Writing Wrongs

May 24, 2007

Booking Through Thursday

Here�s an idea from Julie:


I had an idea for a BTT question when I was taking a peek at one of my bookcases yesterday and spotted my old copy of the Aeneid in Latin sitting there. Maybe this question has already been done--but if not � Do you have any foreign language books and if so can you (still) read them?

I do. I have a ton of books from when studying Russian in college (it was my major). I kept nearly every single one. I still have my Russian/English dictionaries, all +5 of them. Lots of books with penciled definitions above words and scrawled explanations to idioms in the margins.

Can I still read them? Uh, not really. I could pull out a text book, reacquaint myself with the language and start up again, I�m sure. I�ve done it before.

I took German all during high school and some college. I quit when I reached the level where I could read Kafka.

Seriously, I quit when I started confusing the Russian and the German. I�d sit for a Russian exam and could only remember things in German and vise versa. Way back in the day, when I was stationed in Germany, I took a trip to Russia.

Back in Darmstadt, I went out to eat. I opened my mouth to order in German, and out came an unholy union of three languages. The waiter looked at me like I was insane. I hung my head in shame and ordered in English.

To this day, I blame Kafka.

Charity Tahmaseb wrote at 9:22 a.m.

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