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[CABL]

... So it IS sukah bluekah?

I know more traditional Russian curses if that one isn't good enough :p

I guess so, though "блюка" isn't really a word that you can find in dictionaries.

Also, I've just remembered a joke I've read somewhere on Runet a while ago. It goes something like that:
An American professor had a visit to Soviet Union and was quite impressed: "The people in SU are very educated: Every wall has a graffiti of X, Y, and some other symbol of advanced math." - He commented.

[Gentlefish]

Fallout 76

Come on guys, studio Ghibli used it first. Feckin' mainstream losers.

[Tack]

Re: Languages. I dunno if it's because I'm a native English speaker or an Etymology nerd but I find having the worlds most bastard language is pretty amazing for Europe travel.

3am speel:
I've been learning (very, very basic) Indian and Chinese languages like Punjabi and Cantonese and as soon as someone speaks Hindi or Mandarin I have no clue what the heck they've just said. Native speakers say they can generally fossick out the meanings of someone's sentences if they're speaking a different regional language, but I'd originally thought the only western equivalent was the Scandinavians, and as an EFL I was doomed to a life of opulent simplicity.
Until basically the first time I had someone slowly and clearly speak German at me. It's definitely got a whole crapton of different words, but boy did we steal quite a few of the basics- especially the simple nouns.
"Wo Ist De Shadenhaus"? Never been easier.

[GPeter]

Talking about languages, I'm a native portuguese speaker, so boooooooooooooy was it hard for me to learn english. But now I've come to a pretty tough challenge. I've learned a language that came from the Latim, then I learned a language that derived from germanic languages, and now I want to learn an asian language (Japanese). That makes it incredibly difficult, even though people have been telling me that Japanese is relatively easy. After all I learned one of the most difficult languages in the world (Portuguese) due to the RIDICULOUS amount of rules and exceptions to those rules and rules to the exceptions and everything. Overall, I'm fucked...

[Kagus]

The Indian languages in particular are pretty incredible... 22 official languages (the money looks pretty incredible, listing each one), hundreds if not thousands of unofficial regional languages, and they're their own mostly-isolated family.

And a significant percentage of the population speaks English as well. Or, well... I should say Indian-English, because that's also very much its own thing.


I never got around to learning any real Telugu when I was in Hyderabad... Nowadays I just know a couple assorted words thanks to the fact that my GF's ex-stepdad is from New Delhi... Conversationals like achha and thik hai, but most importantly panchod.


Speaking of Portuguese and language rules and exceptions, I'd just like to remind everyone that Portuguese Irregular Verbs is a book series and is highly entertaining, particularly when read by the author on audiobook. No, it actually has very little to do with Portuguese.

[Tack]

Talking about languages, overall, I'm fucked...

I can't make any assertions about Brasiliambique and the languages of, but I know transactional/conversational Japanese, and to be honest if that's all you need then the language does end up being terrifyingly easy. The verbs always go at the end, the nouns always go at the start, and grammar is just kind of tossed in.

Watashi(me)-ga(action) Toiri(bathroom)-wa(acted on) Ikkimasu(go)-ka(?)

Looks like 'Me walk bathroom?'
Actually means... well, "Me Walk Bathroom?"

If you're unconcerned about being beautifully fluent you can learn some top ten phrases and just tack on words from there.


Edit: Obligatory post-comment props to Kagus for giving me the single only tack-pun I've actually laughed at.

[Kagus]

tack on words

Planning a new educational series for learning languages, are we?

[Teneb]

More Alexiad woes.

The text is talking about what I need for my research, currently at the point where Robert de Hauteville dies. But instead of saying what happened next with the norman army... the author goes into a huge tangent about a mathemathician who totally foresaw the death of Robert by writing a letter (after his invasion started), sealing it and saying it should only be opened after the Guiscard dies.

What did the letter say? "The great enemy will come from the West and cause much confusion". I am not paraphrasing. Wow. What a great prophecy mate. So great that Anna Komnene spends pages and pages praising this dude and astrology in general instead of saying what happened next to the displaced norsemen.

And since it's a huge block of text with not formatting and she alternates between calling them "normans", "latins", "franks", and, every now and then, "lombards", it's rather bothersome to find where she stops sidetracking.

EDIT: Oh, thank you Princess. I really needed you to backtrack now that you finished your astrology tangent.

Spoiler: This is straight up after she finishes talking about astrology with no sort of connection to it (click to show/hide)

[WealthyRadish]

And this one time, at band camp...

[Teneb]

And this one time, at band camp...

You'd think so, given that 80 pages before she describes him as some sort of barbaric monster. But the very next page describes her own birth, so that's not awkward at all.

[Kagus]

And this one time, at band camp...

You'd think so, given that 80 pages before she describes him as some sort of barbaric monster. But the very next page describes her own birth, so that's not awkward at all.

"Of course I know what it was like; I was there!"

[scriver]

Man, now I want to make another Guiscard ck2 run

[Teneb]

...Aaaand she just fucking drops the subject of Robert's war and never ever brings it up again. Lovely. Next mention of Bohemund de Hauteville, Robert's son is 70 pages later in the context of the first crusade. I guess I am almost done with the book at least.

EDIT:

Man, now I want to make another Guiscard ck2 run

For all that she tries to make the Guiscard look like the absolute bad guy... he comes out as kind of awesome instead.

[GPeter]

Brazil's education system is such a wonder! Here, people (I'm surely not taking me as an example) get a beautiful 10/10 in English and even more beautiful 4/10 in Portuguese!


Another wonderful thing is how we get into college/university. Instead of getting our High School grades and stuff. The system simply ignores EVERYTHING that you ever done in school, and instead, throws at you a Big test of 180 questions and an essay, to be done in 2 days. Then, how you perform in this test, is what decides if you are approved or not in a college. The only condition though, is that you either has already finished high school, or you're on the last year of it.

[misko27]

I don't think I can fully express the level of stare-glare I am giving the screen right now.

Meanwhile I'm just happy someone had the same reaction I did! I actually stopped on the street and stared. Felt like I'd lost my marbles.