Two things that bother me:
1.) People freaking out about the name of the volcano in Iceland.
It's Eyjafjallajökull, people. It is a foreign language, and I suppose all the j's and the ö make it look exotic if you're not used to that sort of thing. And yes, it's long, because it's a compound word and an extremely simple one at that. Lots of languages put words together and a long word comes out which looks scary if you don't know the smaller words inside.
The 'freaking out' thing I'm referring too are all the masses of unoriginal people saying, "Haha, looks like a cat walked on the keyboard". That's the sort of thing I expect from a few mindless twitter users, but I've even seen it on semi-legit blogs and even a few news stories. Unacceptable. Yes, it looks like random letters to you. Does Popocatépetl look any better? What about Puxsutawny? How do you think a name like Knightsbridge would look to someone with no knowledge of English phonetics? Think about it.
In this case, Eyja - Island, Fjalla - Mountain, Jökull - Glacier. Island-Mountain-Glacier, see? And if you go for some somewhat obscure cognates, it becomes even less foreign. Eyja - Eyot (another word for Island), Fjalla - Fell (Mountain), Jökull - Icle (like Icicle). So, Eyjafjallajökull could be translated as Eyotfellicle. :)
If you want to say, "Ah, what's it called, I can't spell/say the name..." okay. I understand. It's a long word and it's a foreign one. But then, just call it "that volcano in Iceland" or whatever. Just don't pretend that it's a joke, or illegitimate, just because it happens not to be the same nomenclature you're used to.
2.) People clapping after they give an order.
I can understand clapping first, to get people's attentions or whatever. But maybe my ears are just tender, because I don't find it very pleasant, and so when people clap /after/ they say whatever they need to say, it just annoys/angers me.
I mean, why? It must either be because they can, to show that they can make annoying/loud noises if they want to because they are in control... or else because they somehow like the feeling that they have some power that allows them to affect change merely by clapping their hands.
"Stay on topic, guys!" *clap* - People are quiet for a second, then go back on topic. Magic! Except they probably would have if you omitted the clap, too, and now you've gone and hurt the ears of innocent bystanders.
May 04, 2010
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment