My bf studied japanese in high school and often says "gambate!" (not sure of spelling) to be like. encouraging. I think it means roughly "let's get this bread." However, as someone who took spanish in high school, it always sounds like a command to me. And as near as I can tell, in spanish it would mean "go shrimp yourself."

ALT

I'm definitely not a fluent speaker, so I could be wrong, but here's how I got there:

In Spanish, some (informal, I think?) commands are formed by dropping the "r" from the end of an infinitive verb. (Every infinitive verb in Spanish ends in r.) For example, "to run" is "correr." If you want to tell someone to run, it's "corre." If you want to tell someone to do something to something/someone, you append a little pronoun thing to the end. From "besar" (to kiss) we get "bésame" (kiss me). From "cocinar" (to cook) we get "cocínalo" (cook it). From "callar" (to silence) we get "cállate" (silence yourself/shut up).

So, "gambate" immediately reminds me of "cállate," which is a rude command. It would be formed from the verb "gambar" and the second person object "te" for "you/yourself." But "gambar" isn't a word in Spanish. However, "gamba" is a word. It means "shrimp." So while it isn't technically grammatically correct, in the same way we "verb" nouns in English, the noun "gamba" is being used in the place of a verb here. "Gambate" (or more properly "gámbate" to maintain the correct stress for both the Spanish and Japanese). "Go shrimp yourself."

Native spanish speaker. You're quite right about your linguistics here, and spanish speakers love to make up new words by conjugating existing words (at the very least, my parents do)

My confusion stemmed from never having heard the word gamba before. To my knowledge the word for shrimp is camarón

So i looked it up and apparently gamba actually means prawn. So it's actually go prawn yourself

please watch with sound on

My Zaporizhzhia yesterday. The very center of the city, a favorite place for teenagers, the elderly and families with children from all over the city. It is difficult to see here, but closer to the place of the explosion there is a beautiful park area with a pond and a playground, which is always crowded with people every evening. Fortunately (tho there's nothing fortunate about this horror), the weather was not the best, so there were much fewer people than usual. Still 1 person (an elderly woman) was killed, 16 were injured, including 4 children. The hotel they destroyed functioned as a summer art camp for local children, as well as a place were journalists and UN representatives frequently stayed.

Just listen to the voices and imagine the state of every Ukrainian. I'm devastated. What a monster you have to be to do such a thing?!

Support Ukraine. We need you. Without the support and approval coming from the citizens, no country will help us. You are important.

English vocab for level B2 and higher #4

-> definitions are from Cambridge Dictionary & Collins Dictionary

• unhallowed: not consecrated or holy; sinful or profane
• diminutive: very small; used to express the fact that something is small, often either to show affection or to suggest that something or someone is not important; the short form of a name
• to bray: to make the loud noise typical of a donkey (= an animal like a small horse with long ears)
• glade: a small area of grass without trees in a forest
• cacophony: an unpleasant mixture of loud sounds
• to ululate: to make a long, high cry with the mouth and tongue that changes between two or three notes, often to show emotion at a ceremony such as a wedding or funeral
• to abhor: to hate a way of behaving or thinking, often because you think it is not moral
• aberrant: different from what is typical or usual, especially in an unacceptable way
• sullen: angry and unwilling to smile or be pleasant to people
• din: a loud, unpleasant confused noise that lasts for a long time
• to rout: to defeat an opponent completely
• throng: a crowd or large group of people
• bacchanal: a drunken and riotous celebration; a participant in such a celebration
• to mar: to spoil something, making it less good or less enjoyable
• noxious: Something, especially a gas or other substance, that is noxious is poisonous or very harmful; harmful and unpleasant
• to ply: to sell or to work regularly at something, especially at a job that involves selling things
• scant: very little and not enough; almost
• to corroborate: to add proof to an account, statement, idea, etc. with new information
• spectral: coming from or seeming to be the spirit of a dead person
• to aver: to say that something is certainly true

Ukrainian 101, Lesson 37: Beverages

вода - voda - water

мінеральна вода - mineralna voda (soft l) - mineral water

газована (вода) - hazovana (voda) - sparkling water

негазована (вода) - nehazovana (voda) - non-sparkling

вода з-під крану - voda z-peed kranoo - tap water

кава - kava - coffee

какао - kakao - cocoa

чай - chai - tea

лимонад - lymonad - lemonade

сік - seek - juice

молочний коктейль - molochnyi cock-tale (soft l) - milkshake

молоко - moloko - milk

Where does the letter ⟨ñ⟩ come from?

Here’s a quick history!

This article doesn't talk about what I think is the most fun part of the history of ⟨ñ⟩ though!

That tilde / virgulilla was originally another letter ⟨ñ⟩ written above the first! Medieval writers had lots of little tricks and shorthands to save space in manuscripts, since parchment was very expensive. So they would write ⟨nn⟩ in words like “annō” ‘year’ as ⟨ñ⟩ instead, hence Spanish ⟨año⟩ ‘year’.

Want to learn more about the history of writing? Check out my curated list of books on the topic!

Hate being interested in language. Everyone is like "ohhh [character]!!♡♡♡<33" and I'm here like