According to the State Department I now speak and read Russian at a level they consider “Limited Working Proficiency” and that I can now “satisfy routine demands and limited work requirements.” I guess they are entitled to their opinion.
The blog has been quiet lately. I wish it could say it was because I had been studying so hard in preparation for my language proficiency progress test last Friday, but that was only part of it. The bigger parts were that I bought a new computer (and a few games solely for testing purposes) and started guitar lessons (so that I can play Russian songs, obviously.) Still, despite my distractions, I did okay on the language test.
I received a 2 in speaking and a 2 in reading (on a 5 point scale.) The good news is that I only need to get a 2/2 in order to reach the requirements set by my job and I still have two months of training left. The bad news is that I really wanted to get a 2+ in order to be in better shape to get a 3 by April so I can get a language pay bonus. I can still do it, it’ll just be more difficult. Adding to the challenge will be the fact that I’m feeling pretty Russianed out. I’m just ready to head to post and be done with this pseudo-college atmosphere.
Blog Notes: It has been a rare event recently (although he promises more in the future), but Face the Sun has blogged again. His posts are always well-written and worth reading.
My cousin has been staying busy getting his writing career going. You can read one of his recent pieces here.
Tags: Training
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2/2 ain’t bad with 2 months left to go. Especially with a difficult language like Russian.
First test next week and am curious to see how it goes.
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Don’t get hung up on the mid-course score. The Russian department is a bit odd, if you haven’t already figured it out. The key to the 3/3 is to hit all of those connector words at the very beginning of the second book (”first I’d like to tell you”, “in summary” and so forth).
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I think you’re right. The Russians really love to say “Of course,” “it seems to me,” blah blah blah a lot. At first I thought it was just a weird teaching thing, but when you watch the news you find they really do talk that way.
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