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Thursday
28 October 99
6 29 am edt
That wonderful phenomenon known as jet lag has got me up at six in the
morning after about three hours of sleep. I can't really complain,
for I can stay in bed all day long if my heart desires (and it probably
will, though I will hopefully motivate to go to the market).
My trip to France with my father was so fantastic. My only
complaints are that we got drenched the day we saw the gardens at
Villandry in the rain, which I think made my dad unhappy, and I didn't
really get to go shopping at all. I would have oved to have prowled
some vintage clothing stores in Paris, browse antiques, glance around a
French supermarket (supermarché), and expecially I would have loved
to have popped into a music store and come home with some samples of
French music. I did do a good amount of listening to the radio (and
was surprised that most stations played a mix of French and American
music).
8 48 am edt
So, besides catching up on mailing list
e-mail this morning, I am enjoying a perusal of my new map. My dad kindly purchased a map of Europe
for me in France when he picked up a tour book. I know I've made
this gripe once before, but I cannot stand that we call places by
different names than they call themselves. When I opened up
my map, I was so delighted to see Warszawa and Roma. It is so wrong
to me. I'm still undecided on names that mean something (like
calling The United States Los Estatos Udidos, and translating words like
Republic, New, and Great [I love to refer to my current state of residence
as Nueva York]).
So, to my delight, I am now in possession of a map of Europe in the
languages the courtries use for themselves, instead of in English.
I really wish I had gotten a world map too! The countries are all
identified by those stickers people put on their cars for different places
(like GB for Great Britain), and then there is a little section where
they list the "real" name of the country as well as it's name in various
languages [for example, Slovenská Republika,
République Slovaque, Slovak Republic, Slowakische Republik].
So as part of my gripe on misnaming countries, how did we get Albania for
Shqipëria, Austria for Österreich, Greece for Elláda,
Croatia for Hrvatska, or Hungary for Magyarország? And the
whole Nippon instead of Japan thing... that was a surprise to learn.
How hard would it be to say Meheeco instead of Mexico? Ok,
enough...