Archive for 'language'
Defense Against the Dark Arts! Posted by Rob on Nov 6, 2012
[Note: This post was originally written for Хеллуин, but as already mentioned, the arrival of Hurricane Sandy caused some power outages and delays…] In the Harry Potter books, “Defense against the Dark Arts” is a mandatory class for Hogwarts students, and in the Russian editions, it was straightforwardly translated as “Защита от тёмных искусств.” And…
Russian Halloween – Reading the School of Horrors Posted by yelena on Nov 1, 2012
I wasn’t going to do a Halloween post this year. Instead, Rob was going to talk about Russian verbs that can come quite handy around Halloween time. But it looks like, thanks to Hurricane Sandy, Rob was left without electricity and Internet access and was not able to post yesterday. Hopefully him and his…
Getting Through a Hurricane Posted by yelena on Oct 30, 2012
As I am writing this, much of the Восточное побережье США (East Coast of the USA) is getting through ураган “Сэнди” (hurricane Sandy). It is expected to be one of the worst шторм (storm) on record as it plows through крупные города (large cities) of the East Coast, including Вашингтон, Нью-Йорк и Филадельфия. It might…
Karaoke in Russian (or at least “faking it”) Posted by Rob on Oct 29, 2012
Pick the correct song lyrics: ♪♫ Those were the days, my friend, we thought they’d never end… ♪♫ ♪♫ Дорогой длинною и ночью лунною… ♪♫ ♪♫ Try our ge-fil-te fish, it’s such a ta-sty dish… ♪♫ In fact, all three lines — along with many other variants in dozens of languages — have been sung…
Fall Clothes, Foul Weather Posted by yelena on Oct 23, 2012
It is definitely autumn now. The nights are finally довольно холодные (pretty cold) and the days are chilly too. And it is starting to rain more often. So it is time to put away летняя одежда (summer clothing) and get out… what? Well, it’s not quite cold enough for зимняя одежда (winter clothing) such as…
Presidential Debates in Russian Posted by yelena on Oct 18, 2012
First, a disclaimer is in order – this is NOT a post about politics, but about how to talk about politics. Of course, as the saying goes, приличные люди о политике не говорят (well-mannered people do not discuss politics). Then again, rules change. It used to be that разговоры о сексе (conversations about sex) were…
There’s a chill in the air… Posted by Rob on Oct 15, 2012
Осень пришла (“fall has arrived”), at least officially, and at least for those of us на северном полушарии (“in the Northern hemisphere”). Двадцать второго сентября было равноденствие (“The 22nd of September was the equinox”). Cмотря где живёшь, ещё не очень холодно днём. (“Depending on where you live, it’s still not very cold during the day.”)…