Imperial vs Metric System - a simple conversion card -

Well, I'm not going to apologize for my blogging absence, moving and exams been crazy but that wasn't the reason I've not been blogging... I've been doing stuff and I have many projects in mind but again... I'm a perfectionist freak so I'll have to wait till I have perfect photos and stuff.

Recently, or let's say a month ago I entered the world of quilting, I don't know why I've not done it before, it looks so great. I already ordered a book on Amazon and I can't wait till it arrives.

Anyways, I noticed that in the Quilting zone everything is in inches, sigh, inches are not really that hard... what puzzles me are those fractions! So I made myself a conversion card, probably there are many around the web, I haven't checked because I was too excited in making my own.

So while I was looking up information, I found this site in Spanish, Como convertir medidas de pulgadas a centimetros y milimetros. That was my base to make my card and then I just used a calculator and ConvertWorld, I also added the conversion for yards to centimeters.

Here it is:

Polka Dot pattern is from a user in DeviantArt.
I still have to print it out to see if everything is fine, the card measures about 8x11 cm (about 3x4 inches :p)

So while doing this I couldn't help but to remember this graphic I saw a while ago about the Imperial (<- lol click if you wanna smile, cute geese!) system versus the metric system:

see more Funny Graphs

The imperial system doesn't make any sense to me but that might be just because I've used metric all my life and I also know it'd be reaaaally hard for a whole society to just change the system they have been using for decades, so that obvious thing being said I'll have to just get used to this new system with the help of my card and a calculator.
It's also a matter of use, for instance, 40, 60 and 80 inches are a meter, a meter and a half and 2 meters, easy to remember! The trick is when on patterns and books it says: 1 3/4 yard or 12 1/4'' and I have to rush to get my calculator to know what the heck it means  :/, I'm sure it wont be for long though, as I said, matter of practice.

Edit 16/03: So I woke up today and thought about inches again, I figured out by making this conversion card I'm translating, and I always tell people who are learning a new language to think in the new language and try NOT to translate all the time (kind of ironic on my side since I'm a translator -to be-).

It's hard to think in inches since I've never used that side of my measure tape before but if quilting requires it, and everybody uses it as a reference, I'll have to learn and practice and think in Imperial.

Failure

 Just started to watch a video playlist about failure at Etsy, and this video is so me hah, after watching this I really gotta say procrastination leads to creativity, which is great! but in my case it also leads to start other projects and frog them again for other projects and so my list of half things done starts to get big.
 There is really no hurry to finish anything for me since I just create as a hobby, it's not a job, it could be but I guess, as the video curator says at the first video, failure is just being afraid to fail. And I'm afraid to fail or maybe to succeed too?

Key words or thoughts that got stuck in my head after watching this playlist:

• If you fail, It's not a big deal, don't take it personal
• If you get a door slammed in your face, don't try the same thing, improve, change, experiment.
• Perseverance is also a key
• Those people at the Fail Harder project must have gotten sore wrists after all that pinning!

〰☺〰

There is always something random to learn, right? (besides the whole point of learning from failures)
I'm a linguistic sucker and as I was watching this playlist, I learned the expression "bull in a china shop" and it turns out bulls have been misjudged after all! I wonder if this is the case of "as mad as a March hare"

Happy Birthday in Polish and Tourist Language Learn & Speak app review

I hope that's not the only way to say Happy Birthday... actually I remember a song which goes "Sto lat, sto lat, nananna na."
But really, what's with the long complicated phrase? :( I can only pronounce urodzin, and I thought Monday was hard enough!

 This is the Tourist Language Learn & Speak app in my new phone, brought to me by turning 23 and family pressure to move on from my old cranky 5 year old cell which turns itself off when it pleases.
 I'm not into fancy stuff, the new phone is not that fancy (compared to what is on market), I couldn't (and still can't) get used to it... but once I discovered free language apps, I'm starting to like it.

I've found many language apps in Adroid Market but this one got my attention.
It offers common phrases and the alphabet and numbers of each language.
It has many countries (it also gives you a little info about each of them), it lets you choose your native language and allows you to do a search by languages too, it has many ones:
My Pros:
· Some that I was pleased to find, like Finnish, Dutch, Danish, Russian, Romanian,
· Some that I was surprised to see, like Arabic, Hindi, Hungarian, Latvian, Thai and Vietnamese.
My Cons:
· It lacks some, (but I think I'm being picky here) like Greek, Norwegian, Swedish, Afrikaans,
I don't know if this happens just in my phone but:
· In some languages, the voice is not natural at all, it does sound like a robot: in: Latvian, Romanian and Vietnamese,
· And in some it says the language is not supported, like in: Bulgarian, Lithuanian, Slovenian and Thai.

As I said, there are many language apps, I installed other Polish ones but they are not as good as this one, and also some Greek ones, but I'm not really happy with them.
Maybe I'm a bit overloaded of information here.

Trip to Buenos Aires II -Recoleta Cemetery-

 In this trip I visited Recoleta cemetery with my cousin for the very first time, and I have no idea why I've not gone there before, it's so beautiful and full of art and history! and cats! lol

I was about to take a pic of a kitten in a bench but then people sat next to him so I turned and saw this cutie naping behind me.

We took a guided tour throughout the place, it's huge and as I said, rich of history and rich, the guide told us it's not just "any" cemetery, high class families are buried there so tombs and mausoleums are fancy. Some of them are so big that got me thinking about the power of those families... more than power, love...

And talking about love, we have heard many sad and tragic anecdotes in the tour, but in my humble opinion none of those are as touching as the one I found out by myself.

When the tour was completed, my cousin and me stayed and kept on walking around... then I saw a cute kitten staring at me, it was kinda creepy but when I got closer, he ran so I followed him and found them:

Her name was Liliana Crociati Szaszak and her dog, Sabú. It's the only pic I took of a tomb, I don't know why and also I stayed there for a while... I felt really touched. The tomb didn't say how she died, nor if the dog was with her... there was a poem written by her dad that I didn't want to read because I knew it was going to make me sob.
 The statue doesn't look sad, she looks kind of calm, I've seen all kinds of statues in the cemetery but this was so simple.

When I got home I started looking up information about her, and I found many sites.
Turns out she died "recently" in the 70's, while she was in her honeymoon in Austria, she was really young, 24 (which somehow saddens me because I'm turning 23 next week). It is said Sabú passed away the same day she did. I found many myths about her, one being that a mysterious man visits her tomb with flowers on a specific day. other that the dress she is wearing in the statue was her wedding dress.

Anyways, I think these sites explain more:
· Afterlife: a blog with plenty information about the cemetery and the stories behind it.
· Cementerio de la Recoleta: Historias y relatos
· And I was surprised I found Liliana's tomb in Wikipedia.

 Leaving the sadness aside... after staying a while at Liliana's tomb, we were heading towards the exit when for some reason we stop to listen to another interesting tour which is about the love stories behind the tombs,  that is when a woman asks me with a slightly Portuguese accent where Evita's tomb is, and I still don't know why I talked back to her in Spanish, and I did study Portuguese, I guess I didn't want to act like a fool because she was speaking Spanish, I thought she wanted to practice :p.

Anyways, since the place is huge I forgot where the tomb was so I pull out my cemetery's map and start looking for it, and I kept saying "you can look for it if you want, I'm in no hurry" in Spanish and she was just looking at me and staring at the map, then I hear a 'click' and I slightly glanced out of the map... and turns out the other two men who were with the woman were taking pictures with professional cameras! In my mind all I was thinking "oh no, my hair, I'm not wearing make up, my face is going to look huge from that angle". After a few minutes of reading the entire list of tombs and not finding Evita's, my cousin and I told them to look around where we thought it was, which was near where we were, so they left.

 And then I kept on looking because I felt really frustrated, when I found it on the map, we went after them, and I tell the woman "hey I found it" (in Spanish again! I don't know why!!) and then I say "es la número 26" -pointing in the map, and they start mumbling and then one of them says "oh number twenty six", and all I could think of in that moment is "*facepalm" lol. I finally ask them where they are from and the woman says: Belgium!, and then I apologized for not speaking English before and told them to keep looking because they were sure going to find the tomb, in English, finally!, but I walked away because I was so embarrassed, years of speaking English... and I just comfortably stayed in Spanish.

 I had many opportunities to practice my English this year, a cousin who came from Lebanon who happens to had lived many years in London so his English was really good and then a Swiss guy my brother and sister in law met in Ecuador,  who came to visit for a few days, his English was not really good though, in fact I had to teach him some words, like cupboard.


Back to my cemetery experience, I wonder what the pictures are for, I wish I asked them, I was wearing my Copper-Chloride Flame Scarf so if anybody who reads this and lives in Belgium and happens to see me, please, let me know!

Trip to Buenos Aires I

 I go to Buenos Aires once or twice a year, I just love the city, there are always new places to visit.

 This time I visited Tecnópolis, it's a huge technology fair, I was really impressed by everything, but still, there are pros and cons.
 Pros, everything was very... futuristic, a lot of touch screens, leds and fancy stands. Shows and new stuff to explore.
 Cons there were so many people that you could hardly take the time to read and inspect and enjoy it, also it was more like an encyclopedia, in my dad's words, I think it was aimed to people who are not looking for something specific, just a brief view of everything.

I took very few photos in this fair, from the few here are two which I think were worth to share here:

Teal car!! :p if I lived in the 50's, I'd had probably longed for this car.

And

Lots of books! or "books" when I got closer they were just cardboard spines, But anyways, I'd love to have a floor to ceiling bookshelf!

There is a 3rd worth-to-share pic, I took a pic of my dad playing with a huge touch screen, which was a fish bowl and when you touched a fish, it would show you the description of the fish, I think it was really really cool and even more because my dad was born in the 40's and he always tells me how when he was a kid, a tv or camera was something futuristic and also the awesome stuff I'll see when I'm his age, that's the main reason why I wanted to go with him to this fair.

I also visited San Telmo, Recoleta artisan's fair, Recoleta Cemetery and some other non so touristic places.

The obvious snapshot when thinking about BA (well not really to me, when I think of BA, I always think of  Parisian buildings and low-priced stuff :p)

This was in San Telmo, a very antique (and touristic therefore expensive) neighborhood, there is an artisan fair here in which I bought a really nice Jade necklace.

And now that I remember, when walking through its streets I stumbled upon a Danish church, my polyglot me was so excited and even more when I read Danish lessons were given, well, too bad I don't live in BA, but maybe someday I will. Skaal!

Tarta de Zapallitos

My dad is here which is great for two reasons: one, I have a killer cold and I need someone to take care of me :3 and two he is vegetarian so I have to eat healthy and good, good meaning best quality products, since I'm a student, I have to make ends meet so I'm not used to buy those every day.

I'm not really into vegetables, I should, but I get puzzled when trying to cook them properly, except for potatoes, onions and tomatoes (not a vegetable but oh well), the rest is a "?" in my head, specially green vegetables. Once I tried to make a onion/carrot pie and it turned out way too sweet for me, my brother liked it though. So cooking for my dad was a challenge, good thing he also cooks so he always helps me.*

So I called my mom and ask for her assistance, went to the market and then with my dad's help here we have, squash pie or tarta de zapallitos.**

Making it was really easy, we just dice 2 onions and about 4 squashes (plural?) and then put them in a pan and let them cook.
At the same time, I prepared the dough, which is light, put some slices of low fat cheese because my mom told me the squashes would give off (? I will have to look that up) a lot of water and would make everything a mess, so I kind of isolate (or insulate? wow this college break is killing my English) the base with the cheese.

Then when the stuffing is cool, I added it to the dough with some more slices of low fat cheese again and some blue cheese and finally a beaten egg with a pinch of salt, pepper and little bit of grated cheese... I love cheese.
Finally we covered it with the other dough and to the oven!
I almost forgot, my mom always tells me to paint (?) the pie before going to the oven with milk or egg.
It tasted really good, it's not something I'd crave to eat but it is a start.


* Before I went back home for Christmas and New Years last year, my dad came and helped me bake some sweet things, pan dulce and a rosca. He was a great help, I'm surprised we share this, we always bond in intellectual matters. I might make pan dulce and rosca again, it was my first time, the rosca turned out great, unlike the pan dulce which was kind of a disappointment but I'll make it up this year.
** This was interesting in the matter of language, I couldn't find in English the type of squash we have here. This was helpful but even so, I still don't know how to translate it for future uses.

Why is Monday so hard in Polish?

 I'll probably never know the answer but I was stunned when I saw this on my new Spanish-Polish book:

Why?, the first day is supposed to be the easier one! lol


Latin: dies lunae
Spanish: lunes
Portuguese: segunda (well, this doesn't follow the Latin root but it does make sense with the following days; Tuesday= terça [which literally means "third"]; Wednesday = quarta [fourth]; Thursday = quinta [fifth] and so on.
French: lundi
Italian: lunedi
English: Monday
German: Montag
Polish: poniedziałek !!! :/ it'd not be so dramatic if the word moon wouldn't be so different księżyc.


Nie rozumiem, co znaczy?


Edit:  Now I know! thanks to Google Translate I started to check how to say Monday in other languages, tried Dutch and it's Maandag then Swedish and still German alike, Måndag then I thought about going east and it is then when I found out! Ponedelʹnik in Russian and then Slovak and Slovenian are similar, so this image of an old post came to mind, of course! i was looking at the wrong branch and now I know, days of the week in Polish come from Slavic!


 Anyways, I've been with some health problems lately that put me under the weather for a while... but I'm ok now just trying to get back to normal, at least I'm not feeling depressed anymore, so that's good.
  I've abandoned this blog and I'm not proud of it, but it wouldn't be fair if I write depressing stuff here, it's not my goal so, I'll try to keep posting stuff, I have done so many things related to crafting and stuff, I just have to take pics and organize them, all this time I've thought about posting them but I'm perfectionist (and also a procrastinator :woops:)


So if anyone is reading this, have a good jueves/Donnerstag/Thursday or Thor's day (nice!) or like Polish say: Czwartek!


Be happy.

212 Randomness and yesterday's sweetness

The other day I was touching up one of my posts (I can't help it) and saw this:

I don't really trust these things, some of them "catch" the IPs, others if you saw a picture on google images and so on, I think I'm going to get rid of these someday... but I really like the moon and the flags, I wonder how you called a person who likes countries and languages? Anyways...
Nice... 212 Polish views (I bet most of them are you mój przyjaciółka :p)... and tomorrow 1st... I'm going to be 22... yeah, random!!.

And about the sweetness... I baked tortas negras yesterday, I really enjoyed kneading, I used to do it a lot when I was younger, not for eating though, just to make a mess in the kitchen... sorry mom.

Semana de los idiomas 2010

Por Octavo año consecutivo, la Asociación de Centros de Idiomas organiza la "Semana de los Idiomas", del 23 al 31 de Octubre de 2009, con un circuito de actividades especiales en distintos puntos del país, abiertas y gratuitas para toda la comunidad.

La Semana de los Idiomas brinda a la comunidad la oportunidad de reconocer y valorar los distintos idiomas que los estudiantes aprenden en los centros asociados de idiomas de todo el país (inglés, francés, portugués, quechua, español como lengua extranjera, entre otros).

Cronograma de Actividades

 http://www.idiomas.org.ar/Semana_2009_Actividades.pdf 
 Muy interesante todo, pero los que hay en Córdoba parecen que son todos destinados a alumnos que ya están inscriptos en los institutos que participan.

Becas SEA 2010

Hay un concurso este año y se llama "Mis diez palabras favoritas en español o inglés" y de premio hay una beca de estudios para el año que viene. 
Para participar hay que llenar el formulario, hay tiempo hasta el 6 de Noviembre, y la SEA (Asociación de Centros de Idiomas de la República Argentina) ofrece como premio, como dije, 25 becas anuales para realizar cursos de inglés en forma regular.

El programa está destinado a personas de todas las edades, cualquiera sea su nivel de idioma, que cursen la educación formal independientemente del estadío alcanzado y también a aquellos que estén fuera del sistema educativo con el objetivo de brindarles distintas habilidades técnicas que faciliten una mejor salida laboral.

Jak masz na imíe?

I love languages... it's my thing, so far I speak 3 (Spanish, English and Portuguese). And I'm looking forward to learn French and Polish, and I'd like to learn German, Finnish or an Asian language.

I think it's essential to learn new things everyday, and for me, it's essential to learn those things on my both main languages (Spanish and English).

I don't know how (I never know how I find sites, I think the best sites are found randomly) I found a site to learn Polish, and then I ended in a channel on youtube, and that channel guided me to other. (I'm learning English-Polish, English-French and so on, I think it's easier that way because English it's a "plain" language)

They have pretty videos, and they are really easy to understand and practice. The channels are AbcSchoolOfPolish and travellinguist. The last one it's very dynamic and it has a lot of languages to learn from French, Spanish, Portuguese and German to Hebrew, Thai, Russian and many others. Each language has different categories, and each category has 3 levels, in the first one you learn the translation, how to pronounce it (they repeat like 3 or 4 times the word or expression) and how to write it, in the second level you learn how to pronounce it and you hear the word just 2 or 3 times, in the 3rd level you just have to read the word.

Other useful language tool is Wordrefence.com, I go there every time I have doubts, and I have a forum account so, if I want to know how to say, pronounce or define a word or expression I go there and ask and people answer me really quickly.
And also, if you want to know how to pronounce a word or sentence, you can type it in this site, IVONA and you can hear it in English, Polish and Romanian, It is a useful site that people recommened me on the Polish forum.

I'm learning fast, my dad used to tell me that it's easier to learn languages once you have learned 3 or 4.

Do zobaczenia, do widzenia :)

(Language family tree scanned from Almanaque Mundial 2006)