Rambling Etymology Part 1

Note: So, I have been MIA here for the past week or two, but I have been writing. So this is part of a series I'm playing around with- language. These lines are mostly filler, until I go on my next adventure. 

Language has always been a fascination of mine. This can expand from non-verbal to verbal communication and all the way to languages and dialect. In unpacking my boxes, I realized I have a schizophrenic (or just ADHD) consumption of languages. In the first picture you can see 5 languages represented- Latin, Spanish, German, Tibetan, and Hindi.

In this second picture, you can see workbooks for several languages as well. Do you think I can read or speak any of these languages? Not really. At one point my German was good enough to order and provide bare communication while in Germany. I taught myself German through books and audio tapes. In undergraduate, I was taking Spanish because they only offered Spanish and French and I took 2 years of Spanish in high school- let logic take you to the conclusion.

It is important to understand that I was taking Spanish, but teaching myself German simultaneously for this story.

I was touring Europe and ended up in Zweibrüken. This is a small town in West Germany, near Saarbrüken. I had been ordering food and saying simple things in German at this time- feeling confident in my spoken German.

After getting a room, I went to the bathroom and the light broke. Full of pride and confidence, I strolled to the front office. In this small town, I’ll speak their language and show them that not all Americans are mono-linguist idiots. To a group of three Germans having a conversation, I started, “Das licht kaput en . . . el baño.” Laughter ensued. I was embarrassed. Of course, immediately, I remembered it was “bathezimmer” not “el baño,” but by then it was too late.

I have a knack of allowing my pomposity to be followed by foolishness.

There are various reasons for the languages that I have chosen, but there are actually intersections. The most obvious is that Spanish is a derivative from Latin, as are French and Italian. English (which I speak and write only slightly better than the other languages) is a derivative of the Indo-Germanic languages- not Latin. The most interesting connection, to me, is that of Tibetan and Hindi. In their written form they come from the same root- Sanskrit.

We will stop there for now.

Until I ramble on again . . .