Graz, Austria. Week 19th - 25th of March 2007.
Browsing through my own blog I realized that I forgot to mention quite an astonishing amount of work I did to improve my or at least get in touch with the English language.
First, starting in chronological order, I watched Rocky Balboa in the Royal English Cinema Monday night with a few friends, as George puts it. To tell the truth, I did not expect having to much fun watching the movie for a second time, but I need to underline what George already explained in more detail on his blog, the English original beats the pants off the German dubbing.
Tuesday, I joined for the first time the, by now, traditional Pubquiz at the Office. I should have done this a year ago then some of Mr. Newman’s culture questions would have been easily answered (and maybe I’d have passed SuK III on my first try). I don’t want to brag about it, still I think it is important to point out that George, Julia and I tried very hard to stick to English as long as we were inside the Pub (for a proof click here).
Wednesday, this was the hardest bit. Every Wednesday morning (and afternoon) I’ve got a microeconomics class in English at the SOWI. For everyone interested in microeconomics and English I recommend taking a course with Mr. Baigent next semester. At night I watched the only episode of Rocky Balboa I had not seen by then: number V.
All week long I read a few chapters of Jaywalking and finished A Year in the Merde (see, review).
March 26, 2007
Golden, Colorado
Today is my last day of university before Easter break!
Tomorrow I am leaving for Golden, Colorado. This place is very close to Denver, Colorado in the mid-west of the United States of America. The last few days I had to pack for my evection (Wellandians will know what this means). Hopefully the weather will be nice regarding our plans to camp for the majority of our stay.
At arrival we (a good friend of mine and me) will stay at my friend's brother's house for a week or so. Ulrich (the brother of my friend Harald) is completing his master in "Erdöltechnik" at a University in Golden.
By the end of the week we hope to have seen the best parts of Denver and some nice places in Colorado (there are fantastic skiing resorts and hiking possibilities), in order to leave this place for the two weeks left.
According to our rough outline we will start our route in direction "Grand Canyon National Park", a must see when in the area. Next, we will continue our route to the center of gambling, Las Vegas. From there, if time permits, we plan to head to the West Coast and eventually reach Los Angeles. By then we will be broke and hungry, therefore ready to return to Golden and fly back to Graz, Austria where University will have started already a day before we arrive.
I looking forward to leaving a message from time to time in order to let you know what I found out about the American culture ;)
Review, A Year in the Merde
Stephen Clarke's first book on living in Paris, France and stepping way too often into Merde was a wonderful reading experience.
If I had to describe this book with three words, I'd definitively choose: hilarious, short and realistic.
It is hilarious because it made me laugh uncountable times – jokes which, I suppose, are hard to understand for someone who does not speak a word of French and/or has never been to Paris or at least France before. For all those who understand the French and French the 383 pages are a humorous introduction into cultural differences and cultural misunderstandings.
My second word, “short”, is not describing its actual length nor am I talking about the size or format of the book. The aspect I’m referring to is its readability. Clarke’s style of writing, using very few long and boring descriptions, instead using dialogues and “unspoken” comments to explain the situations, make his book very lively. Furthermore, most of the descriptions you actually get are either about girls (sex related) or about food, which makes reading them enjoyable. The language in general is quite easy, however, there are still a few words per page which I don’t know and actually seem useful. Basically, the context makes it possible to understand and grasp the idea of every sentence although not every single word might be clear. A rather obvious exception are the “Frenchenglish” dialogues, Clarke provides us with. Please try to decipher this one (post your thoughts as a comment please): “Ah’em ed of hah tee”.
The third adjective I chose is realistic. The misunderstandings, his learning by doing attitude followed by many faux pas, the ups and downs in his private life and job are reasonably measured. By the end of the book the character more or less knows how to handle the French (in particular the Parisian girls). However, when returning to London he does not feel at home anymore, he has adapted to the French culture in one way or another.
I can wholeheartedly recommend this book to everyone who loves to have a laugh from time to time and needs relief from the heavy pages of Jaywalking with the Irish (not that I don’t like the book, actually I think it is very interesting. However, it contains way more cultural information and words I’ve never heard of, than A Year in the Merde.)
If I had to describe this book with three words, I'd definitively choose: hilarious, short and realistic.
It is hilarious because it made me laugh uncountable times – jokes which, I suppose, are hard to understand for someone who does not speak a word of French and/or has never been to Paris or at least France before. For all those who understand the French and French the 383 pages are a humorous introduction into cultural differences and cultural misunderstandings.
My second word, “short”, is not describing its actual length nor am I talking about the size or format of the book. The aspect I’m referring to is its readability. Clarke’s style of writing, using very few long and boring descriptions, instead using dialogues and “unspoken” comments to explain the situations, make his book very lively. Furthermore, most of the descriptions you actually get are either about girls (sex related) or about food, which makes reading them enjoyable. The language in general is quite easy, however, there are still a few words per page which I don’t know and actually seem useful. Basically, the context makes it possible to understand and grasp the idea of every sentence although not every single word might be clear. A rather obvious exception are the “Frenchenglish” dialogues, Clarke provides us with. Please try to decipher this one (post your thoughts as a comment please): “Ah’em ed of hah tee”.
The third adjective I chose is realistic. The misunderstandings, his learning by doing attitude followed by many faux pas, the ups and downs in his private life and job are reasonably measured. By the end of the book the character more or less knows how to handle the French (in particular the Parisian girls). However, when returning to London he does not feel at home anymore, he has adapted to the French culture in one way or another.
I can wholeheartedly recommend this book to everyone who loves to have a laugh from time to time and needs relief from the heavy pages of Jaywalking with the Irish (not that I don’t like the book, actually I think it is very interesting. However, it contains way more cultural information and words I’ve never heard of, than A Year in the Merde.)
March 14, 2007
English Log 5, Vocab
Here is my first document containing a few usefull (sometimes unknown words - at least to me) words I picked up while reading through the texts for Welland's class.
I'm really looking foreward to our class today - the topic we're working on right now is very interesting and worth discussing. English is such an important language nowadays and spreads all around the world. By doing so it is constantly exposed to other languages, cultures, accents, dialects etc. therefore it is in permanent change. I believe that not only non-english languages are affected by the "world-domination" of English but also American or British English are strongly influenced.
Language is like chicken masala. First, the English arrived in India, they liked their food - brought it to Britain (or at least Indian immigrants brought it there). At this stage it was adapted to the English taste and finally brought back to India, where today you can find Indian-British Chicken Masala. The same happens with English. It travels around the world and every now and then it comes back home and changes the "original" British or American English. Enough for today, we'll speak about this in class anyway.
Follow the link to have a look at my vocab list (I'll update it with new words everytime we have to read for class) Vocab 1
I'm really looking foreward to our class today - the topic we're working on right now is very interesting and worth discussing. English is such an important language nowadays and spreads all around the world. By doing so it is constantly exposed to other languages, cultures, accents, dialects etc. therefore it is in permanent change. I believe that not only non-english languages are affected by the "world-domination" of English but also American or British English are strongly influenced.
Language is like chicken masala. First, the English arrived in India, they liked their food - brought it to Britain (or at least Indian immigrants brought it there). At this stage it was adapted to the English taste and finally brought back to India, where today you can find Indian-British Chicken Masala. The same happens with English. It travels around the world and every now and then it comes back home and changes the "original" British or American English. Enough for today, we'll speak about this in class anyway.
Follow the link to have a look at my vocab list (I'll update it with new words everytime we have to read for class) Vocab 1
March 13, 2007
tongue-twisters
Whatever language you learn tongue-twisters are not easy to do...
This guy makes an art out of it in "Wetten Dass ???" - try simulaneous interpretation ;) or just have fun listening and try understanding what this guy is talking about.
By the way, his method might be interesting for language learners in training their articulation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdeRwWplJ2c
have fun
This guy makes an art out of it in "Wetten Dass ???" - try simulaneous interpretation ;) or just have fun listening and try understanding what this guy is talking about.
By the way, his method might be interesting for language learners in training their articulation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdeRwWplJ2c
have fun
English Log 4, A year in the Merde
Image by www.amazon.fr
A year in the Merde by Stephen Clarke - Chapter I
Amazon is fast and cheap. That's the reason I' loving it to use McDonald language.
A few days ago I ordered "A year in the Merde" by Stephen Clarke after having read a few reviews - I think I mentioned this before in a previous post.
This afternoon I finally received the book and instantly began reading it. (Not that I had nothing else to do but compared to reading a book on macroeconomics it seemed quite a good option to begin Clarke's oeuvre.)
Being half-french therefore knowing the french culture or at least recognizing it when made fun of I had a great time devouring the first chapter. The destcription we got in class as this book being a "LOL - Laugh Out Loud" book is definitly true! More than once I had to put the book aside and calm down again so I could continue reading.
For those that have not chosen a book yet, I can absolutely recommend this one. If you've already been to France once or more you'll recognize many stereotypes or maybe even situations you lived through and laugh even more. Another, for us language learners, relevant aspect is the very fluent style this book is written in. I could read over 50 pages without having to look up many words in the dictionnary to understand what it was all about (altough I underlined more than one word per page - but they were not very important to understand what Stephen Clarke was trying to say) and, more importantly, without wanting to stop reading. Unfortunately, my macroeconomics class is coming up soon, so I decided to switch to this very last one.
The update on new vocab will follow soon!
English Log 3, Rocky Balboa (again)
... by today I've seen part I, II and VI of Rocky Balboa. All of them very nice films, some action but also some story.
The main difference between Rocky and other boxing movies is, that it is not exclusively about the sport but also about Rocky's life. It is the story of a 30 year old man living the American dream. A poor man who is always aware of his roots or at least some people remind him of his roots. It is impossible for him to be part of high society, to be part of the rich people - he doesn't care enough for their goals. Rocky is what I would call a "good" person. He gives advice to people he meets (e.g. little Marie - for those of you who have seen the movie), he can't follow the orders of the mafia he's working for properly, he gives his best in trying other things than fighting because of his wife and health asking him for it.
Very soon you'll get another update on Rocky III!
The main difference between Rocky and other boxing movies is, that it is not exclusively about the sport but also about Rocky's life. It is the story of a 30 year old man living the American dream. A poor man who is always aware of his roots or at least some people remind him of his roots. It is impossible for him to be part of high society, to be part of the rich people - he doesn't care enough for their goals. Rocky is what I would call a "good" person. He gives advice to people he meets (e.g. little Marie - for those of you who have seen the movie), he can't follow the orders of the mafia he's working for properly, he gives his best in trying other things than fighting because of his wife and health asking him for it.
Very soon you'll get another update on Rocky III!
March 11, 2007
English Log 2, Rocky Balboa
This picture is from: http://www.rockybalboaassets.com/RBB/pictures/DF-01624_rv1_wtm.jpg
Listening, week-end 10-11.3.07
To enhance my listening comprehension skills I thought that going to the cinema would be an appropriate comfortable way of exposing myself and in particular my ears to the sound of the English language. Unfortunately Rocky 6 is not played at the Royal English Cinema therefore I had to go and watch it in German... Luckily I found another possibility to train my ears. As I had never seen any Rocky film actively I decided to watch at least one of the 5 precedent episodes on DVD.
After discussing the main plot of Rocky 1-5 with a friend and calculating how much time there was until we had to leave for the cinema, we decided on watching episode 2. The reasons were simple: Rocky wins his fight (he does not at the end of the first episode, which makes you want to look at the second one immediatly afterwards - but we didn't have time for that), it is shorter than some of the others, number 3 isn't a typicall Rocky because he is rich and famous all the time (his social background isn't described that good in this episode I was told), 4 and 5 are late Rockies and not very well suited to get to know what the movie is all about. So, we chose number 2.
Indeed looking at is now I think it was a great decision. Not only does Rocky win in the end, to get there but he has to work hard and make his private life work in one way or another to achieve his doal. I was very astonished by the quality and somehow also depth of this boxing film (same for part 6, although the German dub is not what you want to hear after the English original). Never had I thought that Silvester Stalone's Rocky was more than action and hard fighting but now the fever caught me and I'll have to watch the other 4 episodes very soon!
For those of you who don't know anything about Rocky or those of you who are fans or anyhow interested in this kind of film, check out the Rocky website (http://www.rocky.com/) or the Rocky Blog (http://rockybalboablog.blogspot.com/).
Oh, I almost forgot to mention the music!! How dareI. "The Eye of the Tiger" is a fantastic theme song and also other musical inputs are fantastic - just the best for Rocky Balboa!
Rafael
Well,... I think there's only one thing to add:
"It ain't about how hard you hit it's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward."
March 9, 2007
Log 1, 9.3.07
A few things I did for class today:
Today I copied the English script for the whole class at the copyshop.... It's amazing how heavy 100*24 = 2400 pages can be.
The second thing I did for class was to look up a few reviews of Pico Iyler's "The Global Soul", onw of the books some of us might read this semester. By scimming through an interview with Pico Iyler I could get a pretty good picture of what the book might be like. There seems to be an awfull lot of information about culture, life in general and travel experiences in the first part of the book.
Iyler describes The Global Soul that way: "I begin deliberately with those dizzying surfaces and passageways - movement, an inundation of data, which I think refelcts how the world is today..." "... the book is about the passage from speed to slowness and surface to depth"(citation: www.powells.com/authors/iyler.html)
I think that those few lines tell a lot about the book, maybe even about the style and the philosophy of his book. Reviews always mention that many places are referred to in the book, and that The Global Soul is about the quest for a place where people like Iyler can feel at home. A quest for a place merging as many homes as possible. (Pico Iyler is an ethnic Indian who grew up in the US and GB, now he lives part-time in California and Japan).
For further information see: www.amazon.com/Global-Soul-Shopping-Malls-Search/dp/0679776117
Third, I ordered "A Year in the Merde" by Stephen Clarke at amazon.at...
... Well and now I'll try to understand "chinglish",.... (Yuppie!)
Today I copied the English script for the whole class at the copyshop.... It's amazing how heavy 100*24 = 2400 pages can be.
The second thing I did for class was to look up a few reviews of Pico Iyler's "The Global Soul", onw of the books some of us might read this semester. By scimming through an interview with Pico Iyler I could get a pretty good picture of what the book might be like. There seems to be an awfull lot of information about culture, life in general and travel experiences in the first part of the book.
Iyler describes The Global Soul that way: "I begin deliberately with those dizzying surfaces and passageways - movement, an inundation of data, which I think refelcts how the world is today..." "... the book is about the passage from speed to slowness and surface to depth"(citation: www.powells.com/authors/iyler.html)
I think that those few lines tell a lot about the book, maybe even about the style and the philosophy of his book. Reviews always mention that many places are referred to in the book, and that The Global Soul is about the quest for a place where people like Iyler can feel at home. A quest for a place merging as many homes as possible. (Pico Iyler is an ethnic Indian who grew up in the US and GB, now he lives part-time in California and Japan).
For further information see: www.amazon.com/Global-Soul-Shopping-Malls-Search/dp/0679776117
Third, I ordered "A Year in the Merde" by Stephen Clarke at amazon.at...
... Well and now I'll try to understand "chinglish",.... (Yuppie!)
March 8, 2007
My 1st Entry
This is my very first WegLog entry at Blogger.com
The only purpose of this entry is to try out the functions and get to know some of the options I have when using this blog system.
It was very easy to add an image to this message - size and position were easily arranged!
only last thing for those of you who are not only interested in Hollywood and other mass-public movies. Please sign the petition against the closure of the Augarten Kino in Graz, Austria under: www.sichertdasaugartenkino.at
Rafael
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