TL;DR — Talk. Learn. Discover. Repeat. #10

Hey yall,

I hope you’ve all been doing great! I have and especially since the beginning of the week since I just arrived in Japan yesterday to visit some friends.

Being in Japan for the first time in close to 3 years brings back a lot of memories. It also feels a lot like being back home as every corner reminds me of yet another experience I had during the 5 years I lived in Japan.

I’m a bit worried about how these next 10 days are going to impact my Korean skills but I also started studying for the Test Of Proficiency In Korean (TOPIK) again so, hopefully, things will balance out somehow.

Anyway, let’s dive in!

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🗣️Talk languages

This week, I want to chat about a video I saw last week and that’s been in the back of my head every day since then: In defense of inefficiency.

In this fascinating video essay, the author talks about what we consider “wasteful.” She takes the example of being a writer and having to go through crappy paragraphs she later cut before she got to writing the good ones. In that sense, were these really a waste? She says no and I agree.

That also got me thinking about my life in general and the negative view I had of the time off I took. These past few years, I’ve rarely spent some time for myself reading a book just for fun or playing a game for the hell of it. Everything had to be related to language and I’m reconsidering this lifestyle.

I think it’s because we “waste” time on hobbies, pointless TV shows, and even cleaning dishes, that we can be efficient later on.

There’s nothing wrong with doing something for the hell of it. There’s nothing wrong with taking our time learning a language instead of finding the “best” way to remember everything.

It’s a journey.

And it sure is worth taking the time to enjoy it.

✍️ Learn from my experiences

I consider myself a pretty alright language learner nowadays. I’ve come a long way from the crappy one I was 15 years ago.

Sometimes, I wonder what I really should have known before so I gathered the basics into one simple essay I wish my younger self could see. Basically, I wrote about What I Wish I Knew When I Started Learning Foreign Languages.

Editing this piece was interesting because I kept telling myself “sure, sure” or “how could I have not known that?” but the facts are there. I did, indeed, not know these four simple facts:

• If the journey’s not fun, you’re doing it wrong

• Consistency is better than intensity but not at the cost of your mental health

• Forgetting is a good thing

• Grammar is important… for a moment.

I go into more detail about the why and how in this article so I encourage you to read it if you have the time!

🌎Discover new cultures

This month, we’re turning to a topic a bit darker yet somewhat important as it impacts us all. Death.

Still, I don’t want this newsletter to get too dark so we’ll focus on celebrating the dead and how this differs among cultures. The two worldwide-known methods are burial underground and cremation but it turns out there are a lot of other lesser-known habits around the world.

This week we’re starting with something that kinda blew my mind but is also overblown by the English world.

In South Korea, a few companies are now offering to turn your loved ones into jewelry so you can carry them with you at all times. These “death beads”¹ have been getting some coverage online for over 10 years in English but, talking about it to Korean people and looking online, it doesn’t as much of a “trend” as people make it to be. There are only a few companies offering this service, the first and most famous being Bonhyang (본향).

Some ethnicities of China, Indonesia, and the Philippines practice a custom known as “hanging coffins.” Yes, the noun says it all. It’s about hanging the coffin high up on a mountain where it is difficult to reach.

The reasons for these are not well documented, especially in China where the ethnicities that had this practice (most notably the Bo people) are either extinct or Sinicized. In the Philippines and Indonesia, it’s said to be a practice reserved for higher members of the communities. In the Philippines, it’s said that the higher the coffin, the higher the social status of the person, while in Indonesia, it is said to have been to prevent theft.

In Tibet, there’s a practice quite difficult to watch: Sky Burial.

Sky burial isn’t (as I originally thought) throwing a body from a mountain, but a very organized practice to help the dead be reborn as a human in their next life. Wrapped in a white Tibetan cloth, monks chant mantras to release souls from purgatory. From then on, the body is dissected and left for vultures to eat. This article and this video explain in more detail but be warned that this can be quite graphic.

Turning to something a bit more pleasant to see as an outsider, there’s also a practice of burning beautiful paper creations during Taiwanese funerals. The goal of this practice is to send the burned item to the dead on the other side. This can range from a beautiful house, to money, or a film studio worth $64,000 for a media tycoon!

This practice, however, is still quite taboo, especially nowadays since it contributes to deforestation and environmental pollution.

There are tons of other uncommon practices in Asia but I’ll let you off with Kotsuage (骨揚げ) in Japan, a practice of picking off certain bones with special chopsticks.

I’ll let you dive into the rabbit hole as I did on your own though.

Next week, we’ll turn to South America!

🗺️Repeat with me (Lesser-Known Languages)

Parlanjhe / Poitevin-Saintongeais — A curious language struggling to survive

This week we’re turning to a language found in the west of France, Parlanjhe, which literally means “to speak” in its own language. Another name for it is Poitevin-Saintongeais which is a combination of the names of two similar dialects of it.

Parlanjhe is one of the langues d'oïl (a dialect continuum that includes standard French as well). Parlanjhe borders on the domain of langues d'oc as well, spoken further south. The contact between langues d'oïl and langues d'oc in the area can be found in this interesting language.

Like most other languages in France, it was pushed away as a low-class “patois” which has caused its perdition. However, some speakers are currently trying to preserve it and extend its use.

As a French person, listening to conversations and especially songs in Parlanjhe reminds me of a feeling I once had as a child hearing some other patois languages. It feels like French spoken “the wrong way.”

Now, as an adult interested in languages, I now realize this mindset is wrong. Just because two languages “sound” similar doesn’t mean one is a real one and the other is a bad version of it. Unfortunately, Poitevin-Saintongeais, like other lesser-spoken languages still has this image and will struggle to get rid of it until it is taught more commonly.

After all, as of 2023, there is only one university diploma at Poitiers University where one can learn the language. Apparently, there’s only one teacher of the language throughout France (and obviously none abroad).

The website lepoitevin.com also has some free online “courses” and, while it’s better than nothing, it’s mostly just lists of words.

As of right now, the best resource only seems to be Arantéle, a website aimed at promoting the language. It even has a 50-page PDF with the basics explained in French followed by some texts, their translations, and some pronunciation notes.

Considering there isn’t much about the language’s structure, I’ll share a few sentences found in my research.

Overall, Parlanjhe feels extremely close to French but varies in the expressions and intonation of the words used. For this reason, I’ll also add the French translation in parentheses for comparison.

• Bunjhor ! → Hello! (Bonjour!)

• A çhés fàetes ! → Goodbye ! (Au revoir!)

• Marci / Marcit. → Thank you. (Merci.)

• A me parlant. → They (f.) speak to me. (Elles me parlent.)

• Queùl ajhe at éll ? → How old is he? (Quel âge a-t-il ?)

• De déque parlàu ? → What are you talking about? (De quoi parlez-vous ?)

• Tu lés reveras jhamae. → You will never see them again (Tu ne les reverras jamais).

• Menjhi t-in eù. → I ate an egg. (Je mangeai un œuf.)

• O vat o ? → How is it going ? (Ca va-t-il ?)

Finally, here’s one short sentence proving Parlanjhe’s various influences: i o di, çheù (“This, I say it” or, in French, “je le dis, ça”):

• i (meaning “I” but pronounced “ee”) seems to come from the occitan ieu

• o seems to come from the Latin “hoc” which means “it”

• di is similar to the French first-person present tense of the verb “dire” written “dis” but without saying the “s.”

• çheu (meaning “this, that”) is proof that it’s its own language as the sound “çh” doesn’t exist in French.

Do you know any similar language from your country that was looked down upon and now is striving to survive? Let me know!

In the meantime, here’s a relaxing song in Parlanjhe:

1. Apparently called 유골 보석.