tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post6427565898431344444..comments2024-03-27T03:19:11.216-04:00Comments on Assistant Village Idiot: You Too Can Read BokmålAssistant Village Idiothttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01978011985085795099noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post-39614201089698094642014-09-26T23:00:18.142-04:002014-09-26T23:00:18.142-04:00I had the oddest experience once reading a shampoo...I had the oddest experience once reading a shampoo bottle that had instructions in Norwegian, Danish, and Finnish (it was an import brand). I could just about read the first two, and then ran headlong into a non-Indo-European language in the Roman alphabet, and went into brainlock.<br /><br />It seriously felt as though my language center had banged into a brick wall. The feeling - "I <i>should</i> be able to sort of read this! Or at least recognize some words!" was so strong, and the results were so far from that... Bzzt bzzt bzzt reading module failure bzzt.<br /><br />---<br /><br /><i>Schleim</i> and <i>phlegm</i> are both so unpleasantly onomatopoeiac, aren't they?jaedhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03328666344764784829noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post-75451735757146237282014-09-26T14:57:37.580-04:002014-09-26T14:57:37.580-04:00I've been proofreading a lot of Dutch and Germ...I've been proofreading a lot of Dutch and German lately, and having the same experience. If you cross your eyes, remember a few common shifts, and think about how the words sound, you can get a good bit. I was reading about the history of medicine and couldn't quite remember the four humors: there was blood, two kinds of bile, and what was that last one? Spleen? I was reading "Schleim," when it occurred to me that that was obviously "Phlegm."Texan99https://www.blogger.com/profile/10479561573903660086noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post-35941677693671089072014-09-25T21:42:03.628-04:002014-09-25T21:42:03.628-04:00Oh I have zero chance of understanding anyone spea...Oh I have zero chance of understanding anyone <i>speaking</i> in a foreign language. As bad as anyone you've ever met, I imagine.Assistant Village Idiothttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01978011985085795099noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post-51178791903317306132014-09-25T21:37:26.506-04:002014-09-25T21:37:26.506-04:00The big problem is the treacherous little words th...The big problem is the treacherous <i>little words</i> that flip the sentence from a positive to a negative or turn an offer into a requirement. And people talk so <i>fast</i>...jameshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01792036361407527304noreply@blogger.com