Arabic Vegetarians
So I did 30 days of vegetarianism and 30 days of intensive Arabic study. The results are far from impressive.
Unlike some other bloggers that I read, I did not feel any improvement in focus, concentration or other health benefits from going completely vegetarian as opposed to having a small serving of meat once or twice a week. Maybe others had a very heavily meat-based diet and changed to a diet heavy in vegetables in order to experience this effect; if I eat a big serving of meat (or cream / cheese, for that matter) I definitely feel sluggish afterwards. Anyway, as there seems to be no particular benefit in going completely vegetarian as opposed to my previous diet, I decided not to deny myself my favourite meat dishes anymore. For example Sui Cao, a Vietnamese soup with dumplings. Yumm!
I did 22 hours and 6 textbook units of Arabic study – a far cry from the immersion that I intended to do, but real life intervened. Generally this past month of language study hasn’t been good, I had other things to do, such as taxes, playing/studying Go and spending time with our houseguest. 22 hours of Arabic, 15 hours of Chinese, 13 hours of French, 1 1/2 hours of Swahili, 3 1/2 hours of Greek, 55 hours of language study total… I suppose it’s better than the 10 hours/week that I averaged in weeks 20 & 21, but I’ll see what I can do for the rest of the year.
I also revamped my tracking again, setting up goals for reading and writing in various languages, doing Anki reps and studying Go, because I rediscovered my passion for this ancient Asian strategy game.