Stamps (from South Africa) that I had bought in March (on Ebay) from a seller in China, showed up in my mailbox today.
Tuesday/ Loeloeraai 🛸
Hey! Amazon opened its online doors in South Africa today.
The Books section has a language filter— necessary for a country with 11 official languages.
I searched for Afrikaans books, and specifically for the beloved Afrikaans poet and author C.J. Langenhoven (1873-1932).
I did find the book Loeloeraai, but right now it is out of stock on amazon.co.za.
Wednesday/ for Valentine’s Day 😘
Happy Valentine’s Day— for those that indulge in it.
Here is a cute cartoon from Stern magazine, and from the latest— and 40th— Asterix cartoon book series.
The series first appeared in the Franco-Belgian comic magazine Pilote on 29 October 1959.
Sunday/ Salaverry & Trujillo, Peru 🇵🇪
The Norwegian Sun made it into the port town of Salaverry at seven this morning (first picture).
There was a shuttle bus out to the main plaza in Salaverry (third picture), and from there my party of three were left to our own devices to find transport to the city of Trujillo (pop. about 1 million).
This whole area nearby is the site of the great prehistoric Moche and Chimu cultures before the Inca conquest and subsequent expansion.
We solicited a taxi for the 25-minute drive into Trujillo and all went well until we paid the driver in US dollars. Best we could tell that he was not happy with the quality of the $20 and two $5 dollar bills. The US dollars have to be changed into Peruvian Sol by moneychangers for him. Anyway, we gave him the newest dollar bills we had, and that solved the problem.
We used Uber to get back. That was cheaper and worked a lot better: no exchange of paper money needed.
Look for the Plaza de Armas of Trujillo in the pictures below, with the Freedom Monument and the Cathedral of Trujillo nearby.
The beautiful building of UNT Archeology Museum and pictures of just a few of the displays inside, follow after that.
Thursday/ ‘I’ in Japanese 🏯
Here is Eric Margolis writing for the Japan Times (just the introduction of a long article):
You may have learned that “I” is 私 (watashi). And while this is a handy all-around term to use when referring to yourself, a 2019 survey showed that over 30% of Japanese women and around 70% of Japanese men don’t regularly use it.
To make things even more confusing, people do or don’t use 私 entirely depending on the situation. While 80% of women in their 50s expected to use 私 to address colleagues or acquaintances their own age, just 30% expected to use it for people they met for the first time. Meanwhile, 60% of men in their 50s expected to use it when meeting a young person for the first time. But that percentage dropped to 40% of the time when they were meeting someone their own age.
Japanese dictionaries and resources list over 30 different words for just one in English: “I”. Every word expresses different nuances about how the speaker views themselves and what their relationship is to the person they’re speaking with. There’s わたし (watashi), わたくし (watakushi), あたし (atashi), 僕 (boku), 吾輩 (wagahai), 俺 (ore), うち (uchi), 儂 (washi), 麿 (maro) and 自分 (jibun), just to name a few. So how to know which one to use?
P.S. I would have loved to be in Japan right now, at the tennis courts watching some Japan Open tennis action.
Tuesday/ a full moon 🌕
Toe Vader slaap, toe Moeder droom,
is ek uit by die hek langs die appelboom.
En ek ry op die spierwit perd se rug
bo-oor die heinings en bo-oor die brug.
En niemand weet dat ek daar was
met elwekinders op die gras.
As Father slept, as Mother dreamed,
I slipped out the gate by the apple tree.
I rode on the back of the snow-white horse
over the hedge and over the gorge.
And on no one ever, will it dawn
that I’d been there with elven children, on the lawn.
– From ‘Die Spree met Foete’, reworkings of Annie M.G. Schmidt’s Dutch verses into Afrikaans, 2002.
Verses by Piet Grobler and artwork by Philip de Vos.
The rough translation into English is my own.
August is here, with a full moon tonight.
There are two full moons this August, both of which are supermoons—
The Sturgeon Moon that reaches its peak today, August 1st;
The Blue Moon that occurs on Wednesday, August 30th.
Another Monday/ tick tock ⏰
I’m just going to play Wordle and Scrabble and Duolingo and ignore the news until the debt-ceiling hostage situation at the Capitol is resolved.
(The Republicans with their fake outrage over spending seem determined to crash the world economy).
Sunday/ a few new words 🤔
Ready to learn a few new words in the English language?
Take a quick look at the Scrabble board and see if you know all the words!
ULU all-purpose knife traditionally used by Inuit, Iñupiat, Yupik, and Aleut women.
NIXY a misaddressed or illegibly addressed piece of mail, therefore undeliverable.
FLINT hard, dark quartz that produces a spark when struck by steel
TALAR an ankle-length robe
ZERO the arithmetical symbol 0, nil
KEEF (Arabic) a state of dreamy intoxication, induced by cannabis for example
KI alternate spelling for qi: the vital energy that is held to animate the body internally and is of central importance in some Eastern systems of medical treatment (such as acupuncture) and of exercise or self-defense (such as tai chi)
EX one that formerly held a specified position or place, especially : a former spouse or former partner in an intimate relationship
MADAME a title equivalent to Mrs. for a married woman not of English-speaking nationality
QUINT one of five offspring produced in the same pregnancy
QUEY (British) cow, heifer
GALAGO a small primate (a bush baby)
LIPAS a monetary subunit of the Croatian kuna (plural)
RID to make free of
BREECH (verb) to dress in short pants (covering the hips and thighs and fitting snugly at the lower edges at or just below the knee)
BI short form of bisexual
PATERNITY the quality or state of being a father
YINCE (Scottish) once
LAM sudden or hurried flight especially from the law, as in ‘on the lam’
RETS to soak (something, such as flax or hemp) to loosen the fiber from the woody tissue
OTIOSE producing no useful result, futile
JINKED make a quick, evasive turn (past tense)
VISIVE (archaic) of, relating to, or serving for visionand
OBOE a double-reed woodwind instrument having a conical tube
HO interjection, used especially to attract attention to something specified
DONATORS donor, one that gives, donates, or presents something (plural)
OPA grandfather
AR the letter R
GAPER one that gapes, also: any of several large sluggish burrowing clams
ODAH (Turkish) a room in a harem
DAW (Scottish) dawn
Sunday/ a poem about a fossil II 📱
Here it is, an AI*-generated poem about a fossil :
*ChatGPT Mar 23 Version, at https://chat.openai.com/
There was a ‘Regenerate’ button on the side, on which I clicked.
Instantly, a second poem was generated, line by line.
‘Was this better, worse or the same as the first one?’ inquired the AI chatbot.
‘Better’, I said.
Tuesday/ a poem for a dinosaur 🦕
I found a poem in one of my books that came yesterday— one that is apt for the dinosaur from German toymaker Scheich that I had brought home in my suitcase.
Fossiel
Versteende geheime skuil
in jou primordiale hart.
Hier waar die jakkals nou huil
het oerdier vir oermens getart.
Fossil
Petrified secrets hide away
in your primordial heart.
Here where the jackal howls today,
primeval beast gave caveman a start.
Original Afrikaans poem by Isaac David du Plessis, published 1965.
The rough translation into English is my own.
Monday/ books from afar 📚
While I was in South Africa, I shipped myself a box of books to Seattle from Pretoria, and another box from Stellenbosch*.
The boxes landed on my porch today. They went from South Africa to London’s Heathrow airport, then to Cincinnati, Ohio, and then to Seattle.
*The Protea bookstore in Stellenbosch —always full of new and old Afrikaans books— was going out of business, and I could not pass up the opportunity to scoop up fifty-some books for $1 or $2 apiece.
Saturday/ good, better, butter 🧈
We logged another 95 °F (35 °C) for the day’s high here in Seattle.
Just for fun, here are some Afrikaans expressions and idioms that use ‘butter’.
Ek het met my gat in die botter geval.
Translation: I have stumbled, with my butt stuck in the butter.
Meaning: I lucked out, in a big way.
My brood is aan altwee kante gebotter.
Translation: My bread is buttered both sides.
Meaning: I have the best of both worlds.
Dis botter tot die boom.
Translation: It is butter to the bottom.
Meaning: Said of a friendship that is thick as thieves.
Goed, beter, botter.
Translation: Good, better, butter.
Meaning: Slogan from a ’70s ad campaign for butter in South Africa. Butter is better than margarine, and is actually best of all.
Monday/ butter cookies, in 6 languages
I love packaging that has multiple languages on.
The fine print makes for free little language lessons that come with the product.
Saturday/ finding the Wortel 🥕
I don’t know why I took so long to check again if there is an Afrikaans version of Wordle.
There has been one since February, actually— created by South African software developer Francois Botha.
It is called Wortel.
(Eng. carrot;
originally from Dutch wortel,
from Middle Dutch wortele,
from Old Dutch *wurtala,
from Proto-Germanic *wurt– “root” + *waluz “stick”).
Here’s my first attempt. I can post the solution since it’s now past midnight in South Africa.
TREIN – train
ASIEL – asylum
GELEI – conduct (electricity)
GLOEI – glow
Saturday/ a little Ukrainian
I ran into this 2018 set of Ukrainian stamps while researching the stamp with the Russian warship on (Thursday’s post).
The characters are too cute for words (but each has a letter, and a word, nonetheless).
I compiled the table below with a little help from Google Translate.
ЕНЕЛЯТКО stumped it, though : a word that has to be Ukrainian for alien or extraterrestrial.
ҐАВА was also a problem; must be raven, I thought— but another online translator indicated it is crow.
ПИРОГИ looked like hats in the tree, but turned out to be pyroghie pies, in fact.
Letter | Ukrainian | English |
---|---|---|
A | АНГEЛ anhel | ANGEL ˈānjəl |
Б | БІЛКА bilka | SQUIRREL ˈskwər(ə)l |
B | ВЕДМІДЬ vedmidʹ | BEAR ber |
П | ПИРОГИ pyrohy | PIES pīs |
З | ЗАЄЦЬ Zayetsʹ | HARE her |
Г | ГАРБУЗ harbuz | PUMPKIN ˈpəm(p)kən |
Е | ЕНЕЛЯТКО | ALIEN ˈālēən |
Д | ДРАКОН drakon | DRAGON ˈdraɡən |
Ґ | ҐАВА gavɐ | CROW krō |
Є | ЄНОТ Yenot | RACCOON raˈko͞on |
Ж | ЖАБА zhaba | FROG frôɡ |
Wednesday/ the Gazpacho Police .. are coming for our mazel tov cocktails
New: House Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene is railing against Pelosi’s “gazpacho police” — intending to refer to the Nazi Gestapo, itself a nonsense comparison, but instead referring to a cold tomato soup.
-Hugo Lowell @hugolowell on Twitter
Just to clear things up, @RepMTG
Gazpacho: a vegetable-based Spanish cold soup
Gestapo: Nazi Germany’s secret police
-The Republican Accountability Project @AccountableGOP
With the Gazpacho Police, every crime is a cold case
-Adam Blickstein@ AdamBlickstein
I hope all you Progressos out there are having a fun time
-George Conway aka Oficial de Policía de Gazpacho Conway @gtconway3d
I’ve met some members of the gazpacho police. They are consommé professionals.
-Danielle Decker Jones @djtweets
The Gazpacho Police have just chopped an unarmed tomato.
-Wajahat Ali@ WajahatAli
It won’t be funny when the Gazpacho police give you the burp walk.
-JoeReynoldsChief @JoeReynolds2020
Marjorie Taylor Greene, in condemning the harsh conditions facing the insurrectionists arrested on January 6, is comparing what they’re experiencing to what she read in Solzhenitsyn’s monumental work The Goulash Archipelago*.
-Peter Wehner @Peter_Wehner
*Greene contended that Washington DC jails are ‘DC gulags’.
The Gulag Archipelago: An Experiment in Literary Investigation (Russian: Архипелаг ГУЛАГ, Arkhipelag GULAG) is a three-volume non-fiction text written between 1958 and 1968 by Russian writer and Soviet dissident Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. It was first published in 1973, and translated into English and French the following year. It covers life in what is often known as the Gulag, the Soviet forced labor camp system, through a narrative constructed from various sources including reports, interviews, statements, diaries, legal documents, and Solzhenitsyn’s own experience as a Gulag prisoner.
Friday/ lost in translation
Well, I never would have thought this.
It appears to me that we don’t have a word in Afrikaans for .. icicle.
I was stumped, and I stumped every online English-Afrikaans translator in my search for one.
The Dutch word is ijskegel (ice cone), and therefore I would go with yskegel in Afrikaans.
Wednesday/ PRITHEE, don’t play that word
I was feeling invincible with my triple-triple word play of DIGAMIES (158 points- yowza!) .. but just then Zoey* swooped in with PRITHEE to come out ahead in this Scrabble game.
*Zoey is a Scrabble grandmaster bot.
Here’s a rundown of some of the words on the board.
VIZARD– noun (archaic) a mask or disguise.
DROIT– noun (historical, law) a right or due.
PRITHEE– exclamation (archaic) please (used to convey a polite request).
“prithee, Jack, answer me honestly”
NAE–
determiner
Scottish form of no (determiner).
“it’s nae bother”
exclamation
Scottish form of no (exclamation).
“He was asked if he was ever going back east. ‘Nae, son,’ he replied”
adverb
1. Scottish form of not (adverb).
“it’s nae as guid as whiskey”
2. Scottish form of no (adverb).
“we were just bairns, nae aulder than you lassies are”
QUERNS– noun (plural of quern) a simple hand mill for grinding grain, typically consisting of two circular stones, the upper of which is rotated or rubbed to and fro on the lower one.
DIGAMIES– noun (plural of digamy) a second marriage, after the death or divorce of the first husband or wife.
YAG– noun a synthetic crystal of yttrium aluminum garnet, used in certain lasers and as an imitation diamond in jewelry.
LOGE– noun a private box or enclosure in a theater; the front section of the first balcony in a theater.
PYIC– adjective of or belonging to pus; purulent.
PALI– noun (in Hawaii) a cliff.
VROWS– noun (plural of vrow), 1 : a Dutch or Afrikaner woman. 2 : mistress —usually used preceding the name of a Dutch or Afrikaner married woman.
Tuesday/ sneaking up from behind, for the win
Here’s the board of one of the few games I have won recently against Scrabble Grand Master Zoey (she is an algorithm).
I looked up some of the words that Zoey played, the ones I didn’t know.
I don’t do that for every Scrabble game (I am too lazy, and besides: it cuts into my Scrabble play time).
Here are the words, for the logophiles (persons that love words):
NOES noun plural of the negative response called ‘no’
PLOTTIER adjective superlative of plotty (marked by intricacy of plot or intrigue), as in ‘this spy movie was plottier than the last one’
a plotty novel
MEH interjection— used to express indifference or mild disappointment
ZA noun slang for PIZZA (a word which my friends & I never use)
ALUNITE noun a mineral that consists of a hydrous potassium aluminum sulfate and occurs in massive form or in rhombohedral crystals
KI noun 1. alternative spelling for chi, the 22nd letter of the Greek alphabet; 2. also: aura, chi (or ch’i also qi), energy, vibe(s), vibration(s), as in ‘martial artists learn to use ki to fend off would-be attackers’
LUX noun a unit of illumination
JERRID noun (British English) a blunt wooden javelin used in games involving horsemen in some Muslim countries.
DEVI noun used in India as a title following the personal name of a married woman (in Hinduism)
AR noun the letter r written out
FAH noun abbreviation of Fahrenheit
WYES noun plural 1. a Y-shaped part or object 2. the letter y written out
CONI noun plural of conus, a very large genus (the type of the family Conidae) of tropical marine snails comprising the cones and including many harmless forms and a few chiefly in the southwest Pacific that are highly dangerous because they are capable of biting with the radula and injecting a paralytic venom that has been known to cause death in humans
DIPLEGIAS noun, plural, paralysis of corresponding parts on both sides of the body
Sunday/ pomp and circumstance
Pomp and circumstance: impressive formal activities or ceremonies (Merriam-Webster dictionary).
Beefeater: Beef + eater. Prob. one who eats another’s beef, as his servant. Could also be from: hlāfǣta, servant, properly a loaf eater. (Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary).
Beefeaters are the yeomen of the English royal guard, who, since the accession of Henry VII. in 1485, have attended the sovereign at state banquets and on other ceremonial occasions.
The name is also given to the warders of the Tower of London, who wear a similar uniform.
Queen Elizabeth II received President Biden and First Lady Dr Jill Biden at Windsor castle today. ‘President Biden and the first lady seemed relaxed, and there were no obvious diplomatic breaches‘ reported the New York Times.
Yes. Like stepping in front of the Queen. Or tweeting about the Prince of ‘a group of large marine mammals’ (‘Whales’).