OT: City Names

From: Geoff Roberts <geoffrob_at_stmarks.pp.catholic.edu.au>
Date: Thu Apr 15 13:58:52 1999

----- Original Message -----
From: Hans Franke <Hans.Franke_at_mch20.sbs.de>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp_at_u.washington.edu>
Sent: Friday, April 16, 1999 3:31 AM
Subject: Re: OT: City Names


> > > Just back from Warschau (Poland) - Thanks. And BTW: since Karfreitag
>
> > Where? Oh, you mean Warszawa. Warsaw. ;-)
>
> (You're just lucky that's one of the few polish words without lots of
> accents etc.) Hmm do you want to start another War ? ;)
>
> If you live in a city like Munich you learn about the ways
> of naming a city - and of coure how senseless it is to
> belive in calling a thin worldwide with one single name.

Well, maybe you could explain it to me, I'm afraid I don't get it. :^)
I always wondered why Munich sometimes gets shown as Munchen. I can't do
those funny accented characters, (umlauts?) even if I knew what they meant,
just as well, most people around here have enough difficulty with 26
letters. I don't know how you guys cope with all the extras, not to mention
all this masculine/feminine/neuter gender and case stuff. Confused the hell
out of me.

> > > to find out that I had no Swiss power adaptor at hand (thy use a
> > > different connector)...

Good things about living in a single island country that's larger than most
of Europe.

1) Everybody speaks English. ('Cepting a few migrants/boat people....:^)
They expose kids to other languages at school, but theres is no real
need/pressure to learn one to a level where conversation is possible.
(Who we gonna practice on/talk to?)
Some do learn Indonesian or Japanese, but most don't bother.
2) You don't need a passport to drive across the road. Or travel 2000km for
that matter.
3) 240VAC 3 pin sockets are a national standard.

Disadvantages are mostly that we can't get feel of other European cultures
without flying a few thousand miles. I can't drive to another country. I
sometimes envy you guys for that, heck I don't even have a passport, there's
nowhere for me to use without an air ticket. I'd love to travel, Europe,
the USA etc, but on my income, it's unlikely I will ever get overseas, and I
don't have the kind of job or work for a company that would need me to do
so. I could probably manage a trip to Indonesia one day, (about the same
distance as Sydney to Perth) but the tropics don't really attract me, it
gets hot enough around here.;^)
CNN is about the nearest I get. Upside is that I can now read most of the
Cyrillic alphabet after 4 weeks of watching snippets of Serbian TV news
subtitles!
(Well I can read Belgrad(e) Pristina and Novi Sad anyway)

Cheers

Geoff Roberts
VK5KDR
Computer Systems Manager
Saint Marks College
Port Pirie, South Australia
geoffrob_at_stmarks.pp.catholic.edu.au
Received on Thu Apr 15 1999 - 13:58:52 BST