Category - Esperanto

I guess that Saharan dust storm passed by unnoticed or didn't come at all. I thought the air seemed... sandy... on Monday night, but I might have just been imagining it. It was supposed to cause some great sunsets, but I didn't look.

I'm almost done with "Teach Yourself Esperanto," the book which I've been using to teach myself Esperanto since the end of May. It's a good thing, too: pages are falling out left and right. I'm going to have to tape them back in, because I'm sure I'll continue to use the book as a reference.

Answering Ask Jordon:

Stephen Mead: I have a 1996 courtesy $100.00. Crisp Gem and well centered signed by both Withrow and Rubin. Any ideas on value?

It can be hard to put a price on courtesy autographs, but just to throw a number into the air, I'd say roughly $200. A Withrow-Rubin autographed $1 can go for $100, so that's how I base my estimate.

For the first time in nearly two and a half years, the Space Shuttle is back in flight. Here are some tables to show you when the International Space Station and the Space Shuttle can be seen overhead in your city (or enter your own location to get exact times). And here's a real-time map tracking the two.

I couldn't think of anything to post today, so I was just browsing the Wikipedia home page. Reading the Selected Anniversaries, it reminded me what I had been planning to write today.

As a boy growing up in what is now Poland, L.L. Zamenhof saw that the language barrier was responsible for misunderstanding and hatred among people. As a young man he considered his International Language complete, only to have his plans burned by his father while he was away. Zamenhof saw this as an opportunity to start anew, and his International Language was completed in 1885. After difficulties in finding a publisher, his new father-in-law agreed to publish his work. So 118 years ago today, on July 26, 1887, the Unua Libro ("First Book") rolled off the presses carrying an outline of the language in Russian. (Hebrew, French, Polish, German, and English editions followed.) Zamenhof used the pseudonym Dr. Esperanto, meaning "one who hopes." Needless to say, this was catchier than "Lingvo Internacia" and stuck as the name of the language.

It is truly amazing that a language spoken by one man in 1887 has 1 to 2 million speakers today. Although it can hardly be said that Esperanto has fulfilled its goal of being a universal second language, there is no doubt that it facilitates communication across boundaries. If that were not true, then Esperanto speakers from different countries would not meet, fall in love, and produce native Esperanto speakers. And yet they do. If Esperanto were not a solution for the language problem, then thousands of people from dozens of countries would not be meeting right now in Lithuania, chatting with as much ease as (or more ease than) their respective native languages.

In order for Esperanto to go further, people have to swallow their national pride and learn it. Supposedly English is the universal language, but I daresay that the only people who think this are English speakers, who comprise about one-tenth of the world's population. The other 90% don't know English, and many, for political reasons, will not learn. I'm getting all choked up now thinking that Esperanto has such a long way to go and faces so much resistance from ignorant people. Such a long way, but the only way. I'm determined to work for it.

This is an interesting instrument: the electro-theremin. They're custom-made. You can buy one, apparently, but they're a little expensive for me ($400 US). Listen to the sound samples, though.

Yesterday the 90th Universala Kongreso de Esperanto (usually translated as World Congress of Esperanto) began in Vilnius, Lithuania. 2005 is the 100th anniversary of the first World Congress, and it has been held every year since then, except during the World Wars.

The World Congresses typically attract several thousand Esperantists from around the world. This year 2,228 people are participating. Because Esperanto has never been very popular in North America, the few Congresses that have taken place here have attracted relatively few people (923 in Portland, Oregon, in 1972; 802 in Vancouver, British Columbia, in 1984). Some recent Congresses have been held in Beijing (2004), Tel Aviv (2000), Berlin (1999), and Adelaide (1997). Most, however, are in Europe, which has the most Esperantists.

I hope to attend a Congress someday, when my Esperanto is better and I'm free to travel. Maybe I could stay with another Esperanto speaker using the Pasporta Servo (Passport Service). There are all sorts of things to do at one. You get to meet a lot of people from around the world, and "crocodiling" is discouraged. ("Crocodiling" refers to speaking your native tongue when using Esperanto would be more appropriate. A crocodile, of course, has a big mouth and a small brain. You can't make this stuff up!)

I can feel myself getting better at Esperanto every day. Now that I've studied it a bit, some phrases are slowly coming into my mind naturally, and when I see, hear, or say something, an equivalent Esperanto phrase may pop into my head. I guess that's what you'd call fluency! (Or the beginning of it, anyway.)

In the interest of those who don't care about what's happening in my head, let's move on...

What are the odds of dying? The odds of you being killed are 1 in 23. The odds of you being killed this year are 1 in 1,755.

Did your mom ever tell you not to play with fireworks? Tell her to relax; your odds of dying of a firework-related accident this year are 1 in 57,588,244. Contact with venomous snakes and lizards this year? 1 in 95,980,407. Hey, and don't worry about getting into that streetcar. The odds of you being killed by one this year are 1 in 71,985,305.

How about lightning? The odds of being killed by lightning are 1 in 56,439. The odds of being killed by lightning this year are 1 in 4,362,746.

Ĉu vi parolas Esperanton? Mi volus korespondi kun esperantistoj ĉirkaŭ la mondo. Aĝo kaj nivelo ne gravas, sed mi preferus samaĝulinojn. (Mi havas 16 jarojn.) Memoru, ke mi estas komencanto. Estas malfacile, trovi saminteresajn esperantistojn, kiuj volas korespondi retpoŝte. Do anstataŭ serĉi ilin, ili serĉos min... mi esperas. Mia retadreso estas . Dankon!

I apologize for the "Esperanto moment" right there -- a lot of you reading the RSS feed have probably skipped over this post for that reason -- but it's just a plea for pen pals with which I can practice my abilities. It can be so hard to find someone with the same interests as you. I'm glad to have found Eric, who is eerily similar to me. But why don't the hot chicks go for Esperanto?

Mi: (suavely) It's a facilitator of cross-cultural communication, baby.

Samaĝulino: (biting lip voluptuously) Oh, say "facilitator" again.

Mi: (whispering suavely) Fa-ci-li-ta-tor.

Samaĝulino: (trying desperately to hold back) Say it... in Esperanto.

Mi: Well, let's see here... "facilitate"... "to make easy"... "facila," easy... "ig," to cause... "ilo," tool... so that would be... "faciligilo."

Samaĝulino: (breathing heavily) I love the way you tie words together.

Mi: (suavely) Don't forget to make the "c" sound halfway between "t" and "s."

Samaĝulino: Ĝi... ĝi...

Mi: (suavely) Ĝi -- t.e., Esperanto -- estas faciligilo de interkultura komunikado.

Well, I suppose your imagination can take it from there. In fact, you'd probably be glad I didn't finish that little dialogue. This is no place for firakontoj.

The fallacy of many questions occurs when you ask something that presupposes something that has not been agreed upon by the people involved. In other words, it means you're asking someone about something that isn't true. If they give a straight answer -- "yes" or "no" -- that means they must agree that the presupposition is correct. A common example is "Have you stopped beating your wife?" Whether you say "yes" or "no," you admit to having beaten your wife in the past (and, I suppose, to having a wife). So how would you answer a nonsensical question like that? According to hackers (good or bad), the correct answer is "mu."

For this post, I'm going to try something different. I'm actually going to write in Esperanto. Appropriately, the topic of this post is Esperanto meetings. Do they occur? Certainly. But where? Certainly not around here. Here's a very long list of Esperanto events around the world in 2005. Only a handful are in the United States, and those that are aren't anywhere near here.

I just realized while writing the below section that I still have a problem with the "-n" ending in Esperanto, which denotes a direct object.

Por ĉi tiu blogaĵo, mi penos ion malsaman. Mi efektive skribos esperante. Konvene, la temo de ĉi tiu blogaĵo estas esperantokunvenoj. Ĉu vi okazas? Certe. Sed kie? Certe ne ĉirkaŭ tie ĉi. Jen tre longa listo de esperantaj eventoj ĉirkaŭ la mondo en 2005. Nur kelkaj estas en Usono, kaj tiuj ne estas ie ajn apud ĉi tie.

Dum skribante tiu ĉi sekcion, Mi ĵus konstatis, ke mi ankoraŭ havas problemon pri la "-n" finaĵo.

That's enough of that. I had to look up a lot of those words. I apparently still have a long way to go in learning Esperanto. I can't expect to be fluent in less than two months, but it would sure help if I could meet other Esperantists in person (that would help with my speaking and listening, anyway). Too bad I only know of one around here.

I should also practice my writing, but what can I write about when I can't write about anything? Oh well. To me it seems that I should learn the skills in this order: reading, writing, listening, and speaking. Once I can read fluently I'll have picked up the various grammar rules that maybe my book won't have taught, and I'll have a stronger vocabulary. That would be it for the easy part. The hard part is finding a way to listen to and speak in Esperanto (besides talking to yourself).

Nu, eble mi devas skribi uzanta nur la vortojn, ke mi scias. Tio ne estas tre malfacila. Kvankam mi ne povas diri ion ajn, mi povas peni. Mi esperas, ke mi ne eraras.

Well, maybe I have to write using only the words that I know. That isn't too hard. Although I can't say anything, I can try. I hope I'm not making mistakes.

Kion mi ĵus lernis? Mi forgesas... ho, jes! Mi lernis pri la vortoj fininta de "-ita", "-ata", kaj "ota". Diri "la konstruota domo" estas pli facile ol en la angla (plej mallonge, "the house to be built"). Kun ĉiu leciono, mi scias pli pri la genio de Zamenhof. Li faris la lingvon por ke ĝi povas esti simpla sed potenca (kaj nekonfuzanta).

What did I just learn? I forgot... oh yeah! I learned about the words ending in "-ita," "ata," and "ota." Saying "la konstruota domo" is easier than in English (at the shortest, "the house to be built"). With each lesson I know more of the genius of Zamenhof (the creator of Esperanto). He made the language so that it can be simple but powerful (and not confusing).

Mi trovas, ke estas pli facile unue skribi esperante, uzante nur la vortojn, kiujn mi scias, kaj poste skribi angle.

I find that it's easier to write in Esperanto first, using only the words I know, and then write in English.

Sudoku is something that's supposed to be popular. It's a puzzle with numbers, but there's no math involved. You have to ill in the grid so that every row, every column, and every 3x3 box contains the digits 1 through 9. It sounds like it would be interesting, but I don't think I'd pay for the program after the free trial expired.

In yesterday's post I noted that I wouldn't be getting "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" anytime soon. Well, yesterday my dad went out and bought it for my sister and me. Costco was selling the huge and popular book for $15 -- half price! Kristen, who's always been an extremely fast reader, has read between a third and a half of it already. By the time I get a chance to pick it up, she'll be done with it.

Also yesterday, I got some Esperanto books that I ordered from ELNA, the Esperanto League for North America (serving, despite the name, only the United States). They're technically a birthday gift because my dad decided to pick up the charge.

The books were packaged interestingly. They were placed inside a box that once held one of those garbage bag holders that you would hang on a wall. So they could put the postage, etc. on the box, they wrapped it in paper -- specifically, a 10-year-old table of international postal rates. The books were contained inside a Safeway plastic bag, which was padded with a page from the New York Times and a Portuguese-language newspaper (!), both from April. Also included for more protection were little bits of paper that kind of fell out when I got everything else out.

As for the books themselves, there was a varied selection. But I noticed that only one of them was bound with an actual cardstock cover, like a paperback book. All the others had covers of slightly thicker paper. Also, only one or two of the five books had an ISBN. By the order in which I intend to read them, they are:

• "Gerda Malaperis!" by Claude Piron. This is the quintessential quasi-advanced Esperanto reader, starting in Chapter 1 with simple Esperanto and ending at an advanced level that I can pretty much read already. Published in Brazil by a Swiss author.
• "Ĝis Revido Krokodilido!" by Sten Johansson. A collection of short stories, some of which are about life in Esperantujo (Esperantoland, i.e., wherever Esperanto speakers are). Published in Sweden.
• "La Seĝo Dektria" by George E. Wagner. An original short story in booklet form. Published in the USA.
• "La Besto-farmo" by George Orwell. A translation of "Animal Farm," which I've never read, by Gerald Tucker. I know it's a short book, but it seems impossibly small in such a slim and tiny volume. It looks all the cooler that way, though. Published in Germany.
• "Tri Homoj en Boato" by Jerome K. Jerome. An old translation of "Three Men in a Boat," which I'd never heard of. Will the late 1800s British humor translate well into 1934 Esperanto that can be understood by this 21st century reader? I don't know, but I don't think the binding of the comparatively large book, which appears to never have been read, will stand up to my reading if I'm a slow reader. That's why this is last on the list. Published in Hungary.

Pouring out of my head yesterday were these thoughts:

I want to live somewhere scenic. I want to be able to go out into the mountains in the afternoon... or at least the foothills... maybe live in a little town abutting a National Forest. A place that only a few people know about, with a small general store and a gas station that's part of a chain that you thought wasn't around anymore. And I want to just as easily have a quaint but modern Northern city, with ancient two-story houses lining wide concrete roads, within reach. In the city I would see the skyscrapers old and new, the ancient buildings seeing another day on busy corners. Perhaps I could split my time between the town and the country.

I want it to snow there, without fail, every winter. To be able to stay inside with a good excuse and a mug of therapeutic hot chocolate would be nice. And then maybe I could go into town, chains on tires, and see the white-blanketed city, street sweepers running and Weather Channel camera crews on the sidewalk. Maybe pick up a newspaper and go into a coffee place. Read about what's happening in our big city, and maybe a footnote about building a tunnel in the mountains where I live.

South Florida is hot and flat and built up. There's nothing to do but live your life in the most boring fashion imaginable. It's nothing but an ever-widening string of suburbs with no "urb" in sight, except for Fort Lauderdale, which I rarely visit, and Miami, which I never visit. Winter and summer are one and the same. It's about a six-hour drive to the nearest hill.

A list of words ending in -onym. There are a lot.

I got some pretty good stuff for my birthday. I got two Beatles t-shirts (good thing, my supply's been running low) and an interesting book about the Beatles which I've started to read. It's called "Magical Mystery Tours: My Life with the Beatles," and it's by a fellow named Tony Bramwell, who claims to be a childhood friend and assistant of the Beatles. He paints a good picture of the personal lives of his friends Paul, George, and John (he didn't meet Ringo till later). Paul McCartney is quoted on the cover: "If you want to know anything about the Beatles, ask Tony Bramwell. He remembers more than I do." Shockingly, I've never heard of this guy, but his recollections merit further reading.

Happy birthday to my friend Sean, who turns 16 today (the day after I do). Hope you enjoy your birthday.

Today my grandmother came over. She's staying with us for a few days because they're doing something to her house (exterminating it, I think). That should be a nice change of pace.

Has anyone ever ruled the entire world? No. But many entities over the history of the world have made it their goal, to varying degrees of success. This list ranks the top 27 world powers in recorded history by their greatest extent in area. So, looking back on history, who has controlled the most land? It's not the celebrated Roman Empire (#17), the mind-bogglingly large Mongol Empire (#3), the United States (#12), Alexander's empire (#19), or even the Communist world (#2). The answer may surprise you (if you haven't been using your brain).

(The title of this post is the motto of the Isle of Man. In Latin it is "Quocunque Jeceris Stabit." In Esperanto I figure it is "Kien ajn oni ĵetas ĝin, ĝi staros." Now figure out this English-language colloquialism translated into Esperanto: "Mi ne havas vivon.")

Most of Hurricane Dennis has passed by. For some reason, conditions seemed to be the worst last night and the night before, but not during the day. We didn't lose our power -- except for about a minute this morning -- and so, we've survived this indirect hit.

Speaking of which, I'm surprised at how much Esperanto I can comprehend. I'd estimate I have about 50-90% comprehension, depending on the text, thanks to the sensible grammar and familiar (mostly Latin and Germanic) vocabulary. For example, I could read this news item on the Esperanto portal-community Ĝangalo without much use of a dictionary.

Translation:

There's more to the article, but I didn't feel like boring you (and there were a few words I couldn't figure out).

Anyway, tonight I'm celebrating my birthday (which is Wednesday) with friends at a restaurant. Unfortunately, some of my friends are on vacation, but it should still be fun. My twin sister is bringing her friends also; in fact, this whole thing was her idea and I didn't have much say in it. For the first time in years we're not having a dance party, which is a good thing because they were really boring. Our guests either loved them or hated them, and last year we invited a whole bunch of new friends to show them how uncool we are.

Tonight should be much better, with us just sitting around and talking like old times. One of my friends I'm pretty sure I haven't seen at all this year, though we've talked online and on the phone. Maybe I'll bring cards or something. Ah, good times, good times.

Do you really have to pay tolls on the turnpike? What happens if you don't? Find out one guy's experiences by reading The Turnpike Prank.

Some depressing things:

It's been exactly a month since I pledged to go on the No S Diet: No snacks, no sweets, no seconds, except (sometimes) on days that start with "S": Saturday, Sunday, and special days. How am I doing with that?

If anything has changed, I've gained weight. I stuck to it rigidly at first, but it's hard not to have seconds when your servings are irregular or small, or when you're eating something like soup. I haven't snacked much or eaten too many sweets. But the main reason I haven't lost weight is because I haven't exercised a muscle. I just can't. Some people are people who exercise, but I am not. I think I should just accept myself for who I am instead of trying to change myself to conform to societal pressures. Right? Right?

Also, just now I was trying to write the main page of La Ajnejo, the intended subsite in Esperanto. Then and there it dawned on me that even if I did have something to say -- which I didn't -- I have no idea how to say it and I have to look up practically every word. I'm a long way off from being comfortable enough to write a web page in a strange language. So don't expect to see La Ajnejo around for a while.

Some not-as-depressing things:

I decided I'm going to a restaurant for my birthday on either Saturday night or Sunday night. I've started asking the guests which date they would prefer.

Some neutral things:

I saw fireworks yesterday for the Fourth of July. It was like nothing I'd ever seen because I'd never seen anything like it. Spectacular. The only thing that bugged me were that they played patriotic songs over the P.A. system. Don't get me wrong, but I just think it's annoying that nearly all of the songs they played demand a Supreme Being to shower his blessings upon our country, as if he weren't going to do it anyway. I have a good mind to marry into Irving Berlin's family. Yes, his song "God Bless America" was published during the Copyright Era (1923-forever), and so every time you play it in public, you owe his relatives a few bucks or a Coke or something, via some agency like BMI or ASCAP or something which you should have already paid. Don't break the law!

Also, I don't like bragging about my country, because quite frankly, we could improve ourselves.

I like license plates. Here's a gallery of license plates of the world.

Continuing from yesterday's post, in which I was trying to figure out a name for the Esperanto-language version of this site. Showing how the Internet and Esperanto connect people, an Italian-speaking Swiss provided an interesting suggestion: "La Ajnejo." I had to ask what it meant, because I wasn't sure, but somebody said it corresponds roughly to "The Whatever Place." Even though I haven't been able to truly grasp the humor in this name, I'm sure it'll grow on me. So you'll now see a link on the left to La Ajnejo.

By the way, "la" is pronounced like the Spanish "la," which also means "the." And "Ajnejo" is pronounced "eye-NAY-oh."

Anyway, I don't really have everything straight there yet, but it exists as a proof of concept. Indeed, you'll see a bilingual "Under Construction" message there right now. (Reminds you of the good old days of the web, doesn't it? At least there's no cheesy animated GIF!) Once I write up something for the site -- probably about my experiences with learning Esperanto -- I'll include everything.

Oh yeah, I know what I should do. Translating About Me and About the Site should be a good start. Thanks, me. I was also thinking incorporating original cartoons. I'm not a good artist, and indeed I haven't doodled anything funny in a very long time, but I think if I tried, it would enrich the Esperanto experience. If that makes sense.

If you have any ideas for what should go on the site, by all means, post a comment.

Speaking of Esperanto, my "evil twin" Eric (who, like me, is a southpaw, Dvorak user, and Esperantist -- not to mention we have the same birthday and live relatively nearby) has started a blog of his own. Check it out: One More Blog. Given our similarities, I can pretty fairly say that if you like this site, you'll like his.

On March 18, 1937, a tragic incident occurred when a gas leak caused the collapse of a school in New London, Texas. Nearly 300 people died. Read more about the New London School Explosion and see pictures and newsreel footage taken after the catastrophic event.