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I managed to listen to the chapter and understood a few bits here and there as well as recognised a fair number of words from before even if I wasnāt sure of their meanings. Iām try reading some of it today and see what I get from it.
I got started yesterday with the paperback and the audiobook. I got to the first break point a couple pages in.
This is exactly as difficult as I thought itād be! Itās a cooouple notches above my level, but with copious look ups it seems to be manageable. Hereās to hoping for some noticeable improvement by the end of the book. XD 5 minutes of the audiobook took a good hour to work through properly. (Not sure, but >45mins.) Definitely need to space the chapters out over the week.
I also happen to own a German version! Iām pretty sure my mom gave that to me ages ago. I donāt think Iāve ever read it thoughā¦ I quickly went through the same part to check my understanding and was pretty happy with most of it.
There was one sentence I understood differently even with look ups, maybe someone can help me with it. Itās on the first page with text.
I thought this was meant metaphorically: he expected/imagined? that few blocks away from his house the Pacific Ocean was roaring, overflowing in furious waves against the ledges of the buildings.
The German version translates cornisa as āKlippenā, ācliffsā. Is this another possible meaning for la cornisa? It also sounds a bit less metaphorical to me. Can someone tell me whether Alex actually lives super close to the ocean?
And then there were 2 instances of ānewā sentences in the German version. Does anyone also have these in their edition or is this just a very liberal translation?
My edition has the same sentences as your Spanish one. Itās weird that a translation would add sentences like this.
Question: answer
I wouldnāt translate it as building or cliff either. I visualized something like this, with him living quite close to the sea. But I guess technically all three translations kinda make sense.
Finished the first chapter! I listened to it in audio book form first, without following along with the text, just to see how well I did comprehending it.
I caught a fair amount of details, though I wasnāt able to perfectly follow it. One of the funniest moments was I missed the description of the dog getting sprayed by a skunk (because I didnāt know those words), but figured out that must be what had happened because I understood the part about bathing in tomato juice afterward.
Iād say that this book is harder than the first few books that I read in Spanish, so donāt get too discouraged if itās hard! I had to look up a bunch of words myself.
In total, it took me about 50 minutes to read this chapter (after listening through it all the way once), which was two 25-minute reading sessions for me. Would have taken substantially longer if I wasnāt reading on kindle and couldnāt get instant lookups.
A comment (not a question) on a line near the end of the chapter:
Nuestra familia estĆ” pasando por una crisis. ĀæSabes cuĆ”les son los caracteres chinos para escribir crisis? Peligro + oportunidad.
I donāt know Chinese, but it holds true for the word ācrisisā in Japanese as well!
Thanks. Iāll not put too much stock into the translation thenā¦ Translated works are scary sometimes. I wonder why they chose to do it like thisā¦? Itās still fine for double checking I guess.
And thanks for the pictures and article, to @Megumin as well. La cornisa is just the name of that ledge-like walkway/ edge of the land hanging out into the ocean there then, hope I got that right. I suppose it is a bit cliff like.
Iām still chipping away, up to the second break point on (my) page 15. So sad.
f. Faja horizontal estrecha que corre al borde de un precipicio o acantilado.
Not sure if any learners use it, but you have the official spanish dictionary available at Real Academia EspaƱola . The problem is the definitions sometimes get explained in a too fancy way
I tend to look up anything I need to there first. Sometimes itās great, and I love the comments on ethymology and stuff like that, but other times those definitions really are just extremely convoluted ways of explaining something that should be super simple.
Most of the time itās a lot more piecing together than reading, but sometimes thereās sentences I donāt need to look up anything to understand. Those feel pretty good. It took me 4 days to finish the chapter. Thatās not bad! Leaves some time to maybe listen to the chapter again, start early on the next one, or just some low energy off days.
I enjoyed the characterization and family dynamics shown so far. I really felt for everyone by the end of the chapter. :')
Late starting, itās been a busy week. Really enjoyed chapter one. The writing is really high quality as youād expect from Allende, and I found it surprising and funny.
The meltdown scene - this was so sad. You could see the stress they were all struggling with, and to see all the emotion and anger pouring out of him. Itās a great introduction to Alex, and looking forward to meeting Kate!
Iām starting a bit late, so Iām in catch up mode for the moment. Same as @Belerith, this is probably a good 10 levels above mine in vocabulary alone. But the grammar has not been, so with a ridiculous number of lookups and pausing the audiobook literally every sentence, Iām making progress! And I feel like I understand a good 95% of what Iām reading as well, which is super nice. I paused about 12 minutes into the audiobook, right after a big paragraph break after Alex trashes his room.
I havenāt been explicitly timing myself, but itās probably taken me about an hour for those 12 minutes so far. Real curious what my time will be like at the end of the book.
Quite interesting start to the story so far, with Alexās mom so deathly ill. Itās also interesting starting with characters with such English names; it feels a bit like cheating? Hahaha. Too many Japanese with names I canāt read without furigana. @.@
Okay, and Iāve finished the first chapter! I was closer than I thought to finishing last night; I shouldāve just stuck it out and pushed through. Looking forward to meeting Kate now; I wonder what sheās likeā¦
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Itās a cooouple notches above my level, but with copious look ups it seems to be manageable. Hereās to hoping for some noticeable improvement by the end of the book. XD 5 minutes of the audiobook took a good hour to work through properly. (Not sure, but >45mins.) Definitely need to space the chapters out over the week.
It took me 4 days to finish the chapter. Thatās not bad! Leaves some time to maybe listen to the chapter again, start early on the next one, or just some low energy off days.
And I feel like I understand a good 95% of what Iām reading as well, which is super nice. I paused about 12 minutes into the audiobook, right after a big paragraph break after Alex 