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I guess I stand corrected in this sense, but I feel that the language learning community distinguishes polyglots from other learners by the large number of languages they claim to know – usually five to six or more. Of course there are people who can confidently communicate in that many languages. Still, it is trendy to claim that and maybe only approach A2-B1 levels in all of them. Globally, I think it’s not uncommon for people to speak two or maybe even three languages, and I personally would not call them polyglots.
It still blows my mind how common Latin is in American primary schools. Greek seems pretty cool. I like the alphabet. I still remember a few French phrases from an exploratory language class in junior high. Spanish and French would probably be more useful for me to learn. I think I would struggle with the pronunciation in both cases. Maybe many years from now…
Yep! Sounds up my alley. Haven’t been able to get my hands on it yet but hopefully in the coming months.
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Sorry, missed this response
Ah, that sucks. Can be a problem with any language but seems like this easily happens when learning Chinese.
Sounds like you ventured abroad quite a few times. I am a little jealous. I never heard a lot of Spanish or Chinese in public until I went to college because my hometown was so undiverse.
I think you should do it. Could be empowering. At least that’s how I feel when I speak a foreign language well enough lol
I like how you felt the need to explain what Subway is 
My hometown (and state, for that matter) actually has a very big Middle Eastern population, so I heard a lot of Arabic dialects. It seems very difficult. My best friend is Chaldean and tried to learn Arabic a few years ago – though halfheartedly with Duolingo – and gave up almost immediately. Also lots of Balkan languages around me when I grew up.
No idea about Swedish.
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1/22
3x8 pullups
3 mile run 23:22
No time to procrastinate, as I have to go get a COVID test and bloodwork. I felt like I was moving slowly on the run because I feel bloated, and it was kinda cold, but my time wasn’t bad. Feels good to be done by 9 at least.
Edit: Did 100 pushups as well. I’m going to try to squeeze in as much volume as I can in these next few days.
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I think it’d be difficult to learn by osmosis. If you just participate generally in society, even for an extended period of time, if you’re having language issues with Swedish a Swede tends to switch over to English. We love flexing that muscle. I’ve had several international friends and colleagues who have been here for years and still haven’t learned Swedish.
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Yea, I spent a lot of my twenties floundering about, definitely not financially brilliant but I saw quite a bit of the world and had fun. Vegas for all it’s flaws is wonderfully diverse, even in relatively white areas.
Thanks, I am terrible at hearing myself speak and therefore pronunciation, reading in Swedish was stimulating I’d love to be able to read Gabriel Garcia Marquez in Spanish.
If people didn’t assume I somehow was immediately capable of driving subway trains upon arrival to Sweden I wouldn’t have clarified lol
This is very accurate, almost everyone speaks it well even my ex’s 90+ grandma who didn’t talk to me for the first 30 minutes I met her turned to me, when we were alone and was like “how do you like Sweden” in the cutest old person talk, truly remarkable levels of English proficiency. I took SFI (Swedish for immigrants) and SAS (Swedish as a second language) until I had enough credentials to study in Swedish at college but never actually did.
I would never rely on that method to learn a language anyway. I don’t think it’s realistic in many cases.
Yeah, I know the Swedes are very good at English to say the least. You exemplify that.
It’s a kind thing to do rather than frowning upon any visitor who doesn’t know the native language. But I always fear that Germans in real life will look at me, dismiss me as a typical monolingual American, and automatically speak English with me.
I meant more that I don’t know how Swedish as a language works. The Department of State classifies it as one of the easier languages, but I have no idea.
Pronunciation holds me back from probably ever taking Spanish seriously, and that’s coming from someone who doesn’t feel that the goal for most people should be to sound like a native speaker. Ah, so you’re like those people who want to read Dostoevsky’s untranslated works.
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1/23
Deadlift singles up to 245x1 PR
SSB squat 115x12,12,13,13,14,12,11,11. 4 min rest
SSB lunge 70x3x8
3x60s plank + 20 situps, no rest
Really long session. I wanted to give it my all on this final lower body day, seeing how DW Intermediate feels.
I don’t know when I’ll deadlift heavy again, so despite the accumulated fatigue and that I haven’t touched higher intensities in many weeks, I went for a heavy single. A ten pound PR is not too bad under these circumstances. Part of me wishes I had not done so many heavy reps because I might have been able to get 250 off the floor, but oh well. I don’t regret doing this instead of the prescribed 3x10.
I increased the weight on squats from what I used in Beginner. I initially thought nine sets to 100 reps was ambitious but after the first couple sets decided that I wanted to be done sooner, so I finished the reps in eight. I’m happy with this effort.
Lunges also sucked because I rolled my ankle really badly yesterday – so much so that last night I thought I seriously damaged it. Fun times.
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Awesome!!! Nice PR!
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Way to go Bagsy!!!
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Amazing work. Way to go!
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There we go! Great deadlift PR
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Seriously impressive lifting! I hope your ankle is feeling better and if I don’t get a chance to jump in here before your surgery, just know that I’m sending you all the good vibes I’ve got. Enjoy your week of rest too!
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I appreciate the words and you following along! Also, I’ve been religiously supplementing with liquid Vitamin D rather than capsules for a couple months per your suggestion. Tested my levels again and should know soon if it has helped.
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1/24
Pullups 8,7,7,7
Hang power clean 12,16,17,15,15,17
3x60s plank + 3 standing ab wheel
800m run 3:15
1300m cooldown
I slept poorly last night, but at least that meant I was able to squeeze in both lifting and conditioning this morning. I thought I could do DW power cleans from the floor with 85… no go. I don’t even think it’s a strength thing. My years of neglecting them really showed. So, I did hang powers, and about halfway through I realized that this weight was probably a touch too light. Oh well.
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You been working on these for a while, getting close to extending them all the way out?
I dunno, I think my ROM has increased a bit. Still want to increase it. They’re tough! But I get absolutely nothing out of kneeling reps anymore, even at very high reps, so yeah.
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1/25
Push press from the floor 60x14,15,12,16,14,12,12,5. 4 min rest
BB curl 50x15,14,10,11
Band pull aparts 5x20
Lateral raises
3x60s plank + 20 situps, no rest
This was great. I barely nudged the weight up, but it was a good test because I could not do 10x10 with this weight on the first week. Totally different story today, finishing 100 reps in almost eight sets. This was also potentially my last lift for a while. Knowing me I may still try to squeeze something in tomorrow morning.
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Eh? Isn’t this just a clean/press variation?
@QuadQueen I want to thank you again for your recommendation to switch to liquid D3. I got my results today and nearly doubled my previous levels. It took 12K IU/day, which I will taper off for a while to see if I can maintain this.
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