Slavic Saturday

I was not struck by inspiration this week, so today’s Slavic Saturday is going to be a bit silly. I am going to show you the various forms that one word can take in Czech within the various cases.

Our word will be the word for a dog, which in Czech is a noun of the masculine (animate) gender and in its singular form is universal to slavic languages. Btw, Czech has four genders – masculine (animate), masculine (inanimate), feminine and neutral. That means a lot of fun.

Lets start with singular grammatical cases:

pes – nominative
psa – genitive and accusative
psu/psovi – dative, locative
pse – vocative
psem – instrumental

That is not all, there is also plural:

psi/psové – nominative and vocative
psů – genitive and accusative
psům – dative, locative
psech – locative
psy – instrumental

Of course that still is not all, there is also singular diminutive:
pejsek – nominative
pejska – genitive and accusative
pejskovi/pejsku – dative, locative
pejsku – vocative
pejskem – instrumental

And plural diminutive:

pejsci/pejskové – nominative, vocative
pejsků – genitive
pejskům – dative
pejsky – accusative, instrumental

But that is not the only diminutive. There is also alternative diminutive “psík”. And “psíček”. And “pejsánek”. And “pejsáneček”. The “če” you can then add for further diminution in principle ad infinity. It would sound silly to say it more than once, but it is gramatically correct.

And there is also augmentative “psisko”.

And the adjective “psí”. Which has different forms depending on the gender of the noun it qualifies.

But I won’t torture you with all their forms, you are brave enough if you read so far. To learn this is a torture even for native speakers. No wonder foreigners have rather hard time when they try to learn this. But at least we are not the worst, there are languages with more cases even here in Europe (looking sideways at the finno-ugric family).

Jack’s Walk

Millenial Trail, ©voyager, all rights reserved

I’m sorry that Jack’s Walk didn’t get posted yesterday. It was one of those days. The day began suddenly when a painter, painting in my friend V’s living room, fell 5 feet from a ladder while holding a gallon of white paint. V and I were both still sleeping soundly when it happened, but the sudden crash and cries of pain woke us both bolt upright right away. The fellow was already up and trying to mop up, but his forearm was lacerated and there was blood. And paint. Everywhere. My first thought was actually “Wow! That’s just like in cartoons!” and I had to stifle a nervous giggle. My next thought was “Oh, shit. Where’s the cat?” and finally, when I’d taken in the whole scene, it occurred to me that I’m trained in first aid and should be doing something more useful than standing there gaping. It was just so spectacular to see. Probably a once in a lifetime thing to see. I wish I  had pictures, but it didn’t even occur to me to take one. We sent the painter home with an icepack and encouragement to see a Dr. and then began the tedious chore of wiping up white paint spots from literally every surface in the room. The small spots dried quickly and required some scraping and the large spots just schmeared and made more of a mess. By the time I looked at my watch it was 12 o’clock and I had a 12:30 train to catch. The rest of the story is familiar to every weary traveler; hurry-up and wait. It’s about missed connections and not having a chance to eat. It’s about feeling grubby and irritable and wasted, but then finally it’s about being home. A Very Good Place to be.

Surrounded by Rocks: An Exploration Series, Chapter 6

It’s time for the next chapter by Nightjar and today we’re looking up to see the vast landscape around us.

Chapter 6 – East Hill: The Views

 

I’m always searching for rocks, fossils, flowers and insects, and often I have to remind myself to look up at the views. But let’s look up from the ground now. The first thing we see are some windmills in ruins. There are several here and they were made with limestone, of course.

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

Looking down south we can see the vineyards in their full autumn display and some green fields. The round trees in the foreground and among the vineyards are olive trees. There are still many people here that produce wine and olive oil for their own consumption and to share with family. My family’s vineyard is a little bit more to the right and not shown in the photo.

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

On the foothill there is the village’s soccer field. A match was about to start!

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

Let’s look west now. Those houses are the northern part of the village and in the background we can see the West Hill. It looks very different in terms of vegetation density, doesn’t it? Can you guess what those trees are?

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

In the next chapter we will explore the West Hill and see this one from the other side!

Thanks, Nightjar.

Mornings of the New Year

Another round of same–time–same–placing, this time with a variation (and no, it’s not the darkness). So first, the classic shot:

I freely admit, this is a week ago, so maybe it isn’t quite as dark anymore…
©rq, all rights reserved.

 

This time, however, here’s a peek back towards the station and the town, just as the outbound (outbound from the capital, that is) train is arriving:

©rq, all rights reserved.

We have since received a lot more snow, which has all melted again, but at least it looks a little bit like winter.

Today’s song talks a lot about December, but it still sounds great in January. It’s from Blue Rodeo, a classic Canadian band previously mentioned by voyager:

Hey hey I guess it hasn’t hit me yet
I fell through this crack
And I kinda lost my head
I stand transfixed
Before this street light
Watching the snow fall
On this cold December night
And out in the middle of Lake Ontario
The same snow is falling
On the deep silent water
The great dark wonder
Into the waves of my heart
Into the waves of my heart
Of my heart
Sounds like home to me.

The Death of Handicraft

Today’s video is not the main meat of the article, but just an appetizer:

Joe van der Steeg is a blacksmith from Netherlands. I came across his videos a few years ago and I found them very informative, even though admittedly not very entertaining. I did not subscribe, because I do not intend to seriously go into forging at the moment, but I kept him at the back of my mind for future reference should I need plain and to-the-point info about forging techniques. What was clear from the few videos that I have watched was that he is very committed to the craft and that it is his life.

Previous year he announced that he is quitting the craft as a professional and will only continue with it as a hobbyist. When I have noticed that video, I was saddened, because I hate that old crafts are disappearing.

A few days ago I found out that Alec Steele, the youth YouTube blacksmithing star has afterwards invited him for a few days of collaborative work at his workshop, they had a lot of fun together and Alec’s enthusiasm and infectious personality have motivated Joe to continue to make videos. I shed a sentimental tear over that outcome, and I subscribed to Joe, although his videos are still on a back-burner for me, because day has only so many hours.

I know that to make knives for a living is for me just a pipe dream. There is a lot of people in that market, the competition is fierce and getting notorious enough to make a living would be difficult, even more so for a shy and introverted personality (I can pretend self-confident and strong, but not for long).

But overall I think that at a societal level a step back from automation would be desirable. With current state of technology, it is entirely conceivable having 5 hours working days somewhere at a factory/farm and the rest of the day having off to be a weaver, cobbler or whatevermaker to your heart’s desire.  The factories with their automation are perfect for delivering necessities for survival, but to my mind nothing beats handicraft for delivering the beautiful, unique and shiny. Further jobs at factories are soul-crushing and many people afterward have no energy for anything else than to sit in front of TV. Also most people whom I know who do have a creative hobby are mentally much better off than those who do not. There are reasons for arts therapy.

I am not entirely convinced that decline of handicraft is purely due to automation – there are a lot of people who would love to own handmade goods, but cannot afford them.

So why do we as a society insist on having most people do jobs they hate most of the time if that is not, strictly speaking, necessary for the survival of the species?

In my opinion the thing that is killing handicrafts is the same thing that drives the world inexorably towards global warming – insatiable greed of the upper 1% who are sucking money out of the economy only to put it on their bank accounts so they can engage in pointless dick-measuring contests with their fellow parasites. More and more people have to spend 8 or more hours a day in a factory to produce cheap goods, because fewer and fewer people have the means to purchase the more expensive handmade goods. It is a self-reinforcing cycle.

Surrounded by Rocks: An Exploration Series, Chapter 5

Nightjar is here to share the next chapter of her series.

Chapter 5 – East Hill: Flora

There is quite a lot of biodiversity on the top but what you see will of course depend on the time of the year you visit. Spring would be more interesting, and we would be looking for wild orchids, wild peonies (Paeonia broteri) and honeysuckles. In November we must content ourselves with the late crocus (Crocus serotinus)…

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

… and the autumn buttercup (Ranunculus bullatus).

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

Some plants have berries now, like the wild jasmine (Jasminum fruticans)…

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

… or the hawthorn (Crataegus monogyna).

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

And seedcases of the grey-leaved cistus (Cistus albidus) make me want to come back in Spring for their pink flowers with yellow centers.

©Nightjar, all rights reserved

The next chapter will be the last here and we will just enjoy the views and see the hill we will explore next, on the other side of the village.

Jack’s Walk

Properly tucked, ©voyager, all rights reserved

I’m away from home for the next few days staying with a friend whose mother just died. The funeral is tomorrow and I likely won’t be home until Friday so for the rest of the week Jack and I will be taking separate walks. That means that Jack’s Walk is a bit of a crap shoot this week. We’ll be here, but who knows what you’ll see. For today, I’ll give you a glimpse at how Jack relaxes after his evening walk. When he was young Jack was always hot, but this winter for the first time the boy has decided he likes blankets and the cozier the better. This is the blanket that Jack got for Christmas and he loves it. He makes a great big fuss trying to cover himself with it in the hope that mommy or daddy will come along and tuck him in properly. This is what properly tucked looks like.