http://www.banane.com Fri, 03 Feb 2012 05:12:02 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 http://www.banane.com/2011/09/20/on-playing-chinese-bingo/ http://www.banane.com/2011/09/20/on-playing-chinese-bingo/#comments Tue, 20 Sep 2011 16:43:34 +0000 banane http://www.banane.com/?p=2052 http://www.banane.com/2011/09/20/on-playing-chinese-bingo/feed/ 0 I’ve been thinking of making this app ever since we started the Bingo franchise. This is perhaps the hardest language I’ve learned next to Russian, and was super excited to have a simple little game I can play casually. The other day I looked over my sister’s shoulder as she played with almost every Chinese [...] http://www.banane.com/2010/09/12/games-arent-just-for-kids-learn-french-with-bingo/ http://www.banane.com/2010/09/12/games-arent-just-for-kids-learn-french-with-bingo/#comments Sun, 12 Sep 2010 21:56:09 +0000 banane http://www.banane.com/?p=1862 http://www.banane.com/2010/09/12/games-arent-just-for-kids-learn-french-with-bingo/feed/ 0 I’ve been doing some competitive research on adult language learning tools- namely for French but also for Spanish- and I’ve realized that we let our kids play games, but we don’t let ourselves, as adults, play games. There’s an iPhone app out there that literally, for $0.99, just has lists of vocabulary words! That’s what [...] http://www.banane.com/2010/03/24/computers-vs-poetry-death-match/ http://www.banane.com/2010/03/24/computers-vs-poetry-death-match/#comments Wed, 24 Mar 2010 18:09:25 +0000 banane http://www.banane.com/?p=1560 http://www.banane.com/2010/03/24/computers-vs-poetry-death-match/feed/ 0 I really loved the Ada story- I heard about it in detail from How Stuff Work’s “What You Missed in History Class.” That night I ended up rehashing almost the entire story to my niece and nephew and their parents. Not just that I’m kind of obsessed with British peerage (oddly a generation or two [...] http://www.banane.com/2010/02/25/being-laughed-at/ http://www.banane.com/2010/02/25/being-laughed-at/#comments Thu, 25 Feb 2010 19:31:54 +0000 banane http://www.banane.com/?p=1477 http://www.banane.com/2010/02/25/being-laughed-at/feed/ 2 I really don’t have time to write this post but I’ve been thinking about it a lot. Lately, I’ve run into a few conversational moments where people actually laughed at me. Not with me, not about something else, but at something I had said in all seriousness. Basically: relating to my career and life goals. [...] http://www.banane.com/2010/01/06/long-car-rides/ http://www.banane.com/2010/01/06/long-car-rides/#comments Wed, 06 Jan 2010 18:44:29 +0000 banane http://www.banane.com/?p=1381 http://www.banane.com/2010/01/06/long-car-rides/feed/ 3 I had a long car-ride with my sister Amy- Berkeley-SF-Monterey and back a day later. We had some amazing conversations. Mostly, though, they are the conversations that don’t exhaust after 15 minutes. It’s a depth of conversation that I don’t experience usually. Sometimes with coworkers, where we see each other every day for lunch, and [...] http://www.banane.com/2009/06/19/fearing-failure/ http://www.banane.com/2009/06/19/fearing-failure/#comments Fri, 19 Jun 2009 15:47:47 +0000 banane http://www.banane.com/?p=1250 http://www.banane.com/2009/06/19/fearing-failure/feed/ 2 A director friend at dinner the other night mentioned that people fear failure so much they won’t try new things. That it stunts the creative process, too. I’ve never had a problem learning in public- a contentious issue when I was learning Ruby on Rails recently. I asked this on FriendFeed the other day- “name [...] http://www.banane.com/2009/02/17/notes-about-other-languages/ http://www.banane.com/2009/02/17/notes-about-other-languages/#comments Tue, 17 Feb 2009 18:57:13 +0000 banane http://www.banane.com/?p=1115 http://www.banane.com/2009/02/17/notes-about-other-languages/feed/ 5 Ran across this phrase in my “homework” (reading my book club book in French): “d’un coup sec” Context: “Je poussai d’un coup sec les persiennes.” OK so literally I translated: “I pushed with a salty clap the Persians.” Wrong! It’s actually, “I smartly opened the blinds.” I’m not a francophile, but in reading this I [...] http://www.banane.com/2008/10/28/ahha-karehiha/ http://www.banane.com/2008/10/28/ahha-karehiha/#comments Wed, 29 Oct 2008 01:34:44 +0000 banane http://www.banane.com/?p=915 http://www.banane.com/2008/10/28/ahha-karehiha/feed/ 4 Ever since I was little I’d look at this one book on the shelf: Ahha Kareheha, or, that’s how I read it. We also had “CHEKHOV” which is really confusing, since that’s not even Cyrillic (there is no V like that), but some 1950s book editor who thought it’d be funny to print an English [...] http://www.banane.com/2008/03/22/fika-backslang/ http://www.banane.com/2008/03/22/fika-backslang/#comments Sat, 22 Mar 2008 18:02:03 +0000 banane http://www.banane.com/2008/03/22/fika-backslang/ http://www.banane.com/2008/03/22/fika-backslang/feed/ 0 I decided to translate some Swedish this morning for practice- met my 2nd removed Swedish cousins the other day so planning on visiting at some time- and knowing (at least some of) the language always makes visiting a richer experience. Anyways, I’m translating away (a post about refugees from Iraq, “Irak” in Swedish criticizing Tobias [...] http://www.banane.com/2007/06/01/kayaking-russian/ http://www.banane.com/2007/06/01/kayaking-russian/#comments Fri, 01 Jun 2007 17:41:04 +0000 banane http://www.banane.com/2007/06/01/kayaking-russian/ http://www.banane.com/2007/06/01/kayaking-russian/feed/ 0 On a total lark, drove up to Sausalito with Tink and met up with some college alum for full moon paddle. I only knew one guy – Paul Anderson who is a brilliant songwriter – and ended up having a great time and (hopefully) making good friendships. What stuck with me all night, through dreams [...]