Thursday, December 6, 2012

Trifecta!

Here are the three fects of my current linguistic odyssey:

Fect #1:

I've started studying Romanian in Polish.  Not only is it a good sideswipe from the unhappy accident that is studying-Polish-burnout, but it also helps with "running interference,", or, as I put it in a previous post, "practicing for diversion."  Why Romanian? It seems vaguely exotic, maybe even ethereal and otherwordly.  It's a Romance language, but it's been fellated by Slavic influence for centuries.  And it belongs to the Eastern Romance language family that ends its plurals in -i instead of -s.  Now that's just hot. If only I could find a good beginning Romanian text in Polish at a used bookstore (dream on...not in THIS country).

Fect #2:

Also, I'm enveloping myself in reading "Romeo I Julia, Tragedya w 5 aktach--Wiliam Szekspir."  First I had to get the right version off of the Gutenberg Project site.  It took me a couple of tries, but finally I found one that my e-reader would open.  When you're a Jet, you're a Jet all the way...

Fect #3:

Chinese, anyone?  Nin friggin' hao!  These videos are AWESOME for learning Mandarin.  Sometimes I get the feeling I'm spreading myself too thin.  But what the hell.  You only live once, and you gotta be ready for that moment when these one billion Chinese walk into a bar...  But seriously, it would be cool to speak the language spoken by more people in the world than any other--the language that over 14% of humanity utters natively.

And really, every trifecta should have a...

Bonus Fect:

This one doesn't count because it's only stupid English.  I've started a vocabulary list at Vocabulary.com called "Haphazard Devilous Munch" that consists of some of the most radically gnarly words that I could find that are "quiz-ready" on the site.  Granted, there are some much more severely sebacious words out there in the English language. For example, check out some of the words in this "Greek Words" list that someone else made.  But a lot of the serious munch in the Greek Words list can't be quizzed on the site because the powers-that-be haven't set up quizzes for them yet, whereas my munch is deliciously munchable.

1 comment:

  1. Good heavens! I'm just trying to make myself understood in shops. You're trying to become a one-man United Nations.

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