fishy difference? Is there a difference between 물고기 and 생선? Clearly I am trying to learn my animals in Korean :) Thanks for your help.

Idioms I used today

Here are two idioms I caught myself using today:

 

"That's how I roll" (It's my "thing," my "style," it's "how I do it")

in context: I was wearing high heels with my pajama pants when my niece came over. She looked at me and laughed. "Nice outfit, Chris." I grinned. "Don't you know that's how I roll, Dani?" (I was being facetious, but still, it worked.)

 

"You're barking up the wrong tree" (you're making a false accusation, you're asking the wrong person, you not "on the right track")

"If you think I'm like that, you're definitely barking up the wrong tree.

 

Have you noticed any you used today???

All around the world Justin Bieber's "All Around the World" was blaring on the radio on my way home tonight. It just made me think about how all around the world people want to be loved, all around the world, they're no different than us.... ^^ Have a nice day all!

Do people tell you you look like someone they know?

Once again, someone has told me that I look like someone they know. Does this ever happen to you? I must have very generic features because I have been mistaken for someone or someone has told me I look like someone they know several times.

America the Beautiful Today is Memorial Day in America. It is a special day when we honor and thank all those who have died serving and protecting this country. I am once again reminded of the cost of freedom. Thank you to them all. O beautiful for spacious skies, For amber waves of grain, For purple mountain majesties Above the fruited plain! America! America! God shed His grace on thee, And crown thy good with brotherhood From sea to shining sea! O beautiful for pilgrim feet, Whose stern impassion'd stress A thoroughfare for freedom beat Across the wilderness! America! America! God mend thine ev'ry flaw, Confirm thy soul in self-control, Thy liberty in law! O beautiful for heroes proved In liberating strife, Who more than self their country loved, And mercy more than life! America! America! May God thy gold refine Till all success be nobleness, And ev'ry gain divine! O Beautiful for patriot dream That sees beyond the years Thine alabaster cities gleam, Undimmed by human tears! America! America! God shed His grace on thee, And crown thy good with brotherhood From sea to shining sea! ---America the Beautiful by Katharine Lee Bates - 1913

Unilingual woes... I've never been so sad about not knowing another language as I was today. I was at a party for a Brazilian friend. He is tri-lingual and had a number of friends and family at the party speaking Portuguese and Spanish as well as those of us who only speak English. (Well, I know some Spanish, but not enough to feel comfortable carrying on chit-chat.) Anyway, a gentleman came up to me to ask a question and first he started to talk to me in Portuguese and when I said I didn't understand he started to try Spanish. Oh, how little I felt when I had to tell him I only spoke English...He looked at me like I was from Mars! He said "Not French or even Italian?" Not gonna lie, friends, a little part of me died at that moment. How dare I not know those beautiful languages!One day...someday perhaps I will.

Have you ever been caught pretending to be from somewhere you're not?

Just after I turned 21 (legal drinking age in America), some friends took me out to a bar/pool hall. A friend and I decided to drink "white Russians" and--to add to our fun--to speak to one another in Russian accents. After a while we could tell there were some guys watching us, so we really started to amp it up while we played pool. Then, while I was waiting for my turn, one of the guys came up to me and while I expected he was going to hit on me, instead he started speaking to me in Russian! I was so embarassed I couldn't believe it! I tried to tell him I was pretending, but at first he didn't believe me. He thought I was just trying to brush him off and he kept speaking to me in Russian. After a mortifying explination, it turned out that he was Brazilian himself, but happened to speak 11 languages. I deserved it I suppose, but at least I got a funny story out of it.

 

So, has this ever happened to you? Or have you ever been mistaken as being from somewhere else?

Language learning books/workbooks

Does anyone have any recommendations of good books/workbooks I can use for learning Korean? Or if that is not the language you are learning but you have come across a good and helpful book and they might have other languages from the company can you let me know?

Online work is helpful to an extent, but call me old-fashioned, I need something tangible I can mark up, flip through, and write in.

 

Thanks!

Can you buy international food in your local markets?

I was walking around my local grocery store recently, perhaps even the first time since joining italki, and I found a new appreciation for the fact that there are several aisles dedicated to foods from around the world--Italian, Mexican, Chinese, Japanese...It was all very basic stuff of course. But it made me wonder about your countries and whether or not it is easy to find international food items in your local markets. Are there any American food items in a Chinese market for example??