thinksomething.com

Berlin Wall in Halle!

Sun, 01 Mar 2009 12:24:18 PST

Tomas told me about how they were rebuilding the Berlin Wall in Halle (where he lives) for a film shoot. Here's what it looks like. I would love to go and take a look.

Both the images are from flickr.

Korean stationary #2

Sat, 21 Feb 2009 10:44:38 PST

I've been wanting to post about this great internet find for a long time. Present&Correct is an online shop selling stationary sourced from far and wide and some of the products are even made by the graphic designer owners themselves. I just love this LED card:

I posted about matryoshka cards from the Korean designers and stationers mmmg a while ago and you can get them on this website! They also sell some other Korean stuff such as this tape from the company o-check. It made me very happy, but I ended up buying other people this stuff for Christmas instead of for myself.

Korean stationary #1

Sat, 21 Feb 2009 10:22:46 PST

I haven't posted about stationary in a long time. I found this oversized planner from Korea yesterday. I'm not sure how useful it would be. You would have to a large, complex idea that needed careful planning to actually need one, but somehow it's a cool idea.

I've found lots of nice stationary recently and I'm going to post about it in the days to come.

Learning vocabulary

Fri, 20 Feb 2009 12:13:56 PST

Learning vocabulary is probably one of the most tedious things about learning a language. It's no good just thinking your brain can naturally absorb hundreds of words just by reading texts or listening to the language. Of course, learning words in context is very important, but when you find yourself looking up the same word time and time again in the dictionary you realise it's time to crack open the vocab book and learn. Finding the right method for memorizing lots of words depends on what works for you although there are some basic pointers:

1. Cover up one side of your vocabulary book and translate the individual entries.
2. Say the words out loud. Record yourself saying the words out loud and play it back to yourself over and over again.
3. Try and use the words you have learnt making little sentences.
4. Learn for 30 minutes, take a break, then go through the words again.
5. Make little index cards that you can look through on the bus or when you have nothing better to do. This might help:

I found it in Muji and it's perfect for writing down bits and pieces of vocab. On one side of the page I write the Russian word and on the back its English translation. It makes it so easy to test yourself and you can take it anywhere.

coffee/kava/Kaffee/кофе

Thu, 19 Feb 2009 15:23:37 PST

I've been meaning to post this diagram for a long time (maybe a year). I'm not sure of its original source, but I found it through this blog.

I learnt the word in Russian for coffee beans today (кофе в зёрнах). I'm working my way through a Russian dictionary which lists 10,000 Russian words in frequency order, i.e. the words that are used the most come first in the list and those used less frequently occur further down the list. Seed or grain (зерно) came in at position number 1003. Communism (коммунизм) was at number 666 (it wasn't put there on purpose - it's all very scientific). 10,000 is apparently the number of words you should know by the end of an undergraduate degree in Russian. I'm pleased to say that I already know (without about 20 exceptions) the first 2000 words. That's as far as I've got at the moment.

So far it seems like a really useful resource for learning vocabulary as you can easily identify the gaps in your knowledge and it is far more efficient than reading lots of texts to gather vocabulary. The downside is that the words are not given in context (although you get a few examples of usage) and the words are obviously not grouped together under different topics such as 'the environment' or 'politics'. It is sometimes easier to learn related words that can be used together in certain contexts. A book listing topically related advanced vocabulary (e.g. Mot à mot for French learners and Wort für Wort for German) does not exist for Russian (as far as I know) and I plan to write one after university...maybe.

Language Fingers

Thu, 19 Feb 2009 09:05:18 PST

Once again I have not posted on here for ages. There are two main reasons for this. Firstly, I had exams. Secondly, my laptop died a sudden death. It took me a while to order a new one and in the end I went for this one. It's way lighter than my old brick, but correspondingly slower. The touchpad is also very flimsy. But what can you expect from a laptop that costs less than £350?

Yesterday I read an interesting blog post about how different languages name fingers (i.e. thumb, index finger or forefinger, middle finger, ring finger and little finger or pinky) and their literal translations in English. I have looked up the words in the languages that I know and given their literal translations in brackets:

The German terms are very similar to English: der Daumen (thumb), der Zeigefinger (pointer finger), der Mittelfinger (middle finger), der Ringfinger (ring finger) and der kleine Finger (little finger).

The Russian terms are more interesting: большой палец (big finger), указательный палец (pointer finger), средний палец (middle finger), безымянный палец (nameless finger), мизинец (is an Old Russian word for youngest 'child' and but probably derived from the adjective мизинный meaning 'small' or 'smallest'). I wonder why the ring finger is called the 'nameless finger'?

The Lithuanian names are similar in meaning to Russian: nykštys (it is a noun from the word nykštukas meaning gnome/dwarf), rodomasis pirštas (pointing finger), didysis pirštas, bevardis pirštas (again, nameless finger), mažylis (this is a noun. It can also mean 'baby' which is similar to Russian).

Curiously, Russian and Lithuanian use the same words for fingers as they do for toes. So, большой палец can mean either 'thumb' or 'big toe' and мизинец can refer to either the 'little finger' or 'little toe'.

It is also interesting to note that neither Russian nor Lithuanian differentiate between the words 'hand' or 'arm' using рука and ranka respectively to refer to both in most everyday contexts:

брать за руку - 'to take by the hand'
брать на руки - 'to take in one's arms'

The lack of distinction is usually possible because which one is meant can be determined by the context. Where more specific terminology is required or in anatomical contexts the words кисть and delnas (meaning 'palm') can be used. Lithuanian and Russian are very specific (where English is not) in the phrase 'to clap one's hands' which in Lithuanian is ploti delnais and in Russian хлопать в ладоши which literally translated mean 'to clap with one's palms'.

I heart geek

Sat, 10 Jan 2009 12:37:12 PST

This clip is from a film called the Core that I watched ages ago. It made me laugh so much. I'm not recommending the film. This is the only part that is worth watching really.

Winter Wonderland

Tue, 06 Jan 2009 07:28:42 PST

It's been snowing here in Halle and it has been very cold. I think it was about minus 17 outside last night when we were walking back from the tram stop. I managed to persuade Tomas to go outside and play in the snow. He's not a big fan of the snow. Here's what we created:

The Germans were also out playing, but they were having difficulties spelling:

What we see from the 8th floor:

Lang-8

Sat, 03 Jan 2009 03:31:25 PST

I came across Lang-8 via this site (which is an interesting blog in itself). At first, as with all language exchange sites, I was a little sceptical. Nine times out of ten I never commit to these sites and never get further than looking at a few profiles. But this site has a really great feature which allows you to post journal entries which are corrected by native speakers. Here is an example of something I wrote which has been corrected:

As a native English speaker I can also correct the entries of people who write in English. It's very simple and useful. The site itself is perhaps a little difficult to navigate and could do with a re-design, but overall it's worth checking out.

Poster with Message

Thu, 01 Jan 2009 07:30:59 PST

I absolutely love this poster and it has a message that I totally agree with. Unfortunately, it doesn't have any typical lithuanian characters, my favourites being ė or ą :)

I guess English does use some foreign characters in words such as café and naïve, but as far as I'm aware these are optional.