# Ethnicity of Finns/Egyptians

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-of-finns-egyptians/5576>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [December 24, 1999, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-of-finns-egyptians/5576 "1999-12-24T04:37:00Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Jorge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9fc29f/32.png) [@Jorge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jorge)\
**Post date:** [December 26, 1999, 10:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-of-finns-egyptians/5576/21 "1999-12-26T22:49:00Z")

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Sorry Doobieous, I had responded to **BobT** ’s mention that “Asian” languages are all short-worded, which I agree with you isn’t true. But it seemed he was referring to “Asian” languages, not montagnard Austronesian dialects, Sanskrit-relates gone east rather than west, etc… hence my comment. And it’s a fair estimate, IMHO, that “borrowed” words with the various affixes & suffixes & infixes in most languages _tend_ to be longer than the actual, “native” vocabulary. Whether or not they are “native” words is, I suppose, debatable. Remember, though, the preferred Tagalog root word would be “lakad”, and “pasyal” would better be called a Pilipino word these days…

So to show longer words in Tagalog, say, I’d pick _pandudulay_ or _kapanibulusan_… or Vietnamese _Giangnghiemvien_ (sorry, won’t bother with the accent codes); but to answer BobT I’d pick a “proper” Asian language, say Chinese:_t’i wen piao_, or Japanese: _yoroshiku_or _shimaimashita_…

Now back to regular programming…

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**Author:** ![Doobieous](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/da6949/32.png) [@Doobieous](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doobieous)\
**Post date:** [December 27, 1999, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-of-finns-egyptians/5576/22 "1999-12-27T02:07:00Z")

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Ahh, ok, i see what you mean now Jorge :).

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**Author:** ![dlv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f9b8f/32.png) [@dlv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dlv)\
**Post date:** [December 27, 1999, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ethnicity-of-finns-egyptians/5576/23 "1999-12-27T02:40:00Z")

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I’ve known a few Turks in my life… In my very humble opinion, as long as they don’t dress in their native garb, they looked no darker than most Spaniards or (Southern) Italians, and probably lighter than many Arabs. As for their Turkic cousins further East, well, I’m not really an expert, but I’ve seen a few (even had an Uzbek student a couple of years ago 🙂 ), and they could pass as Russians or Hungarians, many of whom too have pronounced cheekbones. You’d never think there were Japanese or Korean.

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