It should take about five minutes to learn the Polish for “please”, “hello” and “thank you”. Then you’re good to go! Or go on, actually. Heck, my modern Greek is limited to half a dozen words and I learned all of them in Greece (we never learned how to say “thank you”, actually).
It’s the Duck Dance in Germany.
There are not enough rollyeyes in the world to express my feelings whenever someone trots out that tired old ‘Europeans are sophisticated intellectuals, Americans are uncultured louts’ trope. I’ve lived abroad, met many foreign immigrants and visitors here, and honestly, neither seems any more cultured or sophisticated than the other.
Americans are often acutely aware of our reputation, and I’ve encountered the ‘Let’s pretend we’re Canadian’ thing before.
As for Europeans behaving badly in the USA, I’ve told this story before but its always a good one. Me and some friends were vacationing in Wilmington, NC a few years ago. We were walking on the beach that evening when suddenly we were surrounded by a posse of very drunk Dutch marines. They started talking to us, and suddenly one of them, Dion, proclaims, “You come to Holland, I will fuck you all!” I don’t think drunkenly sexually harassing local women exactly counts as ‘sharing your cultural heritage with the natives’.
Efkharisto poli
(poli is “very much”)
And that would be 2 of my about 8 words of modern Greek.
Amazing !
Brits asked you why America invaded Iraq .
Had they been in an underground bunker somewhere for an extended period ?
Because being Brits they would know that as American allies we invaded Iraq alongside the Americans
And as for the invasion of Afghan we were in country several weeks before the Americans due to having a task force on excercise in the gulf at the time.
Did they ask you about that as well ?
As to your previous post about Europeans sitting around complaining about Americans and Americans being the preferred backpackers of choice in the countries that they visit…
Speaking as an experienced B.P.er whos travelled most parts of the world, I’ve never actually encountered an American B.P.er though I’m in no doubt that they exist, so I can’t say how the countries I visited viewed them.
Nor have I ever heard Europeans, S.Americans or people from Downunder sit around criticising Americans…ever !
Or for that matter even talking about them.
I think that there are ugly Americans, Brits, Europeans, Mongolians whatever.
But personally I don’t lump whole nationalities together in sweeping generalisations whatever my alleged experiences with them have supposedly been.
Actually, no, the papers are of general interest. Most of the early papers and PhD theses on the Calculus of Constructions and its extensions are almost entirely in French. And, yes, I’d read them if they weren’t in French.
People do write papers to transmit knowledge. This is why the concept of a lingua franca is so important. Right now, that universal language of science is English. Everybody else understands this apart from the French.
Nobody who has a carrot over the shop door is happy to sell stamps. Never. I had one lady ask me why I needed so many. I explained it was part of my plan to overthrow the Fifth Republic.
Is “efkharisto” related to “eucharist”?
You say “early” papers. How old are they exactly? You can find many mathematics and I suppose computer science research papers from the first half of the 20th century, perhaps even later, written in other languages than English, notably French, German and Russian. I think at some point, and it may even be still the case in some universities, you had to demonstrate proficiency in at least three languages to get a Ph.D.
I agree, but as a research scientist you’re aware that people do research and even communicate it in other languages. English is the common language of publication, so research articles and talks are overwhelmingly in English, but in research laboratories and at conferences, you’ll hear many other languages being used by researchers.
Well, it happens. I’m not sure how you missed us Americans, as I manage to run into lots of American backpackers. But yeah, I don’t appreciate eating my Muesli and coffee at the local hostel to a chorus people people going off about how stupid Americans are, how our foreign policy is ruining the world, how bad our food is, etc.
I had one really uncomfortable car ride in Guatemala with a bunch of Brazilians who spent the entire time making snide remarks to me and my mother about her being American. They felt compelled to talk about how horrific our food is, how fat Americans are, how aggressive we are, how bad our TV shows are, etc. Now, we all know that American culture does have it’s low points. But I’m growing a bit bored with the “it’s always fun and safe to put down America” thing, especially when I’m in the same room. I don’t think we really deserve it, and in any case it’s rude.
Indeed. Lots of American backpackers on Khao San Road in Bangkok. Probably not the majority, but I’ve run into quite a few whenever venturing over that way.
Used to be one myself, and I certainly ran into others in the hostels way back when.
Yes.
The Bible verse quoted during the ceremony includes “and he took bread, gave thanks, broke it, and gave it to them saying…” It’s the “gave thanks” bit that leads to the whole ceremony being called “eucharist”.
And I’m now wondering whether, in all those years of Catholic schools and catechesis, did they really explain Ecclesia ten thousand times and Efkharist not once, or whether every time they explained Efkharist I happened to be asleep.
Efkharisto poli, Tom Scud and PsyXe!
AHA!
So it proves my theory, I too have frequented the Khao San road and I know it sounds weird but never once amongst all the mixed nationalities ever noticed any Americans.
Which goes to show that Americans can’t be loud because thats why I never noticed them.
As to a previous post about only Americans being monolingual, I’m pretty sure that the Brits dead heat you on that one.
Notorius ain’t in it.
I’d agree with this - I expect most US tourists to know a smattering of spanish, at least if they’re southerners. But British? Mostly the only British who I can reliably expect to know another language are young women (teens to twenties) who know some french.
(And Norwegians are embarassingly bad tourists. Pasty-pale, fat louts who shuttle between the beaches - where we blind everyone else with reflected sunlight - and the bars, where we drink far too much because it’s “cheap”.)
No. It’s never appropriate to sing the first verse of Fallersleben’s text. Only neonazis do this.
People might sing the third verse, which is the national anthem, if their national team wins. Or simply cheer.
NO! It’s NOT our national anthem! The offical national anthem of democratic Germany is the third verse* of Fallersleben’s text, with the melody by Haydn.
The first verse - Deutschland über alles (Germany above everything) - is only sung by neonazis.
If you meet Germans singing Deutschland über alles instead of Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit, then they are neonazi jerks, and you have my permission to call them that and give them a slap.
*Originally, back when Fallersleben wrote that poem in 1841, the first verse had a completly different meaning. Germany above everything was a call to put the German country - which didn’t exist at that time, the Kaiserreich started 1871, after all - above the petty interestes of the local states. The geographic borders he names - Maas, Memel, Etsch, Belt - were at that time the borders of the german language area and quite legitametly german.
However, during the 3rd Reich, when large parts of this area had been lost in the treaty of Versailles after WWI, the Nazis used only the 1st verse (combined with the hateful Horst-Wessel-Song after) and meant it in the nationalistic idea: Germany to rule above others, and “the country is everything, the individual nothing” idea, along with “these areas are ours, and we will take them back” imperialism with the geographic naming.
For that reason, after WWII, when it was finally decided to keep the old melody, it was decreed that only the third verse will be sung officially, because that text is harmless:
Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit
für das deutsche Vaterland!
Danach lasst uns alle streben
brüderlich mit Herz und Hand!
Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit
sind des Glückes Unterpfand:
|: Blüh im Glanze dieses Glückes,
blühe, deutsches Vaterland! 
Unity and Justice and Freedom
for the German fatherland!
Let us strive towards this
all together, brotherly, with heart and hand!
Unity and Justice and Freedom
are the foundations of happiness
Bloom in the shine of this happiness,
bloom, German fatherland!
A more detailed history is at wikipedia