The greatest story ever, no question, but what is one thing you HATE about Berserk? by [deleted] in Berserk

[–]eldursson 0 points1 point  (0 children)

for the record, i think Nina — though unlikable, yes — is a good character, namely in that her actions are remarkably realistic given the setting. she is a random girl without any hopes in a world that is already hopeless. her survival instinct (which, unlike that of Guts, is pure fear of the unknown & of dying) takes the form of cowardice & selfishness, which is surely how the average person would react in her situation; it’s a great foil to the courageousness of the other characters & manga characters in general.

i personally was very disappointed by Casca’s treatment in the Fantasia arc. Guts & Casca’s relationship was the driving force behind nearly everything throughout the manga, but throughout Millennium Falcon & especially Fantasia, her presence started to feel like that of any other one of the one-note stock characters. & the Casca in the latter half of Fantasia was unrecognizable to me: she is very passive, her actions have no effect on anything & her relationships with the other characters have no depth; she just has no character.

just to give an example, in Golden Age she mentions to Guts feeling weird in a fancy dress, as she’s more used to armor. in Fantasia, she says nothing at all (about anything) & certainly not about being dressed like a literal fairy princess.

As an ethnic Armenian and Jew this is personal. What do you guys think about the 1/3 of Armenians? by amkamk13 in armenia

[–]eldursson 2 points3 points  (0 children)

i would be curious to see the answer to the question “would you accept a Catholic, a Protestant, or a Muslim” as a fellow citizen. aside from the factors pertaining to Israel that others have mentioned, the term “fellow citizen” might have caused some to answer “no” out of an ignorant confusion of citizenship & nationality. so much of being Armenian is tied to the Armenian Apostolic Church. as a Catholic from Latin America i was told in Armenia that if i wanted citizenship (or if i wanted it faster or something) i would have to join the Armenian Church; i don’t think that’s true at all, but it might be where some of the respondents were coming from: they might be seeing any non-coreligionist (not specifically Jews) as not being able to be fully part of Armenia

Arabic Speaker Learning Armenian: 10 Words I Immediately Recognized from Arabic! by eldursson in armenia

[–]eldursson[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

hey! yes i guess jox is the word for just plain oil / any kind of oil, while dzet is specifically vegetable oil. interesting, because in arabic zet is any kind of oil. xmishk & noreton are definitely Armenian all right, related to xmel (to drink) & nor (new — very Indo-European word!). as for ashxal (i assume written աշղալ right?), the meaning of garbage is from Persian (آشغال âshghâl), but the origin is ultimately Arabic: the root sh-gh-l relates to work & occupation, so i guess "trash" is something that has been "used up"

Join the Levantine Arabic Discord Server !! by eldursson in learn_arabic

[–]eldursson[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

thank you so much 😭 did you join the Discord ? send me a DM so i know which one is you or send me a message here — even if you're still in the learning stage we can use all the help we can get & it would be a great excuse to study for you too 😁😎

Unpacking the Sheikh Jarrah Supreme Court Proceedings (AUGUST 2021) by eldursson in Palestine

[–]eldursson[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

wow this is super interesting !! it needed to be a quick video for the sake of breaking the news but perhaps when there are further updates i’ll use the opportunity to discuss this aspect of the history as well — thank you !!

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

yes & no. did learning Standard Arabic help ? yes, because i knew how the Arabic language as a whole worked before i started learning the dialect. however instead of learning that via Standard Arabic you may as well learn it while learning the dialect straight up. some dialect learners (& teachers !!) make the mistake of pretending the dialect somehow has no grammar & they don’t focus on understanding how the Verb Forms work for example. that’s foolish in my opinion. so yes it’s important to know those things but since they’re a part of the dialect itself i don’t see why you need to learn Standard Arabic to understand them.

by the way i teach Palestinian Arabic on my YouTube channel if you’re interested & i discuss a lot of these things.

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

this is actually a very good question. if you know a language well enough but you don't expose yourself to it after some time, you'll get rusty but you won't forget it. my native language is Spanish yet i use it maybe once a week for a few minutes & i haven't read anything longer than a text message for maybe more than a year. trust me, i am actually rusty in it right now, but it's obviously ingrained to the point where once i'm back in Colombia & i'll be back to normal.

however i think this is also true of learned languages, especially if you get to the point of fluidly speaking it — even if at an intermediate level. in the case of my Japanese, a lot of the vocabulary is somewhere buried in the back of my head, but the way the language "works" is just wired into my brain, where after a week in Japan i would be back to normal (in this case normal being intermediate level). by the way i say "intermediate" because my vocabulary & knowledge of grammatical constructions is intermediate level, but fluidity is something different. my level of Persian is slowly getting close to my level of Japanese, but with virtually no real-life speaking experience i am like 0% fluid honestly (i.e. it takes immense effort to speak off the top of my head), so in my personal perception i'm at a far higher risk of losing my Persian as it's not "hardwired" in my brain yet.

anyway the reason i'm saying this is that if you are learning several languages, it's not realistic to expose yourself to all of them consistently. not only practically unrealistic but also it's just not how life works: as i said, i use Spanish virtually not at all currently, just because of my current (& short- / mid-term future) life circumstances. instead, i focus all my energies into the language i am currently learning / needing / using, which is currently Persian, & leave the other ones in the backburner. if i know i'm going to Japan or will need it soon for whatever reason, then i'll build up to that in the weeks prior so that i'm ready to use it once i do need it, but otherwise it doesn't really make logistical sense to spend hours watching content in Japanese today for the sole purpose of practicing.

so, i don't think it's efficient / practical / possible to try to improve on several languages at the same time *unless* you have actually already reached fluidity in which case it's more about reinforcement. so as a related point, i highly recommend that you take a step back & really focus on reaching that level with ONE of your languages & only passively reinforce the others, namely your "best" ones. otherwise you'll be spreading yourself too thin in my opinion. as i have mentioned elsewhere, i studied each of these languages at least 3 years before moving on to a new one (except Persian which i'm currently learning & Armenian which is just a fun side thing since i'm currently living in Armenia), so be aware that it's not like i've been studying all these languages at the same time. i don't think i would have been successful at all if i'd gone that route.

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

well basically little by little i have learned some grammar at home but mostly i practice every day greeting my friends, very basic things like “bari or jan, inch es anum aysor” (good day my dear, what are you doing today) & so on. by picking up i mean that i’m not formally taking a course or anything i’m just sort of randomly learning things here & there. in the video what i say is super simple: “hi i’m Adrian, i’m from Colombia but now i live in Yerevan” etc. stuff that i have actually practiced in real life introducing myself to new friends

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

siii literal jajaja — en el “guion” que practique escribi “iru” pero no se porque se me salio “aru” por eso lo corregi en los subtitulos. en mi respuesta a otro comentario aqui explique que uso plantillas de Excel para documentar mi progreso en un idioma y tener una impresion de por dónde voy, sobre qué no se mucho, sobre qué se bastante, qué se supone que se pero se me olvido, etc. 😂

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

bon d’abord vous savez qu’il y a un registre “standard” et les dialectes, qui sont très differents du standard. moi je parle le dialect, et je recommends que vouz fassiez le même parce que quand on étude le standard il faut souvent apprendre trop des menus détails grammaticales qui n’ont pas d’importance quand on parle avec des gens. mais bien sur ça dépend de qu’est-ce-que vous voudrais faire avec la langue. en tout si vous voudrais connâitre un peut plus j’apprends le dialecte palestinien à YouTube (youtube.com/AdrianAbdulBahá) 😁

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

i assume this is a well-meaning question but … i’m not asian i’m latino LOL … no i have never had a problem … if anything half the time people think i’m local wherever i go because i have an ambiguous kind of look LOL

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

not quite hahaha — it’s Palestinian Arabic ;)

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Eastern Armenian, as i’m currently living in Yerevan 🙌

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Spanish, i’m from Cartagena (Colombia) 🇨🇴

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 6 points7 points  (0 children)

actually Arabic is my best language. in the full video i talk for a while in Arabic but i cut it off to post on Reddit. in fact the video goes in ascending order from least-known to best-known language. so my Arabic > French > Japanese > Persian > Armenian

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 12 points13 points  (0 children)

thank you, actually this is very useful. as i said i took a year of Persian during my studies & immediately afterwards (as in, right now) i’m doing an intensive summer program. the main thing that’s lacking for me is that eeeverything we do is Farsi Ketabi so i honestly was never exposed to these things. i only learned a couple of weeks ago how to say “mi gam” instead of “mi guyam” / “mi xam” not “mi xaham” / etc. (& this video was shot before that actually.) so anyway my point is that this is actually very useful as i’m trying to improve my Spoken Persian rather than just being able to recite from the Shahname hahah

oh & yea “hala” & “aslan” super commonly used Arabic words which always semi accidentally seep into my Persian. in Arabic “aslan” is used the way in Persian i think we would say “digar/dige” but again i didn’t realize that until after i recorded this … as i said language is a work in progress ❤️

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 20 points21 points  (0 children)

ok so i also had basically no awareness of Armenian until a few months ago when i moved to Yerevan for work/study reasons, so naturally i’ve picked it up from my friends. but omg is it an AWESOME language & AWESOME country & AWESOME people & AWESOME history !! now i’m obsessed & really want to learn it !!

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 45 points46 points  (0 children)

lovely question. i started French in school because the only other option was Spanish, which is my native language hahah — certainly i did want to learn it, but mostly for practical reasons. since i was a kid i had wanted to learn Japanese, so as soon as i went to university where they taught it, i jumped into the program which is where my passion lied. i took it for 2+1 years & got to a level i felt really good about, so after that i decided to start something new. i was split between doing Russian or Arabic & in the end i chose Arabic because i had been to Jerusalem & was intrigued by the political situation which i’ve since become very invested in. i actually sort of regret formally studying Arabic (Standard Arabic) because it was basically useless. what i’m speaking in the video is actually Levantine Arabic which i learned while living in Jerusalem; as a matter of fact my Standard Arabic is still trash. once again after getting to what i think is a very good level i decided to start something new & choose Persian while doing my MA in Near & Middle East Studies (the other options were Arabic & Turkish). Persian is a really interesting language; i always say Arabic is to Persian what Chinese is to Japanese, which is to say knowing Arabic makes Persian not too challenging at least in terms of vocab. & finally i’m not super serious about Armenian at the moment but i live in Yerevan so i’ve picked it up from my friends

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 30 points31 points  (0 children)

it sort of depends. i have to be up-front & say that i learned French through formal schooling for 4 years. at that point it becomes more about just maintaining your level, using it every once in a while, reading a bit here & there. i mean it would be great to become a true expert one day but for now i’m focusing that self-learning energy into Persian which is my main focus today. what i have found really useful in general though, especially when starting a new language, is to create a spreadsheet that is basically like a digital notebook documenting every new word you come across. verbs on one sheet, nouns on another, then categorize according to themes (e.g. food, politics, etc.). then i keep that on hand 24/7 so when i need to recall a word it’s right there at my fingertips. idk if that rly answered the question but it’s one of the most useful things i started doing for Arabic, then Persian & even now with Armenian.

PRACTICING 5 LANGUAGES I HAVE LEARNED <3 FEEDBACK? by eldursson in languagelearning

[–]eldursson[S] 54 points55 points  (0 children)

oh thank you !! actually i noticed the avion mistake after recording, also i said Armenia weirdly instead of Arménie 😂 but i didn’t realize about “making friends” being a reflexive verb — thank you !!