My husband got his score on his oral exam today. He got a 3. No one else in the entire language program, in any of the languages, even Spanish, got a 3. He was the only one to score so high.

He is embarrassed that I am posting this, but I am tickled pink. Now let's just hope he can do as well on the written exam in two weeks.

And tomorrow he jumps out of an airplane. What a life he leads!

Posted by: Sarah at 02:52 PM | Comments (7) | Add Comment
Post contains 87 words, total size 1 kb.

1 Holy Moly! That is impressive! Will he qualify for FLP pay? I hope so.

Posted by: R1 at January 23, 2008 05:33 PM (y1Xat)

2 The result sure came in quickly. Congratulations again! Was that a 3 on the DLI scale? http://www.dlielc.org/testing/opi_examinees.html "Level '3' speakers can converse in formal and informal situations, resolve problem situations, deal with unfamiliar topics, provide explanations, describe in detail, offer supported opinions, and hypothesize. Speakers at this level use complex sentence structures with frequency and facility, and their broad vocabulary includes many abstract nouns. Their pronunciation and communication errors almost never interfere with a native speaker's understanding and listening comfort." Going from zero to that in a short time is no easy task, particularly in a non-European language requiring more time to learn: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~wbaxter/howhard.html I'm impressed. Hope he gets to use this new skill!

Posted by: Amritas at January 23, 2008 08:45 PM (uJSNW)

3 In case anyone is interested, here's a more detailed description of the DLI OPI scale going from 0 to 5: http://www.dlielc.org/testing/opi_levels.html 4 looks like native-speaker level, and 5 is for nonnatives who can beat most natives at their own game. According to Baxter's site, a Farsi learner requires 50% more time than a Spanish learner to reach level 2. I would guess that the gap doesn't narrow much at the higher levels, since higher-level Persian has more Arabic which is still alien to an English speaker, whereas higher-level European vocabulary becomes more recognizable since it's largely shared with English. And the gap is also cultural. Understanding a non-European culture is harder than understanding a Western one. But I'm still impressed by second-language English speakers from Europe who have somehow learned seemingly every nuance of American culture - who can watch FAMILY GUY or SOUTH PARK and get most of the references.

Posted by: Amritas at January 23, 2008 09:03 PM (uJSNW)

4 *clap clap clap*

Posted by: airforcewife at January 24, 2008 01:58 AM (mIbWn)

5 WOW

Posted by: awtm at January 24, 2008 03:27 AM (b8z4b)

6 CONGRATS! He is going to destroy the rest of the test. Awesome!

Posted by: deltasierra at January 24, 2008 08:56 AM (woXks)

7 Holy cow! Congratulations to him! I'm glad Amritas put the entire explanation up - that's mind blowing.

Posted by: Teresa at January 24, 2008 05:03 PM (rVIv9)

Hide Comments | Add Comment

In three weeks, my husband joins the Army. No, really. For the past year and a half (two and a half if you ask him; he doesn't consider his time in Finance to be "the Army") he has been in Army schools. Life has been super easy on us. But all that changes in three weeks: he'll get assigned to a battalion and then find out which continent he's deploying to and when. Life's about to get interesting again.

Posted by: Sarah at 11:39 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 89 words, total size 1 kb.

1 Fingers crossed all goes smoothly! We're here for you and the Mr. no matter what that paperwork says.

Posted by: Guard Wife at January 14, 2008 12:03 PM (BslEQ)

2 Of course, what is REALLY important is that Mr. Husband puts in enough hours for that coveted PowerPoint Ranger patch before going back to the "real Army". It's 1000 hours+ and highly competitive. He made it, right? I'll never forget the tears in my eyes when Air Force Guy got his...

Posted by: airforcewife at January 14, 2008 12:22 PM (mIbWn)

Hide Comments | Add Comment

Last night on SpouseBUZZ Talk Radio, Andi and AirForceWife interviewed two military wives: Stephanie from She Who Waits and Elaine, a Vietnam-era Army wife. It was so interesting to hear what life was like for the "waiting wives" of Vietnam.

My favorite story was when Elaine said that, because she has epilepsy, the doctor told her that she could inform the Army of her condition and her husband wouldn't have to go overseas. Elaine said she went home from the doctor and never told her husband the info. She knew he was a soldier and she wasn't going to be the one to prevent him from doing his job. What a lady!

If you want to listen to the archive, it will be available here at Blog Talk Radio.

Posted by: Sarah at 03:21 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 133 words, total size 1 kb.