Trying out a resolution... (на русском)

[alexpgp]

Для американцев, новогодний период предоставляет возможность развлекатся мыслями самоулучшение посредством так-называемых New Year's Resolutions. Многине принимают решения, например, похудеть, выплатить долги, изучать какой-то новый предмет, и т.д.

Но принимать решения - это одно; на самом деле достигать цели решения - это что-то совершенно другое. (Поэтому я считаю что первое - это развлечение, а второе - упорный труд.)

Один из моих resolutions, это время от времени сочинять статьи в этом ЖЖ на русском языке. Вот и сочиняю; заинмаюсь упорным трудом. Трудное дело.

Устно, конечно легче. Ошибки поглощаются со звуком (более или менее). Людям ясно, что я иностранец (то есть: не россиянин), и на этой основе, ceteris paribus, они готовы прощать случайные ошибки в грамматике или произношении.

Письменно, все по-другому. Каждая ошибка очевидна всякому россиянину, и мне кажется было бы легко прийти к выводу, что писатель - я - какой-то полуграмотный кретин, которому нельзя доверять ни в чем.

С другой стороны, без практики я никогда не научусь писать грамотно на русском языке.

Вот какая штука.

* * *For Americans, the New Year is an opportunity to entertain oneself with thoughts of self-improvement, expressed in New Year’s Resolutions. Many resolve, for example, to lose weight, pay off debts, learn a new subject, etc.

But it’s one thing to resolve, another thing entirely to achieve the goal of the resolution. (That’s why I think the former is entertainment, while the latter is hard work.)

One of my resolutions is to post entries in Russian in my LJ from time to time. So here I am, posting one, engaging in hard work. It’s not easy.

Oral work is easier. Errors fade with the sound (more or less). People understand that I’m a foreigner (i.e., not a Russian) and on this basis - other things being equal - they’re willing to forgive the occasional error in grammar or pronunciation.

In writing, it’s a completely different matter. Each error is obvious to every native Russian and it seems it would be easy for the reader to conclude that the writer - yours truly - is some kind of semiliterate idiot who can’t be trusted with anything.

On the other hand, without experience, I’ll never learn to write Russian in a literate manner.

Ain’t that a kick in the head?

Cheers...

Comments

in unrelated news

[belochka.livejournal.com]

you might find the game we're playing in my community of_disbelief amusing -- the results of one round are in

Re: in unrelated news

[alexpgp.livejournal.com]

Looks interesting, though it took some time for me to wrap my eyeballs around the rules.

Cheers...

[alexpgp.livejournal.com]

Hmm.

1) There are two Russian words that come to mind for the word "kind" that start with the letter "L":

* ëþáåçíûé (lyu-BEZZ-knee), in the sense of "amiable," "affable" or "gracious."

* ëàñêîâûé (LAS-kah-vee), in the sense of "affectionate" or "caressing."

2) "Yes" is "äà"; "no" is "íåò".

"Nikki" is, well... "Íèêêè" (pretty much a letter-for-letter substitution, just as "Frank" would be rendered as "Ôðýíê").

Cheers...

[rillifane.livejournal.com]

I'm confused. How come I see a Russian font when I don't think I have any Russian fonts on my machine?

[alexpgp.livejournal.com]

If you're running Windows 98 or newer, the system fonts support Unicode by default. If you take a look "under the hood," the Cyrillic text of the post consists not of characters, but of the HTML for the Unicode values of the characters.

Someone posted something as a comment to a post of mine some time ago with embedded Unicode HTML of some Chinese characters, and they showed up on my machine with no problem.

Cheers...

[volkris.livejournal.com]

I really enjoy your Russian posts sometimes. I'm actually studying the language right now in my free time (though, at this rate it'll take years to get anywhere), but even though I can't recognize that many words in what you say I like to read it for the sounds and patterns of endings and such.

[alexpgp.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the kind words.

If you're not much of a grammar parser (and I am not), it's those patterns of endings that will ultimately guide you if you decide to go anywhere in your study of Russian. Good luck.

Cheers...

P.S. You ever find a good sushi place at the north end of Houston?

Prolog and Russia

[rosie-posie.livejournal.com]

Hello, Alex!
I and from Russia. Sorry, for my English!
I find you by interest-searching. We have common interests.
You learn russian, I try to learn English.
Also, the programming language prolog.
I work in company. We devlopment the Visual Prolog.
I am a software tester.
I can write to you on Russian.
You can read my journal. I am fresh user. I create my journal yesterday.

Re: Prolog and Russia

[alexpgp.livejournal.com]

Добро пожаловать в ЖЖ!

На этой стороне океана, Prolog является умирающий (если не уже мертвый) язык. Жаль, конечно. Я когда-то был лихорадочным болельщиком языка (написал много статьей о Prolog в компьютерных журналах - первая такая статья публиковалась в BYTE в 1985 где-то). Ваша программа на которой ОС построена? На Виндах? Linux?

Добавил тебя в список френдов. Булу читать.

Cheers...

Re: Prolog and Russia

[rosie-posie.livejournal.com]

Äîáðîå âðåìÿ ñóòîê!

Ñåé÷àñ ïîéäó è òîæå äîáàâëþ òåáÿ â ñïèñîê ôðåíäîâ.
Íàø ïðîëîã 5-îé âåðñèè áûë è äëÿ Windows, è äëÿ OS/2, è äëÿ Unix/Linux. Íîâàÿ îáåêòíî-îðèåíòèðîâàííàÿ âåðñèÿ (ñåé÷àñ ïîêà åùå â ðàçðàáîòêå) - òîëüêî äëÿ Windows.
Íàøè çàêàç÷èêè - ýòî Prolog Development Center Denmark (www.pdc.dk).
Äî íåäàâíåãî âðåìåíè ó íàñ áûëî îòäåëåíèå è ïî âàøó ñòîðîíó îêåàíà - PDC Atlanta.