Lots of languages are non-syntactic, where there is no word order…Russian, Finnish, Arabic, Farsi…they’re all very harsh on the ear. Arabic, for example, is one of the most beautiful written languages in the world, but hearing it spoken is like nails on a chalkboard.
Arabic absolutely requires word order. And unsurprisingly, I disagree on its sonority. Gulf Arabic is quite harsh, true, but Levantine and Maghrebi Arabic is quite lovely to the ear.
The languages that don’t require word order are as a rule the highly declined languages.
I’ve never heard Arabic that wasn’t full of hard consonant acking and hacking. It’s worse than two Germans arguing. But my experience in the Levant is frankly non-existent, so I’ll defer on their smooth lilt.
You should quit traveling to Kuwait during cold and flu season.
Which reminds me…years ago, before COVID, Ty asked me to get him one of those cheesy little statues of the Burj Khalifa. I picked one up in Dubai, but then all hell broke loose. I still have it, waiting for the opportunity to give it to him.
Why the hell are you telling me about it?
You know what, though, that reminds me. If you ever fly EVA again, let me know. I would be forever in your debt if you could snag a Hello Kitty model plane for my son who is an airplane fanatic who especially loves that plane. I understand that the airline makes those available only to customers who fly the routes where the planes are in service.
But one day a couple of years ago we were in Chicago messing around in a park and one of the EVA Hello Kitty planes passed overhead as it was landing. My son was messing around on some juegito as he calls them or another and he looked up to take in the plane that he heard like he always does, registered it as a Hello Kitty plane, and then calmly went back about his business as if you see this plane every day. Weird little dude, that guy.
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Just random musings.
I will absolutely pick one up if I can. I’ve flown that plane a few times. Even the barf bags have Hello Kitty on them. It’s kind of disturbing. There is also a Hello Kitty shrine in Taoyuan, so I’ll look, if/when I’m that way again.
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So back to the sci-fi TV…
On reflection, the Mando finale doesn’t hold up to even “okay”.
Season-long spoilers:
They established very clearly that the jet packs have a limited amount of fuel during the foundling rescue. But then Ax has enough fuel to launch himself into orbit??
The Aftermath books (which are canon) established that the crash of a Star Destroyer devastated the entire surface of Jakku. But crashing a light cruiser creates an impact small enough that Grogu can Force-shield them from it?
And they gave so many head fakes to one of the Mandalorians betraying their own - even calling the penultimate episode “The Spies”, plural emphasized - that the lack of a turn was noticeable. But if you’re not delivering on that, then its very absence should be important, which it just wasn’t.
All in all, the season featured sloppy writing that clearly showed Filoni didn’t have his eye on this particular ball.
Persian requires word order as well.
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No wonder I’ve struggled with both.
MM… I love you, buddy.
But Jesus Christ, tap your nerd brakes.
Wrong thread to say something like that.
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While I have no recollection of this, if you were to tell me today you were going to Dubai I’d ask you to get me one so it tracks. AWESOME!
I noticed the jet pack thing too. They’re like the hero’s gun: never needs loading as it only runs out when it’s plot-convenient.
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Nothing incapsulated my understanding of Latvian quite like my tutor explaining that while there was no set order of words in a sentence, nobody would have any fucking clue what I was saying because nobody would say it that way.
I then reiterated that I could order another drink, the bill, and ask for the key to the bathroom.
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The goddamn Latvians aint got nothin to do with it
I liked the finale to Mandalorian. The big battle scene with the diving Mandalorians and the rising storm troopers was just like watching Thunderball the first time.
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Oh thank God it’s back.
Got to be hard to come up with stuff that’s more fucked up and dystopian than reality.