Language Learning
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Japanese “Wa” (は) and “Ga” (が)
Two weeks ago I talked about Japanese particles and how the Japanese particle “ga” (が) (subject marker) started appearing in my Pimsleur lessons when I was expecting “wa” (は) (topic marker), and how it sounded new to me. But actually, last week my daughter and I were driving around and I played lesson one in the car for us to listen to together, and I was reminded that “ga” (が) was used then. This got me thinking more about the wa/ga situation. I am still fuzzy on when to use “wa” (は) and when to use “ga” (が), but in addition to the guidelines I mentioned in my Japanese particle…
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Here Comes the Cat: Indulging in Some Language Learning Fun
My history with learning languages has been scattered throughout my life. I’ve always loved languages, but never knew which one to focus on. As a child, I liked to create my own alphabets, which I scribbled in journals that are long gone. In high school, I took Spanish and Latin. In college, I took German and New Testament Greek, and even learned the “Our Father” in New Testament Greek by heart. After college, I started learning the language I want to learn more than any other, Russian, on my own. I bought Pimsleur courses and children’s books in Russian, and of all of the language learning I had up to…
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Japanese Particles
Since I started my current language learning schedule in September of last year, I’ve used immersion methods both in my various listening lessons and in my Duolingo app, without referring to any kind of grammatical guides. But this week while I was listening to my level one Japanese lessons in Pimsleur, I heard something new that I had to investigate. Up until now, “wa” (は), has been used as a main word marker. In my lessons it was described as a word that translates to “as for,” so “watashi wa” (わたしは) would mean “as for me” or “I am.” Why わ and は sound the same but have different hiragana…
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“The Sea” by Pablo Neruda
I’m at a point in my language learning where I’m trying to read a tiny bit of literature in Spanish, finding something that sticks and going back and forth between languages. Good poetry works well for this because I find it very captivating and I like the lyricism and symbolic nature of it. Of course, Pablo Neruda is one of the best poets, and a favorite of mine, so his poetry seems like the perfect place to start reading in another language. Today I thought I’d just place the Spanish and English versions of this side by side and reflect on it and try to pick up some new words.…
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A Typical Morning for Me/Una mañana típica para mí
A Simple Exercise/Un ejercicio sencillo As an exercise, I want to write about a typical morning for me, in Spanish. I’m writing this in English and then rewriting it with my limited knowledge of the Spanish language, and then I will double check questionable parts and edit as needed. A modo de ejercicio, quiero escribir sobre una mañana típica para mí, en español. Estoy escribiendo esto en inglés y luego lo reescribo con mi limitado conocimiento del idioma españo, y luego lo comprobaré dos veces partes cuestionables y las editaré según sea necesario. My alarm clock goes off at 5:30 and I usually hit the snooze button until about 6:00.…
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Ecuadorian Poetry
Plane tickets to Quito have been bought, and in my ongoing cultural exploration of Ecuador this week I came across some of Ecuador’s most illuminating poets. I’ve picked a few Ecuadorian poems that I’ve read so far to share here, with translations when I could find them. Here are poems by David Ledesma Vásquez, Alfredo Gangotena, and one of Ecuador’s most famous poets, Jorge Carrera Andrade. In addition to these poets, Nelson Estupiñán Bass, Jorge Enrique Adoum, Efrain Jara Idrovo, Francisco Granizo Ribadeneira, and poets of the Generación decapitada literary movement Medardo Angel Silva, Ernesto Noboa y Caamaño, Arturo Borja, and Humberto Fierro, are also considered to be exceptional Ecuadorian…
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Planning for a Trip to Ecuador
This April I plan to go to Ecuador with a couple of good friends with a photography group and want to create a checklist of things to do to get ready for it. South America will be a new continent for me, and one I’ve wanted to see for a long time, so I’m very excited! We will get to see the Amazon jungle, volcanoes, a flower plantation, Ingapirca ruins, and visit the town of Misahualli which is famous for its monkeys! Here are some things I want to do in the next two months in preparation: 🇪🇨 Ramp up my Spanish language lessons 💉 Check in with my doctor…
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Repetitive Movie Watching for Language Learning
One of my strategies for language learning is to pick a movie in each language that I’m working on and to watch it on repeat for a while until I get the phrases down. For my Spanish language film, I think I’m going with The Motorcycle Diaries (Diarios de motocicleta) (2004) because I love it and it has lots of dialogue and beautiful scenery all the way through. For my Vietnamese film, at the risk of burnout I’m also picking a favorite, The Vertical Ray of the Sun (Mùa hè chiều thẳng đứng) from 2000, because it also has a lot of dialogue to focus on, as well as gorgeous,…
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Tití me preguntó si tengo mucha’ novia’
“Tití me preguntó si tengo mucha’ novia'” (Auntie asked me if I have many girlfriends) was how this year’s epic Bad Bunny Superbowl halftime performance started and this was by far the lingual highlight of my week! This year’s halftime show was the first one performed almost entirely in Spanish, and with references to Puerto Rican history and culture all over it. It starts with a historical walk-through from the beginning scene with sugar cane workers in pava hats, representing the slave-like conditions Puerto Ricans endured under U.S. corporate rule, to cultural nods like a game of dominoes and a piragua stand, to exploding power poles, indicative of Puerto Rico’s…
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The Vietnamese Alphabet
Did you know that the modern Vietnamese alphabet, chữ Quốc ngữ, was developed as recently as the 17th century and is based on a Latinized script of Vietnamese created by a Portuguese Jesuit priest named Francisco de Pina and other Jesuit missionaries? It was later refined by the French during the French colonial period in Vietnam, resulting in the alphabet we have today, which has Portuguese, French, and Italian influences. In 1867, Vietnamese scholar Trương Vĩnh Ký dubbed this Latinized Vietnamese script “chữ Quốc ngữ” in one of his grammar books, Mẹo luật dạy học tiếng pha-lang-sa (Tips to teach and learn French). Before the Vietnamese language was Latinized, it was based on Chinese characters…
