French | French
Jan.29.2013
Lions, lions everywhere... no kidding. People love lions. The ancient Jews loved lions. Jacob, one of the patriarchs of the Jews was referred to as a lion in the Book of Genesis. The lion became the symbol of the Israelite tribe of Jacob's son Judah so Judah also signifies lion. In times of...
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Nov.22.2012
Gizmag had another interesting article about a new vending machine. Craig Small has created a vending machine to sell used books. Put two dollars in and the machine will randomly dispense a used book.
Now, I like the idea of a vending machine that sells used books for two dollars. I don...
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Oct.28.2012
My train from Brussels pulled into La Gare du Nord the day before Bastille Day, 1992. I was parched from oohing and aahing over the countryside, and at last, the city I had dreamed about all during my college art history classes.
I couldn't believe I was there at last, and all on my own. My first-...
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Oct.25.2012
I went to France for the first time in the fall several months after graduating from high school to live with my older sister and her French husband in the suburb of Paris, a small town on the Orge River with a direct train to Paris. I enrolled at a language school in Paris for four months and...
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Oct.18.2012
I’ve always loved languages – starting with English – and I couldn’t wait until I had an opportunity to learn a new language at school. For me that opportunity didn’t come until ninth grade.
But instead of opting to study a romance language I took my father’s advice to study Latin. After all Latin...
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Oct.14.2012
“S and I got engaged!” I announced to my family, just before my second year at university, showing off my emerald and diamond ring.
My grandmother did not miss a bit. “Congratulations, my sunbeam! Does he speak any languages?”
“No.”
“Oh, dear,” she said, her smile waning. “His family...
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Oct.13.2012
The Revolution
Why don’t we do it in the road?
Honey, I don’t grasp articles—
why’s my chair feminine, wall masculine?
Stones.
Why is face masculine,
mouth mine?
Yours....
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Oct.11.2012
When I was eight, in 1963, my family spent a year in a French village where I was immured daily in a one-room schoolhouse with 20 French-speaking children and an iron-fisted but loving maitresse who knew only the words yes, non, and sank ewe verry mooch. At home, I read Tartine comic books, and...
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Oct.11.2012
This is not going to be one of my literary blogs. This is nuts-and-bolts advice. It's about how to learn to read in a foreign language in just one month. Maybe you'll find the story inspirational. But I mean to deliver strictly practical ideas for anyone trying to master a language.
The master's...
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Aug.17.2012
After re-reading Jane Eyre, I decided I should read Shirley since it was right there in my bookcase tempting me. I almost quit sooner than I did a few years ago when I started this second novel of Charlotte Bronte. The foreword warned me accurately that the book sometimes dragged. That...
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