From: kristine soerygfsh@illumia-rpg.comOddly, this reminds me of my second Russian language class. I was about to enter a graduate history program in Russian History, and I needed a reading knowledge of Russian. So, I took 5 back-to-back courses at the University of Toronto, and then hired a private tutor with two former classmates for several months.
hello, I am pretty russian girl, bored tonight.
would you like to chat with me and see my pics?
if so then email me at ekristine2@mefindhome.info
Class number 2 featured a bookish, balding, and somewhat emaciated dude with thick glasses. He had just received his mail-order Russian bride in the mail. I wondered if she came in a plain brown wrapper, or if the words "Russian Bride" were printed on the box for all to see. Perhaps there was a Russian bride warehouse.
OK, so not really: you couldn't send a person through the mail, especially a Russian bride, because I think that the temptation would have been too much for all of those postal workers, and the box would have been opened long before these men ever received their packages. In fact, I would suspect that many such packages would be lost in the mail.
Back to the story: the man's new Russian friend spoke not one word of English. Well, I think she could say hello and goodbye, but I am not entirely sure. So, he diligently sat there, every week, regretting the lack of a present tense of the verb "to be," learning relevant vocabulary, like "meat salad", "autobus," "escalator," "elevator," "toaster," and phrases like "my neighbour is an eccentric," "I need a doctor," "I like to swim in the Volga River," "how many hours is it," and "when I was a little boy, I liked to play chess."
All of this reminds me that Khrushchev's famous phrase "We will bury you" is open to re-evaluation. The poor translator had to translate on-the-fly, and, if he had time to reflect, he probably would have come up with something like: "We will leave you in our dust," which has an entirely different meaning, if you ask me. In other words, I don't believe that Khrushchev said what we think he said.
Happy Friday.
Technorati Tags: Russian, languages, Khrushchev, spam
16 comments:
Lay off the postal worker jokes.
That was good ZF. I have to say I was getting those kinds of e-mails all the time. And you know what I tried responding to one once because they were harrassing my husband and when I responded to the e-mail given it wasnt an e-mail at all. LOL... But I have to say is since we switced internet providers we havent had as much junk mail as we did before. I like this provider much better.
R42K: that was the last one. I promise :-)
I get a lot of emails like this at work. Ha!
zf,
oh, Russian brides! This post was timely because I recently learned that many Pleasantville professors have or have had foreign wives and because the guy I am currently seeing seems to know a suspicious number of Russian women. hmmmmmm. He speaks Russian, too. Should I worry?
Liz: Interesting factoids. Yes, I think you should worry :-)
zf,
Don't tell me to worry unless I really should. I'm insecure.
OK, seriously now, I think you have nothing to worry about, unless there is something to worry about :-) Honestly, I think you have nothing to worry about, but I don't know this dude.
Why is it always Russian mail order brides? You don't hear a lot about Italian mail order brides or Brazillian mail order brides. And what about mail order husbands?
Not all of the Pleasantville foreign wives are Russian. Actually, Asian women seem to be popular with the men of Pleasantville U.
As for RB & the Russians ... I don't think that having a lot of female friends that he describes as cute little Russian girls is a problem--oh, wait, yes that does sound like a problem. Let me go home and fret about this.
Funny, most of my spam seems to zero in on my penis, and its lack of , er, girth.
People. Some weird stuff goin gon here. LOL.. My husband and I have a russian friend that had to marry an american girl to stay in the United States. Hes nice but just plain weird. I have to say I dont know if they know what a shower is over there but he stinks or just doesnt know how to take care of himself.LOL.. Really though. Hes nice. Just a stinky fellow.
Ooo...gotta love those Sexy Russian Ladies emails...sent by some guy in Turkey :)
Well, maybe there are lonely Russian girls in Turkey too :-)
maybe there are lonely russian man-girls in turkey
Liz: that's a fascinating thought.
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