Posted in English, Portuguese

[IN]Pertinente – Podcast

In pertinente podcast
[IN]Pertinente

I can’t remember if I’ve mentioned this podcast before: I heard about it a while ago on twitter and Portuguese tweeps were praising it as being an good listen. It’s put out by the Fundação Francisco Manuel Dos Santos. They bring together experts, eggheads, brainboxes and boffins to discuss a different topic each week, ranging over politics, economics, science and society. I have quite a few “serious” podcasts in Portuguese and tend not to be very good at listening to them because they require sustained concentration over an hour or so which is usually more than I can cope with, so I usually stick to shorter stuff. As a result, it’s been on my list for a while but I hadn’t given it much eartime.

Anyway, recently I listened to an episode about Britain and I found it both easy to understand and very detailed and interesting, so I based that day’s Portuguese text on it. And just to confirm my good opinion, the marker said it was one of her favourite podcasts too!

Now obviously when I say “easy to understand” I don’t mean the language is simplified: you’ll still need to be at a decent intermediate level of learning to follow it, but they speak clearly, don’t talk over each other, don’t ramble or drone on in a monotone or do any of the other things podcast hosts sometimes do that make it hard to follow the thread of what they’re saying. I appreciate that and I hope the episode I heard was representative of the series as a whole.

Anyway, here’s what I wrote. Thanks to Dani for correcting it.

Hoje, ouvi um podcast chamado In Pertinente. Os apresentadores estavam a falar sobre a história do meu país. Tocaram nos temas* “Astérix e os Bretões”, Shakespeare, Alan Turing, Blackadder, a guerra entre a Escócia e a Inglaterra e mais alguns outros. Fiquei muito impressionado com a profundidade da discussão. Não costumo de ouvir mas acho que, de futuro, isso vai mudar!

*I originally wrote tocaram no “Astérix e os Bretões” but it seems you need to write “touched on the theme(s)…” and not just “touched on..”

Posted in Portuguese

A Casa No Bosque

A Casa No Bosque é parte* dum par de livros escrito por Susana Morais, dona do site “Portuguese Lab”. Este foi escrito para estudantes do nível B2 (intermédio) e o outro é mais básico, de nível A2. Ambos têm áudio e alguns exercícios para estimular a compreensão. É curto (o áudio é quase uma hora), portanto é um conto, não um romance.

A Casa No Bosque (B2)

Muitas histórias educativas acabam por ser aborrecidas, mas Susana Morais escreve muito bem e a história é engraçada. Contudo, confesso que não prestei atenção o suficiente aos nomes das personagens portanto perdi o fio da meada. Vou ouvir novamente e anotar a nome de cada pessoa à medida que é dita.**

*I tried to day it was “one of a pair” but that’s not a thing, apparently

**And I did and it made a lot more sense in the second pass when I understood why some of the other characters were there. It really is good. I definitely recommend it and the A2 equivalent. I mentioned them in a post a few days back.

Posted in English

Storyglot

I’ve just updated the Textbook page of the blog with a new set of books I’ve heard about.

Susana Morais is the creator of the Portuguese Lab Podcast and Academy and she’s written a couple of story books aimed at portuguese learners: A Casa Na Bosque for intermediate learners (B2) and A Baú das Coisas Perdidas for beginners (A2). They each come with an audio version read by the author and some questions at the end to test your comprehension. I have the B2 version and have listened to the first few minutes. It looks like a really useful addition to the ever-growing list of resources for learners.

Looking out at the landscape today, compared to when I started, when it was pretty much just the Practice Portuguese podcast – and even that was pretty shonky in the early days – there’s really quite a lot of good stuff out there for anyone wanting to ;earn european portuguese.

Anyway, the links above go to the Kobo versions, which is what I’m using, since it allows me to listen to the audio and read all on one device, but you can get a printed version or several other ebook options via her website Storyglot.