Things you thought of the world, but weren't true....

[PiercedPixie2]

Okay, disclaimer: If you plan to laugh at people but not share at least 1 embarrassing story, dont bother posting because it will piss me off.


We were not educated out of the womb, and some of us didnt have the most traveled parents - whatever reason, i know we all believed strange things of the world when we were kids.

Here are some examples....

1) Everyone spoke English like me
2) Hebrew was a dead language like Latin (I'm so sorry Einllikoach and Little Pea!)
3) That British wore monocles and spoke just like Mary Poppins!
4) Germany spoke German, and Austria spoke Austrian.

Okay as you can tell, i was a YOUNG girl when i thought those, thankfully my education was very open about world studies at a young age. So these were corrected xD

What sorts of misguided things did you assume about this big world of ours?

 

[Im A Little Pea]

Some things I remember I believed in when I was a small child.

1. People in Brazil spoke Spanish.
2. Only people from other places had an accent, but I didn't.
3. In America everything was much larger. eek
4. All elderly people I knew came from other places and all had foreign accents, so I thought an accent was something that simply "happens" to you over age. I couldn't recognize it as an accent, but I thought that this was just the way old people talk. I kept wondering to myself at what age exactly I'd start talking like that, and whether this change is going to be very sudden, or gradual. I didn't even mind the fact they didn't all have the same accent.

I was a silly little girl...  

[Daionii]

- I also thought that everybody else had an accent except for me!
- Only people with English accents could put on other accents.
- Languages developed from where they're spoken today - I often thought how strange it was that Welsh was spoken in Patagonia too, and English in the US, etc. Didn't dawn on me that people moved there! *doh*
- Welsh was the most "unique" language.
- Nobody lived in Iceland

Not my own, but my sister used to have a really bizarre thoughts on Scotland:
- They're in a different time zone to the southern half of Britain
- You have to cross the sea to get there from Wales
- Scotland is the capital of Wales

xD;

 

[PiercedPixie2]

Daionii

- I also thought that everybody else had an accent except for me!
- Only people with English accents could put on other accents.
- Languages developed from where they're spoken today - I often thought how strange it was that Welsh was spoken in Patagonia too, and English in the US, etc. Didn't dawn on me that people moved there! *doh*
- Welsh was the most "unique" language.
- Nobody lived in Iceland

Not my own, but my sister used to have a really bizarre thoughts on Scotland:
- They're in a different time zone to the southern half of Britain
- You have to cross the sea to get there from Wales
- Scotland is the capital of Wales

xD;

Those ones about Scotland were cute xd  

[Verderbnis]

Ok, that's quite hard for me to recall all of it:

1. Hamburgers came from Hamburg.
2. "Russisch Brot" (it's a kind of cookie) was really "russian bread". (It's not, it's derivated from "roasted bread")
3. People who came from a country all spoke the language called after their country (China-chinese, Iceland-icelandish, Mexico-mexican, etc.)
4. Iceland was one big island made of Ice.
5. Everyone called the filled pancakes (or donuts) "Berliners". (that's only in Berlin, they're usually called pancakes all over germany)
6. The world was one big continent.
7. "dog food", "cat food", or "baby oil" contained what was labeled on their containers.  

[In Medias Res III]

Wait, Hebrew isn't a dead language? sweatdrop

Isn't the Hebrew of today not the Hebrew of 2000 years ago?

I don't think Latin is a dead language; it haunts the s**t outta me.

I used to think that there was absolutely no way that I was really from Canada. I could have sworn I was from Europe, especially since I do not (and still do not) look like the girls I know. I didn't know that Egypt is part of the Middle East and I romanticised the country beyond belief. I thought the Jews were some secret and untouchable society that I could never gain membership to sans a hooked nose and large bank account mrgreen . French fries were invented by Napoleon.

When my father left for different countries for weeks at a time I always looked forward to the candy he brought home as I was convinced that Russia has the best chocolate in the world and that India doesn't have candy at all. I thought that ALL Catholics are Italian and Italians are Catholics. I am a descendent of a great Roman, probably an imperator or general. I thought that no music existed outside of Classical and Italian opera.

I thought that if we were to fall asleep in the dark, aliens would kidnap and probe us. I believed that this Earth has different realms of existence and that time doesn't really exist. I believed that no one saw the same colours, grass could be blue to someone else, but we'd never know.

Er, I could go on and on, I was a messed up kid.  

[RubyLight]

I thought many silly things when I was a little kid:

1. Iceland was a massive block of ice.
2. French fries were invented by some ancient Frenchman.
3. Saudi Arabia was like the Disney film Aladdin. (sorry sweatdrop )
4. People from Michigan didn't have an accent, everyone else did.

I'm really glad that I took an interest in what the world is really like at a relatively young age. I think everyone has goofy ideas when they are small.  

[Einllikoach]

In Medias Res III

Wait, Hebrew isn't a dead language? sweatdrop

Isn't the Hebrew of today not the Hebrew of 2000 years ago?

It’s a complicated issue... sweatdrop

The Hebrew we are speaking today is a modern dialect of the Hebrew of 2000 years ago; every 8-years-old child who have just came across the Bible will understand that Hebrew well (of course, not completely as we are still speaking about a literaric work that requires analysis if you want to understand it better), but there are still some verbal and grammatical differences (the most prominent example for the last could be the declension of verbs into present-future tense to indicate past tense).
When Ben-Yehuda started his life work, he had no other choice than making some changes in order to fit that language to the modern lives - whether it was giving new meanings to old words and creating new ones, or changing the grammar a bit.  

[In Medias Res III]

Einllikoach

In Medias Res III

Wait, Hebrew isn't a dead language? sweatdrop

Isn't the Hebrew of today not the Hebrew of 2000 years ago?

It’s a complicated issue... sweatdrop

The Hebrew we are speaking today is a modern dialect of the Hebrew of 2000 years ago; every 8-years-old child who have just came across the Bible will understand that Hebrew well (of course, not completely as we are still speaking about a literaric work that requires analysis if you want to understand it better), but there are still some verbal and grammatical differences (the most prominent example for the last could be the declension of verbs into present-future tense to indicate past tense).
When Ben-Yehuda started his life work, he had no other choice than making some changes in order to fit that language to the modern lives - whether it was giving new meanings to old words and creating new ones, or changing the grammar a bit.

YUS! So I won't have to learn both Biblical annnnd modern Hebrew as two very diffferent languages <3  

[Einllikoach]

Im A Little Pea

4. All elderly people I knew came from other places and all had foreign accents, so I thought an accent was something that simply "happens" to you over age. I couldn't recognize it as an accent, but I thought that this was just the way old people talk. I kept wondering to myself at what age exactly I'd start talking like that, and whether this change is going to be very sudden, or gradual. I didn't even mind the fact they didn't all have the same accent.

I thought I was the only one to think so. xd

Here are some of mine,
1. English isn’t a real language, but a gibberish used for TV programmes.
2. English speaking people always eat, because in all English and American programmes I ever seen they were either eating or speaking about food for most of the time.
3. Rowan Atkinson is the king of Britain.
4. You can reach Argentina without any knowledge of Spanish, because they would understand you, anyway (as in Marco).
5. Israel is the strongest country in the whole world. :þ  

[PiercedPixie2]

Einllikoach

Im A Little Pea

4. All elderly people I knew came from other places and all had foreign accents, so I thought an accent was something that simply "happens" to you over age. I couldn't recognize it as an accent, but I thought that this was just the way old people talk. I kept wondering to myself at what age exactly I'd start talking like that, and whether this change is going to be very sudden, or gradual. I didn't even mind the fact they didn't all have the same accent.

I thought I was the only one to think so. xd

Here are some of mine,
1. English isn’t a real language, but a gibberish used for TV programmes.
2. English speaking people always eat, because in all English and American programmes I ever seen they were either eating or speaking about food for most of the time.
3. Rowan Atkinson is the king of Britain.
4. You can reach Argentina without any knowledge of Spanish, because they would understand you, anyway (as in Marco).
5. Israel is the strongest country in the whole world. :þ

Aha, Mr. Bean being the King, that would be tooooo weird!
And for #5, thats awesome ^^

I used to be 'patriotic' as a lass, but when i came to see how the world worked, i was no longer patriotic.  

[Einllikoach]

PiercedPixie2

Aha, Mr. Bean being the King, that would be tooooo weird!
And for #5, thats awesome ^^

I used to be 'patriotic' as a lass, but when i came to see how the world worked, i was no longer patriotic.

It’s not quite patriotism; I’ve just thought so from what I’ve heard - mostly by media - as a child.  

[Im A Little Pea]

You know, I tried reading Chaucer's "The Canterbury Tales" a little while ago. If I'm not mistaken, it was written in the fourteen century, right? I'll tell you the truth here – I gave up after the first page of the book because I couldn't understand what he was saying. I understood some of the words there, but that's about it. I'll quote a section of it, and bold out the parts I did understand. Some parts I thought I understood, but then checking the dictionary, I realized I didn't (for example, "Croppes" aren't Crops, they're twigs):

Chaucer

Whan that Aprill, with his shoures soote
The droghte of March hath perced to the roote
And bathed every veyne in swich licour,
Of which vertu engendred is the flour;
5 Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt and heeth
The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne
Hath in the Ram his halfe cours yronne,
And smale foweles maken melodye,
10 That slepen al the nyght with open eye-
(So priketh hem Nature in hir corages);
Thanne longen folk to goon on pilgrimages
And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes
To ferne halwes, kowthe in sondry londes;
15 And specially from every shires ende
Of Engelond, to Caunterbury they wende,
The hooly blisful martir for to seke
That hem hath holpen, whan that they were seeke.

So I'm sure you could do better than me, as a native English speaker. Maybe you've also learned this in school, too. But knowing modern English, apparently, isn't enough to understand 14th century English poetry.
Like Einllikoach here said, most 8 year old Hebrew speakers could understand the bible. They won't do it perfectly, but I'd give them over 90% success. We're talking about something that was written a few centuries before "The Canterbury Tales"… So I don't think it would be that reasonable claiming Hebrew is dead because modern Hebrew is different from Old Hebrew. smile  

[Verderbnis]

Einllikoach

...
3. Rowan Atkinson is the king of Britain.
...

He's not, John Cleese is!

That's old english? I though it was dutch...

Nah anyways:

Here my other point:

The Southpole had a capital.
English texts are shorter than in german...

...I write longer posts in english....  

[Im A Little Pea]

Verderbnis

Einllikoach

...
3. Rowan Atkinson is the king of Britain.
...

He's not, John Cleese is!

That's old english? I though it was dutch...

Nah anyways:

Here my other point:

The Southpole had a capital.
English texts are shorter than in german...

...I write longer posts in english....

I know, doesn't it look like Dutch? eek But no, that's Middle English. Which to me seems really crazy. That's just 600 years old. Which is a lot of course, but... damn.