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Did you know that...? (language trivia) | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room |  | |
| Captain Haddock Diglot Senior Member Japan kanjicabinet.tumblr. Joined 6577 days ago 2282 posts - 2814 votes  Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, Korean, Ancient Greek | Message 17 of 90 26 May 2010 at 5:47am | IP Logged | |||||
In Japanese, you can have the same vowel appear many, many times in succession. tōō o ōu (to-o-o-o o o-o-u) means "to cover Eastern Europe". 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| egill Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5505 days ago 418 posts - 791 votes Speaks: Mandarin, English* Studies: German, Spanish, Dutch | Message 18 of 90 26 May 2010 at 5:58am | IP Logged | |||||
Sure. to french can mean a lot of different things culinary-wise. One of which refers to slicing food into slivers (cf. julienning). Also to french someone can be short for to french kiss someone. Of course these all derive from the demonym so it doesn't have quite the same satisfaction as Polish & to polish which came from different roots and merged. Many of these pairs are derogatory in nature, having to do with some bad traits supposedly associated with some ethnic group. I'm thinking of to jew, to gyp, and their ilk here. 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Luso Hexaglot Senior Member Portugal Joined 5870 days ago 819 posts - 1812 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, French, EnglishC2, GermanB1, Italian, Spanish Studies: Sanskrit, Arabic (classical) | Message 19 of 90 26 May 2010 at 1:38pm | IP Logged | |||||
I find this quite interesting, because I've always heard that the word "arigato" came from the Portuguese "obrigado". The spelling is quite different, I know, but if you pronounce it the portuguese way ("eating away" the "b") the sound will be quite similar. It might be a legend, because it is a story from the sixteenth century (even if there is some literature that supports it), but here it goes: when the Portuguese arrived in Tanegashima in 1543, it was the first contact between Europeans and Japanese. So, and since they did not have a short way of saying "thank you", they took ours. Due to our exploring period, Portuguese is full of loanwords from other languages, and we also gave many to others. Some examples: Japanese: "tempura" was introduced in Japan by Portuguese missionaries and it comes from the Portuguese word "tempero" (meaning "seasoning"). Burkina Faso: there's a local type of beer called "mijo", which is the colloquial Portuguese word for urine. Arabic: the words for "Portuguese" and "orange" are written and pronounced in almost the same way, because sweet oranges were introduced there by the Portuguese. Explaining a bit: the Arabs already knew oranges, but they only had access to the bitter variety (for which they used the Persian word "naranj"). When the Portuguese began trading regularly with China, they brought back sweet oranges, some of which were sold in Arabian countries, where they came to be known by the name of the people that had first brought them. Edited by Luso on 26 May 2010 at 1:41pm 5 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| furrykef Senior Member United States furrykef.com/ Joined 6281 days ago 681 posts - 862 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Japanese, Latin, Italian | Message 20 of 90 26 May 2010 at 2:46pm | IP Logged | |||||
Here's one: did you know that in Japanese, the same word (違う "chigau") is used for "to be wrong" and "to be different"? I wonder if this has anything to do with Japan being a conformist society...
Apparently this is a common legend, but it's not true. The adjective "arigatai", from which "arigatou" is derived, is attested long before the arrival of the Portuguese. 6 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Splog Diglot Senior Member Czech Republic anthonylauder.c Joined 5478 days ago 1062 posts - 3263 votes Speaks: English*, Czech Studies: Mandarin | Message 21 of 90 26 May 2010 at 3:21pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Did you know that ...
Czech is actually the Polish spelling of Czech. Czechs would spell it with Č （pronounced like the ch at the start of cheese). It is a mystery why English doesn't simply spell it Check and adopted the Polish spelling instead. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
 budonoseito Pro Member United States budobeyondtechnRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5614 days ago 261 posts - 344 votes Studies: French, Japanese Personal Language Map | Message 22 of 90 26 May 2010 at 3:38pm | IP Logged | |||||
It is also the only word that changes pronunciation when capitalized. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| karaipyhare Tetraglot Groupie Paraguay Joined 5394 days ago 74 posts - 150 votes Speaks: Portuguese, Spanish*, English, Guarani Studies: German, Italian, French, Mandarin, Japanese | Message 23 of 90 26 May 2010 at 11:49pm | IP Logged | |||||
three F's in a row: Schifffahrt = German for "boat trip" a seven-letter word in English that, whith the change of a consonant, becomes a new word with no vowel sounds in common = hideous -> hideout 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| mrhenrik Triglot Moderator Norway Joined 5888 days ago 482 posts - 658 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, French Personal Language Map | Message 24 of 90 27 May 2010 at 12:24am | IP Logged | |||||
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Did you know..
..that in an unofficial northern way of writing Norwegian, you can have a conversation with single word vowels only? - Æ e i A. - Æ e i A æ å. "I am in A." (primary school classes at the same year are divided in letter names beginning from A) "I am in A me too." Not 100% correct bokmål or nynorsk, but a bunch of people would write it like this - and it's the common way of pronouncing it (with a northern accent). Edited by mrhenrik on 27 May 2010 at 12:25am 4 persons have voted this message useful |
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