Sieben Aufsatzthemen

I'm finally finished with my seven topics for German. This time I really watched the grammar of everything instead of winging it. It probably still has mistakes but at least I know I did my best, not like the previous time when I just wrote without thinking about the grammar side of things. I really hope there will be less mistakes than the previous time but that I will know in a few days after tomorrow.

However, I did make a few interesting observations:
My main problem is with articles and their inflection.
While I have enough content words in my vocabulary I need to shift them into active use so I can think of them faster.
My structure seems good if a bit complex but I have a certain degree of innate understanding of how German syntax works.
I have a significant lack of knowledge in the idiom and cultural reference department.

The subjects were:

Mein Leben als Student in England - My life as a student in England
Lots of bitching about how I despise the student culture... and a bit on how people annoy me in the library...

Brighton meine neue Heimat - Brighton my new homeland
Lots of bitching on how I don't like this place and how I don't consider to have a homeland so I can't have a new one...

Was ich von Polen vermisse - What do I miss from Poland
A few sentences basically saying "nothing"

Unterschiede zwischem Alltag in Polen und Alltag in England - Differences between an average day in Poland and England
The same like before but saying more about surface differences that don't matter and that after you go past them, there is no variety in life

Mein Hobby - My hobby
Roleplaying, 361 words, the basics...

Mein Lieblingsfilm - My favourite film
Ghost Ship, descriptions of death!

Mein Lieblingsbuch - My favourite book
The Sorrows of Young Werther, love and death...

Even I am amazed at how I'm able to make the simplest subject depressing to the extreme...

Answers

I called a friend today and an interesting question came up. She's really down because she doesn't know what to do with herself now so she asked:

1. Do I know what I want to do in life?
2. Do I miss my country?

The answers, like always, just dragged me down...

1. I think I know where my life is heading. There are some prospects for me, like my tutor said: I could travel the world as an English teacher. I could technically go to any country and teach English there but it's just not what I thought would be happening. I always thought that by this time I would be planning on having a family, instead I constantly prove to myself I'm incapable of living with anyone but myself and that I keep dragging myself into work thus not seeing anything outside of that concept. Meanwhile, all the people I know have someone, some are thinking of marriage, while one of them has a baby. I bury myself in books and pretend I don't exist...

2. No. There's nothing holding me here, nor to any other place in the world. I never felt like I belong and neither do I feel that now. In a way I don't feel as if I changed, but I did change. I learned that life is not worth living and that I should not go against who I am. So I stopped rejecting my hate towards people, their stupidity and their egoism...

One Week Down

The first week of intense studying is over.

Excessive weight carried each day to the library and back didn't work well on my muscles.
I'm stressed to the extent I sleep less than a human being has to, which means I'm quite cranky so it's good I don't know any German curses or I would end up spitting them on the Austrian reading this...

The schedule seems to be working. The online games I'm in are moving, even though I didn't post anything in two days due to extensive headaches. I'm reading to ease the nerves and posting on the forums just an hour a day. I also found out it's fairly easy to update this journal daily with insignificant information, which are then used to make a paragraph of some longer post that'll go up in the future after it's done in its entirety.

As far as the university goes, one thing annoyed me recently. It's about an essay that was marked and given to me, the following is an excerpt from the feedback form followed by an excerpt from the bibliography:

"You did not provide a copy of the catalogue so I was unable to actually see what you were referring to."

"The Lego Group. (2007) Lego Catalogue January 2007 [online]. Available: http://shop.lego.com/ByCatalog/onlinecat.aspx?c=uk4 [January 2008]"

Right now I have a deadline for something each week so it's difficult to keep up with everything... At least I'm done with one essay, the next is written and ready for submission and I have a subject to propose for another essay so I can focus a bit on practising German for an exam. Which of course will be a week before I have to give in yet another essay, but I can't start working on it as I don't know the subject for it at present.

Sacrament

The reader is introduced to Will Rabjohns, a photographer of soon to be extinct species. He has his deal of fame, an Englishman living in San Francisco and a gay.

After we take a look at the average day of the main character, Will falls into a coma. This acts as a way for Barker to shift our attention to Will's childhood. The reader goes over the major events that made Will into who he is now and builds the basis for the rest of the book. At the same time, it's uncertain how the book's present interacts with the character's past. In many ways, I was reminded of time travel stories. It's also the first time we are introduced to the story's main antagonists, although their true nature isn't revealed up until the very last pages.

I am not familiar with literature where the main character is homosexual but I am pleased that this fact isn't used merely for the sake of it. Will's homosexuality is part of the plot and one of the reasons why the main antagonist despises the photographer so much, it also correlates Will's perception of himself.

The story overall is gripping. I found myself craving to read what happens next. However, the main reason it caught me as much as it had was that the author doesn't limit himself just to pleasantries. I would imagine some might find the images this book gives to be slightly disturbing if not obscene.

Me liking Books!!!

On Thursdays I volunteer as a teaching assistant for Pre-Entry Level English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) classes for a group of adults without literary skills. I've been doing this for 17 weeks now and today the teacher I assist surprised me. She gave me book tokens to use in local book shops... not only is that job enjoyable, refreshing and relaxing but I also got free books!

Now I just need to decide what literary works I'll spend them on...

However first, I need to sleep, my head hurts...

Prima Aprilis

[insert clever joke]

[point finger]

[laugh]

[write lol]

LOL

Writing with a Passion for More

If you're reading this entry you probably already know that a significant amount of my time is spent on writing. I write on this blog, on forums and on games. It's not the only thing I write, there's poetry and prose to my craft... I started to think about it all because I suddenly remembered an old site.

I once had an account on Opowiadania.pl, back when most of my writing was in Polish. There are still some stories there that I fondly remember but they are lost in the thousands of works and I don't currently have the time to search for them anew. In English I know only of FanFiction.net for which I might write something one day, I'm not normally into fan-fiction but I could put something that happens in some already made universe, like the World of Darkness or some Anime. I don't know of any fiction centric website like that other than the one in Polish but that's a bit beside the point.

I'm starting to wonder why is it that apparently, I write a lot better in English than my native tongue. Maybe it's because I write so much in it and I do it because there's many people who speak the language and are interested in my works, but I knew some Poles once who were interested too and yet, I just don't write in it. It may be the reason why my Polish has eroded over the past few years but since I want to be a translator, I need to have sufficient proficiency in both. Thus I bought three books in Polish, two of them written by Poles, in hopes it will help me. However, I believe it would also be good if I were to write something in Polish from time to time. And not just articles for the World of Darkness websites! Some prose in my usual style, whatever it might be. One problem with that is that when I write, I don't like to write the same thing over again. Unfortunately for me, a story written in English is the same one written in Polish and I could never decide which one to write it in.

I often hear that I can come up with good ideas but the only indication of style I ever got were from three people. My teacher once said that I have the talent to take elements from various sources and turn them into something of my own. Another person, who left me with fond memories of our MSN sessions and I mourn the fact there appears to be a growing divide between us now, that person said if I were to write a book of erotic nature, they'd buy it. Lastly, my Creative Writing tutor at the university told me that the story I wrote reads like a book but she can't find all the other pages. That's something that really pushed me into a certain direction.

I always wanted to write a book. For a long time it remained a dream, as intangible like any other but at present it seems more material, more like something that can be achieved. I find myself dreaming of a time when I'll have a job, a steady income which I'd save a few coins now and then as I use what time remains in the day to work on a novel. And after a few years I'll have enough material and funds to go to a printer company and print some books. Then I'd send them to all the people I know, having signed each copy and with a letter saying how much it cost me, maybe some will be kind enough to pay me back. The rest, I'll sell to whoever is willing to buy them... at a price that covers the print job and a bit more so I can fund another book. That would be awesome. But first, I'll probably format them into pdfs and let them loose over the internet...

I always felt that it's more important to write for the readers' enjoyment than for your own pocket, but that's just me...