Misplaced Lens Cap

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NASA
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Lint Roller? I Barely Know Her
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@onecynicoptimist
A mesmerizing rendition of the “Song of Hildebrand” - one of the earliest surviving texts in Old High German, dating to the 9th century.
It tells of a father and a son (Hildebrand and Hadubrand) meeting on the battlefield at the head of opposing armies. Hildebrand rode off to the east with the warlord Dietrich (Theoderic) to flee from king Otacher (Odoacer). After many years, he returns home to find his son ruling over his land. Hadubrand, however, doesn’t recognize his own father, believing him to be an impostor and his real father dead. Hildebrand proffers him his band of rings given to him by the “leader of the Huns” and Hadubrand refuses it, calling him “an old Hun” (alter hun - a possible wordplay (Hun and Hund (dog)? Hildebrand's honor code bars him from yielding and he proceeds to fight him. Just as the two clash in single combat, the original text breaks off and we do not know the end of the story, although from the later versions of the legend it is assumed that Hildebrand kills him.
What I find impressive about this from the historical perspective is that even in the early 9th century, the memory of Attila the Hun and Gothic kings (who lived more than three centuries before the poem was written) is still vivid, despite the illiteracy of the population in that period. Not only is the main conflict in this poem reminiscent of that between Luke and Darth Vader (I am your father!), but this motive also appears in Irish, East Slavic and Persian stories, making some consider a common Indo-European origin of this story.
إذا الشعــب يومــا أراد الحيــاة فلا بـــد أن يستجيب القــدر ولا بـــد لليــــل أن ينجلـــي ولابـــــد للقيـــــد أن ينكســـــر ومن لم يعانقــه شــوق الحيــاة تبخــر فــي جوهــا واندثـــر كـــذلك قالــت لــي الكائنــات وحدثنـــي روحهــا المستتـــر If, one day, a people desires to live, then fate will answer their call. And their night will then begin to fade, and their chains break and fall. For he who is not embraced by a passion for life will dissipate into thin air, At least that is what all creation has told me, and what its hidden spirits declare…
From Abu al-Qasim al-Shabi’s If the People Wanted Life One Day (via aishawarma)
philosophers, but they’re cats
One of the most powerful moments I experienced as an ancient history student was when I was teaching cuneiform to visitors at a fair. A father and his two little children came up to the table where I was working. I recognised them from an interfaith ceremony I’d attended several months before: the father had said a prayer for his homeland, Syria, and for his hometown, Aleppo.
All three of them were soft-spoken, kind and curious. I taught the little girl how to press wedges into the clay, and I taught the little boy that his name meant “sun” and that there was an ancient Mesopotamian God with the same name. I told them they were about the same age as scribes were when they started their training. As they worked, their father said to them gently: “See, this is how your ancestors used to write.”
And I thought of how the Ancient City of Aleppo is almost entirely destroyed now, and how the Citadel was shelled and used as a military base, and how Palmyran temples were blown up and such a wealth of culture and history has been lost forever. And there I was with these children, two small pieces of the future of a broken country, and I was teaching them cuneiform. They were smiling and chatting to each other about Mesopotamia and “can you imagine, our great-great-great-grandparents used to write like this four thousand years ago!” For them and their father, it was more than a fun weekend activity. It was a way of connecting, despite everything and thousands of kilometres away from home, with their own history.
This moment showed me, in a concrete way, why ancient studies matter. They may not seem important now, not to many people at least. But history represents so much of our cultural identity: it teaches us where we come from, explains who we are, and guides us as we go forward. Lose it, and we lose a part of ourselves. As historians, our role is to preserve this knowledge as best we can and pass it on to future generations who will need it. I helped pass it on to two little Syrian children that day. They learnt that their country isn’t just blood and bombs, it’s also scribes and powerful kings and Sun-Gods and stories about immortality and tablets that make your hands sticky. And that matters.
Salut! This is the continuation of my first post (here) and will have resources for intermediate learners of french (B1-B2.)
Intermediate (B1-B2)
Textbooks/Guides
bien dit 2 & 3 (scroll down to Bien Dit section)
bon voyage 2, bon voyage 3
open learning intiative french 2
french review (summarises content from several levels)
Intermediate free lessons
Babbel Intermediate (subscription required for repeated use)
french 2 final review
french 3 final review
Vocabulary
bien dit 2 vocabulary
bien dit 3 vocabulary
french 2 vocabulary list
french 3 vocabulary list
space vocabulary
environment vocabulary
supernatural vocabulary
politics vocabulary
music vocabulary
my bien dit tag
advanced phrases
Grammar (there’s going to be a lot of it)
Subjonctif ou indicatif
Y and En (more y and en)
the future tense
direct object pronouns
indirect object pronouns
depuis, il y a, ca fait
reflexive verbs (1) (2) (3)
imparfait or passe compose?
the subjunctive mood (1) (2) (3)
the conditional mood
relative pronouns (relative pronouns with ce)
present participle
demonstrative pronouns
the future perfect (1) (2)
passe simple
past perfect
Sequence of Tenses (indirect discourse)
Reciprocal Verbs
The Imperative
Apporter, amener, emporter and emmener
Verbs followed by à/de and the infinitive
Passive Voice
Supplementary (Videos, Books)
French Youtubers
My fav french youtuber (her french videos are spoken very quickly.)
arte french tv (available as an app!)
tv5monde (also available as an app I believe)
see my previous post for netflix suggestions, and music (Dior and I, War of the Buttons, Marseille, etc.)
Fluentu book recommendations
Harry Potter à L'École des Sorciers
La Stratégie Ender
Et si c’était vrai…
Les Misérables
Le comte de monte-cristo
Thanks again for the suport! If there are any other resources you feel should be added, feel free to contact me (my ask). An updated version of both posts, as well as an Advanced (C1-C2) Resource list will be out sometime in the future.
What would modern technology and social networks look like if they were vintage ads
This is a post gathered Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Skype, iMac, Nintendo Wii and Sony Playstation as if they were vintage ads.
turns out french has just always Been Like That™
knowing six different languages but only at a basic level like
More like nine, but yeah, pretty much this.
Art By SHUXING LI part 2/2
Tips to learn a new language
The 75 most common words make up 40% of occurrences The 200 most common words make up 50% of occurrences The 524 most common words make up 60% of occurrences The 1257 most common words make up 70% of occurrences The 2925 most common words make up 80% of occurrences The 7444 most common words make up 90% of occurrences The 13374 most common words make up 95% of occurrences The 25508 most common words make up 99% of occurrences
(Source: 5 Steps to Speak a New Language by Hung Quang Pham)
This article has an excellent summary on how to rapidly learn a new language within 90 days.
We can begin with studying the first 600 words. Of course chucking is an effective way to memorize words readily. Here’s a list to translate into the language you desire to learn that Derek Roger suggested! :)
EXPRESSIONS OF POLITENESS (about 50 expressions)
‘Yes’ and ‘no’: yes, no, absolutely, no way, exactly.
Question words: when? where? how? how much? how many? why? what? who? which? whose?
Apologizing: excuse me, sorry to interrupt, well now, I’m afraid so, I’m afraid not.
Meeting and parting: good morning, good afternoon, good evening, hello, goodbye, cheers, see you later, pleased to meet you, nice to have met.
Interjections: please, thank you, don’t mention it, sorry, it’ll be done, I agree, congratulations, thank heavens, nonsense.
NOUNS (about 120 words)
Time: morning, afternoon, evening, night; Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday; spring, summer, autumn, winter; time, occasion, minute, half-hour, hour, day, week, month, year.
People: family, relative, mother, father, son, daughter, sister, brother, husband, wife; colleague, friend, boyfriend, girlfriend; people, person, human being, man, woman, lady, gentleman, boy, girl, child.
Objects: address, bag, book, car, clothes, key, letter (=to post), light (=lamp), money, name, newspaper, pen, pencil, picture, suitcase, thing, ticket.
Places: place, world, country, town, street, road, school, shop, house, apartment, room, ground; Britain, name of the foreign country, British town-names, foreign town-names.
Abstract: accident, beginning, change, color, damage, fun, half, help, joke, journey, language, English, name of the foreign language, letter (of alphabet), life, love, mistake, news, page, pain, part, question, reason, sort, surprise, way (=method), weather, work.
Other: hand, foot, head, eye, mouth, voice; the left, the right; the top, the bottom, the side; air, water, sun, bread, food, paper, noise.
PREPOSITIONS (about 40 words)
General: of, to, at, for, from, in, on.
Logical: about, according-to, except, like, against, with, without, by, despite, instead of.
Space: into, out of, outside, towards, away from, behind, in front of, beside, next to, between, above, on top of, below, under, underneath, near to, a long way from, through.
Time: after, ago, before, during, since, until.
DETERMINERS (about 80 words)
Articles and numbers: a, the; nos. 0–20; nos. 30–100; nos. 200–1000; last, next, 1st–12th.
Demonstrative: this, that.
Possessive: my, your, his, her, its, our, their.
Quantifiers: all, some, no, any, many, much, more, less, a few, several, whole, a little, a lot of.
Comparators: both, neither, each, every, other, another, same, different, such.
ADJECTIVES (about 80 words)
Color: black, blue, green, red, white, yellow.
Evaluative: bad, good, terrible; important, urgent, necessary; possible, impossible; right, wrong, true.
General: big, little, small, heavy; high, low; hot, cold, warm; easy, difficult; cheap, expensive; clean, dirty; beautiful, funny (=comical), funny (=odd), usual, common (=shared), nice, pretty, wonderful; boring, interesting, dangerous, safe; short, tall, long; new, old; calm, clear, dry; fast, slow; finished, free, full, light (=not dark), open, quiet, ready, strong.
Personal: afraid, alone, angry, certain, cheerful, dead, famous, glad, happy, ill, kind, married, pleased, sorry, stupid, surprised, tired, well, worried, young.
VERBS (about 100 words)
arrive, ask, be, be able to, become, begin, believe, borrow, bring, buy, can, change, check, collect, come, continue, cry, do, drop, eat, fall, feel, find, finish, forget, give, going to, have, have to, hear, help, hold, hope, hurt (oneself), hurt (someone else), keep, know, laugh, learn, leave, lend, let (=allow), lie down, like, listen, live (=be alive), live (=reside), look (at), look for, lose, love, make, may (=permission), may (=possibility), mean, meet, must, need, obtain, open, ought to, pay, play, put, read, remember, say, see, sell, send, should, show, shut, sing, sleep, speak, stand, stay, stop, suggest, take, talk, teach, think, travel, try, understand, use, used to, wait for, walk, want, watch, will, work (=operate), work (=toil), worry, would, write.
PRONOUNS (about 40 words)
Personal: I, you, he, she, it, we, they, one; myself, yourself, himself, herself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, themselves.
Possessive: mine, yours, his, hers, its, ours, theirs.
Demonstrative: this, that.
Universal: everyone, everybody, everything, each, both, all, one, another.
Indefinite: someone, somebody, something, some, a few, a little, more, less; anyone, anybody, anything, any, either, much, many.
Negative: no-one, nobody, nothing, none, neither.
ADVERBS (about 60 words)
Place: here, there, above, over, below, in front, behind, nearby, a long way away, inside, outside, to the right, to the left, somewhere, anywhere, everywhere, nowhere, home, upstairs, downstairs.
Time: now, soon, immediately, quickly, finally, again, once, for a long time, today, generally, sometimes, always, often, before, after, early, late, never, not yet, still, already, then (=at that time), then (=next), yesterday, tomorrow, tonight.
Quantifiers: a little, about (=approximately), almost, at least, completely, very, enough, exactly, just, not, too much, more, less.
Manner: also, especially, gradually, of course, only, otherwise, perhaps, probably, quite, so, then (=therefore), too (=also), unfortunately, very much, well.
CONJUNCTIONS (about 30 words)
Coordinating: and, but, or; as, than, like.
Time & Place: when, while, before, after, since (=time), until; where.
Manner & Logic: how, why, because, since (=because), although, if; what, who, whom, whose, which, that.
oldboy (2003) dir. chan-wook park