed how people might be near the world.

[catalogado]

The Mooch, Anthony Scaramucci, Trump’s latest anus ex machina, is a real gift to the world of politics-as-entertainment. If you wrote him into a novel, the readers would say, “The fuck d’you think you are, Thomas fucking Pynchon?” If into a play, “David fucking Mamet?” But no, fuck that, this slick-headed wisemouth bounded right out of the commedia dell’arte, obviously: Scaramuccia (called Scaramouche in French), whose  name literally means ‘little skirmisher’, is a grimacing rapscallion given to braggadocio and pusillanimity. And just as the eternal Scaramouche has carried vulgar behaviour through the ages and between countries, the present Mooch has done a service to international studies of vulgarity, because now we get to see how newspapers in other countries translate fucking paranoid schizophrenic, cock-block, and suck my own cock.

Seriously, when the fuck else have you been able to use simple searches of international newspapers – just type Scaramucci Bannon in the box – to learn how to talk like a New York fuckface in other languages?

So, first of all, how would Scaramuccia, the Italian, say all this shit? (We’ll leave aside the fact that, being Neapolitan, he wouldn’t be speaking standard Italian. Look, the Italian newspapers use an Italian that’s grown out of the Florentine version, OK? That’s just the fucking way it is. Go to Hell and argue with Dante if you don’t like it.) Well, I’ll take the translations from HuffingtonPost.it’s article. Fucking paranoid schizophrenic is “un cazzo di paranoico schizofrenico”: literally ‘a cock of paranoid schizophrenic’. Italian likes cocks in its vulgarity, you see. Where in English we might say What the fuck? in Italian you’d say Che cazzo? ‘What cock?’

So what’s cock-block? It’s fermare e rompere il cazzo: ‘stop and break the cock’. Where the English is “Let me leak the fucking thing and see if I can cock-block these people the way I cock-blocked Scaramucci for six months” the Italian from HuffPo is “Fammelo raccontare ai giornali così vediamo se posso fermarli e rompergli il cazzo così come ho fermato e ho rotto il cazzo a Scaramucci per sei mesi.” (Note that they leave off the vulgar intensifier on raccontare ai giornali, literally ‘tell the newspapers’ but here translating “leak the fucking thing.”)

What’s funny is that when it comes to “I’m not trying to suck my own cock” the Italian doesn’t use cazzo. No, you see, as Costanza Rizzacasa d’Orsogna explained to me (she writes for Corriere della Sera, but I couldn’t find a frank translation of all this on their site), you could translate suck my own cock literally as succhiarmi il cazzo, but Italian has a better expression: fare il pompino, literally ‘do the little pump’, figuratively ‘give a blowjob’. And that’s what HuffPo went with: “Non mi interessa farmi i pompini da solo” – ‘I’m not interested in giving myself solo blowjobs’.

Fine, OK, great, that’s how the Italians say it. As always, speaking lively Italian is like driving a Maserati on a mountain road. But how about German? Do they make it a Porsche or a Mercedes? The answer, it seems, is more of a fucking Audi. I looked on a couple of leading news sites and couldn’t find a translation of cock-block. But Die Welt obliges on the other two: a fucking paradoid schizophrenic is “ein verdammter paranoider Schizophrener” (pardon me for being underwhelmed; I don’t really think verdammt ‘damned’ is very strong, but hey, ich bin kein Berliner) and I’m not trying to suck my own cock is “Ich versuche nicht, meinen eigenen Schwanz zu lutschen,” which is a straightforward translation. Schwanz literally means ‘tail’ but is used like English prick and cock, and lutschen means ‘suck’.

The French can do themselves prouder. Slate.fr should give its translator a bonus for capturing the tone so nicely – not just the idiomatic vivid coarseness but the colloquial grammar too. “I’m not Steve Bannon, I’m not trying to suck my own cock” – so beautifully transcribed by The New Yorker’s Ryan Lizza with a fucking comma splice that would normally get cock-blocked at the copy desk but conveys the tone more smartly than a period, let alone a fucking semicolon – shows up as “Je suis pas Steve Bannon, j’essaie pas de sucer ma propre bite.” If you don’t speak French, you won’t know what’s missing from that. Well, whoever did it up for HuffingtonPost.fr knew, and kept it in: “Je ne suis pas Steve Bannon, je n’essaie pas de sucer ma propre bite.” See it? ‘Not’ in standard French is ne…pas, but in colloquial French the ne is normally dropped. Oh, by the way, bite (pronounced like “beat” in France and “bit” in Québec) doesn’t have anything to do with biting. It means ‘cock’ tout court, nothing else – apparently it comes from an Old Norse word for a wood beam.

I couldn’t find a French news source willing to talk about cock-blocking; I’m not sure if it’s because it’s a killing offence in French culture to cock-block someone. But the vulgar intensifier for paranoid schizophrenic once again shows what the go-to is in the language: “putain de schizophrène paranoïaque“, ‘whore of paranoid schizophrenic’. Yes, French is a language that makes much use of prostitution-related taboo words, especially in France. Quebec has a different angle, famously using liturgical terms, but fuck me if I could find a Québécois news source willing to give me the goods. Even Huffington Post completely sanitized it (to the point of prissiness) for the Québec audiences, which surprised me given how lively of tongue they can be in la belle province.

OK, but how about Spanish? If we’re going to cover European imperial powers, we can’t do without Spain and all the countries that speak Spanish because of it. I gotta tell you, Spanish is what started me on this exploration. Lucía Leal, of the newswire Efe, tweeted:

Scaramucci llama a Priebus “un puto paranoico esquizofrénico” y dice: “No soy como Steve Bannon, no estoy tratando de chupármela a mí mismo”

That covers two of our three phrases right there. The fucking paranoid etcetera is ‘a paranoid schizophrenic whore’ – putting Spanish in the same sex-worker-cussing set as French – and suck my own cock is down as, roughly, ‘suck me it to myself’.

But wait! There is, of course, more than one Spanish-language news source. El Mundo gives a different version: “no estoy tratando de comerme mi propia polla” – ‘I’m not trying to eat my own cock’, except polla is formed not from a word meaning ‘rooster’ but from one meaning ‘pullet’. And they actually give exegeses on the cock-blocking:

Oh, Bill Sine viene. Voy a filtrar la puta cosa (fucking thing) y ver si puedo joder (cock-block, literalmente “bloquear la polla”, una sofisticada metáfora traducible como “impedir que alguien lleve a cabo la penetración”) a esa gente del mismo modo que bloqueé la polla (cock-blocked, pasado de verbo regular) a Scaramucci durante seis meses.

So they translate cock-block directly as joder, which would be translated back as fuck or fuck up, and then explain that it’s literally ‘block the cock’, “a sophisticated metaphor translatable as ‘keep someone from carrying out penetration’.” How very helpful! But before they explain all this, they tell the reader, “A partir de este momento, la presente crónica es para mayores de 18 años.” Which means, roughly, “From this point on, the present article is for readers 18 years of age or older.” This Spanish journalist, Pablo Pardo, is by far the most conscientious of the bunch. He even explains the autofellation: “en lo que Lizza considera una referencia no a las habilidades de Bannon como contorsionista, sino al aparente interés que éste tiene en salir en los medios de comunicación”: ‘which Lizza considers a reference not to Bannon’s ability as a contortionist, but to the apparent interest that he has in his appearance in the media’.

Isn’t translation fun? Truly, if you had not realized, translation is one of the funnest things you can try that are actually technically impossible but you get close enough (making me the right kind of Manhattan being another). All the English retranslations herein are by me, and if they suck, apply for a refund at i-did-them-for-free@fuckyou.ca. Or you can give better ones in the comments if you wish.

Let’s keep on with the imperial power languages. How about Portuguese? Brazilian Portuguese is a language for anyone who likes fun things that look easy but will leave you sucking your own – um, tongue. But the trickiest part is the pronunciation, and you’re reading this. From UOL Notícias I get these two: “Reince é um esquizofrênico paranoico de merda” – meaning ‘Reince is a paranoid schizophrenic of shit’, putting Brazilian Portuguese in the coprophilic set – and “Não sou Steve Bannon, não estou tentando chupar meu próprio pau,” which is like the Spanish but uses pau for ‘cock’, which is a word that also literally means ‘stick’. They left out the cock-blocking thing. Sigh.

Well, whatever. Go to European Portuguese and you get what Diário de Notícias gives us, and it’s boring: “Não procuro chupar o meu próprio pénis.” You can see it: they use pénis. ‘I’m not trying to lick my own penis.” Thank god they have wine in Portugal. Especially because they didn’t even try with “Reince é um esquizofrénico paranoico.” Do you see an expletive? Jackshit.

Quick, let’s call in another imperial power of yore to save this. Who? The Dutch, of course. They’re known to be frank. I got a nice hit from de Volkskrant, which opens with three quotations, the first of which gives us “Reince is een fokking paranoïde schizofreen.” If you can’t sort that one out, there’s no fokking hope for you. The next is even sweeter, possibly my favourite out of this whole fucking thing: “Ik ben Steve Bannon niet, ik ben geen zelfpijper.” That means – literally – ‘I’m not Steve Bannon, I’m no self-whistler’ or, of course, using the colloquial sense of pijpen, ‘…I’m no self-cocksucker.’ Isn’t it lovely that Dutch has such a compact way of saying it? Talk about getting to the point. So to speak.

Alas, the third quote wasn’t the cock-blocking one. The article doesn’t give us that. I’m going to have to give a gold star to the Spanish and Italians, who at least attempted the cock-blocking. Translation, I mean. Who else can I turn to?

The Scandinavians, of course. Have a piece of Danish. Denmark’s TV2 sets us up nicely. “Åh, der kommer Bill Shine, lad mig lige fucking lække det og se, om jeg kan sætte en kæp i hjulet på dem, som jeg gjorde mod Scaramucci i seks måneder.” You can see which quote that is. Yes, the cock-blocking! So… how is it rendered? ‘Oh, there comes Bill Shine, let me leak the fucking thing and see if I can put a stick in the wheel on him as I did with Scaramucci for six months.’

Put a stick in the wheel?

OK, my Danish isn’t fluent, but some Dane can tell me if there’s a sexual reference there I’m missing. Dammit. How about the other two? One is down as “Reince er en fucking paranoid skizofren.” Well, that’s straightforward. Fuck do you expect? It’s not that distantly related to English (yes, it’s North Germanic and English is West Germanic, but never forget the massive Danish and Norwegian influence in the Old and Middle English periods due to invasions). How about Bannon? “Jeg er ikke Steve Bannon. Jeg prøver ikke at sutte min egen pik.” Well… it means the same as the English. But now you know. But hey, do you want to know how to write it in Swedish? “Jag är inte Steve Bannon, jag försöker inte suga min egen kuk,” according to Aftonbladet.

There are, obviously, many more languages I could look it up in. Some of them might even have nice translations of it. But I don’t want to wander into ones I have less-than-basic knowledge of. So just let me leave you with one more: Icelandic. I get no cock-blocking from the high cold vikings, but RÚV gives me the other two. It tells Icelanders that the Mooch is not Steve Bannon: “ég er ekki að reyna að totta minn eigin böll,” which translates even more directly than most languages – Icelandic, like English and unlike most other Western European languages, makes common use of a present progressive aspect. Ég er ekki að reyna really means ‘I’m not trying’ and not ‘I don’t try’.

The capper, though, and the one that reminds us of the particular pertinacity of the Icelandic, is this: “Reince er fjandans ofsóknarbrjálaður geðklofasjúklingur.” Icelandic prefers to use Icelandic roots rather than Greek or Latin ones for things when it can, you see, and that sentence there means ‘Reince is a fucking paranoid schizophrenic.’ Except fjandans doesn’t literally refer to anything sexual or scatological at all. It’s used as an expletive like English fucking, but it’s actually a devil reference, cognate with English fiend. And then the rest is… fiendish. It even looks a little bit like sounds you might make while sucking your own cock. With a lot of tongue action.

[learnspanishfans]

MosaLingua Review: A Faster Way to Learn a New Language?

MosaLingua is a mobile app that uses spaced repetition (SRS) to help language learners efficiently learn words and phrases in English, French, Spanish, German, Italian and Portuguese. It’s suitable for absolute beginners and more advanced language students. For this MosaLingua review, I decided to use MosaLingua to study a language I had virtually no prior experience in: Italian. I say “virtually” because I knew a few Italian words, like Allegro! Crescendo! Fermata! Di capo al coda! I play a couple of musical instruments, so I’m used to seeing these terms on my sheet music. But that’s not too useful in the real world! I’ve wanted to study Italian for a while, so I jumped at the opportunity to study it with MosaLingua. As cool as any new app looks, it’s only good if it actually works. I wanted my review to be as in-depth as possible, so I tried out MosaLingua for 10 hours and then recorded myself speaking Italian with an advanced speaker. You can watch my video at the end of this review.

MosaLingua: More than “Just” a Flashcard App

Flashcard apps that use SRS are a really efficient way to learn difficult vocab in a new language. SRS is a proven technique, and you’ll find lots of advice here on Fi3M about how SRS works, and how to use it for language learning. In the past, I’ve used Anki as my SRS tool. If there’s one downside to using a really customisable app like Anki, it’s that you have to do all your own research and make your own flashcard decks, or else download decks from other users and hope they’re accurate - and relevant! I created an audio flashcard deck a few months ago during my Portuguese mission, but it took me two months to get around to doing it, and I only made the one deck. I found the process tedious, even though I knew it would be helpful in the end. Enter MosaLingua. I found it to have all the benefits of a general flashcard app like Anki, with a lot less work.

How to Get Started with MosaLingua

It’s easy to get up and running with MosaLingua. Just download the MosaLingua app to your iOS or Android device. I put links for the different languages at the end of this review so you can find the right one for the language you’re learning. When you first launch the app, you can take an assessment test to calculate your level in the language (or bypass this step if you’re an absolute beginner). Then, you select your reason for learning the language. Options include travel, socializing, exam prep, and more. After that, it’s time to get started learning flashcards. You can tap the ‘Learn’ tab to see which flashcards you’re about to learn. If you’ve already learned some, then the Learn tab becomes the ‘Practice’ tab (look at the bottom of these screenshots): When it comes to which flashcards to study, MosaLingua does the heavy lifting for you. It has a built-in directory of thousands of flashcards for you to choose from. Tap the ‘Explore’ tab to search for flashcards, and select ones that are relevant to you. You can browse cards by topic, level, or by typing in a keyword to find a specific card. Each flashcard contains a recording of a native speaker saying the word or phrase. You can also create your own cards, just like with generic flashcard apps. The Italian text on your homemade flashcards will be read by a computer voice. If you don’t create or search for your own flashcards to learn, MosaLingua will choose for you. It does a pretty good job of picking suitable cards, too. I LOVE this option, because if I’m too lazy to browse the directory, or am just not sure what to study next, it’s nice to let the decision be made for me. So I never have an excuse not to study with MosaLingua.

Studying Flashcards with MosaLingua

Learning New Cards

When it’s time to learn new flashcards (such as when you first launch the app, or when you’ve finished reviewing cards that you’re due to be tested on), you’ll see a ‘Learn’ tab at the bottom of the screen. MosaLingua gives you new flashcards to learn in groups of five. If you want to learn more, just tap the + sign below the list. The flashcards in the list will be ones that you’ve chosen by searching for cards in the ‘Explore’ tab. Or, if you haven’t picked any yourself, they will be chosen automatically for you by the app. There are four steps involved in learning new flashcards:

Listen and pronounce. You hear the word (or phrase) spoken by a native speaker, and repeat the sounds even though you won’t understand the meaning yet. If you want, you can tap the record button and record your voice saying the word, to compare your pronunciation to the native speaker’s.

Memorize. You see the English side of the card and try to remember the translation.

Write. You see the English side and a jumble of letters. You arrange the letters in the right order to spell the word in your target language. For longer sentences, you arrange each word rather than individual letters.

Self-evaluation. Similar to the Memorize step, but now you get to rate how well you answered. More on the ratings below.

Reviewing Previously-seen Cards

Practising flashcards you’ve already seen is just like the self-evaluation step you do when you first learn a new card: you see the English on side one, and have to guess the translation before flipping over the card. Then you rate your answer with the tap of a button:

Perfect (you recalled the word almost as if it was your native language)

Good (the word was pretty easy to remember and you’re confident you got it right)

Difficult (the word took you a bit of time to remember)

Again (you forgot the word or guessed wrong. The card will be shown to you again during this review session.)

To make the MosaLingua SRS algorithm work correctly, it’s really important to be honest in your self-evaluation. The easier a card is for you to remember, the less often you’ll see it. The maximum possible time before seeing a card again is one year. Some SRS apps can’t show you a card any less often than every three months. I like that MosaLingua is in it for the long run.

My Experience with MosaLingua: The Good

There’s a lot to love about MosaLingua. The flashcards cover tons of different scenarios and can get pretty advanced if you want. Some of them contain individual words to help build your vocab, and others have entire sentences, which improves your conversation skills. Beyond just the flashcards, you can also study entire dialogues! I found this feature really useful, as it lets me see sentences in real-world contexts. Some days, I just don’t feel like studying a stack of flashcards. Dialogues are a great alternative because they tell a story. To study dialogues, just tap the ‘More’ tab, then the ‘Dialogues’ icon. Browse them by subject, select the one you want, and follow the steps to study the dialogue:

Audio only (just listen actively and look at the accompanying images, even if you don’t understand everything.)

Audio with foreign language subtitles (listen again, and read in your target language as you go)

Audio with English subtitles (listen again, and see the English translation)

Memorize (select which cards you’d like to add to your deck for your next learning session)

I also liked unlocking bonus material after completing a review session. A bonus item could be a joke, a fun fact about the language or culture, learning advice or a popular expression or quotation in your target language. You can add each of these items to your flashcard deck if you want. Another great aspect of MosaLingua is its incredible customer service. On virtually every screen in the app, you can tap the ? icon in the corner to get an explanation of what to do, followed by options to rate the page or send a suggestion. You can also report problems with individual flashcards. And the response time is fantastic. I left a lot of feedback on pages and flashcards, and I nearly always heard back from an actual person within 24 hours, to either confirm that there was an error that they will fix, or else to ask me more questions to better understand the issue. I’ve never had such good customer service on any app, ever. Kudos, MosaLingua. One of my favourite features about MosaLingua is how it doesn’t shove grammar down your throat. I don’t like to study grammar when I’m first learning a language. Often grammar rules just fall into place after I’ve learned a good number of phrases and their meanings. If you want to learn about grammar (and sometimes I do, too), you can go to the ‘Lessons’ category in the ‘Explore’ tab, and browse for specific grammar rules. Finally, I need to give a shout-out to MosaLingua’s non-spammy reminders. There are very few apps on my phone that I allow to send me push notifications. They always seem to abuse it with notifications like “Here are some tips to better use this app!” or “Looks like you haven’t logged in for a while. Why not see what your friends are up to?” Argh! I must admit, I only turned on MosaLingua notifications so I could comment on them for this review. But the developers were telling the truth: they don’t abuse the feature. You get one notification when you're approaching 24 hours since your last review session. Since the app works best when used daily, this is definitely not overkill at all. I left notifications turned on the entire time I was using the app for this review.

My Experience with MosaLingua: The Bad

As with any product that has a lot of functionality, MosaLingua has a few problem areas that could use some work. MosaLingua offers a hands-free function that lets you listen to your flashcards and try to remember the translation before the cards automatically flip over. This is great if you’re on the bus, going for a walk or just lying on the couch. But it has one flaw. You can’t lock your phone or navigate away from the app while you listen, or else the audio stops playing. This isn’t very useful when you’re not near a charger, because if your phone’s screen is constantly on while you listen to your flashcards, it will drain the battery pretty fast. I used the “suggestion” feature in the app to ask the developers about this, and they replied that they’re still perfecting this feature. So stay tuned. The search function I mentioned earlier, while useful, is not particularly “smart”. It only matches the exact search term you enter, spaces and punctuation included. I wanted to look up the word “software”, but I typed a space after the word, so MosaLingua filtered out every flashcard that contained the word “software” without a space after it. For example, one flashcard said on the Italian side, “il software, il programma”, but it didn’t match my search term because there’s a comma after “software”. Another flashcard said on the English side, “to run (software)”, and it didn’t match either because of the parenthesis after “software”. So some refinement is needed in the search function. My final comment only applies to the Italian version. I found that a small handful of native-speaker recordings were not of very good quality. They were muffled, or too quiet, or the speaker’s tone didn’t really match the “mood” of the phrase on the card. This didn’t happen too often, and I used the “report a problem” feature on the card to send a comment about it.

My Results with MosaLingua After 60 Days

You can see from my review so far that I’m a pretty big fan of learning with MosaLingua, even if it has a couple of flaws. I easily put in a bit of study time every day. Study sessions are really nice and manageable. If you learn ten new flashcards a day, then you’ll probably spend an average of 10-15 minutes per day in review. I defy anyone to assert that they don’t have 15 free minutes per day! In my case, I reviewed flashcards with MosaLingua right before bed for about ten minutes per day for nearly eight weeks - so a total of about ten hours. I learned an average of nine new cards per day. Obviously ten minutes of study per day isn’t a very well-rounded routine. But MosaLingua doesn’t pretend that it’s the only thing you’ll ever need. In fact, in addition to flashcards, dialogues, grammar and bonus items, the app also has a lot of advice for how to keep studying when you’re not using the app. For instance, it gives tips for starting a conversation with a stranger, and offers a list of movie and podcast suggestions in your target language. In my case, I chose to use only MosaLingua to study Italian, followed by three conversations with native speakers. I wanted to be absolutely clear about what MosaLingua can do, and what it can’t. If I watched Italian TV or went to frequent language meet-ups, I wouldn’t be sure if my improvement in Italian was really from MosaLingua. I did do three conversations with native speakers the week before recording my result video, to get a bit of speaking practice. I strongly feel that whether or not I use a single product like MosaLingua for my language studies, it’s still essential to occasionally use the language with native speakers.

The Video: Me Speaking Italian After 60 Days with MosaLingua

So, how was my Italian after using MosaLingua for 10 minutes a day for 60 days? I haven’t taken any placement tests, but I feel like I’m still an A1, though a strong A1. According to MosaLingua’s ‘Progress’ section, I have 264 cards stored in my long-term memory (out of 416 cards I’m currently learning). Many of these cards are complete phrases, not just single words. So I know quite a bit more than 247 Italian words. Although I’m still an A1, I know enough Italian to converse about a few basic topics, as you can see from my result video: httpvh://youtu.be/kswmF5ZaWi8 The video is only six minutes long, but Shannon and I actually talked for nearly 20 minutes, exclusively in Italian! Yes, I had to look up several words before I could say them, and Shannon had to repeat herself a few times, but our conversation was absolutely a success. I must admit I was a little worried at first! When I called Shannon on Skype and it was ringing, I felt minor panic when I tried to recall some Italian words and couldn’t think of a single one! But once we got talking, I gained some momentum and the words came to me as I needed them. Speaking the language with a real person is the only way I can overcome that mental block and start using the language naturally.

MosaLingua Review: The Bottom Line

Would I use MosaLingua again? Absolutely. Especially in the early stages of learning a new language. It’s a fast, efficient way of building up a nice foundation of vocab and phrases. No matter what your level is, I recommend including MosaLingua in your language studies. It requires a small enough time investment that you could even squeeze it into your existing routine without changing anything else. MosaLingua alone can’t make you fluent, but no single method can. But if you use MosaLingua correctly, you’ll store tons of useful material in your long-term memory, where it will be easily recalled when you need it. This recollection is the key to progressing in your target language toward fluency.

MosaLingua Links

To use MosaLingua to help you learn your target language, click the links below to find the app for the language you’re learning: Italian: MosaLingua Italian for iOS MosaLingua Italian for Android Spanish: MosaLingua Spanish for iOS MosaLingua Spanish for Android French: MosaLingua French for iOS MosaLingua French for Android German: MosaLingua German for iOS MosaLingua German for Android Brazilian Portuguese: MosaLingua Portuguese for iOS MosaLingua Portuguese for Android English: MosaLingua English for iOS MosaLingua English for Android

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