Conversations

With Hans, who lives on my floor in the hostel: The English word "load" is only used in the context of putting stuff onto something portable. You can't load a house, for instance. The corresponding German word is "einladen", but it has no such restrictions. How would you translate into English a German sentence about einladen-ing some furniture into your new home? You'd have to resort to some generic word like "move".

With Ece, an exchange-student friend from Turkey: Her German got as good as it is from attending at a German-language high school. No, they're not at all unusual in Turkey. Weak Turkish high-school students go to trade schools; good ones go to grammar schools, where they get prepared for university. The language of instruction in a grammar school is always something other than Turkish. There's an exam at the end of primary school that determines which type you'll be sent to.

But the exam decides not only what type of high school, but also exactly which -- the best students go to the English-language schools, the next best to the German ones, the next best to French and the very worst good students to (that natural language for slackers,) Spanish.

With Achim, another floor-mate: Yes, Germany has a lot more smokers than New Zealand. (Achim lived in New Zealand last year for six months.) Maybe it's because the New Zealand government (and the Australian and American and British ones too) is a lot more agressively anti-smoking than European ones. The frequency of corner cigarette-machines (like chocolate or Coke machines in New Zealand) might also have something to do with it. Constant temptation's hard to resist.

I also played Mafia in German yesterday night. (This is a cult math-student game of psychological manipulation. At an IMO, you will usually play your first Mafia round within five hours of arrival. It should come as no suprise to hear that my Mafia games here arose during Math Orientation.) I learned a few useful German words ("dead", "detective", "murderer"), but otherwise understood almost nothing.

I was by necessity one of the silent players I always despised in English-language Mafia, who vote when needed but never say a word. On the other hand, it was a great chance for me to test the folk theorem, often cited by those about to make improbable accusations, about it being "not people's words that matter, just their faces and voices . . . ." (Result: It's balderdash.)