Palabras

PALABRAS PALABRAS PALABRAS* the publishing cabin

*units of speech or writing that native speakers of a language usually regard as the smallest isolable

meaningful elements of the language, although linguists would analyse these further into morphemes.

PALABRAS PALABRAS PALABRAS PALABRAS PALABRAS PALABRAS February 2014 Texts: UWC RCN students and staff Editor: Teresa Irigoyen L贸pez Layout and design: Ana Flecha Marco Made in Flekke

PALABRAS PALABRAS PALABRAS

EDITOR’S NOTE Teresa Irigoyen López Spain

I have always enjoyed talking. Yet I was never especially good when it comes to vocabulary in Spanish. So I decided to start playing with words.

I liked breaking up some and joining others to come up with new words, words without meaning, wonderful words! I liked the contrast of words even if I didn’t know what I was doing most of the time. Soon, as it always happens when you really like something, I started having favourites. I liked long words better than short ones. I liked words that only existed in tiny places in the whole planet, maybe only inside a family! Words only pronounceable with a specific accent; words with lots of ‘R’s in them and words with almost no consonants. I think I actually started learning other languages to discover completely new words.

Living in Red Cross Nordic and constantly hearing different languages spoken, made me wonder which were the current and former staff ’s and students’ favourite words. Here are some of their answers; I hope you also enjoy discovering these little treasures accumulated by them in many different languages!

ARABIC ARABIC ‫( يبيبَح‬habibi): it’s not my love, it’s not my dear; it’s something between them.

-Mazen Abu Sharkh, Jordan

‫( ينربقي‬ya’aburnee): it’s basically ‘you bury me’. It’s a declaration of one’s hope that they’ll die before another person, because of how difficult it would be to live without them.

-Athina Sabbag, Lebanon

CHINESE CHINESE 缘分 (yuán fèn): fate or chance that brings people together. A predestined affinity or relationship. Binding-force that links two people together.

-Tim Chong, Hong Kong

CROATIAN Siječanj: January. Literally translated as ‘the period of cutting’, supposedly because some crop was harvested in the month of January.

-Antonio Johman, Croatia

DANISH DANISH Hygge: It is a noun, but it cannot be directly translated and it is hard to capture exactly its meaning, but it means something like comfort or cosiness, a friendly/homely/cosy/cheerful atmosphere. The word can also be used as a verb, and then it means something like: make comfortable. It is used A LOT, like ALL the time in Danish about everything nice. This is what we build our society on! —Okay, maybe not, but is a nice word.

-Frida Videbæk Andersen, Denmark

DUTCH DUTCH Gezellig: the English translation might be ‘cozy’, the Norwegian one ‘koselig’. Dutch peaople I know —and me— feel that you can never catch the real feeling in the translation. Gezellig can be made by creating an atmosphere (een gezellige sfeer) using e.g. candles, a stove etc. But mostly the gezellig (gezelligheid) occurs from the elements being there.

Imagine an evening, a room.Your brother is listening to music (headphones on), your sister is playing with the cat, you are looking up from your book. Your mother is laying the table, while you just can see your father preparing some food.

-Leonie Merts-Koning, The Netherlands

ENGLISH ENGLISH Abstract: I love what it means and it has four consonants in a row, which is not very common.

-Mateo Dupleich, Bolivia

Cellar Door: from Donnie Darko: someone once said the most beautiful English phrase is ‘Cellar Door.’

I looked up the history on this and in Phonaesthetics (how words sound without regard for semantics) ‘Cellar Door’ is often referred to as a most musical and soft toned phrase. It is said that it is Edgar Allen Poe’s favorite phrase and that Nevermore from his poem The Raven is the closest sound he could get to Cellar Door to create a similar musical sound.

-Onyx Bengston, USA

Contrariwise: in the opposite way or order. The phonetics of the word themselves almost make a U-turn when you say them out loud; very fitting for a word that means to go on in the opposite direction.

-Brandon Mok, Hong Kong

Family: to me, the word in itself contains many other words such as love, care, laughter, home. Anyone can be included in your family list and, once you know who they are, they’re usually the ones who bring you warmth and companionship. They can be a best friend. They are the ones who call you once every 10 minutes when you are 5km away, but rarely call you when you are 9,150 km away. This means something.

-Vann Ky, Cambodia

Lalochezia: emotional relief gained by using indecent or vulgar language.

The consonants themselves leave a very satisfying sensation as they roll off the tip of your tongue.

-Brandon Mok, Hong Kong

Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis: a lung disease caused by the inhalation of very fine sand and ash dust (mostly volcanic silica ash dust). It was coined to serve as the longest English word and is the longest word ever to appear in an English language dictionary.

This word was invented in 1935 by Everett M. Smith, president of the National Puzzlers’ League, at its annual meeting. The word figured in the headline for an article published by the New York Herald Tribune on February 23, 1935, titled “Puzzlers Open 103d Session Here by Recognizing 45-Letter Word”.

-Robert Bob Okello, Uganda

Serendipity: the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way. Serendipity sums up what I love most about life, especially here at RCN. -Jenny Kenyon, USA

Supererogatory: unnecessary. Ironic for a word that’s unnecessarily long and hard to pronounce.

-Brandon Mok, Hong Kong

FINNISH Viili: is a kind of milk product, something in between sour cream and quark. One eats it with muesli, jam, sugar, cinnamon or fruits on top. Viili is extremely healthy and the taste is addicting.

I like the way it feels when you pronounce it, soft on your tongue and sort of flows out of your mouth. When the last ‘i’ is extended, the word becomes an object instead of subject. Putting a weigh on the ‘l’ transforms the word to mean wild!

-Ria Feldt, Finland

GERMAN GERMAN Wanderlust: it is an inner urge or desire to travel and explore the world.

The destination doesn’t really play an important role, so one could also see it as just the desire to stroll around. Wanderlust is originally a German word, which has been adapted to the English language. However, I would say that the meaning and connotations Wanderlust has in German, are not the same as in English. I really like this word, because it reflects this never resting curiosity, longing to see distant places, and open-mindedness, which are also closely linked to the values of UWC. -Leonore Wünsche, Germany

GREEK GREEK Fιλóτιμο: ‘friend of honour’ or ‘love of honour’. It is the highest of all Greek virtues and determines how someone should behave in their family and social groups. In its simpliest form, it means ‘doing good’ and it ensures your behaviour will stand out from others’.

-Christina Pavlaki, Greece

GUARANI GUARANI Ñe'emombyryha ohóva inimboatãre: probably the longest word in Guarani. It means telephone.

-Nadia Romero Nardelli, Paraguay

LATVIAN LATVIAN Kāpšļumurslis: a late passenger in public transport that is stuck between the closing doors of the bus. Šeptiņš: small job (like going from your room to kantina, brushing your teeth, etc.)

NEPALI NEPALI

-Emíls Sietiņš, Latvia

रवुचिङ (khu ching): This is a Nepali word that probably cannot be translated in any language as it is even hard to explain. It is used especially by children. It can be used both in a positive and a negative way. This word is used when someone does a mistake even after being aware of the situation. Sometimes people use it just to tease the one in that situation, but sometimes it also used to show one’s satisfaction for seeing others suffer. We have an action that we do together with the word.

-Lakpa Lama, Nepal

NORWEGIAN NORWEGIAN Døgn: one consecutive night and day, 24 hours.

Lumsk: cheeky and smart and not nice. Kind of sly, I guess. Can also be used about tricky weather that MIGHT come.

Skiføre: condition of the snow in relation to skiing.

Vemod: kind of a sullen feeling mixed with regret, used a lot in Norwegian literature I like most of these words because they accurately describe things and events that occur a lot in Norwegian climate and culture. Døgn for example is different than day, because in parts of Norway there is no “day” in terms of sunlight and dark, because they have sun for 24 hours straight during summer and 24 hours straight without sun in the winter. Anyone who lives in Flekke might also relate to the lumsk weather (typically fog that comes gradually).

-Astrid Brakstad, Norway

POLISH POLISH Załatwić: if you open a bilingual dictionary, there will a translation. It would probably say ‘to take care of ’, ‘handle’ or ‘relieve oneself ’ (sic!). But for me załatwić is a great linguistic reflection of Polish mentality.

I will ‘załatwię’ this —I will use my connections, bribe a few people, manipulate emotions and do other things that would be inappropriate in any politically correct environment, but be sure I will handle this and it will be done soon.

-Marcin Jerzewski, Poland

Żółć: the meaning is not particularly exciting, as it means yellow or bile (sic!), but this is the only word consisting solely of Polish letters.

-Marcin Jerzewski, Poland

PORTUGUESE PORTUGUESE Saudade: in Portuguese, saudade is a noun and it indicates the feeling of missing someone, something, some place, or pretty much anything. It is usually a fond memory of a person, place, or whatever, that is currently far away from where you are (and that you obviously wish was closer), or that is, perhaps, gone or dead.

I moved out of my parents’ when I was 16, and ever since I have lived in many places and met many people, and came to love everything along the way. In the process, I left a piece of myself with every person, animal, and place I love, and so I live in constant feeling of saudade, without ever being capable of gathering all that I love in one place only. If I’m in my hometown I have my family and my childhood friends, but I don’t have the ocean, nor the high school friends, nor the other friends, nor all the places that I have lived and loved, and so on. And yet, it is a comforting feeling, because the memory of something or someone also makes you feel closer to it/him/her.

-Rita Melo Franco Santos

RUSSIAN нравственность (nravstvennost): it doesn’t have a direct translation in English. The only closest word is morality, however nravstvennost means “inner disposition of an individual to act in accordance with one’s conscience and free will, as compared to ‘morality’, which alongside with the law, is an external demand to behaviour of an individual”.

-Julia Makayova, Belarus

SPANISH Cacharro: old, damaged or malfunctioning appliance.

-Andrés Caicedo Sierra, Colombia

Duende: although the word refers to a goblin-like creature in Spanish mythology, when used with the verb tener (to have), it actually refers to a specific emotion or feeling. It is mostly used in the arts, especially flamenco, to describe the emotional state in which one is after experiencing a very expressive artistic performance. Duende is what makes you cry, gives you the chills or makes you smile.

-Teresa Irigoyen López, Spain

Esternocleidomastoideo: Sternocleidomastoid. It is a muscle found at the sides of the neck.

I have a passion for long, hard words, and it took me around a week to learn this word at age 7.

-Augusto Bravo Ballón, Peru

Hueva: that feeling one has when he or she does not want to do anything.

That same feeling you get when you have been working to much. That same feeling that makes you want to be in bed all day long. That is hueva.

-Carlos Escobar Fuentes, El Salvador

Jaleo: jaleo is the feel of the Spanish streets (outside siesta time). It is a bit like racket, a bit like a hassle; it is confusing and noisy, but not aggressive.

A playful mess.

-Ana Flecha Marco, Spain

SWEDISH SWEDISH Lagom: a typical Swedish word, which is used in various situations. It can be translated moderate or decent. It’s not too good, nor too bad. Not too much, not too little. It’s just enough, but at the same time it is a little bit more than ok.

If you want to describe the weather where you’re currently at and you think that the warmth is just enough to make you feel comfortable, describe it as lagom. If someone is serving food for you, and they ask how much you would like to have, you may answer: Lagom.

Sweden is even sometimes called ‘Landet lagom’ or in English ‘The country of lagom’.

-Julia Romare & Sara Löwgren, Sweden

THAI ความสุข: it means happiness. I like this word because it is the aim of human life. I think it is one of the most important reasons of everything that I have done until now.

-Noot Koonrungsesomboon, Thailand

VIETNAMESE Hạnh phúc: it’s happiness, because no matter what language it is in, the word happiness reminds me of the purpose of my life.

-Nghiem Huynh, Vietnam

WELSH Hiraeth: a homesickness for a home to which you cannot return, a home that maybe never was; the nostalgia, the yearning, the grief for the lost places of your past.

-Cerren Richards, Wales

Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch: St Mary’s church in the hollow of the white hazel near to the fierce whirlpool and the church of St Tysilio of the red cave.

-Cerren Richards, Wales

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