Showing posts with label lost in translation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label lost in translation. Show all posts
Jul 14, 2014
Nov 19, 2013
Erosion
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| Heavy rains washed a lot of debris into the sea this morning---the stream ends up in the left corner, next to the marina---and you can see the border between the muddy rain water and the sea water. |
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| Interesting, isn't it? |
And while we are at it...our Korean in-laws are still visiting...
Nov 1, 2013
History of the world --- Venice (3)
When yours truly arrived in Venice 25 years ago for a brief sojourn at the Business School, Massimo, his correspondent, picked him up at the airport and took him to a down-town café stuffed with pastries, liqueur bottles, and high tables inviting patrons to stand and drink sprits, small glasses of white wine with a schuss, a few drops of Cinzano, say. The spritz then was the stuff of true Venetians, tourists wouldn't know and drink Chianti or Campari instead---if they would drink in the morning, that is, because true Venetians had two spritzes at breakfast. Habits have changes in the meantime; the spritzes have tripled in size and been taken over by tourism, so true Venetians refrain from the stuff and drink lager instead.
I spent two weeks in Venice as a non-tourist and learned a lot, especially about tourism. Already then, Venice was almost completely touristicated---cool, folks, what an ugly word, "touristicated," but the spell checker doesn't recognize it so it's possibly a neologism1---, and the locals behaved like a dying breed. They would avoid tourists like the plague, would only patronize their own restaurants (hidden away in secret alleys where the food was three times better), would not speak English, would not know about directions, would not make appointments because you only had to step into the street to meet friends, would sit on roof-top terraces and enjoy life, would spend week-end afternoons in secluded gardens (not having sex, by the way, just dozing off jointly for a few hours), would recognize the voices of the passing gondoliers at night (while still enjoying life on the roof-top terraces)...
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| "I'll spritz you." |
I spent two weeks in Venice as a non-tourist and learned a lot, especially about tourism. Already then, Venice was almost completely touristicated---cool, folks, what an ugly word, "touristicated," but the spell checker doesn't recognize it so it's possibly a neologism1---, and the locals behaved like a dying breed. They would avoid tourists like the plague, would only patronize their own restaurants (hidden away in secret alleys where the food was three times better), would not speak English, would not know about directions, would not make appointments because you only had to step into the street to meet friends, would sit on roof-top terraces and enjoy life, would spend week-end afternoons in secluded gardens (not having sex, by the way, just dozing off jointly for a few hours), would recognize the voices of the passing gondoliers at night (while still enjoying life on the roof-top terraces)...
May 2, 2013
Dec 23, 2012
Nazi-style
We didn't really have the scoop but were posting on Gangnam-style back in August when its YouTube tally was a tiny 27 million or so (now more than 1 billion), encouraged by the excessive oriental wisdom of our partner, the certain Chang Man Yoon. And we have been posting the Hitler parodies since years, right? So, here goes:
What else? A suitable quote from the Green Eyes of course, from Chapter 32, The humble worm C. Elegans, the only Nazi reference in the book, by the way:
Something has changed in that man [John's father], the tide went out, including Boston harbor, and the muddy ground of the nation is packed with naked clowns, wrapped in the flag, whose sole point is that they are angry, angry --- that's how tyrants justify blanket executions --- but their anger is not the point here, they are insulted by a black president who dares to provoke their racism, that’s it. I recall some chain email that Nick passed on last year, with a bunch of Anti-Obama cartoons, plus some language about real Americans, real Americans, and accompanied by the complaint that the nation is under siege because all these cartoons couldn't be published in the US, and when you looked closer, you could easily see that most of them were by American artists and had been published in the Washington Times, the New York Post, or the Times-Picayune, that's how they operate, claiming the high grounds of patriotism and victimhood, supported by nothing but lies and ignorance, assuming that the rest of the world is even more stupid than they are, it's exactly, EXACTLY the way the NAZIS operated on their march to power.
And while we are at it, lets contemplate a chain-mailed "joke" originating from a certain Henning and received today:
For Immediate Release:
Effective Jan 1, 2013, aspirin will be heavily taxed under Obamacare. The only explanation given was that they are white and they work. No other reason was given, but I thought you'd want to know about it.
Funny? Yeah, right, this is funny only if there's in fact some truth to the prejudice that (1) Obama despises the white race and (2) blacks are lazy. Any evidence, anybody? That's why Obama's mother was white, right? That's why he is from Kenya, right? That's why blacks were imported as slaves, right, because they don't work. From Kenya. Right?
Very funny. So we complain to Dirk, who sent us this "joke." Dirk mumbles something of political incorrectness in reply. Well, Dirk, political incorrectness is a derived term, derived from its antonym, political correctness (PC). PC was an attitude to language, invented sometime in the late '70s, suggesting or dictating the avoidance of verbiage supposedly hurtful to minorities, so dwarfs became "vertically challenged individuals," blacks became "Afro-Americans," and Harvard professors edited the word "nigger" out of Mark Twain's "Huckleberry Finn." That's PC. Political Incorrectness, thats pointing out the absurdities of PC. Political incorrectness neither implies nor condones the stupid, debased racism of Henning's "joke." Dirk. So, let's be politically incorrect again. And please tell Henning.
What else? A suitable quote from the Green Eyes of course, from Chapter 32, The humble worm C. Elegans, the only Nazi reference in the book, by the way:
Something has changed in that man [John's father], the tide went out, including Boston harbor, and the muddy ground of the nation is packed with naked clowns, wrapped in the flag, whose sole point is that they are angry, angry --- that's how tyrants justify blanket executions --- but their anger is not the point here, they are insulted by a black president who dares to provoke their racism, that’s it. I recall some chain email that Nick passed on last year, with a bunch of Anti-Obama cartoons, plus some language about real Americans, real Americans, and accompanied by the complaint that the nation is under siege because all these cartoons couldn't be published in the US, and when you looked closer, you could easily see that most of them were by American artists and had been published in the Washington Times, the New York Post, or the Times-Picayune, that's how they operate, claiming the high grounds of patriotism and victimhood, supported by nothing but lies and ignorance, assuming that the rest of the world is even more stupid than they are, it's exactly, EXACTLY the way the NAZIS operated on their march to power.
And while we are at it, lets contemplate a chain-mailed "joke" originating from a certain Henning and received today:
For Immediate Release:
Effective Jan 1, 2013, aspirin will be heavily taxed under Obamacare. The only explanation given was that they are white and they work. No other reason was given, but I thought you'd want to know about it.
Funny? Yeah, right, this is funny only if there's in fact some truth to the prejudice that (1) Obama despises the white race and (2) blacks are lazy. Any evidence, anybody? That's why Obama's mother was white, right? That's why he is from Kenya, right? That's why blacks were imported as slaves, right, because they don't work. From Kenya. Right?
Very funny. So we complain to Dirk, who sent us this "joke." Dirk mumbles something of political incorrectness in reply. Well, Dirk, political incorrectness is a derived term, derived from its antonym, political correctness (PC). PC was an attitude to language, invented sometime in the late '70s, suggesting or dictating the avoidance of verbiage supposedly hurtful to minorities, so dwarfs became "vertically challenged individuals," blacks became "Afro-Americans," and Harvard professors edited the word "nigger" out of Mark Twain's "Huckleberry Finn." That's PC. Political Incorrectness, thats pointing out the absurdities of PC. Political incorrectness neither implies nor condones the stupid, debased racism of Henning's "joke." Dirk. So, let's be politically incorrect again. And please tell Henning.
Dec 10, 2012
Skyfallen (2)
The never-ending story continues, so go here for the first installment.
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| Hi, I'm Ben Whishaw, the new-new Q, or quartermaster (we never knew that, or did we). I'm glad to combine the old donnish eccentricity of Desmond Llewelyn with the new donnish eccentricity of mainstream nerdism (computers), while discarding any pretense to step into the shoes of John Cleese, who took over from Desmond in the Bond-brand makeover that also brought about Judy Dench. It's a complete miracle what got into John's head when he got into Q's character --- he wasn't funny, he wasn't eccentric, he wasn't British, he wasn't spy-ish --- anyhow, he did so poorly that they had to ditch him and complete a few Q-less Bond installments. Is the pun intended? --- I haven't made up my mind yet, sorry. Well, I'm here to stay. |
Nov 28, 2012
Feb 25, 2010
Vom Eise befreit
Dirk Sch. sent us this charming picture, and it brings to mind the mysterious scriptwriter that we met the other day on the Croisette. You may recall that he handed us a stack of manuscripts before his unfortunate disappearance in the Bay of Cannes.Hidden in this heap was a single sheet of paper, not attached to any of his hopeless feature scripts ("Lethal Weapon meets Dr. Strangelove"). The sheet was covered with three handwritten lines, and nothing else. Here they are:
It's hardly legible, and it's in German, but here is the Google translation:"Are freed from ice streams and creeks,
Spring holder, invigorating look,
Springeth in the valley hope luck."
Yes, I know. Perhaps I should not have brought this up. Perhaps it isn't German after all. Plus, it's unfortunate that his "poetic" lines do not really match the beautiful winter theme of Dirk's picture. One starts to understand why the washed-up scriptwriter had to end the way he did.
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