Hafa tatamanu ha? Todu maolek

Some of you will be aware that my use of language can be quite innovative. That is a language says one thing and I pronounce it completely differently! There are times when I am sure that I may have committed a genocide on various languages and would be brought before the Hague, save for the fact that the Language police haven't caught me yet. I like languages. I may prounce everything wrong and make huge grammatical screwups in form but I still like em!

So you can imagine my delight when I came across this site which told me how to say "How are in you?" in 426 languages! I may never get to speak Chamorro ( from Guam) or Cree (from Canada) but you never know.......

Liked it.

Nominate it.

10 Years of EMU and here is the prize..

Wow 10 years eh. God it seems like only yesterday when I started secondary school and we started talking about the Economic and Monetary Union in Business studies class with our teacher. Back then, all of 1998, I don't know if I really appreciated how important this little acronym would come to be. Some 2000 years of a European idea of having a common currency in order to reinforce either imperial ideals of the Roman Empire or the lustings of a Middle-European country dominated Holy Roman Empire. Finally realised with the downfall of the former-Soviet Union and the integration of Western & Middle Europe more wholly, economically & socially. I certainly do remember the changeover from 1999 onwards of dual-currency bank statements, then dual pricing in the stores and learning the changeover rate (IR£1= €0.787564), before the eventual realization of actually using the new currency in my local stores, with a certain sense of nostalgia as I handed over my Irish pound notes & coins and received my Euro change-rampant nationalism dies hard in the face of the European dream.

Anyway what has brought on this sudden realization of 10 years of EMU I hear you ask!?!, Well it would appear that our lovely administrative staff within the European Central Bank, have decided to mark this 10 year anniversary by allowing us, the gracious citizens of the European Union to decide on what the new logo for the €2 coin should be. So here are the designs....



However is it just me or do they all look like something which would appear in a Museum of Modern Art. They are all very interpretative pieces but I would love if the ECB would elaborate on what each design is meant to signify, at least then it wouldn't be a case of a simple "which one do you like citizen?", but rather an informed decision. Trivial perhaps but not a big ask. A currency is something which represents its citizens and should embody the ideals of that citizenry. In Ireland, it used to be Lady Lavery within our notes and the Harp on our coins. In France, the use of the slogan of the French Republic, "Liberty, Equality & Fraternity" was on their coins. But then again the interpretative nature of these designs is perhaps what some within the European Union would sieze upon as somewhat ironic. ie a Europe that is exactly what you want it to be as long as you toe the line. For those of you who wish to vote for the new design its availble here. Only open to European citizens and residents I am afraid, so all those non-European citizens/residents peeps apologies but I think you will forgive us if we try and sort out what exactly we stand for and what we want our coins to embody.

A Common European Language

With all the talk about a single European currency, some people are talking about a common European language, with English being touted as the preferred language for communications, ahead of German. But the British will be asked to concede a simplified spelling to be phased in over a five-year period.

In the first year, 'S' would be used instead of the soft 'C'. Sertainly, sivil servants will resieve this news with joy. Also, the hard 'C' will be replaced with 'K'. Not only will this klear up konfusion, but typewriters kan have one less letter on the keyboard.

There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year, when the troublesome 'ph' will be replaced by f. This will make words like 'fotograf' 20 per sent shorter.

In the third year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters, which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil agre that the horible mes of silent 'e's in the languag is disgrasful, so they would hav to go.

By the fourth year, peopl wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing 'th' by 'z' and 'w' by 'v'. During ze fifz year, ze unesesary 'o' kan be dropd from vords kontaining 'ou', and similar changes vud of kors be aplid to ozer kombinations of leters.

After zis fifz year, ve vil hav a reli sensibl riten styl. Zer vil beno mor trubls or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi tu understand ech ozer. Ze drem vil finali kum tru.