Author: Rauf Aliev

an interesting lecture on global warming

https://www.youtube.com/attribution_link?a=SXIh7VHLEoI&u=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3D7VGtgSUB8DM%26feature%3Dplayer_embedded

@[1637446765:2048:Tae Youn Oey] They exist! Letterpress printing has been used in China since 1040 AD. Thousands of tiles, immense manual effort, for over a thousand years.

http://idsgn.org/posts/the-end-of-movable-type-in-china/

I wanted to write that the use of eye tracking mechanism in phones will be common in a couple of years, but I decided to search online to check if there was anything on the topic. And here is an excellent study, with an analysis of options and ready solutions.

https://medium.com/@taolu_99738/developing-of-eye-tracking-application-for-smartphone-b875c50ee0c3

Walking home from work, and Mars stares at me from the darkness

Interestingly, why does the phrase “в соцсéти” make you want to ask “where to?” (send, post), whereas the phrase “в соцсети́” prompts the question “where?” (found, met)?

“The Large Explanatory Dictionary of the Russian Language” edited by S.A. Kuznetsov suggests varying the stress depending on the preposition: about сéти, but in сети́. Are there similar examples in Russian where only the stress changes during declension?

The hurricane with its downpour reached us tonight. Something suddenly escalated.

#eng If you’re having trouble falling asleep, that just means that all the dream servers are overloaded, and you need to lay down and wait until someone wakes up and frees up a slot out there somewhere.

I’m wondering why this isn’t covered in the news anywhere.

The Russian anti-doping committee has acknowledged the involvement of officials from the Ministry of Sports in the system of covering up positive doping tests of athletes.

At least, the day before yesterday “…Compliance Review Committee reviewed at length a letter from the Russian Ministry of Sport to WADA and was satisfied that this letter sufficiently acknowledged the issues identified in Russia, therefore fulfilling the first of the two outstanding criteria of RUSADA’s Roadmap to Compliance…”.

Russia also agreed to allow experts access to samples stored at the RUSADA laboratory.

https://www.wada-ama.org/en/media/news/2018-09/wadas-executive-committee-to-discuss-updated-recommendation-from-independent

#learnkorean

Just leaving notes here for myself and the few interested. This is already the third part.

In Korean, the alphabet “lacks” a bunch of sounds, yet there is a plethora of “extra” ones. There are diphthongs, double vowels. The complication is that they have almost the same pronunciation when written differently. For example, 애 and 에 are both read as “e”, and the following three 외, 왜 and 웨 are also read as “we”. There are very similar letters ㄱ (k+g) and ㅋ (k+h), and ㄷ (t+d) and ㅌ (t+h), ㅂ (p+b) and ㅍ (p+h). There are long consonants, such as “ㅃ” (a bright and accented “ㅂ” (p)), “ㅉ” (a bright ㅈ, closer to ts), “ㄸ” – a bright sound from “ㄷ”, “ㄲ” – a bright and accented “ㄱ”, “ㅆ” – a bright from “ㅅ” (s).

Interestingly, Korea in Korean is 한국 (Hangook), which means “One nation”, and its full name is 대한민국 (Daehanminguk) – “Democratic Nation of Great Han”. More precisely, not quite so. Hangook refers to both Koreas, while the South is called Namhan, i.e. “Southern Han” (남한). North Korea is called by Koreans as 조선 (Joseon) or Bukhan, “Northern Han” (“북한”).

Over this weekend, I somehow managed to primarily learn the alphabet, and I can read words like 샌프란시스코 (San Francisco) or 코카콜라 (Coca-Cola), 러시아 (Russia). Basically, everything that does not require knowing any word from the Korean vocabulary. I still need to better memorize the diphthongs and not hesitate while reading, and also get acquainted with grammar on a superficial level, and then we’ll see whether to continue or that’s enough)

It’s interesting how Koreans themselves describe the pronunciation of Russian alphabet letters through Korean and English. http://orus.tistory.com/14.

P.S. Oh, I can also now greet like this:

ㅐㅌㄴㄴㅇ!

#learnkorean (following up on the previous post about the Korean language)

To reinforce the Korean alphabet in my memory, I decided to see how familiar Korean brands are spelled in their native language.

Samsung – well, this one is number one. Two words: 삼성. The English equivalent is a very accurate pronunciation of the original, sam-sung. It originally means “three stars”.

Hyundai – two syllables: 현대. Translates as “modern”.

Kia. In Korean ki-a, 기아. Translates as “Entering the world from Asia”. Here, ki and a are not just letters of the alphabet, but the pronunciation of the Chinese characters 起 and 亞 (from 亞細亞 – Asia).

Daewoo – 대우, denotes “Great Woo”, where Woo is the founder. Modest) Well, the company no longer exists.

Doshirak – 도시락, pronounced toshirak, and means “rice in a box”.

By the way, Taekwondo is also a Korean word, 태권도.