Just in case that one or more of my dear readers are in Brussels at or around the 7th of July (= Saturday next week), and you do not know what to do with your day/evening, there is one event I can definitely advise you: The German-Austrian Summer-Soccer-Stagiaires’ Party**
* This is no spam post
** To be political correct, this party is officially called the Austrian-German party but since it is a football party, I mean… You see what I mean, don’t you?
Posted in La puce enchantée
Something I always regret after doing it is reading first a critic and than watching the film. I go than more or less consciously with a negative attitude in the film thinking more about what is not so good instead of just enjoying it. And, instead of making up my own opinion about the film I stick to what others think. Actually, for films I am really interested in, I try hard not to read the critics but for someone as curious as me that is a very hard thing to do.
What I really wanted to do today is to write about Shrek III but I realised that my opinion was far too much influenced by what I read before about it. So all I can say is that I spend a good moment in the cinema laughing most of the time despite everything I read before and I thought after it.
Future advice to myself: Ne pas oublier pour la prochaine fois…
Posted in Ce qui pense la puce, N'importe quoi
I am still thinking about language. For me, every language I have some command of has it’s own character. I cannot speak English in the same way I do with Spanish or with French. The different languages require somehow a different attitude towards it and the range of topics which can be best addressed with them is slightly different from one to the other. If you see what I mean…
So the main character I would attribute in a completely personal and arbitrary way would be the following:
If I may shortly explain: French is the best language to chat about tout et n’importe quoi just because it sounds good. English is a language for Gentleman especially if they have this cute British accent while Spanish is not a language you can speak with the arms pending – you have to move your hands, gesticulate and so on. And German is the best language if you want to sum a topic up (auf den Punkt bringen), at least for me.
Well, I think this gonna be the last language post for now but who knows what may come out of my mind tomorrow?
😉 la puce
Posted in Ce qui pense la puce
Yesterday’s post made me think about something different I noticed several times. Whenever I read a book, I start adapting my speaking and writting to the style of the book. This was especially the case in France where I read a lot in order to improve my French. Somehow that must have been a bit weird sometimes because I remember when I was reading very different books on the same time (like Sagan and Sèrge) mixing the styles…
This phenomena is not as strong in English and German as it is in French. I remember when I used the passé simple in an exam because I had never used it before and only did it because the book I was reading at that time was entirely held in it. Actually, I think that it is quite useful to learn a language and it’s different forms of use also through reading because than the sense of what you are trying to say cannot longer be misconducted by translation. Sometimes for me, it is even the other way round: I do not know certain expressions in German because I learned them in France. For instance, most of my (very small) knowledge about HTML was acquired in France. Until today, I do not know how to say par défaut in German.
Just wondering… la puce
Posted in Ce qui pense la puce
I just saw a video of myself and no, that is not the amazing part of this post. Actually, on the video I spoke English and I was very surprised to hear what my English voice sounds like. Usually, when I hear my German voice on my mailbox or something like this, I do not like it very much. It sounds not like me but… let’s say different and a little bit weird.
So on this video, I heard myself speaking English for the very first time and: I like my English voice. It sounds interesting and more like me. And, just in case you wonder, I do not know why but I speak English with a different voice than German and German with a different voice than French. I never heard my French voice so I can’t say what it sounds like…
Posted in La puce entdeckt die Welt, N'importe quoi
I am probably the last to find it out, but I just discovered that it is possible to watch Les guignols de l’Info on the site of Canal+. Actually, I was hoping to find something about the splitt-up of France most famous socialist couple (François Hollande – Ségolène Royal) but there is nothing. En revanche here are the links to Canal+ and to a very good article on Wiki about les guignols.
Have fun even if you don’t speak French 😉
Posted in N'importe quoi
I am guilty. I am guilty for leaving my home country looking for better education and better job opportunities elsewhere. I am guilty for leaving uneducated and jobless men behind. I am guilty for the new uneducated underclass finding their only refuge in right-wing groups. I am guilty for the fact that less kids are born in East Germany. Guilty, guilty, guilty!
Ok, what is the whole story about is that since 1991 more than 400.000 women left the former East Germany while only 270.000 men did the same, many of them returning. The consequences are that the East of Germany is one of the European regions with the biggest gender imbalance (only 80 women for 100 men). If you are interested, here is the whole article from the Guardian.
Poor, uneducated men… never will they enjoy the pleasure of having a family because this mean women are looking for equally or higher educated partners in the Western part of the country. Of course we are. During 40 years, the socialist system encouraged women to work and we won’t simply forget this from one day to the other. And since there is not enough work to find where we come from, we go where it is instead of getting hitched by bloody stupid guys and producing radical offspring….
The pity is that East Germany has a far better care taking system for young children giving families a better support to have both: work and family. But without a job, a way to earn a decent income and to have a prospect in live, this is not enough. This is the reason why the idea from some mayors to pay every women returning to her original region is not more than the literal drop in the bucket. What East Germany needs is jobs. Then, the women may return or even stay…
Thank’s to Maik for the idea!
Posted in Ce qui pense la puce, La puce méchante
Yesterday, I simply did not go out of the house but stayed reading in my bed. Today: market in the morning around lunchtime (one melon, five pair of socks, cheese, galette marocaine with cheese, olives and honey – very tasty, avocados) and this evening cinema: Zodiac. If only I had done half of all the urgent things to do, this would have been a very successful weekend…
But as we put it so nicely in German: You can’t get everything…
La puce
Posted in N'importe quoi
∑ Back to reality! And good to be back again.
Have a nice weekend, la puce
Posted in N'importe quoi
There was one very particular thing I couldn’t help noticing more often than wanted in Sweden. Or let’s rather say in Malmö since I haven’t gone much farer and I do not want to blame the whole country in case it is just this city which has such a bad taste.
So what I could not help noticing where: leggings. During one 20 minutes walk, I noticed 15 girls wearing thights under skirts or shorts. And once aware of this I saw them every day, everywhere… Nine times out of ten the leggings were black. I don’t know if anybody can imagine how ugly this looks like. I mean, either you have the courage to wear short skirts or you don’t but these leggings. Especially since so many girls wear the same colour, this new fashion style trend “whatever you call this” looks very uniform…
The only hope I have now is that this is a simply Swedish thing and it won’t take over to the rest of Europe. So far, I haven’t spotted something like this in Brussels. It is absolutely unnecessay that so many girls hide their legs that way, show them!
Posted in La puce méchante
La puce, die Welt and everything else 