• 0 Posts
  • 21 Comments
Joined 3 years ago
Cake day: June 16th, 2023
  • isyasad@lemmy.worldtoMildly Infuriating@lemmy.world•The price of soda in 2017English
    0·
    6 days ago

    I looked it up before making my comment and couldn’t find any info about what % of Americans drink water, only info about average volume of water consumption and average volume of soft drink consumption.

    You are right that there is a problem in North America with soft drink vs water consumption and it sounds like you know more about it than I do. I only called out your original statement that “most don’t even drink water” because it seems like a huge stretch beyond what the research I was able to find can actually support. The idea that >50% of people in America don’t drink water regularly or ever still seems absurd to me. I struggle to think you even believe it yourself.

  • isyasad@lemmy.worldtoNo Stupid Questions@lemmy.world•How are there people who don't know Alaska and Hawaii are states?
    4·
    6 days ago

    I took a college class once about early childhood development. We were looking at a map of countries colored based on how much paid maternal leave is required to be provided. There were only two countries on the map with 0 required.

    Person sitting on my right: I should really know the name of that other country [looking at Papua New Guinea]

    Me: Yeah I don’t remember right now but I knew it was just the US and one other country. I really should know the name I just forgot it right now…

    Person sitting on my left: Yeah I’ve never seen it before… Is it part of Canada or something?

    Me: … That one?

    Left: Yeah

    Me: That’s Alaska

    Left: Haha. Wait really? Are you sure?

    Me: 🤨

    True story that took place at a USA university

  • isyasad@lemmy.worldtoMildly Interesting@lemmy.world•Japan Is Building Cardboard Suicide Drones
    181·
    4 months ago

    You’re basically right. The kami in origami means paper 紙 while the kami in kamikaze means god 神. That doesn’t mean you couldn’t make a pun about it, but the more fundamental problem is that kamikaze does not mean “suicide attack” in Japanese. The actual word for it is tokkou 特攻, a euphemism that means “special attack”.
    Kamikaze originally refers to this historical event where a “divine wind” protected Japan from invasion. The term was later used in relation to suicide attacks, but I think tokkou is the word that’s more commonly associated with the WW2 suicide attacks in Japanese and kamikaze has kept its original definition.

  • isyasad@lemmy.worldtoNo Stupid Questions@lemmy.world•How do I become a sea boat worker
    1·
    4 months ago

    Reminds me of the beginning of Moby Dick

    Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people’s hats off—then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can. This is my substitute for pistol and ball. With a philosophical flourish Cato throws himself upon his sword; I quietly take to the ship. There is nothing surprising in this. If they but knew it, almost all men in their degree, some time or other, cherish very nearly the same feelings towards the ocean with me.

  • isyasad@lemmy.worldtoNo Stupid Questions@lemmy.world•Do YOU consider Kanji difficult?
    9·
    5 months ago

    I’ve been studying Japanese for almost six years now and I would say YES kanji is difficult, but it’s not insurmountable. It’s also one of the most interesting and fulfilling parts of learning the language.
    There’s a certain level of “you have to know the rules before you know how to break the rules” but kanji can often be used in interesting nonstandard ways in literature & manga and just in general carry so much meaning and depth.
    There’s always something new to learn. Did you know that there’s another version of 探す (to search) that has a slightly different connotation? 探す is usually used to search for something you want, but 捜す is used to search for something that’s missing.

    By the way, do we have a Japanese learning community on Lemmy?

  • isyasad@lemmy.worldtoNo Stupid Questions@lemmy.world•Do YOU consider Kanji difficult?
    4·
    5 months ago

    Depends on what you mean by “similar”. If you’re looking for the right thing, there are often a lot of phonetic hints in kanji.

    For example, 矢 and 夫 sound completely different, totally unrelated. These are pretty basic kanji though; I think it’s analogous to how O and Q are totally different, or i and j.

    If there’s more complex similarities though, then yeah there can be an implied phonetic relationship. Look at: 同胴洞銅恫桐粡. These can all be pronounced the same: どう (dou). Though, many of them have kunyomi readings that are totally unrelated.

  • isyasad@lemmy.worldtoMildly Infuriating@lemmy.world•Especially the Ø...English
    4·
    1 year ago

    “Learn” and “bird” are pronounced very differently depending on the accent of English. Wiktionary has “learn” RP pronunciation listed as lɜːn and American as lɝn, although personally I don’t believe in ɝ so I would write it as lɹn and bɹd.

    Slight rant about American English IPA, but Wiktionary even has American “bird” listed as bɜɹd, which is frankly ridiculous. Say bɜɹd out loud and it sounds absolutely insane. Be’rd. Nobody says bɜɹd, it’s gotta be bɹd. English spelling treats R as a consonant, but American English functionally treats it like a vowel. If we spelled with R the same way it’s pronounced, it would be brd, lrn, teachr, wrking, etc. Not suggesting a spelling reform, because the current system works so well for uniting different accents of English, but it seriously bugs me when people talk about how American R (ɹ) is a consonant. It’s not!