Back to the old ways

Here it is, your thousand words. Isn't it a thing of beauty? monshu also took an "after" picture but I'm rather ashamed to show how little was left, especially given that we were only four people. (One of the diners didn't have any, but this is compensated for by the fact that I cut off a piece to bring in to a coworker today before the shot was taken.) Only the fact that I was running late this morning prevented me from slicing off another hunk, devouring it with my cream tea, and calling that "breakfast".

The meal was lovely. Rather than the Cuban-Indian-Italian fusion of the previous night, this was more straightforwardly Inditalian: roast leg of lamb stuffed with figs and prosciutto accompanied by aloo dal masala and asparagus avec oeufs mimosa. (So despite all the fuss, ham and eggs for Easter after all.) And to wash it all down, a magnum of Sine Qua Non (sorry, can't remember the lot name offhand), which was exactly the kind of big beautiful red that monshu goes wild for.

Apart from my piggish behaviour at dessert, I managed to moderate myself such that I avoided post-prandial bloat and woke without a hangover. It would've been wonderful had it been mild enough for a head-clearing passeggiata, but by then it was already becoming the chill cloudy day that I woke up to this morning. Fortunately, we were able to fit in a stroll in the morning and admire the flowers in our neighbours' beds (although more, it must be said, for their efforts than for their achievements). Some squill, crocus, and glory-of-the-snow, but very little in the way of daffodils, tulips, or forsythia as of yet. Plus I made the mistake of looking at the Plants in Bloom page of the Missouri Botanical Garden--Rhodies! Cherries! Magnolias! Camelias, for Chrissakes! I just really hope it's not all over by the time of my visit in a month's time.

In Italien kennt man keinen Osterhasen.

Yesterday, as we were setting out for our stroll, we ran into our neighbour discarding a turtle terrarium, which led to jokes about the "Easter turtle". (He takes longer to do his job than the Easter Bunny, but he's much more reliable.) Afterward, I told monshu that I wouldn't be shocked to discover an "Osterschildkröte" in some obscure corner of Germany, what with the plethora of beasts who have been known to distribute eggs in that country. The only one I was certain about was the "Osterfuchs", which he thought was my own invention. That prompted me to track down this partial compendium:

Wenn der Osterhase heute in Deutschland allgemein bekannt ist, so ist das nicht immer so gewesen. In Tirol spricht man daneben von der Ostereier legenden „Osterhenne”. In Oberbayern, Österreich, Thüringen und Schleswig-Holstein war es der Hahn, in Hannover der Fuchs, an der holländischen Grenze der Ostervogel oder Kranich. In Thüringen heißt es, der Storch sei es gewesen. In manchen Gegenden der Schweiz bringt der Kuckuck die Ostereier. In Oberbayern wurde auch vereinzelt das Osterlamm (!) als Eierbringer bezeichnet. In den Vogesen wie auch in Kärnten sagt man: Wenn die Glocken am Gründonnerstag verstummen, sie seien nach Rom geflogen, um die Ostereier zu holen. Wenn sie am Karsamstag zurückkehren, werfen sie die Eier beim Vorüberfliegen ins Gras, wo die Kinder sie suchen müssen. (Source.)

To summarise in English:

• Tyrol: Easter Hen
• Austria, Schleswig-Holstein: Easter Cock
• Hannover: Easter Fox
• Dutch border: Easter Bird (often a crane)
• Switzerland: Easter Cuckoo
• Thuringia: Easter Stork or Easter Cock
• Upper Bavaria: Easter Cock or Easter Lamb

I'm especially charmed by the legend from the Vosges and Carinthia that the church bells fly to Rome on the eve of Good Friday (when they are silenced in memory of the Passion of Christ) and then scatter the eggs on Holy Saturday while flying back to their belfries. Apparently, this belief also survives in the Low Countries as well, though naturally only in Catholic portions.

Sadly, the rest have most likely fallen before the relentless homogenisation of commercial culture, which has promoted the (Alsatian) Easter Hare above all other egg-carriers. A shame, because an Easter Fox really is way cooler. On the other hand, if it was Reynard hiding the eggs when I was a kid, we'd never have found the damn things.

Boyfriend Brain Teasers: Cleaning day

There was a certain edge to the GWO's voice tonight when he reminded me to have the kitchen cleaned up because the putzfrauen (bzw. sprzątaczki) are coming tomorrow and any dishes we leave, they'll wash up for us.

Do they charge us extra for this? No, it's a fixed fee for the visit no matter what.

(Yeah, I'm still trying to wrap my head around it, too.)

WotD: sweeten

Now here's a puzzle I can actually solve! I'm forever running out of words whenever I speak a foreign language (including English, now that I think about it). So I have to improvise. Sometimes this involves modifying a word from a closely-related language and hoping for the best. (Results have been decidedly mixed.) Other times, deriving one on the spot using the native resources of the language. (Also dodgy.)

For instance, planning a chat in Spanish today, I realised I didn't know the proper word for "sweetened", so I assembled one based on the word for "sugar". To test myself, I decided to do this in my other languages as well. Below you have what I came up and, behind a cut so you all can test yourselves as well, the correct term(s).

1. versüßen ( Read more... )
2. verzoeten ( Read more... )
3. azucarar ( Read more... )
4. sucrar ( Read more... )
5. sucrer ( Read more... )
6. siwcrio ( Read more... )
7. milsigh ( Read more... )
8. 다기다 ( Read more... )
9. 甜化 tiánhuà ( Read more... )

So pretty sad: Came close nearly every time, but only nailed it twice. In two cases, the formation was sound by imperfect, and in four, I stumbled upon a legitimate word that didn't mean quite the same thing, but might well have been understood in context. The only one I completely whiffed was the Korean.