INPUT ARTICLE: Article: Listening to Arabic music is a great way to immerse yourself in the language as well as become more familiar with common words and phrases. The typically repetitive nature of song lyrics reinforces the words and phrases in your mind.  Major music streaming services typically have an Arabic channel or Arabic playlists. Check with your favorite streaming service to find out what's available. If you happen upon an artist that you like, search them online. You may be able to download their albums or watch music videos for some of the songs you like. Movies and television allow you to listen to more natural Arabic conversations. Many popular movies have also been dubbed into Arabic, so if you find a movie you're already familiar with, you'll find you start to comprehend a lot more of what's going on and what the characters are saying.  Fantasy and historical drama tend to be dubbed in Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), while contemporary comedies and dramas are usually dubbed in either Egyptian Arabic or Levantine Arabic. Reality television tends to use a limited vocabulary and exposes you to more realistic unscripted conversations. You likely learned how to read in your native language with simple children's books. This is also an effective way to start reading Arabic. Copying the sentences from the stories can help you practice your writing as well.  For free children's ebooks, visit http://www.childrenslibrary.org/icdl/SimpleSearchCategory?langid=309. Visit the Arabic Collections Online at http://dlib.nyu.edu/aco/ to access more than 10,000 free digitized books in Arabic. Use sticky notes to write the Arabic word for objects in your home and label them. Every time you see the object, repeat the Arabic word for that object aloud. Over time, you'll come to think of that object by its Arabic name first. This can be a great way to expand your vocabulary as well as get your brain used to thinking in Arabic.  Extensive Arabic vocabulary lists are available at http://arabic.desert-sky.net/vocab.html to help you create your labels. Once you've committed your first set of labels to memory, take them off and use different labels. Generally, it's a good idea to go from large to small so you don't get confused about what the label applies to. For example, you might first label your sofa as a whole, then add labels for "arm" or "cushion." Al Jazeera has a website available at https://learning.aljazeera.net/en that offers news as well as basic learning stories and videos in basic Arabic to help you learn the language. From the website, you can also take language level tests or chat with an Arabic teacher.  Even if you don't use the video resources, you can take advantage of the online dictionary available on the site to look up words you don't know. Al Jazeera broadcasts and language lessons primarily focus on Modern Standard Arabic (MSA). However, you'll also find lessons on Mediterranean Arabic. The ultimate test of immersion is spending time in a country where the majority of the people speak Arabic. Simply sitting at a café and listening to the conversation around you can help improve your comprehension. Try to go to a country that speaks the form of Arabic you've been studying, or you may find you have a difficult time understanding people despite your study. For example, if you've been studying Levantine Arabic, you would want to travel to Lebanon or Jordan rather than to Egypt.

SUMMARY: Listen to Arabic music. Watch movies and television in Arabic. Read children's books in Arabic. Label items around your house with their Arabic names. Practice reading and listening comprehension with Al Jazeera. Travel to an Arabic country.


INPUT ARTICLE: Article: If you want to play the card game, you may want to focus on finding certain Pokémon or trainers and building a strong team to challenge other collectors. Pokémon cards can be usually be bought in boxed sets of themed decks, booster packs, and tins. A theme deck will generally have 60 cards but will be more expensive overall. It's a great way to get your collection for playing started because it will give you a wide range of Pokémon, energy cards, trainer and item cards, as well as a decent mix of different card rarities. Booster packs will have about 10 cards in the newer expansions (and around 11 in older ones) and can cost as little as $3 or $4. Tins serve a similar purpose and are a great way to expand your collection. Trading cards with people you play against is a great way to find new cards out in the "wild" and you can negotiate trades to expand your team of Pokémon. This maintains that fair deals and no one is being taken advantage of within the trade. Some people make the mistake of trading several of their cards for one rare one they have their eye on and instead end up trading several cards of value for just one good card. Trading uneven amounts of cards is a quick way to lose large chunks of your collection and it's best to swap one at a time. Some people might think that duplicates aren't of any use and just take up space. Instead, think of duplicates as opportunities to trade with other collectors whether in person or online to expand your collection. It's very likely that another collector will have multiples of a card you want and vice versa, so you can swap cards with each other without taking a card from your overall set. Having duplicates can also be beneficial when building a deck and having back-ups when playing the card game. The best way to go from owning a low value card to a high value one is to trade up gradually. Start by trading a card for another that is just slightly more valuable than the one you started with. Then, continue to trade that card for a slightly more valuable one each time you trade it. This is also a great way to obtain rare cards without going bankrupt. Selling cards is an option, but trading doesn't require any monetary transactions and you can still end up with a great card.

SUMMARY:
Buy strategically. Keep a ratio of 1 to 1 when trading cards. Hold on to duplicates for later use. Trade in baby steps.