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Maya Angelou | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Polyglots |  | |
| CaitO'Ceallaigh Triglot Senior Member United States katiekelly.wordpress Joined 6669 days ago 795 posts - 829 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish, Russian Studies: Czech, German | Message 9 of 50 14 August 2006 at 5:49pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
You are right. While her biography states that as a girl, after running away from her father in his rundown trailer, she found refuge in a graveyard of old cars with other homeless children. What few people realize is that these cars were Rolls Royces and Cadillacs. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Sinfonia Senior Member Wales Joined 6556 days ago 255 posts - 261 votes Speaks: English* | Message 10 of 50 14 August 2006 at 6:08pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Assuming you're being sarcastic, that's very funny, in an American kind of way. I notice you didn't bother to respond to my remark about languages; I presume you didn't find it worthy of consideration, let alone comment? But what do I know, I've never even been in a plane. Never had the money, nor the arrogance to assert my right to destroy the environment so that I get to see the world and chat to local peasants in their own language. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| CaitO'Ceallaigh Triglot Senior Member United States katiekelly.wordpress Joined 6669 days ago 795 posts - 829 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Russian Studies: Czech, German | Message 11 of 50 14 August 2006 at 9:14pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
I am agreeing with you, yet again! 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| lady_skywalker Triglot Senior Member Netherlands aspiringpolyglotblog Joined 6702 days ago 909 posts - 942 votes Speaks: Spanish, English*, Mandarin Studies: Japanese, French, Dutch, Italian | Message 12 of 50 14 August 2006 at 10:00pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
This is somewhat off-topic but...if I follow this logic, it's only Americans who've ever travelled or been on a plane? Funny that as I tend to see more British tourists taking cheap EasyJet and RyanAir offers to go to places like Prague and Barcelona (where they proceed to terrorism the 'natives' with their binge drinking and lack of respect). Let's not blame the Americans or Maya Angelou for all the world's ills. :) Also, travel, be it by plane or bicycle, does allow us to broaden our minds a little. How else can you expect to learn first-hand about other cultures and, by extension, languages? I guess one could just go to London as there's nary an English speaker to be found! And by the way, not all people who travel by plane are arrogant or trying to destroy the environment. Businessmen have little alternative (no other way to travel from, say, London to Tokyo in less than a day) and some of us happen to have family abroad or work abroad. Should we all just be good little citizens and never leave our village boundaries? :) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Sir Nigel Senior Member United States Joined 6916 days ago 1126 posts - 1102 votes 2 sounds | Message 13 of 50 15 August 2006 at 2:02am | IP Logged | ||||||||
It is worth noting that people in the States are more likely to go on an aeroplane if they need to travel within the country. Perhaps the need to travel large intra-country (I've made a new word) distances quickly by plane causes ones to think flying is more American.
That makes me think of the series "The Prisoner" where the chap couldn't leave "The Village". "Who are you?" "You are number six" "I am not a number, I'm a free man!" Sorry for taking this so off-topic. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Journeyer Triglot Senior Member United States tristan85.blogspot.c Joined 6680 days ago 946 posts - 1110 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, German Studies: Sign Language | Message 14 of 50 15 August 2006 at 4:17pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I don't think she was turning a blind eye to global warming. I don't think
she even considered it, actually. She wants people to expand the minds by traveling to plaecs they might usually not. Pollution by vehicles is definately a topic worth considering (although perhaps elsewhere) but for travelingn to see the world, which I for one love doing if I can, long distance traveling methods are necessary. Airplanes aren't the only thing polluting the planet. :-( Like Sir Nigel, my apologies for continuing to be off-topic. You are right, though, that pollution and global warming will destroy loads of lives, cultures, and languages if something isn't done quickly. But I'm not sure how much ceasing travel the world and seeing it is going to stem that. Perhaps it will by a goodly (is that a real word?) number, but I think that more people will be prompted to do something better if they know what they are trying to save by having seen it themselves. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Sinfonia Senior Member Wales Joined 6556 days ago 255 posts - 261 votes Speaks: English* | Message 15 of 50 15 August 2006 at 5:15pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
And by that very act of saying nothing you speak volumes. In American English, loudly, of course. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Sinfonia Senior Member Wales Joined 6556 days ago 255 posts - 261 votes Speaks: English* | Message 16 of 50 15 August 2006 at 5:26pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Absolutely not; in fact, wherever the Americans blaze trails (often literally), the British are seldom far behind. Both nations seem to do what they do with a particular gusto and arrogance that often sets them apart.
You could indeed just walk around London (or New York); practically all the world's cultures are there in miniature. I'm not suggesting we all give up travel; only that we do it in much greater moderation, so that future generations still have a planet to live on. After all, nearly all people managed without air travel right up until the 1970s or 1980s.
Moderation's the answer again. And businessmen don't *need* to travel anywhere near as much as they do, not in the high tech digital world where video conferencing is easy and cheap (something some firms have finally realised). Seriously, air travel is a major contributor to global warming, and global warming is, despite what most Americans think, real and going to change global society perhaps irrevocably. Fragile cultures, and therefore languages, are already being affected and some will disappear -- perhaps even literally when societies are drowned by rising sea levels. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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