Just wanted to write and say we got our blog figured out... as for now. I had been posting on what I thought was our blog, but it turned out to be a pseudo-blog. So, I've copied and pasted the last 4 blog posts (which are the most recent) here. I hope you enjoy them.
My goal is to have some humor to start your week off. Each Monday the hope is to have a blog segment called "Monday: Lost in Translation" which will feature some goofy English translations of various words and phrases. This isn't to demean the culture or people here, but to show that language is a difficult barrier to overcome and, as a language student, I am right in the middle of that every day.
Today's version is to catch up on that which I've failed to post in the past. Emjoy!
Today my girls and I were learning about Mexico. I shared with them that both Aaron and I used to study Spanish. We both spent years in both high school and college learning Spanish. Now it's difficult to remember anything beyond "Hola" and a few colors and numbers. Mandarin has used up most of the language area of our brains. One of the more challenging aspects of living as a foreigner in another country is learning the language. Language is not just grammar and vocabulary; a language exists in a culture, it has a context. There is a way of calling someone an idiot here that is just a series of numbers, a series of numbers that you would surely use when bargaining. If you don't remember to use a different name for the numeral "2" in the number, you will offend the shopkeeper. I can know the vocabulary but if I don't understand the context then I miscommunicate. We have a store of language bloopers, so many that it's hard to re...
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