#I had to look up a ton of yiddish words

[crusheswhimsandfancies]

Listening to this today and omg I love the lyrics! I’m Old Enough To Be Your Zaide😳🥴 and Kiss My Mezuzah are my faves, obviously🫦 very saucy!

But then!!! Oh no!

“Go on just step inside

Or if not, I’ll just kiss my own mezuzah

I’m resilient, I can always retrench

Blessed am I, for always standing by

The needs of this fine, available, attractive,

Secure, well-rounded, intelligent lonely mensch”

That just breaks my heart😭😭😭 even if it isn’t about him, I feel like it’s close to the bone💔

[the-firebird69]

Watch "The Book of Eli (2010) Official Trailer - Denzel Washington, Mila Kunis Movie HD" on YouTube

One of his sins is to dishonor. But there is more than that a lot more than that. Is a priest for 40 years of Israel but he was not really fighting to defend Israel means he does not fighting to defend people like me but that's not the sin that caused him to suffer it's because the top side is sometimes called Israel by them below and it's a threat they're saying and that's what it means and that's what they said in the Bible that they were 40 for Israel it says it in Yiddish and ancient Hebrew and it is translated that way into English. This man has earned himself a spot in the Bible and there are many references to him but he doesn't have a book...

Zues

I found that odd cuz he's so big and nasty and has done so many things over the years. And I checked. And it's true.

Hera

It is true and he is done a lot less over the years but he did more later on in life and he is allotted a book and he wasn't disciple and our son thinks that he's Peter and we think that he was not and he was Saul that's who he was became Paul and he never changed and true he doesn't have a book

Thor Freya

There's a huge answer here he's not me. And that was me Peter. Said he's looking for the words it was something Paul and Saul or Peter and saw because he was the Roman soldier and he changed into someone new even though he's one of us and we do understand that and Jesus Christ was put in the grave by him and he is of course no suspect and that's going badly for us were divided you can see it already written and it's playing out that way

Simon Peter

Well I'm Simon from Simon Peter and I will say that this is very intense and that we are together and we're husband and wife but this is a little bit intense. And he says he's made it to a book no because his works we're not that great for the max in his vehicle and his set up to be the antagonist towards everyone in order for them to use him as a fulcrum to achieve the two huge planets and more. I do see that and we've been used the whole time and they're calling him some sort of warrior versus what we are which is like philosophers and things that they influence people with. I've got to go home and figure out what to do we know what our books say about us. And who says that Connie f is not the only one who dishonors him and it's rampant that he's not doing what it's supposed to do it's not a surprise and an odd thing to say and it says he sets people up like us to fight against those who would rule over all of us and I do understand that it's against the max he means and they know about it and they want to use it and but he says that he was set up to do it a long time before he was born so I'm going to go think about this

Simon

These things about the truth when the sun says is true too what our son says is true too that this started a long time ago and they're trying to blame him for all sorts of nasty things that they had done it's going to be a pretty big leap to do and not accustomed to people blaming us for making some idiot that is threatening the Earth and has been for thousands of years it's raining all of civilization so we don't want to hear it it's idiocy. The black ship fleet is whittled down to about 200,000 ships and their class A and big and getting beaten up, the stone ship fleet is down to 2.5 million and shrinking fast the ships are huge but they're vastly outnumbered in both cases and although they took losses it's not necessarily the empire it was McDonald's and Stan both are not Mac proper no Mac is but the rest of US Army is not, and it's going on now Mac is figuring out it should be in business doing tons of stuff they lost about 65% of their fleet Stan lost 85% through damage or theft or destruction it's a huge number for them the morlock last 90% of their fleet and we're talking all of their fleets not just the empire ships. And it's still weighed you the war up there is still waigimg. And down below the clones there were 10 bases this morning and now there are eight bases all of them are at 30 to 40% and the troops have stopped coming and they're calling for the clones to arrive and the big ships to get here like madness. Shortly we're going to see those ships move and they're going to try and get here more soon

Olympus

[leandra-kinard]

Every time I come across something like this, I learn something new. Or do another double take. There's such a vast overlap between Yiddish and German words. Schmutz just made me double take, because I hadn't been aware it was a Yiddish term.

So I wondered is this one of the many examples of words of Yiddish/Hebrew origin that we have long since incorporated into German, or is it an originally German word that was incorporated into Yiddish? In the case of Schmutz, apparently, it's the latter.

There are tons of examples of the former, however, and I think one of my faves is "Schlamassel".

Verklempt is also an interesting example. It's a German originated word - verklemmt, and in German, it does not mean what it means in English/Yiddish. It means stuck up, prudish.

Language is fascinating, and the whole history of how Jews brought terms into other languages (mainly German and Polish in the first waves), then took words from those languages, and brought them to yet other areas, especially the US in the later migratory waves, is particularly interesting.

I also remember how we studied this in German class in high school, and we watched an American Yiddish movie with subtitles. It was really fun how much I could understand because I also know Czech, and there are many words with that Slavic root in Yiddish.

Also, "Tuches" was another one that had me look up the etymology. Until this point, I never made the connection, but that's what tushie derived from. Absolutely fascinating.

Insults will be their own poll lol

[supercantaloupe]

okay yeah actually, i’ll bite. i’ve got some of my own thoughts about the unsleeping city and cultural representation and i’m gonna make a post about them now, i guess. i’ll put it under a cut though because this post is gonna be long.

i wanna start by saying i love dimension 20 and i really really enjoy the unsleeping city. i look forward to watching new episodes every week, and getting hooked on d20 as a whole last summer really helped pull me out of a pandemic depression, and i’m grateful to have this cool show to be excited about and interested in and to have met so many cool people to talk about it with.

that being said, however, i think there is a risk run in representing any group of people/their culture when you have the kind of setting that tuc has. by which i mean, tuc is set in a real world with real people and real human cultures in it. unlike fantasy high or a crown of candy where everything is made up (even if rooted in real-world cultures), tuc is explicitly rooted in reality, and all of its diversity -- both the ups and downs that go with it. and especially set in new york of all places, one of the most densely, diversely populated cities on earth. the cast is 7 people; it’s great that those 7 people come from a variety of backgrounds and identities and all bring their own unique perspectives to the table, and it’s great that those people and the entire crew are generally conscious of themselves and desire to tell stories/represent perspectives ethically. but you simply cannot authentically represent every culture or every perspective in the world (or even just in a city) when your cast is 7 people. it’s an impossible task. this is inherent to the setting, and acknowledged by the cast, and by brennan especially, who has been on record saying how one of the exciting aspects of doing a campaign set in nyc is its diversity, the fact that no two new yorkers have the same perspective of new york. i think that’s a good thing -- but it does have its challenges too, clearly.

i’m not going to go into detail on the question of whether or not tuc’s presentation of asian and asian american culture is appropriative/offensive or not. first of all, i don’t feel like it’s 100% fair to judge the show completely yet, since it’s a prerecorded season and currently airing midseason, so i don’t yet know how things wrap up. secondly, i’m not asian or asian american. i can have my own opinions on that content in the show, but i think it’s worth more to hear actual asian and asian american voices on this specific aspect of the show. having an asian american cast member doesn’t automatically absolve the show of any criticisms with regard to asian american cultural representation/appropriation, whether those criticisms are made by dozens of viewers or only a handful of them. regardless, i don’t think it’s my place as someone who is not asian to speak with any authority on that issue, and i know for a fact that there are asian american viewers sharing their own opinions. their thoughts in this instance hold more water than mine, i think.

what i will comment on in more depth, though, is a personal frustration with tuc. i’m jewish; i’ve never really been shy about that fact on my page here. i’m not from new york, but i visit a few times a year (or i did before covid anyway, lol), and i have some family from nyc. nyc, to me, is a jewish city. and for good reason, since it’s home to one of the largest jewish populations of the country, and even the world, and aspects of jewish culture (including culinary, like bagels and pastrami, and linguistic, like the common use of yiddish words and phrases in english colloquial speech) are prevalent and celebrated among jews and goyim alike. when i think of nyc, i think of a jewish city; that’s not everybody’s new york, but that’s my new york, and thats plenty of other people’s new york too. so i do find myself slightly disappointed or frustrated in tuc for its, in my opinion, rather stark lack of jewish representation.

now, i’m not saying that one of the PCs should have been jewish, full stop. i love to headcanon iga as jewish even though canon does not support that interpretation, and i’m fine with that. she’s not my character. it’s possible that simply no one thought of playing a jewish character, i dunno. but also, and i can’t be sure about this, i’m willing to bet that none of the players really wanted to play a jewish character because they didn’t want to play a character of a marginalized culture they dont belong to in the interest of avoiding stereotyping or offensive representation/cultural appropriation. (i don’t know if any of the cast members are jewish, but i’m assuming not.) and the concern there is certainly appreciated; there’s not a ton of mainstream jewish rep out there, and often what we get is either “unlikeable overly conservative hassidic jew” or “jokes about their bar mitzvah/one-off joke about hanukkah and then their jewishness is never mentioned ever again,” which sucks. it would be really cool to see some more good casual jewish rep in a well-rounded, three-dimensional character in the main cast of a show! even if there are a couple of stumbles along the way -- nobody is perfect and no two jews have the same level of knowledge, dedication, and adherence to their culture.

but at the same time, i look at characters like iga and i really do long for a jewish character to be there. siobhan isn’t polish, yet she’s playing a characters whose identity as a polish immigrant to new york is very central to her story and arc. and part of me wonders why we can’t have the same for a jewish character. if not a PC, then why not an NPC? again, i’m jewish, and i am not native, but in my opinion i think the inclusion of jj is wonderful -- i think there are even fewer native main characters in mainstream media than there are jewish ones, and it’s great to see a native character who is both in touch with their culture as well as not being defined solely by their native-ness. to what extent does it count as ‘appropriative’ because brennan is a white dude? i dunno, but i’m like 99% sure they talked to sensitivity consultants to make sure the representation was as ethical as they could get it, and anyway, i can’t personally see and glaring missteps so far. but again, i’m not native, and if there are native viewers with their own opinions on jj, i’d be really interested in hearing them.

but getting back to the relative lack of jewish representation. it just...disappoints me that jewishness in new york is hardly ever even really mentioned? again, i know we’re only just over halfway through season 2, but also, we had a whole first season too. and it’s definitely not all bad. for example: willy! gd, i love willy so much. him being a golem of williamsburg makes me really really happy -- a jewish mythological creature animated from clay/mud (in this case bricks) to protect a jewish community (like that of williamsburg, a center for many of nyc’s jews) from threat. golem have so often been taken out of their original context and turned into evil monsters in fantasy settings, especially including dnd. (even within other seasons of d20! crush in fh being referred to as a “pavement golem” always rubbed me the wrong way, and i had hoped they’d learned better after tuc but in acoc they refer to another monster as a “corn golem” which just disappointed me all over again.) so the fact that tuc gets golems right makes my jewish heart very happy.

and yet...he doesn’t show up that much? sure, in s1, he’s very helpful when he does, but in s2 so far he shows up once and really does not say or do much of anything. he speaks with a lot more yiddish-influenced language than other characters, but if you didn’t know those words were specifically yiddish/jewish, you might not be able to otherwise clock the fact that willy is jewish. and while willy is a jewish mythological creature who is jewish in canon, he isn’t human. there are no other direct references to judaism, jewish characters, or jewish culture in the unsleeping city beyond him.

there are, in fact, two other canon jewish characters in tuc. but...here’s where i feel the most frustration, i think. the two canon jewish humans in tuc are stephen sondheim and robert moses. both of whom are real actual people, so it’s not like we can just pick and choose what their cultural backgrounds are. as much as i love stephen sondheim, i think there are inherent issues with including real world people as characters in a fictional setting, especially if they are from living/recent memory (sondheim is literally still alive), but anyway, sondheim and moses are both actual jewish people. from watching tuc alone you probably would not be able to guess that sondheim is jewish -- nothing from his character except name suggests it, and i wouldn’t even fault you for not thinking ‘sondheim’ is a jewish-sounding surname (and i dislike the idea/attitude/belief that you can tell who is or isn’t jewish by the sound of their name). and yeah, i’m not going to sit here and be like “brennan should have made sondheim more visibly jewish in canon!” because, like, he’s a real human being and it’s fucking weird to portray him in a way that isn’t as close to how he publicly presents himself, which is not in fact very identifiably jewish? i don’t know, this is what i mean by it’s inherently weird and arguably problematic to portray real living people as characters in a fictional setting, but i digress. sondheim’s jewish, even if you wouldn’t know it; not exactly a representation win.

and then there’s bob moses. you might be able to guess that he’s jewish from canon, actually. there’s the name, of course. but more insidious to me are the specifics of his villainy. greedy and powerhungry, a moneyman, a lich whose power is stored in a phylactery...it does kind of all add up to a Yikes from me. (in the stock market fight there’s a one-off line asking if he has green skin; it’s never really directly acknowledged or answered, but it made me really uncomfortable to hear at first and it’s stuck with me since viewing for the first time.) the issue for me here is that the most obviously jewish human character is the season’s bbeg, and his villainy is rooted in very antisemitic tropes and stereotypes.

i know this isn’t all brennan’s fault -- robert moses was a real ass person and he was in fact jewish, a powerhungry and greedy moneyman, a big giant racist asshole, etc. i’m not saying that jewish characters can’t be evil, and i’m not saying brennan should have tried to be like “this is my NPC robert christian he’s just like bob moses but instead he’s a goy so it’s okay” because...that would be fuckin weird bro. and bob moses was a real person who was jewish and really did do some heinous shit with his municipal power. i’m not necessarily saying brennan should have picked/created a different character to be the villain. i’m not even saying that he shouldn’t have made bob moses a lich (although, again, it doesn’t 100% sit right with me). but my point here is that bob moses is one of a grand total of three canon jewish characters in tuc, of which only two humans, of whom he is the one you’d most easily guess would be jewish and is the most influenced by antisemitic stereotypes/tropes. had there been more jewish representation in the show at all, even just some neutral jewish NPCs, this would not be as much of a problem as it is to me. but halfway through season 2, so far, this is literally all we get. and that bums me out.

listen, i really like tuc. i love d20. but the fact that it is set in a real world place with real world people does inherently raise challenges when it comes to ethical cultural representation. especially when the medium of the show is a game whose creatures, lore, and mechanics have been historically rooted in some questionable racial/cultural views. and dnd is making progress to correct some of those misguided views of older sourcebooks by updating them to more equitably reflect real world racial/cultural sensitivities; that’s a good thing! but these seasons, of course, were recorded before that. the game itself has some questionable cultural stuff baked into it, and that is (almost necessarily) going to be brought to the table in a campaign set in a real-world place filled with real-world people of diverse real-world cultures. the cast can have sensitivity consultants and empathy and the best intentions in the world, and they’ll still fuck up from time to time, that’s okay. your mileage may vary on whether or not it’s still worth sticking around with the show (or the fandom) through that. for me, it does not yet outweigh all the things i like about the show, and i’m gonna continue watching it. but it’s still very worth acknowledging that the cast is 7 people who cannot possibly hope to authentically or gracefully represent every culture in nyc. it’s an unfortunate limitation of the medium. yet it’s also still worthwhile to acknowledge and discuss the cultural representation as it is in the show -- both the goods and the bads, the ethically solid and the questionably appropriative -- and even to hold the creators accountable. (decently, though. i’m definitely not advocating anybody cyberbully brennan on twitter or whatever.) the show and its representation is far from perfect, but i also don’t think it ever could be. still, though, it could always be better, and there’s a worthwhile discussion to be had in the wheres, hows, and whys of that.

[progressivejudaism]

hello! im a goyische content creator looking to create jewish characters in my story, and i was wondering if you had resources as to some of the everyday things that makes someone jewish? my story is not slice-of-life so i have difficulty inputting clear indicators that they are jewish, but i don't want to be one of those creators who just says a character is something without making it a part of them. sorry if this ask doesn't make much sense, but id really appreciate any input you could give!

Hi friend!

Thank you for your thoughtful question.  I am a student rabbi living in NYC and appreciate such a respectful discussion here.  I am so thankful that you are attempting to write this story in a respectful manner and that you are coming to Jews for consultation.  But alas, I am about to bring you news with which you might feel uncomfortable hearing.   Ultimately, I am the bearer of bad news.

I get these messages a lot- well intentioned, passionate writers looking to include Jews in their writings. Jewish representation is SO important. And thank you so much for thinking of us. But I would hate for you to frame something incorrectly or get something really wrong. A lot of times non-Jews who misrepresent Jews in their writings are identified as antisemites or plainly people who appropriate Judaism. I would HATE for someone to argue anything like that about you- who I could tell is a rather intentional and thoughtful.

Just one simple example-- I recently was talking to a person who wanted to write about a gay Orthodox man in an interfaith relationship with a Christian man and their story about the adoption of a child around December. This person was well intentioned, but failed to recognize that few Orthodox Jews would ever be in a relationship with a non-Jew and would never have to deal with the struggles of Christmas/Hanukkah. They also failed to recognize that writing the story of a gay Orthodox Jewish person is an incredibly challenging and difficult topic- more so than a Reform LGBTQ+ person- because of how a lot of Orthodox theologies are framed. Typically in these situations, most LGBTQ+ formerly Orthodox Jews shift away from religion. It would be a rather challenging and niche character that a non-Jew-- and frankly, myself as a queer rabbinical student in a liberal institution-- would struggle to write.

Writing a Jewish character requires not just a ton of background knowledge on Jewish rituals and customs (and the nuances within those customs), but the knowledge of representing them in a way that sounds authentic. Most non-Jews that I know have never lit a Hanukkah menorah, dwelled in a sukkah on Sukkot, sat in a Purim shpiel on Purim, nor engaged in Jewish prayer or Torah study. And beyond representing Jewish rituals correctly, there is Jewish Theology. That is a complicated conversation in it of itself, but let's just say, this is where most writers get their Jewish characters wrong: in how they address (or don't address) God, in how they understand God, etc. Sadly, most Christians (or people who grew up Christian who don't necessarily identify that way) believe that Judaism is "Christianity without Jesus with a few more holidays" and that is completely untrue and a dangerous ideology.

Beyond theology, there are issues of race/ethnicity/peoplehood/etc (whatever you want to call it). Like theology, this is a majorly complicated side to this question of Jewish representation. As an example-- a Jewish writer on Elena of Avalor recently got that story *so* wrong. The writer is an Ashkenazi Jew telling the story of a Jewish princess who is clearly not an Ashkenazi Jew-- most likely Mizrahi or Sephardi-- and the writer/director included Yiddish words and nuances in the show. (Yiddish being the language of Ashkenazi Jewry). It was not cool at all.

Ultimately, I have to thank you for your thoughtful questions and apologize that my response had to be so negative.  They are so because I really respect you and what you’re doing and would NEVER want anyone to argue that any ounce of your creativity was for the wrong intentions.  

I’m here if you have ANY questions, comments, or discussions whatsoever. 

l’shalom,

Josh

[jewishconvertthings]

I'm interested in learning more but so much of the vocab I'm not familiar with and I was wondering how you would recommend learning that. Preferably, if you had a suggestion that was online that would be best

Hi anon, 

So there are a ton of terms to learn and a lot of them are in other languages, so I definitely get your confusion. Unfortunately, “vocab” is really vague and I honestly don’t know which specific things you’re struggling with. That being the case, this is going to be kind of long-winded to cover as much ground as possible. 

First, I would recommend reading Essential Judaism by George Robinson to get a broad idea of underlying concepts. This will help you have enough of a basic framework for understanding that you’ll be able to situate those terms in a practical, useful way. 

From there, please understand that many of the words and phrases you’re searching for are going to be in one of several other languages. If it’s a biblical term or reference, it’ll likely be in biblical Hebrew, if it’s a Talmudic reference, it could be in Hebrew or Aramaic, if it’s a modern reference (especially anything to do with medinat Yisrael/Israeli culture) it may be in modern Hebrew, and depending on whether your community is Ashkenazi, Sephardi, or Mizrachi, it could be in Yiddish, Ladino, or Judeo-Arabic, respectively. And all of these are written in alef-bet rather than English letters. That being the case, your best bet is to try and figure out the context of the phrase and look it up from there. 

The way I’ve approached this is by making sure I have the correct words (and ideally, a common transliteration of them) and then googling them + the word “Judaism” as a search term. 

So let’s say I don’t know what bishul akum means. I know that the phrase is used in discussing the halacha of kashrut, which means it’s probably a Hebrew term. I’ll then google “bishul akum meaning Judaism.” Here’s what I found: 

[Image is just a screencap of the top google results, which can be found here.]

(You can do this search yourself and read more about it, but basically it refers to food that is not kosher because it was prepared entirely by a non-Jew, even if all other laws of kashrut are kept by that non-Jew in the process.) 

Make sure that you’re using reputable sources once you do your search. Chabad, Aish, My Jewish Learning, Jewish Virtual Library, the Orthodox Union and other major organizations usually have solid information on these topics. Definitely also keep in mind the perspective of that organization. (Namely, if you go to an orthodox organization’s website for answers, don’t be mad if you get an orthodox answer. Liberal resources do exist, but are sometimes harder to find.) 

Mainly what I would try to avoid is the many non-Jewish (often xian or messianic!!) sources that also try to define these terms. Adding “Judaism” to your search helps weed out some of them, but often enough you’ll still get hits from “hebrew4christians” and various other messianic sources. If you’re not sure, try searching the term on a known Jewish resource or organization’s website. 

If you’re looking for phrases or terms that people seem to use colloquially, I’ve found the Jewish-English Lexicon website to be invaluable. So let’s say your frum friend drops “chas v’shalom” into her sentence and you have no idea what she means by this. You later search it on the Jewish-English Lexicon website: 

[Image is of the search results for “chas v’shalom” on the Jewish-English Lexicon website, which can be found here.]

No exact matches, but based on the context you think the meaning might be similar to chas v’chalila, so you check it: 

[Image is of the entry for “chas v’chalila,” which can be found here.]

In the notes at the bottom, you’ll also notice that it’s mentioned as a “see also.” 

Long story short, it can be daunting to try to get up to speed on a lot of the terms and phrases used in Jewish spaces, especially if you’re entering a more observant space. Please don’t feel like you’re dumb or hopelessly out of the loop for not knowing all of this, even after a while. I literally had to google “sitra achra meaning” the other night because I had no idea and I’ve been done with my conversion for six months.

I hope this helps, and please feel free to follow up with further questions!

[gotgifsandmusings]

Could the Rhoynar be seen as a Jewish analogue? They were forced into exile by an empire after their homeland was destroyed. It's not a perfect analogy, but the Orphans on the Greenblood in particular seem to have some elements (separate from the main population, many are traders, etc.) and also resemble the Roma in some ways, because GRRM doesn't do perfect 1 to 1 comparisons.

Like…in a very very broad sense, sure. But you really can’t look at jews as a checklist of what our survival looked like or specific events (Egypt, Masada, etc.) without also looking at the culture and of course, the religion. Even now that there’s more secular jews, the religion still kind of provides the vehicle through which there’s cultural connections (this is why high holiday tickets sell out). But moreso, there’s a very jewish way of looking at things that’s inherent to the practice, and a specific…mentality that is super super hard to explain satisfactorily.

It’s kind of like this commitment to survival and living knowing that it all can be snatched from you at any moment. “Remember that we suffered.” But there’s also a… I feel like I’m going to step in it here.

There’s a decided “fuck you” about it all, too. Every day we draw breath is a fuck you to the people who have tried so hard to prevent that. I’ve actually just read The Story of Yiddish which gets into jewish culture and spirit a ton, and this probably buts that ineffable thing better than anything I could come up with:

Usually all of the Jews’ wordly possessions had to be left behind as they alchemized into instant refugees by formerly relatively friendly hosts who’d suddenly had enough of this strange people with their bizarre babble and weird beards. Usually the Jews were given five minutes to pack up and flee one more time somewhere else.

“Somewhere else” would be anywhere the Jews could rest, even for a spell. Yiddish, needing no luggage, was the one thing the Jews always could and did bring along. Before fleeing another land, they usually had managed to take as lovely parting gifts some vocabulary and slang that they could incorporate into Yiddish.

Yiddish was Jewry’s Silly Putty. Like the toy dough, Yiddish lifted off the image of the words it was borrowing from other cultures, leaving an impression on the clay that could be bent and stretched for the Jews’ own linguistic needs.

Hanukkah isn’t about oil (I mean it is, but it’s a metaphor, fool); it’s about the staunch refusal to assimilate. Yiddish, hilariously considered the language of “self-degradation” by some, was the jewish home for years, and the reason we never did get swallowed.

In ASOIAF, I simply don’t see any cultural survival narrative that is remotely evocative of this. This driven, survivalist mindset, but with a decidedly playful, ironic edge to it. A unifying religion whose defining feature is “everything’s up for interpretation and debate.” There’s in-verse cultural prejudices in Westeros and Essos of course, but any similarity is in a very, very general sense.

What’s cool about speculative fiction is that you have the ability to parallels even when they’re not perfect. The Dornish can be the Poles and the Welsh, you know? Hell, the Avatar-verse Water Tribe, with their strong focus on collective responsibility and oral tradition, can be read through a jewish lens at times. So we don’t need perfect parallels. I do, however, think that this is one that Martin just didn’t set out to explore. And that’s fine.

[jewish-philosophy]

In Hasidic Williamsburg

About a year after growing as an observant Jewish person, I began to explore communities outside of my own general area of Atlanta. I had yet to be immersed into a particular area that’s as traditional as Williamsburg. I have been in areas that have Haredim, but most of the time, I have not been to a town completely  immersed in Yiddishkeit. I had already heard of what many call “Hasidic Williamsburg”.

After conflicts in Europe, many dynasties of Chasidish Rebbes found safe haven in America - mostly in metro New York City as place to grow. Williamsburg along with Borough Park and Crowned Heights became places for the growth of traditional Jewish life. It wasn’t always common to see many people in New York City being Shomer Shabbos. Secular Jewish people had been becoming more observant over the decades. This is known as the Baal Teshuvah movement. Jewish outreach became more common from the 1960’s forward with the important people such as Shlomo Carlebach and Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the Chabad-Lubavitch Rebbe, who dedicated their lives to help bring people closer to HaShem and the Jewish people.

Upon leaving the airport, I realized I needed to find an effective way to get to Monsey. Shortly before getting to the exit of the airport, I saw two Frum people (non-Hasidim) entering into the airport, and I asked them if they knew I way to get to Monsey. They said that if I go to Brooklyn, I could get a ride to Monsey from there. When I left the airport building, there was someone assigning people to taxis. That person asked me where was I heading, I didn’t know the address of a particular place to go to in Brooklyn, so I told him that I wanted to go to the nearest Jewish “part of town”, and he said “Williamsburg”. He then told me to go to the cab across the road. I quickly walked passed the road, and realized a cab pulled from my left and quickly stopped. It then occurred to me that I would have to watch where I walk when crossing each road which wasn’t much of an issue in the Suburbs of Georgia. The driver of the cab I was going to asked me where I was headed, so I typed in “Williamsburg Shul” and the first to appear was  Congregation Yetev Lev. It was a Satmar Shul on Rodney Street.  I said to the cab driver “150 Rodney Street”. He then said what road it “crossed” with. I didn’t know and would have to look up. I then realized that knowing what road a place intersects with is normally how drivers figure out how to get to places. Now, I realized that people may say something like “24th and 48th” when referring to the street block intersections.

As we were driving, I realized he was Jamaican and from a brief discussion on Islander culture, the conversation eventually lead into us talking about Jewish topics. The driver believed that Trump was not antisemitic mentioning how Trump’s daughter, Ivanka, converted to Judaism and married Jared Kushner. The driver then talked about how he would buy gifts for his Jewish lawyer in the Hasidish part of Williamsburg that we were headed towards.

I decided to be dropped off before Rodney Street in the general area of Hasidish Williamsburg. I chose to stop the cab after seeing the first road that had people wearing Frum attire. This was the beginning of that area shortly after a bridge. I then proceeded towards the area where I begun to see people wearing Shtreimels and Bekishes. I was looking all around me at this new environment as if I was exploring a continent I haven’t been to.

I remembered learning that on Shushan Purim, Hasidim wear their Shabbos and Yom Tov attire. More and more of them would walk by. Ideally, Frum experience was more interesting than what I could potentially have been doing in the secular, elitist, and “hip” part of Brooklyn. Though, personally, the secular content of the other side of Williamsburg did not interest me. When walking around the streets of this part of town, I was internally thinking “Shtreimels! Shtreimels everywhere! I’m totally in the right part of town!” given I’ve never experienced anything like this in my life. There was an unbelievably enormous amount of Yiddishkeit in this part of town. I walked along the sidewalks looking above in awe at the mere social atmosphere of this community viewings of the environment around me.

I then saw various Hasidim walking towards a building. I was curious what kind of building it was since you couldn’t always tell from the outside.  I asked them if it was a Shul. They said yes. So I walked in. It seemed like a small, compacted Shul.

Upon preparing for the trip, I had the plan of giving Tzedakah to Frum Jewish people but never had a specific plan on who, what, when, or where to do it. I realized that Williamsburg would be a good place for that.

The Rebbe of the Shul then saw me, and I talked to him for a little bit. I asked which Dynasty this was part of, and he said it was Nanash which I’ve never heard of before. I then decided to donate to a dollar to this Shul. He then showed me various folder slots where I could put one in. It may have been that seeing me with Tzitzis and a Kippa, along with casual street clothes, didn’t stop him from being hospitable despite not having the Hasidic appearance.

I then left that Shul looking for something to eat since the place didn’t have much, and I was also interested in seeing more of the area knowing that I’d eventually have to get to Monsey before the blizzard. I found another Shul where I heard someone talking over a microphone. It was a Satmar Shul. When entering the first people to see me gave me a look that showed that they didn’t know what I was doing there. The Rabbi talking through an intercom and was discussing Purim in Yiddish. It then occurred to me that they really do emphasize on the distinct accent by using the Hasid’sh way of pronouncing Purim as “Pirim”. It was that word that made me realize they were discussing Purim since the fast-paced Yiddish wasn’t something I could keep up with. I then felt like this was another place to donate money to, and saw kids collecting charity. I then gave multiple kids one dollar each. The kids looked very enthusiastic to receive these donations from someone like me - given that I didn’t look Hasidish.

I found a small Kosher grocery store. When being close to entering the store, I saw a young Hasidish man (probably around my age) walking into the store. I decided to say hit to him. He then gave me that look as if I was doing something not socially ideal. It then occurred to me that I was thinking with my more Southern mindset where saying hi to everyone is more acceptable.

In the store, was a pack of pre-made scrambled egg for a little less than four dollars. For some reason, I decided not to buy it. The cashier had a Russian accent, and we briefly spoke in Russian. I asked him if there were any Kosher restaurants near by...

When leaving the store, a Frum person in a black hat started asking asking if I was lost. I told him I was trying to get to Yeshivah Ohr Somayach in Monsey. He then told me that I could use the Monsey Trails bus to get there. When asking if I wanted to eat anything, I said I’d probably buy something in the area, and he decided to show me this free-soup kitchen around the block. It was a place where some local Frum people would gather to eat.

I wanted to wash my hands before eating but couldn’t find the soap. The young man helping people out only knew Yiddish. When trying to say “Soap”, he didn’t understand. So I pulled out my smartphone and googled “Yiddish for Soap”. The word “Zeyfer” was the Yiddish word for Soap, so I said “Zeyfer, Zeyfer.”, and he then suddenly seemed to understand what I wanted to directed me to the soap.

After washing my hands, I got a place and begun serving myself  with a piece of bread, some egg salad and multiple slices of Gefilte Fish on it. After sitting down, I could hear tons of people saying “Gefilte” within their own conversations in Yiddish which I did not fully understand but could assume that they were talking about me and my large quantity of Gefilte Fish.

Because I wanted to give more people Tzedakah, I pulled all of the coins out of my wallet, and tried to find someone to give it to. Given that I was wearing street clothes and was walking around with coins in my hand, when trying to ask someone if they needed Tzedakah (since I didn’t know Yiddish I just said “Tzedakah?” two times, and then man I was intending to donate money to pulls out some coins and puts them in my hand (that already had coins). It then occurred to me that this man may have thought that I was the poor one begging for money when I was really trying to make a charitable donation.

I then benched on my meal, and then left the area. Still waiting for the bus, I decided to check out the local Shul, and found Yetev Lev. It was a Satmar Shul. I found more people to give donations and used the coins I got from the soup kitchen to put it in that Tzedakah box in this Shul. In a way, the Hasidim were indirectly donating to each other with me as the intermediary.

It then came time for Mincha. I had realized I entered what I now know as a “Minyan Factory”. There were plenty of rooms for different minyanim one after another. I didn’t attend the first one but attended the second one. In that room, I heard their way of pronunciations of words like “Ameyn” which they pronounced as “Umayn”. Surprisingly, I was able to keep up with their davening despite not fully recognizing this dialect, I was able to keep up with them by merely reading along with the Hebrew script in the Siddur. Given there was no English translation in the Siddurim, my recognition of the Hebrew text was how I was able to understand what was happening around me.

The words of my own personal thoughts on Observant communities are still the same from when I was secular “The Haredim are rejecting and revolting against modern world”. I could still make the same statement now except for the fact that my tone in how I say it is much more positive given that I’m less secular. When one is adapted to various commodities in postmodern societies, it can be easier for such an individual to say the above statement with negativity, but overtime, I have turned around to a much more positive view on the statement.

Eventually, I found someone who knew some English.  He said he lived in Monsey and was waiting for the same bus I was waiting for. When he asked me where I’m from, I told him I’m from “Atlanta” He said he doesn’t know where that was. I decided it not to go into detail about that because I didn’t want to over-expose him to the outside world given he’s clearly been able to be purely  preserved this far in life.  We later talked about Yiddishkeit, and then asked him if he could help me put on Tefillin. Later, I found more people to give Tzedakah to. I saw someone dressed with a fancier Bikishes, and for some reason,I thought it was the Satmar Rebbe, Aaron Teitelbaum. So I went up to him and started talking to him. So I asked the younger bokher near him “Is that the Satmar Rebbe?”, and he said “No, that’s my dad” then told his dad that I thought he was the Satmar Rebbe. The individual who I thought was the Satmar Rebbe, then told me that his son needed to stay in Yeshivah and talked about the hopes for the son to get married. So I gave that person some money.

The only reason why I was even in New York on that Monday was because I had to reschedule my flight to be a day earlier in order to not get stuck in the snow storm. Had it not been for that snowstorm, I would have not been able to be there on Shushan Purim experiencing this.

[5-w-4]

EarthBound Headcanons

Requested by @warmquiltsandhoneyedtea. I have a ton of headcanons for EarthBound!

Ness (headcanon surname Kramer)

Ness has ADHD (combined type). He thrives off of spontaneity but struggles with any form of criticism due to rejection-sensitive dysphoria.

Ness likes the smell of petrichor.

Ness usually played shortstop in baseball. He was so good at it that when he was out of high school, a college team recruited him; it was the only reason he went to college. While playing for the team Ness studied Judaic history. This proved useful for him because his baseball career ended after he deliberately smashed a sports camera.

Ness’s favorite color is red. Ness's build can be described with two words: Lean. Muscle. He was five foot two during his EarthBound journey. He grew to be five foot nine.

Ness is Jewish. The religion came from his mother’s side of the family. The last time he saw his father was at his Bar Mitzvah, where Ness blew people away with his speech.

Ness mostly listens to grunge music. He also likes The Offspring.

Ness is an ESTP. Ness is quite fond of 80s films and 90s culture. His favorite movie is “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.”

Ness's IQ is 115.

Ness had his first kiss at a baseball game at the age of thirteen. The person he kissed was none other tham Paula Polestar. It was pretty brutal. (He gave the kiss cam his middle finger, complaining to the cameraman about privacy and personal space.)

Ness married Paula and went on to teach Yiddish at the college he attended. They celebrate Chrismukkah during the winter holiday season.

(I can’t tell if Ness is just a nickname. Probably. I don’t know what his real name would be though.)

Paula Polestar

Paula is severely dyslexic. She finds it humiliating, especially around her preschoolers she works with; they usually read with less trouble than she does.

Paula comes from a conservative Christian family. Her parents weren’t happy to find out that their little girl was going off to marry a Jewish boy, so they didn’t give her permission to marry Ness. She didn’t listen.

Paula was always small and thin for her age. She was four foot ten during her EarthBound journey, and she grew to be five foot one and a half.

Paula’s favorite color is cyan, the same color as her eyes. She also likes the color of the night sky.

The Polestar family name is a lie. Their real last name is Peterson. (Paula and Floyd [Mother 4] are third cousins and they share a last name.)

Paula is an INFJ.

Paula always had a penchant for darkness and creepy things. She never brought her teddy bears for her preschoolers to play with because the bears would freak the kids out.

Paula is a terrifyingly good liar. She could easily manipulate anybody she wished to, but she prefers the PK Fire method.

Paula enjoys doing visual art as a hobby. Her favorite medium is charcoal.

Paula’s hair is strawberry blonde. The red and blonde looks sort of streaked, but that’s her natural hair.

Paula is an extremely wild sleeper. This has caused problems for Ness ever since they knew each other.

Paula’s middle name is Sloane.

Jeff Andonuts

Jeff has an IQ of 150.

Jeff’s full name is Jefferson Winthrop Andonuts. (Ha! Based on my naming pattern I bet you were going to guess that Andonuts was a show name and that his real surname was Anderson! I got you, didn’t I?)

Jeff is an ISTJ. Many of his habits are idiosyncratic.

Jeff is asexual homoromantic. He remains single throughout the entirety of his life.

Jeff has an affinity with cryptids, which is why Tessie surfaced the day he went to the lake.

Jeff was the most hardcore preppy at Snow Wood Prep. It was partially due to his schooling and partially his choice.

Jeff is naturally stocky. He grew from five feet even to five foot three on his EarthBound journey; he stopped growing at five foot seven.

Jeff has astigmatism.

Prince Poo of Dalaam

Poo’s birth certificate lists his name as Mu Poo. He wishes to change it.

Under Poo’s rule, Dalaam is a socialist democracy. He legally mandates that each citizen gives him forty per cent of their income.

Poo is an ISFJ.

Poo has broad shoulders; the rest of his body narrows as it goes lower. He was five foot eight on his EarthBound journey, and he grew to be five foot eleven and a half.

Part of the reason Poo is such a picky eater is because of food allergies. He had very little food variety growing up, so his body isn’t used to a lot of Western food. He is also gluten and lactose intolerant.

Poo’s favorite color is the color of gold.

Tony (headcanon surname McIlbowie)

Tony is Scottish. His last name is a Scottish one, which is quaint because it translates to “son of a blond(e).” Tony’s hair is auburn.

Tony's IQ is 96.

Tony's favorite color is pine green. It reminds him of Jeff, who he remained friends with for all of his life.

Tony also has a stocky build.

Snow Wood was a Mormon school before it shut down; Tony was Mormon until he left high school to further explore his sexuality.

Tony dropped out of high school to serve drinks at a gay bar. He later dies in a Copacabana-style shooting.

Tracy (headcanon surname also Kramer)

Tracy worked with Escargot Express from the tender age of seven. She is now the CEO.

Tracy has endometriosis.

Ness called Tracy "Tracer."

Tracy is polysexual.

*Bonus note on King: King's full first name was King Lazarus. He died at fourteen calendar years old.

The Minch Family

The Kramers' loan from them went to Ness's journey.

The only Minch-Kramer neighbors who got along were Tracy and Picky. Whilst they were okay with each other, none of the others stayed so civil.

Lardna is a nickname as well. Mrs Minch's actual first name is Lora, but Mrs Kramer once said Lardna by accident and it stuck.

Porky is an actual psychopath. He sometimes has fantasies of Auschwitz-style torture, usually involving Ness or other people in Ness’s life.

Location Parallels

Onett is somewhere around where Northern California would be.

Twoson is around where the four state corners meet.

Threed is where Oklahoma would be.

Fourside is Chicago.

Summers is Sicily.

Foggyland is the equivalent of the United Kingdom, with Winters being England’s parallel.

Dalaam is like an amalgamation of several different Asiam countries, including Thailand, Nepal, India, and Mongolia.

Sorry the post is so long, and thank you again for asking!

[deafwestnewsies]

Love’s More Romantic Unplanned

...and that’s the miracle of judaism.

cross posted to my ao3! check it out! 

Jack grabbed Davey’s wrist as he turned to walk away. “Wait!” He yelped, causing Davey to scoff and turn around.

“What, Jack?” Davey was tired. Tired of acting like it was some secret, like he had to reveal it to the whole world. It wasn’t that crazy! Tons of people were just like him. Kath had took it really well when Sarah told her, and now they were dating!

Jack looked at a loss for words. “I- I… I should have known when I met you by the orthodox synagogue.” Davey raised an eyebrow. “I should have known when I saw you buying extra lox at the bagel shop.”

“What does lox have to do with anything-” Davey asked annoyed, but Jack cut him off.

“I should have known, you’re not to blame! I should have known we’re not the same.” Davey rolled his eyes and tried to yank his wrist out of Jack’s grip, but he held fast. “It doesn’t take an Einstein, you and Sarah have the nose and the name! And that name is Stienstien.”

“My last name is Jacobs, you know tha-”

Jack looked right in Davey’s eyes, sliding his hand down his wrist and laced their fingers together. Davey rolled his eyes again, but smiled slightly. “I’m not sure what you want me to do, but I think this is worth working through. I’ll admit that it’s a little out of the blue, but I could be Jewish for you.”

Davey’s grin widened a little more, but he still looked faintly annoyed. “Jack, you can’t just choose to be Jewish. You have to like, do things.” Jack let go of his hand and started waving his arms around like a crazy dictator.

“Like on holidays! I’ll stop baking gingerbread, start baking challah. When Hanukkah comes, heck, I’ll light the mandala!” Jack spun circles around Davey while he laughed.

Davey grabbed Jack’s shoulders and stopped his twirling. “It’s Menorah, dummy. And you don’t make the gingerbread, Specs does-”

“Menorah, then!” Jack broke free of Davey’s grip, picked up one of hands and began to dance with him ballroom style.

“If you could just choose me, I’ll sing eidledeidle not fala. As far as the culture I might need a clue, but I’ll give it a shot, ‘cause I’ve got to be Jewish for you.” They continued to dance as Jack made ridiculous claims and tried to get Davey to laugh.

“What is ‘eidledeidle’ and ‘fala’???” Davey exclaimed.

“I’ll go with you to temple, I’ll try to learn Yiddish,” Jack said.

Davey cut him off. “I don’t go to temple, and I learned Hebrew. We are a strict ‘No Yiddish’ household.”

Jack smiled wide. “I’ll start eating Kosher, I’ll even play quidditch!”

Davey shot him a pointed look, and Jack laughed. “Nope, not a Jew thing, Jack.”

“Well teach me some new things, I won’t be the slightest bit skittish! I’ll do it by note till it feels like it’s true, yeah till I’m verklempt I’ll attempt to be Jewish for you.” Now Jack was doing ridiculous leaps through the air, and Davey wondered what he was trying to prove.

“Verklempt. That’s a big word for you, Kelly.” Davey noted. Jack stopped for a moment, breathing hard after all of his strenuous dancing. While Jack stayed bent over, wiping at sweat, Davey admired the way his shirt clung slightly to his chest, highlighting all the right areas. He also appreciated the way his lips stayed parted, ruby red and slick with spit and absolutely kissable-

Jack sprang up again. “I could be Irish, or Russian or French, though Chinese is-”

“A bit of a stretch.” Davey interrupted.

“Just wait, even your Rabbi will call me a mensch. Did I mention I’ve been practicing my kvetch?!” Jack was back at the leaping and spinning until he made himself dizzy.

Davey sighed. “I’ll say it one more time. I don’t know Yiddish.”

“Fine! I will adapt where the av’rage guy freezes, and if I have to have “Just Friends” talk, I’ll have it with Jesus.” Jack scowled at the sky, as if the big man himself was speaking directly to him. “Sorry Jesus, you’re just not my type.”

Davey laughed, a full, broad sound that got Jack to smile again. “Whatever they are I could learn to like latkes!”

“My mom made you some during Hanukkah!”

“And if we have sons they’ll all have Bar Matzahs!”

While Davey glared at him, Jack doubled over in laughter. “Bar Mitzvahs, I’m joking!”

“Jack Kelly. Did you just say you want to have kids with me?”

Jack stopped for a moment, and there was a second before Jack smiled awkwardly. “I promise I know things, enough not to ruin Shabbat, ‘cause if that’s what it takes then that’s what I’ll do, just don’t run away and one day I’ll be Jewish for you.”

Davey shook his head again and started walking away. “I’ve been Jewish my whole life, you can’t just walk in here-”

Jack ran out in front of him and blocked his window opening. “Tell me you’ve never questioned one holy command.”

He tried pushing past his arm. “I’m gay, I think that questions like, eight-”

“Tell me, don’t you think love’s more romantic unplanned?”

Jack’s arm held fast, but Davey kept trying. “Oh and I’m sure Sarah, Katherine, and even that cute counter boy at Tibby’s were all unplanned.”

He looked taken aback for a moment, but looked Davey straight in the eyes. “Tell me you’re nervous, or start with the service, just tell me where you stand. Tell me “I need you!” Tell me in Hebrew!”

“Finally! Hebrew!” This pleased outburst caused Jack to smile again and whirl Davey back into dancing.

“Teach me lechayim and horcrux and oy. Just let me try. Instead of hi, I’ll say shalom till my hovel feels like home, but I won’t say goodbye, so here’s what I propose:” He said these words to a lilting tune, one that was perfect for dancing. At the end he spun Davey clumsily and set him down on the windowsill. Jack knelt down in front of him and took his hands.

“I’ll read through the Torah from cover to cover, till even Moses could see we were meant for each other.”

“I haven’t even read the whole Torah.”

“You know I adore you, so let me fight for you, together we’ll take on your mother.”

“My mom could and will kick your ass, Kelly.”

“It might be a prayer, but a prayer can come true.”

“Prayers aren’t wishes, Jack.”

“I dare you to dare me, I swear I’ll come through.”

“I don’t even know where you are half of the time!”

“When I’m with you there isn’t a thing I can’t do.”

“Oh.”

“So if you’re inclined, I won’t mind being Jewish for you.”

Davey took Jack’s face in his hands and stared into his eyes for a moment. They were filled with a quiet hope, not unusual for the dreamer, Jack Kelly. There was something new this time, something Davey hadn’t seen before. And it looked an awful lot like love.

“You’re going to have to brush up on your Hebrew,” Davey whispered before kissing Jack softly.

watch barrett wilbert weed sing this song!! she's super funny in it :))

up next: sarah sings Shiksa Goddess to katherine

i don't know shit about being jewish please correct me if i got anything wrong

also i was really tired when i wrote this please forgive me

[acommonrose]

What Makes Spelling Words Hard

This post is 75% in response to the spelling bee’s commentators frequently pointing out the wrong parts of words as difficult, but I figured I’d try to use my actual knowledge of the  bee to describe what makes words hard in general.

For some actual statistics, there was a great fivethirtyeight article recently that ran some numbers. I don’t know if I agree with all the analysis, but it does point out things like it’s provably false that longer words are harder. My thoughts are a lot more subjective than that, but hopefully useful.

A hard word is a word you don’t know.

I’m going to lead with this, and honestly, if you want to stop reading here, you’ll still know the main takeaway. We can talk for forever about what makes words hard and what might trip them up, but once you’re watching the finals, most of it comes down to how many words the speller has studied. If they’ve studied the word, they’re going to get it. If they haven’t, it’s going to be a lot harder.

So how do we gauge how likely a word is to be known by a speller and therefore how hard it is? Well, we can’t really necessarily know, since every speller uses a different list to study from. What we do know is that the bee frequently reuses words, so spellers are likely to know words that have appeared in previous bees. It’s possible to find all the previous bee words from 1997 onwards online if you’re willing to do some poking around the Scripps site and maybe use the wayback machine a little. It’s also the case that almost every bee word spelled up until 2004 (I think) was compiled into a list called the Consolidated Word List (CWL) that is no longer “officially” provided by Scripps but is still very findable. Once you get past the prelim rounds, it’s just the case that a speller is more likely to spell a word right if it’s on one of these previous bee lists, and in general, the words that a speller gets right are the ones they’ve studied. (If you, say, look at the championship list rounds of this year’s bee, it was pretty clear that both spellers already knew basically all the words they spelled right.)

Of course, it’s still possible for a speller to correctly guess a word they don’t know, so putting aside the “already known” factor, let’s get into words that can be guessed.

Root words make things easier.

The most guessable words by far are basically the mix and match version of “words you already know”. Many spellers will study common (and not so common) Greek and Latin roots, and even those who don’t explicitly study them will run across the same roots plenty of times in the words they do study, since they pretty much make up the basis of all those impressive-sounding lengthy scientific terms that the bee loves to use. The nice thing about words that are made up of Latin and Greek roots is that if you know the roots, you can spell the word, even if you haven’t seen that particular word before. In fact, the national bee even encourages this, allowing spellers to ask if their word contains a given root word, as long as they provide the root word’s language of origin and meaning.

Consider, for example, the word achromatopsia, which appeared in the written round of this year’s bee. It’s a long, complicated-sounding word, and it’s never been in a bee before, which theoretically should make it quite hard. As things actually go, though, it’s not too hard a word to figure out, and I imagine most of the top spellers did just fine with it. The prefix a- is pretty common, you can figure out chromat- from knowing relatively common words like chromatic, and the end (which is straightforward anyways) is also related to words optic. Put the parts together, and you have the word.

Some languages of origin are easier than others.

Fivethirtyeight has actually done a breakdown of which languages of origin are the hardest for spellers, and I know some spellers (or coaches/tutors) have done the same, but this is just going to be a subjective take on the matter. One of the crucial parts of the spelling bee is learning the spelling patterns from the many languages English borrows from. The bee makes no secret of this. The Spell It, which is the official study list for the regional bees, even splits up words by origin. What makes a language of origin hard is a combination of factors, most notably both how consistently a language is spelled and how intuitive those spelling rules are. Latin words, for example, tend to be spelled in a consistent, intuitive way even if they’re not from common root words, making Latin a relatively easy language of origin (with exceptions, of course). French, on the other hand, tends to have a number of ways to spell most vowel sounds (and some consonants) and even a lot of its simpler spelling patterns don’t make a ton of sense if you’re not familiar with French, so French words are generally considered pretty hard. Old English, which had no standard spelling, tends to produce words that are either common enough that they’re not worth asking at the national bee or horrifying messes like the word getish in last night’s final (pronounced yeh-teesh). And on top of this all, it means that words of unknown origin or that come from proper names (depending on the nationality of the name) can sometimes basically be impossible to guess (like Klydonograph in last night’s bee).

Of course, this is all complicated by the fact that any of these words could change in spelling or pronunciation when entering English or at any of the intermediary points if they went through multiple languages. To give a firsthand example of how this can trip up a speller, let’s consider the word cacoethes, which was on the written round in 2008, where we were given that the etymology was that it went from Greek to Latin to English. In Latin, the hard c sound is basically always spelled c. In Greek, it’s never spelled c and is either k or ch. My mind latched onto the Greek part and connected it back to some words I’d studied with the kak- root like agathokakological, so I spelled it kakoethes. Obviously, I should have focused on the Latin part instead. (Or just connected it back to, say, cacophonous. We all have slip ups.)

Anglicization of pronunciations can also throw a huge wrench in things. Consider, for example, the ending of  last night’s winning word marocain. Theoretically, this could be really hard, since the long a sound in French can be spelled a lot of different ways. Of course, those of us who know French know that the French word marocain (which isn’t that uncommon, it just means Moroccan) doesn’t actually have a long a at the end. Instead, the ending is pronounced closer to the English word can but with a nasal vowel at the end. In this case, it’s not so tricky, since the “ain” ending is really common in French borrowings, and a lot of the time it gets pronounced the same way as in marocain, since nasal vowels are uncommon in English. (Think of the significantly more common word legerdemain.) Still, any knowledge of long a sounds in French would not be useful here.

In some cases, the fact that sounds not present in English get anglicized can have even trickier consequences. Notably, some languages that get spelled or transliterated phonetically may have two sounds that are considered different in the language but are indistinguishable to English speakers. You might realize, for example, that in a bunch of words from South Asian languages, things like “b” and “bh” or “t” and “th” seem to be used interchangeably. This is because these languages distinguish between something called aspirated and unaspirated consonants, which basically corresponds to whether there’s a short puff of air after the consonant. Interestingly, we do have aspirated consonants in English. (Try putting your hand in front of your mouth and saying the words “top” and “stop”. You should feel a puff of air after the first but not the second.) However, aspirated consonants can only appear in certain places in English and aspirating a consonant can never change the meaning of a word. In many languages, however, changing, say, an unaspirated t sound into an aspirated t can completely change the meaning of word (the same way that changing a t to a d can completely change an English word). Therefore, it makes sense to transcribe aspirated t sounds as th and unaspirated t sounds as t, but when these words go into English, they follow English patterns for aspiration, and the distinction is lost, making it basically impossible to know whether there’s a (seemingly) silent h after the t without knowing the word. Similarly, doubled consonants in Italian are pronounced differently than single consonants (or at least I’ve heard as much from native Italian speakers), but since English never uses consonant length to make a distinction between words, these distinctions are completely lost when the words enter English, leading to all sorts of tricky Italian words in the bee.

The last wrinkle in this is that languages that are written in non-Roman alphabets can be either very easy or very hard depending on how easy it is to capture that language’s phonology with the Roman alphabet and also the history of that language’s contact with English. Japanese words, for example, tend to be transliterated in a consistent, sensible way and are mostly relatively easy to spell. Hebrew and Yiddish words, on the other hand, tend to be spelled pretty inconsistently (and often have spellings and pronunciations in use that aren’t even in the official dictionary), making them often quite difficult. To a lesser extent, this is also a problem for languages that make heavy use of accents and other diacriticals, since these diacriticals get omitted or transcribed in some weird way, often differently in different ways. For example, the word aracari in last night’s bee is pronounced ar-uh-sar-ee, with the c denoting an s sound, because in the original Portuguese, there was a diacritical mark under the c, indicating its pronunciation, but it becomes much more difficult in English, where we don’t have that diacritical.

Schwas are evil.

If you talk to any speller (or even listen to some of the inane commentary during the bee broadcast), you’ll probably hear about schwas being difficult to spell, and I’m guessing you might not know what that means. Basically, in English, nearly every unstressed vowel turns into a short “uh” sound. This sound is called a schwa and is written as an upside down lowercase e in phonetic transcriptions. (I say “nearly every” because sometimes short i sounds actually turn into a slightly raised schwa sound, indicated by a dotted schwa in Webster’s dictionary. There’s a lot of variation among speakers, and it’s not super important. I mention this only because there was a weird amount of drama in the 2007 National Spelling Bee over a dotted schwa. Also stress is a lot more complicated than I’m making it out to be here, but I’m trying to only sort of give a giant phonology lesson here.) Because schwas are the unstressed form of every vowel in English, they can be spelled using basically any vowel, which makes them really hard to guess unless the word happens to have an alternate pronunciation with a different stress pattern. This is why you’ll occasionally see spellers “schwa fishing” or repeating their words but slightly stressing unstressed syllables with tricky schwas and pronouncing these schwas as other vowels, trying to get the pronouncer to slip up and reveal the spelling of the schwa. (Pro tip to spellers: don’t schwa fish. It doesn’t work.)

Sometimes knowing language of origin information can help. For example, schwas connecting Latin roots tend to be i, and schwas connecting Greek roots tend to be o. Schwas in German words tend to be e, and a lot of languages have similar patterns. Unfortunately, there are plenty of cases where there’s a number of fairly reasonable options for what a schwa could be, and all of the general rules have exceptions. Consider, for example, two of the words from last night’s bee: aubusson and saussurism, both of which have French origins (both from French names, I think), and both of which have schwas denoted by u in the second syllable. These are tricky, because schwas are typically spelled as e in French when they appear, though of course neither of these words was pronounced with a schwa in the original French. I believe both are pronounced with a fronted long u sound (that doesn’t actually exist in English), but because of the resulting stress patterns, when they’re adapted into English, they both become schwas. To make things more complicated, schwas spelled with u in English, while prevalent, usually are near the start (as in suspicion) or end (as in impetus) of a word. That makes the schwas in aubusson and saussurism amazingly difficult to guess unless you happen to be familiar with the specific words or the names they’re derived from.

(Side note: There’s another notable instance where English has different sounds that become the same sound in certain contexts, which is the case where d and t appear in the middle of words, as in water or leader. In these case, both t and d turn into the same very short “tap” sound, which is actually the same as the short r sound in Spanish. The only reason this hasn’t been a problem as of yet in the bee is that because of the way these are denoted in Webster’s Third, if there’s a t that becomes this tap, the pronouncer at the spelling bee is supposed to give a pronunciation where the t is more clearly pronounced. You can read more about how the bee handles these over here.)

Overcomplicating is a constant problem.

Sometimes there’s a word in the bee that just doesn’t look too bad. Maybe you don’t know the specific word or any of its roots, but it’s from a relatively straightforward language like Latin, and there seems to be an obvious way to spell it. Your first instinct is to go with the simple spelling. Unfortunately, your second is that this is a trap, and that there’s some sort of secret trick to this word you need to figure out.

Consider, for example, the word coloboma, which appeared in round 5 of this year’s bee. It’s a little bit of a weird word in that it passed through both Greek and Latin, and the beginning uses the Latin c, but the mid-word schwa is the Greek o, but that’s pretty common in Greek to Latin words (see the aforementioned cacoethes example), and mostly, it’s pretty simple and straightforward, and even though it had never be in a bee before, it seemed guessable.

And I really thought the speller who got the word was going to guess it right after he opened with c-o-l. I could see some ways to overcomplicate the beginning: opening with a ch, doing something weird with the first vowel, maybe doubling the l, but the -oboma part seemed straightforward. The speller could put in the normal Greek schwa, spell the completely straightforward (and hard to overcomplicate) ending, and would be on to the next round.

And then he said y for the next letter. Why? I don’t know. I think attempts to analyze what the spellers are thinking are presumptuous and obnoxious. But this is an example of a speller in a hard round overcomplicating things and misspelling as a result. A common piece of speller wisdom is “keep it simple, stupid”, but I get why spellers overcomplicate. It doesn’t seem all that unreasonable that there would be a surprise y in a word in a round where other words include saccharomycete and pterylosis. In general, keeping it simple is the right call, but at the top levels, it can be hard to know which words have bizarre quirks and which don’t.

The problems are exactly what you think they are.

Here’s the thing. Things like schwas and languages of origin are kind of inside baseball, but at the end of the day, the most common things that make National Spelling Bee words hard to spell are the same things that make normal words hard to spell. Yes, the double letters in panniculitis might be more intimidating than the double letters in unnecessary. The silent k in knock seems more reasonable than the silent z in suivez (swee-vay). Yes, the spelling bee words are intimidating, and success requires a working knowledge of basic linguistics and the spelling patterns of many of the world’s languages, but at the end of the day, it’s a spelling bee. If you’ve ever been in one, you might have a sense of what it’s like.

[wormbussy]

Speaking of Yiddish, as someone who's studying to translate for a living I always try to be hyper-aware of everything that gets lost in cultural translation and it's fascinating to me how the end product is filtered through the choices and interpretations of someone who came into the picture sometimes a lot later in the creative process. To take a concrete example, when Miss Peregrine's School for Peculiar Children came out, I went with my flatmate to see it in English, subbed in French. For me, it was pretty damn obvious that the movie was specifically an allegory of the Holocaust rather than just a generic supernatural WW2 thing, because not only does it have these kids hidden away, being shunned by the outside world for being different, getting everything constantly blamed on them, being targeted by people who turn into monsters out of resentment... it's also pretty heavily hinted that the actual main character and his family, namely his granddad, are literally Jewish, and the granddad's survivor guilt makes him read a lot like, well, a Holocaust survivor. The kid whose name I forget, it's been like 6 months, has his granddad who tells him exactly what it was like fleeing "the monsters in Poland", growing up with all these X-Men, describing them to him, showing him actual pictures, only for him to go to show-and-tell and have his classmates and *teachers* tell him it's all bullshit, his granddad made it all up, the pictures are doctored, etc. I mean thematically, that's a Holocaust denial reference if there ever was one, and it's kind of brilliant. Ironically, if I remember correctly, the teacher essentially thinks the granddad is trying to tell his kid about the Holocaust but makes it into one big bedtime story to make it palatable. Which I guess is itself one way to read the actual movie, kind of meta but i mean ok, whatever. There's the fact that the granddad traveled all over the world hunting down the bad guys to protect the Peculiar Children on terms that are very, very reminiscent of Nazi hunters like the Klarsfelds. And there's something so incredibly subtle and blink-and-you-miss-it. The granddad speaks Yiddish. At one point the dad's like "stop filling my kid's head with fairy tales, dad", and the old dude replies "don't listen to your dad, he's always been a bit of a shmuck". Now, I *know* that American English picked up a fair few loanwords from Yiddish, and that Yiddish went from being something fairly stigmatised and connoted to permeating the dominant culture to the extent that at one point every movie set in New York had like an Irish cop calling some guy a putz (which to me is exactly what Mel Brooks was satirising in the Native American scene of Blazing Saddles). But I'm not sure the family *are* New Yorkers, and the granddad's house and its surroundings looked more like Florida to me, possibly suburban LA but it's not like I've been to either. And that said, connected to the granddad's diction, the references to Poland, and the aforementioned imagery, it's not exactly rocket science to figure it out. And that added a lot of depth to my experience of the movie watching it in the theatre, because it made it more than a wacky trailer with a Florence + the Machine sountrack in a similar way that Edward Scissorhands was more than some guy with scissors for hands. Again, I saw it subtitled, and I couldn't help but notice that the French translators replaced the Yiddish word "schmuck" with a more generic French word, I forget which but the line went something like "Écoute pas ton père, il a toujours été un peu borné". They did this for a very good reason: 95% of French moviegoers, unless they're themselves Jewish or at least vaguely familiar with Ashkenazi culture, have no idea what "schmuck" means, what language it is, and how that would be significant, so the audience would be left with a line that just doesn't land. Even if they had decided to keep the yiddishism anyways, there are Yiddish speakers in France but Yiddish hasn't made it into mainstream French culture like it has in the US, and it's less obviously connected to the Jewish community, partly because a sizable proportion of French Jews today are Sephardim, who wouldn't speak Yiddish anyways. Yet at the same, changing that one word takes away a small world-building element that steers the audience towards reading the main characters as Jewish and the plot as allegorical. The idea when you're translating, even if there are no hard and fast rules, is that you try and retain the "local flavor" of the text even if you express it through different means than the text does, so that a book set in New York "feels New Yorkey" even though you're reading it in a completely different language on a different continent. That doesn't mean "Kawaii*, bitch! [*kawaii means cute]", it means that even if you can't stick to what's written on the page, you need to stick to why the author wrote it that way and restitute meaning elsewhere. Writing this I don't even know if more people on here would find my point obvious or far-fetched, but when I nerded out about this particular cultural translation problem to my flatmate at the time, who's a STEM major, she *definitely* didn't read anything allegorical into the movie and enjoyed it at face value, ie as the story of a kid who goes to meet Hedwig and the X-Kids to connect with his granddad, and defeats Samuel L. Jackson the Roald Dahl villain. She was even a bit baffled that I could possibly read so much into a generic Tim Burton movie. And I mean, I'm not throwing shade at her or the movie, but I was thinking about how many people sitting there in the audience might have missed that element, when for me it was the best part and potentially the entire point of the movie. I was thinking about that again because I just saw Get Out (again, subbed), and of course the contrast between the AAVE of the main character and his buddy, and the creepy, unnatural-sounding WASPy English of the maid and groundskeeper is one of the first things that tips him off. In French, they just kind of went for old-people French, I guess, partly because "white speech" is less perceived as marked than in the US (im sensing a pattern here) but obviously subtitles aren't great at conveying diction, so instead it kind of looks like he's weirded out first and foremost by the way the guy at the party is dressed, which seems like an odd point of reference as opposed to something like speech. So yeah, it's interesting how such minor changes can change the way you experience the entire movie, so keep that in mind next time you're consuming translated media.

[topworldhistory]

Estimates suggest that Nazis murdered 85% of the people sent to Auschwitz. Here are the stories of three who survived.

Mindu Hornick, 13, peered through a crack in the door of her stopped cattle car and read a name: Auschwitz.

“I spelt it out for my mother,” Hornick recalled recently. “She says, ‘I don't know where it is, I've never heard of the place.’ And then suddenly all this clatter of the doors opening, and when the doors opened I mean there was, just, all hell let loose.”

They had traveled for days in the dark, 70 women and children packed shoulder to shoulder in a cattle car, with little food and a single sanitation bucket to share. Now they saw piles of rotting bodies, barking dogs, Nazis shouting in German, thick gray ash clotting the air. An official scrambled into their car.

“I think that a kapo must have known that this train of mothers and children—that were no use to them for work—would end up in the gas chambers,” said Hornick. “And that's why he must have looked in that coach and thought to himself, ‘well perhaps I'll try and save a couple.’”

He advised Hornick’s mother to let her two older girls go ahead, while she stayed behind with her younger two sons. You’ll see them soon, he assured her in Yiddish. He told Mindu and her sister to lie about their age and skills. “You are a seamstress,” he told them.

“You better do as this man says,” her mother said. “We looked back and we saw our mother with her spotted scarf, and we waved to her and we went ahead,” Mindu said.

She never saw her mother or little brothers again.

READ MORE: Horrors of Auschwitz: The Numbers Behind WWII's Deadliest Concentration Camp

Mindu Hornick, Auschwitz survivor.

Auschwitz and the ‘Final Solution’

The Nazis established Auschwitz in 1940 in the Polish suburbs of Oswiecim, building a complex of camps that became central to Hitler’s pursuit of a “Final Solution to the Jewish question.” Nazis murdered between 1.1 million and 1.5 million people at Auschwitz, including more than one million Jews, but also Roma (gypsies), homosexuals, political dissidents and more.

As prisoners arrived, young children, the elderly and infirm were separated and immediately sent to take “showers,” which pumped deadly Zyklon-B poison gas into the chambers. Daily mass executions, starvation, disease and torture transformed Auschwitz into one of the most lethal and terrifying concentration camps and extermination centers of World War II.

Children, especially twins, could be selected at any time for barbaric medical experiments conducted without anesthesia by Nazi Josef Mengele. These included injecting serum directly into children’s eyeballs to study eye color and injecting chloroform into the hearts of twins to determine if the siblings would die at the same time and in the same way.

In January 1945, Soviet soldiers liberated the camp to find 7,600 emaciated prisoners left behind, heaps of corpses and seven tons of human hair that had been shaved off the prisoners.

Estimates suggest that Nazis murdered 85% of the people sent to Auschwitz. Here are the stories of three who survived. [Comments have been edited for clarity.]

Before the war

Edith Eger, born September 29, 1927

The town that I grew up in was part of Czechoslovakia until 1938, when it became part of Hungary. I spent a lot of time with my mom because my father played billiards, and so she took me to the opera and she introduced me to Gone with the Wind. I was told at a very young age that I am a very talented gymnast.

Mindu Hornick, born May 4, 1929

I grew up in this shtetl in the Carpathian Mountains. Life was good. We had a lovely home and an orchard and we had nice relations with our neighbors and our school friends, which were not always Jewish.

Billy Harvey, born May 20, 1924

My city was called Berehove, population was approximately 26,000. In the springtime I used to work in a vineyard, cultivate the growth of the grapes, in the fall we used to harvest the grapes. The whole city was like Napa Valley. [My father was injured in World War I] so my mother became the sole supporter of the family. She was a dressmaker, but what I know about her talent today, she was more like a dress designer. There was no indoor plumbing, there was no electricity, my mother had to go every day to the farmers’ market, purchase the food, prepare the food for six children, also make a living.

The rise of anti-Semitism

Edith Eger

I wanted to be a gymnast and be competing in the Olympics. I was told by my trainer that ‘I have to train someone else who is not Jewish,’ and that was to me the biggest shock of my life because I spent at least five hours a day training, training, training. And then I said to my trainer, ‘I'm not Jewish.’ I denied it, and that's when I realized that when you had a child, you had to go to the City Hall and register the child and put the religion next to it.

Mindu Hornick

[Once we were forced to wear Jewish stars] that was terrible, suddenly we were singled out. We were different to school friends, we were different to our neighbors. My father was taken away from us. His businesses were confiscated, and honestly I don't know how our mother fed us.

Billy Harvey

I graduated age of 18 from a gymnasium [an advanced secondary school]. Unfortunately my graduation present became Birkenau Auschwitz.

Transport to Auschwitz

Mindu Hornick

We were suddenly told to pack our luggage and be ready to come to the station. We were taken to a ghetto first.

Billy Harvey

We were [in the ghetto] for six weeks under terrible sanitation conditions. We were freezing, we had very little food to eat. One day the train arrived...they pushed into one cattle car as many people they possibly can—so that we were crushed like sardines. There [were] no windows on the cattle car. When the sliding doors slammed closed on us, the only light came through the wooden cracks.

Edith Eger

I begged my father to look presentable, to look younger. We were all shmooshed up, you know, very small, little place, in the cattle car, on the floor, sitting down, and I am crawling to him and asking him to shave. He didn’t listen to me. My mom hugged me and said, ‘We don't know where we're going, we don't know what's going to happen, just remember no one can take away from you what you put here in your own mind.’

Mindu Hornick

It was not a long way from where we were to Auschwitz, but because of railway lines being bombed, [the train] was shunted forward and back...and suddenly we arrived at the place.

Billy Harvey, Auschwitz survivor.

Arrival

Mindu Hornick

We were pushed through to the main gate, and once we entered there we thought we'd entered hell. There were bodies everywhere, and there were these watch towers with machine guns pointing at us...this terrible grey ash falling around us. There were the barking dogs, viciously walking around, there were loudspeakers always and these SS men walking around, with shiny boots and guns on their back. I mean, we were just frightened out of our wits.

Billy Harvey

When we first glanced out, it looked like a twilight zone, big chimneys going to the sky, smoke was going all over. We didn't know where the smoke was coming from, but we found out soon enough—the smoke was coming from the crematorium. They were burning—burning between 12,000 and 13,000 people a day.

Edith Eger

Men and women were immediately separated. I never saw my father again. After the war, I met someone who told me that he saw my father going to the gas chamber.

Billy Harvey

Who they wanted to stay alive, go to the right; who was condemned to die, go to the left. Most of the children were bitterly crying, didn't want to be separated from their mother, so the young mothers went to the left, to the gas chamber.

Edith Eger

We stood at the end of the line, with my mum in the middle, Magda [my sister] and I. And [Doctor Josef Mengele] asked, ‘Is this your mother or is this your sister?’ And I did not forgive myself [for] saying, ‘That's my mother.’ So Doctor Mengele points my mother to go this way, and my sister and I the other. I followed my mum, and...the very person who annihilates my family grabs me, and there is an eye contact, and tells me, ‘You're gonna see your mother very soon, she's just gonna take a shower.’

Billy Harvey

We were stripped from every inch of human dignity. They made us strip completely naked, shaved our hair, gave us a prisoner’s suit to wear.

Mindu Hornick

They marched us into shower rooms to be deloused. Our heads shaven and then we were going in to be tattooed with a number and, from then on, we had no name, that was it. For young girls like ourselves, possibly even our mother [hadn't seen] us undressed. We had to sit there naked for men shaving our heads.

Billy Harvey

We passed by where the [women were]...my mother, my aunt, my cousins and their children all were naked as we glanced in, and they looked like they were in a trance. [The Nazis] must have used a gas, a small amount, because they didn't look normal. We weren't allowed to say a word...we'd be murdered immediately.

Edith Eger

We were completely shaven, and then we were in our nakedness, and my sister asked me, ‘How do I look?’ You know, Hungarian women can be quite vain, and, and I had a choice...realizing that I became her mirror, and I said to her, ‘You know Magda, you have such beautiful eyes, and I didn't see it when you had your hair all over the place.’

Mindu Hornick

Once we got through all that routine, we were taken to block 14. It was night, and by that time there was no room for us. We had to sit all night on the stone floor.

READ MORE: The Jewish Men Forced to Help Run Auschwitz

Survivors of Auschwitz on the day of liberation.

Daily Survival

Edith Eger

In Auschwitz you couldn't fight, because if you touched the guard you were shot—right in front of me I saw that. You couldn't flee because if you touched the barbed wires, you were electrocuted. When we took a shower, we didn’t know whether gas is coming out of the water.

Billy Harvey

Every morning, four o'clock, they knocked on the door [for] roll call. I don't know what was the purpose of it because nobody could escape—the barracks were surrounded by barbed wire, the barbed wire was connected to electricity and every morning in front of the barracks was piled up naked dead people.

Mindu Hornick

Very often we would see Doctor Mengele walking along, looking very smart in shiny boots and always immaculately dressed, and he would wear a pair of white leather gloves. And if anybody didn't look well, he would wave and they would have to step out of line, and we never saw those people again. If you were feeling pale, or whatever, you weren't feeling right…you would prick your finger to draw some blood and make yourself rosy cheeks.

Billy Harvey

Once a day you got a bowl of soup—they called it soup, I don't know what it was, it wasn’t fit for an animal. No utensils. Five to six people have to share it, so we handed it [from] mouth to mouth, back and forth until the soup disappeared.

Edith Eger

I constantly was hallucinating about food. My mother kept Kosher, and she made her challah that was an art piece, and I visualized that in Auschwitz, my mother doing the challah, and mak[ing] her noodles.

Mindu Hornick

I remember a young boy. I think he picked up a potato skin or something. Whenever there was a hanging, we were all called out to watch it, and I remember us shouting, ‘For God's sake, where is God?’ A young boy hung because he picked some bit of food up.

Edith Eger

I danced for Doctor Mengele and he gave me a piece of bread. I shared it with everyone. We were a family of inmates, we had to care for each other. If you were just for the me, me, me, you never made it. [Later, during one of several death marches] when you stopped you were shot right away, and I was about to stop. I was getting weaker and weaker, and the girls that I shared the bread with...formed a chair with their arms, and they carried me so I wouldn't die.

Billy Harvey

When I wanted to give up, I said [to myself] what a great lady my mother was, who stood by all the hardship, raising six children, all by herself in such a primitive circumstances. That's what gave me the strength to want to survive—and also to tell the world what was happening.

Mindu Hornick

It's a notorious thing that people in the camps survived in pairs, or some other people that were taking care of them. My aunt, my mother's sister...heard that our transport came in, so she came to find us, Auntie Berthe. We were still crying for our mother. She did a secret exchange...and took us into her block to take care of us. When people say, how did you survive? We lived for each other.

READ MORE: This Midwife at Auschwitz Delivered 3,000 Babies in Unfathomable Conditions

Survivors of Auschwitz leaving the camp at the end of World War II, photographed by a Russian photographer during the making of a film about liberation of the camp. Above them is the German slogan 'Arbeit macht frei' ('Work makes one free'). 

Liberation

Edith Eger

All I could tell you [was] that it was quite dark, I saw just kind of darkness, and we didn't know who's alive and who's not alive. I was in a very bad state, I was already among the dead, and then I looked up. It was a man. I saw tears in the eyes, and M&Ms in [his] hand.

Billy Harvey

[As the Allies approached, the Nazis evacuated Harvey and other prisoners to Buchenwald by cattle car.] People [were] dying left and right from hunger. When they died, we took their clothes off to try to keep warmer. When we arrived back to Buchenwald, they came to collect all the dead people from the cattle car to transport them to the crematorium. I was frozen. I was put among the dead people. When I arrived to the crematorium, the prisoner who worked there discovered that I was still alive. He saved my life. I woke up in the barrack. When I opened my eyes, I thought I was in a five-star hotel. Nobody was hollering at me. Nobody was beating me. I was age of 21. I weighed 72 pounds. I could not stand up well on my feet. But I was so happy to be alive. Next day, I ask the people to carry me outside. I wanted to get some fresh air. They carried me outside. I hear a gentleman speak with the French accent.

Mindu Hornick

I really did not know what happened to us in those last hours [before] liberation. Suddenly the Germans got very, very impatient and they collected us all and put us on a train, and it was the first time we went on a passenger train and [at] either end of the train there were machine guns. The British saw a train moving with machine guns on either side, thinking they've got some valuable cargo, they shot our train up. About 60 or 70 of our girls were killed by the British Armada. We jumped out of the train and started waving. I think now it was a miracle that we weren't killed on that train, either by the British or the Germans, who tried to...kill us in the last moment.

READ MORE: How the Nazis Tried to Cover Up Their Crimes at Auschwitz

Living as a survivor

Edith Eger

When I was liberated, I got up in the morning, and I realized that my parents are not coming home, and reality hit me. I became very suicidal. I just wanted to die. But I'm glad I did not...because I was able to somehow turn all the tragedy into an opportunity for me to now, not only survive, but also to guide other people to be survivors as well.

Billy Harvey

I was the age of 22 and I came to [the United States] with one pair of shoes and shirt and slacks, and I was determined to make a success out of my life and that's what I did. I also discovered the best revenge in life is success. You can't hate your enemies, as I said, because when you hate you're not living.

Mindu Hornick

Have I ever found an explanation? No, I haven't. I haven't. But if you want to remain normal, and you want to not end up on psychiatrist couches, or something like that, you have to drift back into a life, join a community and be part of it because...when you were brought up in a community, you want to belong again. And that was the most important thing for me: to belong again.

Billy Harvey

I don't believe that the world learned the lessons from the Holocaust. This troubles me very deeply.

Edith Eger

When the children were separated at the border, I had very, very, very many nightmares, and I still do. So when people tell me I overcame, no, I never overcame, and I never forgot.

Billy Harvey

I know that I'm 95, I'm blind, I don't question why that happened to me. I wanna go forward, I wanna enjoy every day of my life. When I wake up in the morning, I says, “You're not gonna let me down, I have to get up, I have to proceed with my lecture because I help people.” There is nothing greater and there's nothing bigger.

Edith Eger, 92, earned her doctorate in psychology at the University of Texas, El Paso, and works as a clinical psychologist, helping survivors of trauma, including veterans. She is currently writing her second book The Gift and Twelve Lessons from Hell.

Billy Harvey, 95, established a successful career as a celebrity cosmetologist before opening his own beauty salon, working with actresses including Judy Garland, Mary Martin and Zsa Zsa Gabor. He currently speaks regularly at the Museum of Tolerance and other venues to share his experiences.

Mindu Hornick, 90, was awarded an MBE in December 2019 for her two decades of work as a Holocaust educator teaching about the dangers of intolerance and hatred. She works with the Holocaust Memorial Trust and the Anne Frank Trust.

HISTORY special, Auschwitz Untold, premieres Sunday, January 26 at 9/8c. Learn more.

from Stories - HISTORY https://ift.tt/3avscUW January 22, 2020 at 09:22PM

[potvalet1-blog]

A World in Love with Jokes

Judging from the listings on the essential online bookstores, the complete world is in love with jokes, and books of jokes to such an extent, well, almost as tons as it loves Paris Hilton.

But what jokes precisely? We did a random seek on several sites and got here up with some interesting outcomes.

Using the key-word "jokes", it became a watch-opener while a unmarried website online discovered 54540 books involving jokes indexed in its database. This become form of atypical in a way.

 When last did you check out a pal's book shelf at their region? We are organized to wager that books of jokes did not characteristic a lot, if at all. Most likely there were courting books, vehicle manuals, sports books, sleek novels, a present books, unopened textbooks.

Perhaps there was a ragged cartoon e-book on the give up of the shelf and one inside the bathroom.

 So what are some of these indexed shaggy dog story books precisely?

 At the bottom of the price variety ($1) we observed Spongebob, Rugrats, Dumb and Dumber Garfield and masses inside the one zero one Jokes collection: one zero one Vacation Jokes, a hundred and one Telephone Jokes, 101 Pet Jokes - you get the photograph. Some jovial writer glaringly figured out also that the complete global loves an excellent funny story or greater than a hundred ideally.

It is thrilling too that so many of the books of jokes in this charge range are aimed toward youngsters. Books containing "Children's proper clean jokes" is a habitual subject here.

 At the $15 degree the funny story books are more person (O'Brien and Fitzgerald Walk right into a Bar: The World's Best Irish Jokes) and edgy (the "Extremely Gross Jokes" series).

And here's a shaggy dog story for you. Our seek threw up "The Joke" with the aid of Milan Kundera. Funny huh?

Then there may be the fabulously exciting name "The Jokes of Sigmund Freud: A Study in Humor and Jewish Identity" by using Elliot Oring. Not a joke e book to take to the pub possibly but you could feel the laughter properly up in spite of this.

Then I got here across the name "I Give you Texas! 500 Jokes of the Lone Star State". I even have usually had a craving to stay in Texas despite the fact that I recognise very little about it. I reckon Texan jokes must inform me all I want to recognize. So I were given sidetracked and ordered the e-book. Mexican Jokes

 Of course there is a dark facet to the joke industry - the academics who Take It All Very Seriously. Consider the title "Rationale of the Dirty Joke: An Analysis of Sexual Humor". This form of name need to now not sincerely be thrown out with the aid of a look for jokes. It's now not fair and it is not humorous.

At the top of the price variety ($100 and more) there were interesting discoveries, consisting of an album of fifty saucy now not blue postcards from World War II. My grandpa had some of those.

Published in Poland in 1931 was "I Laugh at You", in Yiddish, by way of Joseph Tunkel. Mr Tunkel left Poland in 1939 whilst the laughter stopped.

For $300 you may have David Henry Thoreau's "Cape Cod" in two volumes, reportedly Thoreau's sunniest, happiest book. It bubbles over with jokes, puns, tall stories, and genial properly humor, the bookseller says.

If you're prepared to stump up $seventy seven 500 bucks for a laugh, you can have the whole autograph manuscript of Chapter 23 of "A Tramp Abroad" with the aid of Mark Twain. It was the most expensive that came up under the quest time period "jokes" on Abebooks.

 The bookseller supplies a painstaking description of the item (revisions, maintenance, smudging, fingerprinting and all) and says: "The challenge of the chapter is, in massive part, memory from Twain's days as a printer's apprentice. Nicodemus Dodge, a seeming yokel from out of town, is hired on the printer's keep wherein the younger Sam Clemens is operating. The locals hope to make Nicodemus the butt of their jokes only to discover (as Twain notes in a phrase that changed into in the long run deleted), that they 'had fished for a sardine and caught a whale'  http://Arenajokes.com

[amordedeuspelohomem-blog]

A World in Love with Jokes

Judging from the listings on the essential online bookstores, the complete world is in love with jokes, and books of jokes to such an extent, well, almost as tons as it loves Paris Hilton.

But what jokes precisely? We did a random seek on several sites and got here up with some interesting outcomes.

Using the key-word "jokes", it became a watch-opener while a unmarried website online discovered 54540 books involving jokes indexed in its database. This become form of atypical in a way.

 When last did you check out a pal's book shelf at their region? We are organized to wager that books of jokes did not characteristic a lot, if at all. Most likely there were courting books, vehicle manuals, sports books, sleek novels, a present books, unopened textbooks.

Perhaps there was a ragged cartoon e-book on the give up of the shelf and one inside the bathroom.

 So what are some of these indexed shaggy dog story books precisely?

 At the bottom of the price variety ($1) we observed Spongebob, Rugrats, Dumb and Dumber Garfield and masses inside the one zero one Jokes collection: one zero one Vacation Jokes, a hundred and one Telephone Jokes, 101 Pet Jokes - you get the photograph. Some jovial writer glaringly figured out also that the complete global loves an excellent funny story or greater than a hundred ideally.

It is thrilling too that so many of the books of jokes in this charge range are aimed toward youngsters. Books containing "Children's proper clean jokes" is a habitual subject here.

 At the $15 degree the funny story books are more person (O'Brien and Fitzgerald Walk right into a Bar: The World's Best Irish Jokes) and edgy (the "Extremely Gross Jokes" series).

And here's a shaggy dog story for you. Our seek threw up "The Joke" with the aid of Milan Kundera. Funny huh?

Then there may be the fabulously exciting name "The Jokes of Sigmund Freud: A Study in Humor and Jewish Identity" by using Elliot Oring. Not a joke e book to take to the pub possibly but you could feel the laughter properly up in spite of this.

Then I got here across the name "I Give you Texas! 500 Jokes of the Lone Star State". I even have usually had a craving to stay in Texas despite the fact that I recognise very little about it. I reckon Texan jokes must inform me all I want to recognize. So I were given sidetracked and ordered the e-book. Mexican Jokes

 Of course there is a dark facet to the joke industry - the academics who Take It All Very Seriously. Consider the title "Rationale of the Dirty Joke: An Analysis of Sexual Humor". This form of name need to now not sincerely be thrown out with the aid of a look for jokes. It's now not fair and it is not humorous.

At the top of the price variety ($100 and more) there were interesting discoveries, consisting of an album of fifty saucy now not blue postcards from World War II. My grandpa had some of those.

Published in Poland in 1931 was "I Laugh at You", in Yiddish, by way of Joseph Tunkel. Mr Tunkel left Poland in 1939 whilst the laughter stopped.

For $300 you may have David Henry Thoreau's "Cape Cod" in two volumes, reportedly Thoreau's sunniest, happiest book. It bubbles over with jokes, puns, tall stories, and genial properly humor, the bookseller says.

If you're prepared to stump up $seventy seven 500 bucks for a laugh, you can have the whole autograph manuscript of Chapter 23 of "A Tramp Abroad" with the aid of Mark Twain. It was the most expensive that came up under the quest time period "jokes" on Abebooks.

 The bookseller supplies a painstaking description of the item (revisions, maintenance, smudging, fingerprinting and all) and says: "The challenge of the chapter is, in massive part, memory from Twain's days as a printer's apprentice. Nicodemus Dodge, a seeming yokel from out of town, is hired on the printer's keep wherein the younger Sam Clemens is operating. The locals hope to make Nicodemus the butt of their jokes only to discover (as Twain notes in a phrase that changed into in the long run deleted), that they 'had fished for a sardine and caught a whale'  http://Arenajokes.com

[becauseiamnotanelephant]

Day 70: Bucharest, Romania

Arriving somewhere at night is always hard - without context, without knowing the language, and without knowing where you’re going, things can seem a little scary. The ride on the bus from the airport was a little tricky from the start but I found my way, figured out how to buy a ticket, and which bus to take. It was a thousand degrees on the bus and even with the language barrier, I figured out that I wasn’t the only one sweating and the the guy next to me encouraged me to open a window. Traffic here is crazy. It’s the evening rush so it must be at it’s worse, but the bus ride took forever. At least they announce the stops so I was able to find my way. The walk to my apartment was pretty quick, and already I noticed that the lack of American chain stores in Italy and Greece is not the case here. McDonalds, KFC, and Starbucks are quite popular. At least I haven’t seen any 7 Elevens, which really bother me in foreign countries. At my apartment, I met my host, Racula, and she took me to the 8th floor corner apartment and through a door, down a hall, through another door, onto an open balcony, through another door, and into the apartment. The bedroom is through yet another locked door within the apartment, which is weird, but not as weird as having the tub in the room with me without a shower curtain. Its quirky, for sure. I went to a nearby place for dinner and had some typical Romanian cabbage stuffed rolls and grilled veggies for dinner and then hit the sack. Today I did some exploring. Its quite chilly here and I have to wear my winter coat for the first time on the trip. I did a lot of walking around and saw a lot of things, so here is a summary: - lots of women here dye their hair blond. I doubt anyone is a real blond here so I sort if get the desire, but it’s pretty funny. - of all the people I’ve interacted with, only two have not spoken English. And those who speak the language speak it almost perfectly, without hesitation and with a great vocabulary. - I can’t really get a grasp on the language. I can mostly read it, and between English and Italian, can figure out many words. But some are completely out of left field and I have no idea where to even start. And while it’s a romance language, it sounds very slavic when spoken, so even more confusing. - traffic is insane here. Three lane signalized traffic circles with no lane markings, and three or four lanes of traffic in each direction. Pedestrians have to wait a long time to cross and have to walk outside the traffic circles to the crosswalks, but as much honking as there between the drivers, they are super respectful of the pedestrian space. And one big difference compared to Italy and Greece is the number of larger, American-sized cars. Still many smaller european models, but more suvs than I’ve been seeing on my trip. - lots of bike lanes too, and quite a few cyclists especially near the parks. - and there are quite a few parks, some quite large. Even along the main arterials, there are nice tree-lined paths for pedestrians and cyclists. - there are a lot of ugly, grimy communist era buildings, and quite a lot of graffiti. It’s reminiscent of Budapest, and I like that part of these countries. Add to that the electric cables that are tied up on the utility poles like in Thailand and hanging off of buildings (so much that you have to duck sometimes when walking on the sidewalk), and you’ve got yourself a lot of interesting things to look at. Plus, a lot of these run down buildings still operate with active businesses, which is hard to believe, but people are just using the available space and making it work. - in contrast, there are many incredibly beautiful buildings that have given this city the name “Paris of the east”. There are so many I wish I could go into but just have to enjoy from the street. The arc de triomphe at one of the main traffic circles helps make it seem like you’re somewhere else. - I visited the main synagogue and had a great guide. First, I had to get through security, where they made a copy of my passport, and had to put my bag in a locker.  The guards were nice but intimidating, and I tried to befriend the one who’s last name was Laurenticiu. He was moderately amused.  The synagogue was beautiful, and apparently its still used with a large orthodox community that holds two services a day, has a hebrew school, and a yiddish theater. They even held services every day during WWII. The guide spoke Romanian, English at a thousand words a minute, and then when some Italians came in, perfectly in Italian, too. He’s very passionate about everything and even talks to the government it Israel about how concerned he is that children in Israel aren’t taught about why their country exists. He said antisemitism isn’t really an issue here, and he focused mostly on Muslim migrants in his response, saying that if any immigrants do even one suspicious thing here, they are deported immediately. - which isn’t directly related, but part of why this place feels safe. I think that people know if they do anything, they will be in deep shit. The police presence is pretty obvious, many stores have security guards, and there are other regular eyes on the street - bus ticket booths, street sweeping crews, etc. While there are dark alleys I don’t walk to walk down, I have felt very comfortable here. - except that the guy at the synagogue said Bucharest is overdue for an earthquake; the last was in 1977 and was a 7.2 magnitude. That’s a little unnerving considering where I’m sleeping at night. - I also saw another synagogue that is now a Holocaust museum. Romanian Jews definitely didn’t fair too well, but it’s reassuring how much better things are here compared to what I’ve seen in Italy and Greece. - the old town here is less exciting than the others I’ve seen on the trip, and after reading that it was created as a gathering place rather than growing organically, it sort of makes sense.  Mostly it’s crummy tourist restaurants and clubs, although there are some really nice buildings hidden in there. - I decided to leave the heart of the Old Town and area near the parliament and explore  further north, where I found some cute commercial strips and beautiful houses, which made me think of those little neighborhood nooks near Kew Gardens. I found a great cafe-bookstore where you pay $2 an hour for tea, coffee, snacks, wifi, and a seat. Why can’t we have nice things like this in NY? - there are also tons of pastry shops with all the baked goods on display in storefront windows, and then a small opening, like at the post office or the bank, where people line up outside to get food. Super cute but hard to point at things when they are far from the teller. - its very clean here - almost no litter and with little garbage cans on each corner, its easy for people to throw their trash away. - almost no one is walking around wearing headphones. It wasn’t immediately obvious, but it was interesting to notice. - there are definitely some poor people here - more homeless than in other citied I’ve visited on this trip and definitely some slums/makeshift housing. Not sure if it’s all the Roma gypsies, or a mixture, and not sure what they do in the winter. - there is an extensive public transit network but I prefer to walk around and take it all in. But seems like the subway is well used, as are the trams/streetcars and buses. That said, there are many taxis also floating around.