And yesterday my Arabic teacher elicited my most meaningful thought in Arabic so far. Well, it came out of a conversation as I was packing up my things.
Me: Al-an mada? (Now what? as in, What are you doing now?)
Fatima: Alan-an, dars. (Now, a lesson)
Me: Ma man? (With whom?)
Fatima: … something... (Two Spanish people)
Me: Limada yadrus alarabiya? (Why are they studying Arabic?)
Fatima: Liana …something... yaskununa fi Ceuta wa…something... Maghrebi. (Because they live in Ceuta and interact with Moroccan people)
Me: Oh.
Fatima: Maryam, limada anti tadrusina alarabiya? (Mary, why are you studying Arabic?)
Me: Liana...ana... uridu an aamal ma ashkhaz… [here Fatima filled in ‘Arab world’] fi medinati fi Canada. (Because I want to work with people from the Arab world in my city in Canada).
:)
He did not think of himself as a tourist; he was a traveller... Whereas the tourist generally hurries back home at the end of a few weeks or months, the traveller, belonging no more to one place than to the next, moves slowly, over periods of years, from one part of the earth to another. Indeed, he would have found it difficult to tell, among the many places he had lived, precisely where it was he had felt most at home... another important difference between tourist and traveller is that the former accepts his own civilization without question; not so the traveller, who compares it with the others, and rejects those elements he find not to his liking.
'If I watch the end of a day--any day--I always feel it's the end of the whole epoch. And the autumn! It might as well be the end of everything,' he said. 'That's why I hate cold countries, and love the warm ones, where there's no winter, and when night comes you feel an opening up of the life there, instead of a closing down. Don't you feel that?''Yes,' said Kit, 'but I'm not sure I prefer the warm countries. I don't know. I'm not sure I don't feel that it's wrong to try to escape the night and winter, and that if you do you'll have to pay for it somehow.'**'You are here with your wife?' asked the Lieutenant. Port assented absently. 'That's it,' said the Lieutenant to himself. 'He's having trouble with his wife. Poor devil!' It occurred to him that they might go together to the quartier [brothel area]. He enjoyed showing it off to strangers. But as he was about to say: 'Fortunately my wife is in France-' he remembered that Port was not French; it would not be advisable.**[Just after Port dies] She did not recall how they had agreed that one can be anything but anything but dead, that the two words together created an antinomy. Nor did it occur to her how she once had thought that if Port should die before she did, she would not really believe he was dead, but rather that he had in some way gone back inside himself to stay there, and that he would never be conscious of her again; so that in reality it would be she who would have ceased to exist, at least to a great degree.
Touching intimate parts: the implications of early modern German men-midwives touching their patients
What motivates rugby players to continue competing
The role of headphones in the sonic constitution and social negotiation of space
Indigenous perspectives on teaching yoga
You are here: in pursuit of a literature of the Canadian mall
Important factors in the desert fathers’ withdrawal to the desert
Eight hours drive from anywhere: a geographic occupational study of clasical musicians in Thunder Bay, Ontario
Female romantic jealousy and extra-pair desire across the menstrual cycle
Creating community in medieval Aragon
Meanings of masculinity in the Fort Simpson fur trade, 1834-1887
Bad sex objects
A deleuzian ontology of Christ
*Each got $17,500 from SSHRC in 08-09. If they won, then surely this will:
Press here: Indigenous fathers’ geographic occupational perspectices on what motivates struggling writers from medieval Aragon and present day Fort Simpson to withdraw and touch themselves across the menstrual cycle in a negotiation of space, masculinity, and ontology.
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Mary: Salut, Oriane! How was the art institute? Did you find any classes? I hope you are well. Best, mary.
Oriane: Buenas tarde. Me parece que la clase de arte sera muy interesante pero, para la gente exterior, deberia ouvrir una classe pero no es muy seguro. Te deciria mas cuando se encontramos. Que tal con este nuevo trabajo y la langua maroquis? Hasta pronto. Oriane.
Mary: Gracias por el mensaje! Quieres venir a la casa manana y tomar un te? Yo se que es tarde, pero podemos encontramos en frente de l’institut francais a las 10 por la noche.
Oriane: It would be pleasur, but in this time I live in Martile. 10pm will be difficult after with taxi but we can it something for the lunch if you have some time.
Mary: Ah, je vois! Veux-tu manger avec nous a 1 heure, a la restaurant la union? Si non, nous pouvons rencontrer a l’institut francais a 2 heures, avant de ma classe a 3.
Oriane: Merci. Je ne sais pas encore comment les choses s’organisent-Je te dis vers 12H.
Mary: Bueno :)
The next day
Oriane: OK-Pour 2H-A l’institut de langue? Ou l’institut francais?
Mary: De francais. see you at 2!
Mary: 2.15 svp!
The next day
Mary: Hey oriane, quieres ver una pelicula al instituto cervantes esta tarde a las 5? Se llama los ladrones. Cleo puede venir tambien, peut-etre.
Oriane: Muchas gracias pero estoy trabajando para la exposicion en la medina. Cleo tambien. El vernisage sera manana en 4H. Bienvenida. Buena pelicula.
Oriane: Demain, vers midi? Dans le jardin de l’institut francais?
Mary: C’est possible a 10? Si non, a 3.30? la chose est que je dois faire quelque chose a midi.
Oriane: Alors peut etre apres demain? C’est possible pour toi?
Mary: Oui, d’accord. Mercredi, entonces. Sabes tu horario?
Oriane: J’ai juste en cour de 10 a 12 – on peut se retrouver avant pour petit dej ou apres.
Mary: Hmm…como es 1-3 manana? Je vais manger dej avec une amie, mais apres ca marche.
Oriane: Ouja. Mzien bzef.
The next day, in the evening
Oriane: Bonsoir. Eric, n’etait pas a l’exposition. Je peux tout de meme venir te chercher demain.-Dis moi-Bises.
Mary: Je voudrais tout la meme. A quelle heure veux-tu meet ici? Et merci!
Oriane: Ok. Vers 9H 45.
Mary: Parfait, see you then.
I believe the world's economies reduce to five gas stations.First there is the Japanese gas station. Gas is $5 a gallon. Four men in uniforms and white gloves, with lifetime employment contracts, wait on you. They pump your gas. They change your oil. They wash your windows, and they wave at you was a friendly smile as you drive away in peace.Second is the American gas station. Gas costs only $1 a gallon, but you pump it yourself. You wash your own windows. You fill your own tires. And when you drive around the corner four homeless people try to steal you hubcaps.Third is the Western European gas station. Gas there also costs $5 a gallon. There is only one man on duty. He grudgingly pumps your gas and unsmilingly changes your oil, reminding you all the time that his union contract says he only has to pump gas and change oil. He doesn't do windows. He works only thirty-five hours a week, with ninety minutes off each day for lunch, during which time the gas station is closed. He also has six weeks' vacation every summer in the south of France. Across the street, his two brother and uncle, who have not worked in ten years because their state unemployment insurance pays more than their last job, and playing boccie ball.Fourth is the developing-country gas station. Fifteen people work there and they are all cousins. When you drive in, no one pays any attention to you because they are all too busy talking to each other. Gas is only 35 cents a gallon because it is subsidized by the government, but only one of the six gas pumps actually works. The others are broken are they are waiting for the replacement parts to be flown in from Europe. The gas station is rather run-down because the absentee owner lives in Zurich and takes all the profits out of the country. The owner doesn't know that half the employees actually sleep in the repair shop at night and use the car wash equipment to shower. Most of the customers at the developing-country gas station either drive the latest-model Mercedes or a motor scooter--nothing in between. The place is always busy, though, because so many people stop in to use the air pump to fill their bicycle tires.Lastly there is the communist gas station. Gas there is only 50 cents a gallon--but there is none, because the four guys working there have sold it all on the black market for $5 a gallon. Just one of the four guys who is employed at the communist gas station is actually there. The other three are working at second jobs in the underground economy and only come around once a week to collect their paychecks.What is going on in the world today, in the very broadest sense, is that though the process of globalization everyone is being forced toward America's gas station. If you are not American and don't know how to pump your own gas, I suggest you learn.
In a UN discussion of the Organic Act introduced in Tanganyika prior to independence, the English-to-Russian translator, the daughter of Russian émigré parents, fluent in Russian but educated outside of Russia, translated the law as Organicheskiy Akt--literally a correct translation but a phrase that in modern Russian also means "sexual intercourse." Perhaps primly unaware of this generally accepted meaning, she captured her audience's undivided attention. She continued to develop, in Russian, the ramifications, modifications, and positions taken on this Organicheskiy Akt. The fascinated Russian delegates first chortled, then laughed outright, even exchanging waves with the Ukrainian, BYelorussian, Bulgarian, Polish, Czech, and Yugoslavian delegates of the Slavic fringe who, delegation by delegation, joined in solid Pan-Slavic hilarity. The final clincher was a question to the English delegate from a non-Russian speaking delegate: "What do the natives think of the Organic Act?" The reply, which brought down the Slavic side of the house, was: "In general, they maintain a passive attitude."
--From Native Tongues, by Charles Berlitz.
dars (lesson) ders (lesson)
dar (house) daire (apartment)
resim (picture) resim (picture)
maktab (desk) mektup (letter)
balad (country) belediye (municipality)
daqiqa (minute) dakika (minute)
kalam (pen) kalem (pen)
jumla (sentence) cumle (sentence)
sabah (morning) sabah (morning)
kitab (book) kitap (book)
| ﺏ | ـب | ـبـ | بـ | bāʾ |
| ﺕ | ـت | ـتـ | تـ | tāʾ |
| ﻙ | ـك | ـكـ | كـ | kāf |
| ﺭ | ـر | ـر | ر | rāʾ |
| ﻡ | ـم | ـمـ | مـ | mīm |
| ﻝ | ـل | ـلـ | لـ | lām |
