How It Feels To Become a Millionaire

Today is one of the happiest days of my life.  I got out of bed this morning and dashed to my home office and checked my computer screen.  I knew there was something special waiting for me.  Very special indeed.  Today Lingua Franca reached the landmark of 1,000,088 page views.  This remarkable task was accomplished in five years and eleven days to be exact.  I’m feeling so happy, I’m jumping out of my skin.  Bud Fox (Charlie Sheen), in the film Wall Street, replied to the receptionist at work while he was coming in one morning this way:

—“How are you today, Bud?”

—I’m feeling fine, if I felt any better it would be a sin!”

After blogging for about eight years, I finally reached the Finish Line and entered into the one million page hits territory.  It’s difficult to describe what this means to me for several reasons.  First, I’m not a writer.  Second, I’m not a photographer.  And third, I’m not a native English-speaking person.  However, with all these limitations. I became a millionaire.  I’m absolutely feeling over the moon today, January 11, 2013.

Never did I ever dream that a country boy from a banana plantation in Changuinola, Bocas del Toro, would start a blog in English and reach out and touch thousands and thousands of people around the world and accumulating one million page hits in the process.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

There are several names I would like to acknowledge who helped me make this dream come true. Don Ray, the author of Chiriqui Chatter in David, gave me the idea of opening a blogging account and write about events that happened  in Panama City.  His blog posts were full of useful information, and his photographs of David added pizazz to his work.   After reading his blog, I knew I had a task to carry out.

Abraham Lincoln in Brookville, Ohio also contributed considerably to my work.  He impressed me with gorgeous photographs of animals and flowers taken in his backyard.  His pictures were so well taken, that it induced me to buy a camera and learn how to take pictures and insert them in my blog.  That’s how I got involved in photography.  Abe is a consummate and professional photographer and a dedicated blogger as well.

Linda, Jim and Nena, Hilda, Richard, Marjorie and Jaime encouraged me to keep on going with their continued comments.  I appreciate their dedicating part of their valuable time reading and commenting on Lingua Franca.  And last but certainly not least, I am grateful to the thousands and thousands of people around the world who have read Lingua Franca for over five years.  I can’t thank you enough for your encouragement and support.  Reaching this goal was only possible because of you.

GLOBAL COVERAGE

 According to the elves of WordPress, Lingua Franca is mostly read from citizens of the following countries since February 25, 2012; (Figures are expressed in Page Views)

1. United States:  110,480
2. Panama:  19,444
3. United Kingdom:  17,605
4. Canada:  12,435
5. India:  9,287
6. Australia:  7,332
7. Philippines:  5,143
8. Germany:  2,566
9. Malaysia:  2,036
10. Brazil:  1,974

As you can see, the leading page hits originated from countries of the American Continent (40 percent), Europe (20 percent) and Asia (40 percent).

Lingua Franca was read in almost every country in the world with the exception of eight countries in Africa and two countries in Asia.  With these exception, the whole globe was covered by the blog.  Kindly click here to view the countries covered by Lingua Franca.  It’s impressive how far a blog can reach out using today’s technology.

STATISTICS

Below are the Lingua Franca’s page views provided by WordPress for the last five years:

1. 2008:  67,131
2. 2009:  193,340
3. 2010:  245,319
4. 2011:  218,395
5. 2012:  268,154

The average page hit per day in 2012 was 733, which in my opinion, is amazing.

Yep, today is one of the happiest days in my life.  I feel like a million bucks thanks to you my dear readers.  All of this was accomplished because you made it happen by taking the time to read Lingua Franca.  I am most grateful for your support.  What else can I say?  I’m still in a state of shock.

Today I’ll take it easy and assimilate the news together with my wife.  I feel as if I’m walking on water.  Thank you so much and Good Day.

Suggested Reading:  Lingua Franca’s Annual Report 2012

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Monitoring the Construction of the Panama Subway

The construction of Panama City’s metropolitan subway system is working full speed ahead on a 24/7 basis in a race to cut the inauguration ribbon during the first half of 2014.  Enormous efforts are being done to reorganize basic services like water, electricity, cable television and communications.  The entire city is upside down and driving is a nightmare.  The “tranques” or traffic jams is a daily torture thousands of motorists must endure.  You will find them round the clock, anywhere in the metropolitan area.

As a prelude to the inauguration of the new mass transit system, bus routes are being rearranged in the city and the implementation of electronic prepaid cards for both the buses and the future subway.  We are already paying our bus fares with prepaid electronic cards.  Panama Metro wants to go further and apply NFC technology (short-range wireless communication) which will allow the subway passengers to pay with their mobile phones.

Line 1 (which follows a north-south route) consists of 8.7 miles and will start at Albrook, next to the National Transportation Terminal, the arrival hub for all provincial bus routes to Panama City.

The first seven subway stations of the route Albrook-Los Andes will be underground. The remaining five are elevated approximately 59 feet above ground.

The trains are being built by the Alstom company in Barcelona, ​​Spain. The track’s width is 4.7 feet, which is the standard size for subway systems around the world.

Panama transit authorities have said that the subway transportation service will begin operations with 19 trains with three cars each; then they will add two more cars for a total of five cars.

Initially, the new subway will move approximately 30,000 people per hour, between 5:30 a. m. and 11 p. m., with trips every three or four and a half minutes during peak hours.  Pretty impressive if you ask me, considering that now all massive transportation is done with buses in over-crowded highways, thus the pesky  “tranques“.

Below are several pictures which I shot yesterday, December 16, 2012, at approximately 08:00 a.m.  This is how the construction looks like on this date.  Will include progress of the subway system right here on Lingua Franca until its official inauguration date in 2014.

Snapshot of a sign where a subway station is being built. The sign reads, “The station of October 12 is being built here. Line One of the Panama Metro. Administration of Ricardo Martinelli.” Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

Snapshot of the elevated tracks of the Panama Metro in Panama City, Panama. Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

Take notice at the end of the cement structure, a tiny picture of a Metro Bus moving in the direction my position in the Transisthmian Highway. Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

In this picture you can easily distinguish the elegant buses of Panama City. They are relatively new in the metropolitan area. Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

Snapshot of the massive construction of the metro station of October 12 on the Transisthmian Highway. This place is about one mile from our house. Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

Photo by ©Omar Upegui R.

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Understanding the English Language

For those of you who are studying English, I’ll bet there are times when you just can’t take it any more.  It has happened to me lots of times, but after while, when the smoke and the dust settles down, I keep on plowing until the confusion is cleared.

A word that irritated me for some time was “colonel”.  Even though there are no ‘rs’ in the word, when Americans or British would pronounce it, I could clearly listen to the consonant ‘r’.  “Why is that?”, I asked in total bafflement.  Even my English teacher couldn’t give me a convincing answer.

A few days ago, I received an e-mail from a buddy in Chiriquí which revealed the mystery of the weird pronunciation of this military term.

This is what I learned about the word “colonel”.

“From the very beginning, when this word came into English in the 1500s, there were two spelling variants and two pronunciations. Coronel came through French and colonel through Italian. Colonel preserved the look of the related word ‘column,’ but coronel brought a nice, regal ‘crown’ to mind (though it wasn’t actually etymologically related). So it went back and forth until we settled into the ‘l’ spelling with the ‘r’ pronunciation. Yay compromise?”

And now you know the story of why we pronounce an invisible ‘r’ in the military rank.  Yep, I affirm once more that English is a difficult language to master.  Good Day.

Source:  11 Weirdly Spelled Words—And How They Got That Way – Mental Floss Online

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Idiomatic Phrases

A week ago, while I was casually browsing on the Internet, I chanced upon an interesting idiom which I had never read before; or maybe I did, but since forgot it.  If you are a regular reader of Lingua Franca, you already know how passionate I am about English idiomatic phrases.

The idiom includes the words,  “hands down”.  An example of how the idiomatic phrase might be used would be:  “He was the clear winner, hands down”.  The expression comes down from British horse racing. When a jockey had the lead in a race and there was no chance whatsoever of anybody catching up with him, the jockey would put his hands down, allowing the horse to continue galloping across the finish line.

I really enjoyed learning this new idiom.  Now it makes a lot of sense.  If you liked it, go ahead and use it with your friends, relatives or co-workers in your daily life.  You could be the next popular kid on the block hands down.  Good Day.

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Inside The English Maze

Credit: James Foley

Thanks to a collaboration from Richard, a fellow blogger, author of “One More Good Adventure”, I was able to partly clear some confusion I had about several English words.  He sent me an e-mail with an article explaining the difference between word-pairs easily confused, even by English-speaking persons.  The difference between them is very subtle and it requires concentration to notice the difference between them.

The name of the article sent by my friend is, “Shades of Meaning:  Five Commonly Confused Word-Pairs” written by William B. Bradshaw, author of “The Big Ten of Grammar:  Identifying and Fixing the Ten Most Frequent Grammatical Errors”.  If English is your second language, reading this article will be highly beneficial in polishing up the language.  Reading the book will further consolidate the understanding of the difficult language of William Shakespeare.

“Most of the world’s prominent grammarians have reached consensus for the appropriate uses of many often-confused word pairs. I explore the details of many of these grammatical errors in The Big Ten of Grammar and am sharing the grammarian’s official verdict on the usage of five commonly confused word-pairs.

These are the five word-pairs selected by William B. Bradshaw:

1. “Sure” and “Certain”
2. “Less” and Fewer”
3. “Further and “Farther”
4. “Big” and “Large”
5. “Often” and “Frequently”

Bradshaw offers a comprehensive distinction between the often confused English word-pairs.  Even though I’ve read his explanation of items 4 and 5, I still feel confused as to the proper usage of the terms.  I’ll keep my ears close to the ground to see how they are used by recognized authors.  In the meantime, I’m still inside the English maze trying to find my way out.

Source:  “Shades of Meaning:  Five Commonly Confused Word-Pairs” penned by William B. Bradshaw

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Is Faggot a Decent Word or a Derogatory Expression?

The answer to this question is a “Yes” and a “No”.  How come?  Let me explain.  The reason for this ambivalent answer is a result of the constant evolution of the English language.  It is constantly changing the meaning of its words, as it were alive—live a living creature.  I’ve made this assertion before.

If you look up the word “faggot” in a dictionary worth its salt it will be defined as follows: [North America, offensive slang]  A disparaging term for a homosexual man; a gay man.  The expression is also shortened as “fag”.  But it also means a bundle of sticks and branches bound together or a package of several things tied together for carrying or storing.  The relationship between a bundle of sticks and a homosexual male is odd.  The explanation to this linguistic disparity leads us to our previous assertion that the English language is a living creature—always changing.

In the 12th and 13th century in Great Britain, the expression “faggot” meant a bundle of sticks.  Examples:  “A short distance further lay a little faggot of the same shoots bound together with a strip of bark.”—Typee by Herman Melville.  “He ordered his servants to bring in a faggot of sticks, and said to his eldest son: ‘Break it’—Fables by Aesop.  It was a burning implement used as kindle for a fire or a rustic broom for sweeping and sometimes used as whip.  The word “besom” which is an instrument for sweeping was also used, thus our modern word “broom” which we all obviously understand.

In the 15th century the meaning of the words changed slightly and was used as a pejorative expression for women.  Women were called faggots.  The view of the men of the time was that their wives were a burden, in the same way carrying a bundle of sticks can be a burden.

According to my research, in 1914 the word faggots was first used as a derogatory term for gay men; a generalized insult (fagula, fegula).   Currently the word is used as a derogatory term for gay men or as an informal way to tease somebody; so the meaning depends on the context the word is used.

This is one of many example of a language in permanent change.  The historical transformation of the word faggot is indeed admirable.  Good Day.

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Between You and Me and the Lamppost

Everybody who has studied the English language knows that there are grammatical rules for the proper use of the pronouns “you”,  “me” and “I” depending on what you are trying to say.  And yet, there has been for some time a great controversy over the phrases, “between you and I” and “between you and me”.

First let’s take a hard look at the the basic rules of English grammar: the words you, I, and me are all pronouns. They stand in for nouns like Dick, Jane, Sally and Spot.  Pronouns can be subjects, objects, or possessive.  The subject of a sentence is the agent taking action, and the object is the thing or person being acted upon. If I say, “I love you,” I am the subject (the one doing the loving), and you are the object (the target of my love and the object of my affection).  I remember understanding this very clearly when I was in primary school.  No big deal.

If you have spoken English for a long time, you probably know that I is a subject pronoun, and me is an object pronoun.  If you are learning English, you just have to memorize it.  Things begin to get tricky when when you combine I and me with you because  you is both a subjective and an objective pronoun. It’s one of those confusing things that just isn’t fair. Whether it is in the subject or the object position, you still use the word you. You love Jane and Jane loves you. They are both correct.

That seems pretty straightforward. So now we can move on to “Between You and I” and figure out why it’s wrong.  And this is where the controversy begins, since the days of William Shakespeare to this very day.

Between is a preposition, just as on, above, over, and of, are all prepositions.  Because prepositions usually either describe a relationship, or show possession, they don’t act alone; they often answer questions like Where? and When?

So, instead of acting alone, prepositions are part of prepositional phrases. Thus, between you and me is a prepositional phrase. And it’s just a rule that pronouns following prepositions are always in the objective case.  When you’re using the objective case, the correct pronoun is me, so the correct prepositional phrase is between you and me.  That was well and good until William Shakespeare came along and started a controversy that is still going on even as we speak.

The writer whose English is so inflexibly correct that it never violates the laws is very likely a writer who will not be published until he learns when to break the laws painstakingly learned and dares to say, ”In this case, wrong is better.”  Sometimes correct English is wrong and wrong English is right.

Below is the slip of the quibble written by William Shakespeare in Act Three, Scene II of The Merchant of Venice:

“Sweet Bassanio, my ships have all miscarried, my creditors grow cruel, my estate is very low, my bond to the Jew is forfeit, and since in paying it, it is impossible I should live, all the debts are cleared between you and I, if I might but see you at my death.  Notwithstanding, use your pleasure:  if your love do not persuade you to come, let not my letter.”

Grammatically, of course, Shakespeare was wrong. He should have written ”between you and me.” The grammar rule is quite plain. ”Between” is a preposition. The object of a preposition must be in the accusative (or objective) case. The accusative form of the first-person-singular pronoun is ”me.” Therefore, the correct phrase is ”between you and me.”  It is considered standard English which follows the basic rules of grammar.

The use of the phrase “between you and I” was very frequent during the end of the 16th and 17th century, but is now considered ungrammatical.    Yet, many English-speaking people to this day, consider this phrase as a polite expression, and has been used since Middle English.  It is universally used in common spoken English.  I understand even Mark Twain used it in his writings.

I must acknowledge that, whether we like it or not, the English language is very dynamic, and will change with usage.  English is an evolving language. We all know it’s adding words furiously, not to mention idioms. A few years ago, a majority of people didn’t say “back in the day.” Now you hardly ever hear “back in the old days.” Please don’t tell anybody; this is strictly “between you and me and the lamppost”.

Oh, one more thing… Shakespeare also used the phrase “between you and me”.  Good Day.

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What in the World is a Paraprosdokian?

Recently I received an email from a dear friend in David, depicting an explanation for a strange English word and several examples of how the term was used.  It was the first time I had seen such a word.  Initially I thought it was a Greek word, but never an English expression.

Since I’m a curious person, I Googled the word and found that it was indeed a legitimate English word.  The word is paraprosdokian.  What is its meaning you might ask?  This is what I found:

“A paraprosdokian, meaning ‘beyond’ and ‘expectation’ sentence, is a figure of speech in which the latter part of a sentence or phrase is surprising or unexpected in a way that causes the reader or listener to re-frame or reinterpret the first part. 

It is frequently used for humorous or dramatic effect, sometimes producing an anticlimax.  For this reason, it is extremely popular among comedians and satirists.” 

According to Wikipedia encyclopedia, “Paraprosdokian” comes from Greek “παρά“, meaning “against” and “προσδοκία“, meaning “expectation”. Canadian linguist and etymology author William Gordon Casselman argues that, while the word is now in wide circulation, “paraprosdokian” (or “paraprosdokia”) is not a term of classical (or medieval) Greek or Latin rhetoric, but a late 20th century neologism.  However, it occurs—with the same meaning—in Greek rhetorical writers of the 1st century BCE and the 1st and 2nd centuries CE.

Below are several examples of a paraprosdokian.  Oh, before I forget, Winston Churchill liked to use these humorous expressions quite often.   Here we go.

1. “Take my wife – please!” — Henry Youngman
2. “He was at his best when the going was good.” — Alistair Cooke in the Duke of Windsor
3. “You can always count on the Americans to do the right—after they have tried everything else.”  Winston Churchill
4. “On his feet he wore…blisters.” — Aristotle
5. “A modest man, who has much to be modest about.” — supposedly Winston Churchill, about Clement Attlee
6. “She was good as cooks go, and as cooks go she went.” — Saki
7. “I don’t belong to an organized political party. I’m a Democrat.” —Will Rogers
8. “If I could just say a few words… I’d be a better public speaker.” — Homer Simpson
9. Where there’s a will, I want to be in it.
10. The last thing I want to do is hurt you. But it’s still on my list.
11. Since light travels faster than sound, some people appear bright until you hear them speak.
12. If I agreed with you, we’d both be wrong.
13. War does not determine who is right – only who is left.
14. Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
15. To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism. To steal from many is research.
16. I didn’t say it was your fault, I said I was blaming you.
17. Women will never be equal to men until they can walk down the street with a bald head and a beer gut, and still think they are sexy.
18. I used to be indecisive. Now I’m not so sure.
19. Going to church doesn’t make you a Christian any more than standing in a garage makes you a car.
20. I’m supposed to respect my elders, but it’s getting harder and harder for me to find one now.
21. Do not argue with an idiot.  He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience.
22. Light travels faster than sound.  This is why some people seem bright until you hear them speak.
23. Evening news is where they begin with ‘Good evening,’ and then try to tell you why it isn’t.
24. Always borrow money from a pessimist. He won’t expect it  back.
25. Hospitality:  making your guests feel like they’re at home, even if you wish they were.
26. Some cause happiness wherever they go. Others whenever they  go.
27. A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory.
28. Money can’t buy happiness, but it sure makes misery easier to live with.
29. Nostalgia isn’t what it used to be.
30. A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. My desk is a work station.

And now you know why I say that English is a tough cookie to learn.  Good Day.

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Confusion in the Use of Some English Words

If you are studying English as a second language, you probably agree with me that sometimes its very confusing.  Since I was six I’ve been having my ups and downs with the language, but I keep hanging in there trying to break the code.  Still have a long way to go though.

Some English words are so confusing that many experienced writers have to pause for a second and think when they are about to type certain words.   Some words are so close to others in spelling or meaning that they cause confusion, time after time. For this reason, it’s a good idea to study the most common word mix-up’s, to avoid problems that vex writers everywhere.

If you can conquer these common problems, you’ve made a giant leap forward in the language of Shakespeare.  Here are some frequent offender words provided by Grace Fleming in her article Confusing Words.  This is what she said about confusing words:

“affect/effect: To affect is to produce an effect. Still confused? Affect is usually a verb meaning “to impact or influence.” It might help to remember that “a” is for action and “e” is for result.

accept/except: Accept is a verb, meaning to take willingly. Except is a preposition, meaning “other than.” Remember the phrase “I will accept any food except spinach.” The words “accept” and “except” are in alphabetical order in that sentence. Hey, it’s silly but it might work.

conscience/conscious: Have you ever been present when somebody fainted? It’s scary, because nobody knows which word to use. It’s that bad. Seriously, many well-educated people stumble over this one! “Conscious” is an adjective, meaning “aware,” “awake,” or sometimes “on purpose.” Use this one if somebody faints. It might help to think of other “state of mind” words that have the same ending, like “serious,” or “delirious.” “Conscience” is your sense of right and wrong. It rhymes with “sense.”

fewer/less: If you can get this one right, you’ll be ahead of most of the English-speaking population. You’ll hear this mix-up all over the media! Few and fewer refer to objects that can be numbered. Less refers to a quantity of something non-specific. It might help to think of “less” as a “lump” word. Examples: I have “fewer” dimes and “less” money than you.

it’s/its: The apostrophe in “it’s” poses a real problem for some people. Many people think of possession when they see it. But it’s is a contraction, meaning “it is” or “it has.” It might be helpful to think of the possessive pronoun its in a group with “hers” or “his.” No apostrophe!

to/too: This is probably the most common problem pair, but once you get the difference, it seems so simple! To is a preposition that indicates location or direction, but it also can be used in front of a verb to make an infinitive, like “to eat” or “to swim.” That sounds more difficult than it is. Too is an adverb meaning “excessively” or “additionally.” Either way, this word indicates “an extra amount.” Just think of the extra “o” in too!

whose/who’s: Again, the apostrophe in who’s creates confusion, because it tricks people into thinking it indicates possession. It doesn’t! Who’s is the contraction for “who is” while whose is the possessive form of who. Examples: Whose turn is it to feed the dog? Who’s going to do it?”

Do you feel better now, after getting the grasp of some confusing English words?  I’ll bet you do.  Don’t let the language intimidate you.  Good Day.

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Digging Deeper Into the English Language

During the last three years I’ve fallen deeply in love with the Enlisc language, also known as English.  I used to struggle with it for a long time, trying to understand the confusion underlying its words, grammar and pronunciation.  Now I’m finding the beauty of the language assisted by my blogger friends Richard and Linda.  Both of them are writers and masters in weaving words, if you know what I mean.

English is a Western Germanic language spoken originally in England, and is now the most widely used language in the world.  It is spoken as a first language by a majority of the inhabitants of several nations, including the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, and a number of Caribbean nations. It is the third most common native language in the world, after Mandarin Chinese and Spanish.  It is widely learned as a second language and is an official language of the European Union, many Commonwealth countries and the United Nations, as well as in many world organizations.

During the last month, I’m removing the layers of the language in an effort to understand how it started and how it expanded to rule most of the world, together with Mandarin and Spanish.  Richard suggested a book to help me in my linguistic quest.  The name of the book is dubbed, The Adventure of English by Melvyn Bragg.  It’s one of those books you don’t want to keep your eyes off the printed text or let it down for a while to take a pause.  You want to read it from beginning to end in one day.

Below is an excerpt from the aforementioned book.  Here we go.

“The American influence on English has been and continues to be crucially important and one of the lucky turns in the adventure is that it was English and not, as it just might have been, French or Spanish or German which adopted or was adopted by that new-found land—that engine of the new and modern world.  America has brought much treasure to the word-hoard but also, like the British Empire it succeeded, its English has caused casualties, and in both empires they are part of this story.

There had been luck but also cunning and the beginning of what was to become English’s most subtle and ruthless characteristic of all:  its capacity to absorb others.  Two brief examples of the linguistic osmosis are:

• Frisian:  Laam (lamb), goes (goose), bûter (butter), brea (bread), see (sea), stoarm (storm), boat (boat), rein (rain), and snie (snow).  Indoors, there’s miel (meal) and sliepe (sleep).
• Latin:  Planta (plant), win (wine), catte (cat), candel (candle), ancor (anchor), cest (chest), forca (fork), weall (wall), straet (street), mortere (mortar), spitula (letter), and rosa (rose).

The way in which a few tribal and local Germanic dialects spoken by a hundred and fifty thousand people grew into the English language spoken and understood by about one and a half billion people has all the characteristics of a tremendous adventure.

English like a living organism was seeded in England a little over fifteen hundred years ago.  England became its first home.  From the beginning it was exposed to rivalries, angers and threats:  there was an escape from extinction, the survival of an attempt at suffocation; and there are casualties.  It has often been a fierce war over words—whose language rules?—but also there were and are treasures:  literatures, unified governance, and today the possibility of a world conversation, in English

Only writing preserves a language.  Writing gives posterity the keys it needs.  It can cross al boundaries.  A written language brings precision, forces ideas into steady shapes, secures against loss.  Once the words are on the page they are to be challenged and embellished by those who come across them later.  Writing begins as the secondary arm but soon, for many, becomes the primary source, the guardian, the authority, the soul of language.

But who found the first words?  Who finds new words today?  We know that Shakespeare put into print at least two thousand new words, but the majority of words come out of the crowd.  An American frontiers-man like Davy Crockett can be as good a word spinner as a master of Trinity College, Cambridge.  Early words came from those who worked the land, those whose centuries of nose to the earth made them acquainted with the minutiae of nature and most likely it was they who, often out of necessity, had to name what they saw:  basic things, and creatures which might endanger or nourish them.  The giving of names could be called the most democratic communal effort in our history.  Language is the finest achievement of culture—and in my view, the English language is the most remarkable of the many contributions these islands have made to the world.”

If English is your second language, I encourage you to keep hanging in there making new discoveries and soon you will unwrap the beauty of the language.  I can’t emphasize enough how much I enjoy reading and learning abut this Lingua Franca of our times.  Good Day.

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