Sep

Life Lessons at the Top of a Paris Tour Bus

by Sheron Long on September 27, 2012

Open air tour bus in Paris leading to life lessons

The best seat in the house?
© Sheron Long

The seat at the top of a Paris tour bus—I wanted it. I ran for it. I got it. My good friend often tells me, “Watch out what you wish for.” OK, buddy, after it rained all kinds of “Oh, I see” moments on me, now I see what you mean!

Comment on this post below, or inspire insight with your own OIC Moment here.

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Art of Travel/Life Lessons

Sep

Being Bilingual Builds Brain Power

by Sheron Long on September 24, 2012

“Rainy Day in Paris” © Sheron Long

If video does not display, watch it here.

French? You Can Learn It!

Chatting in a French café makes for a good day even in the rain. Chatting in a French café in French is worth even more—knowing the language, just some or being bilingual, deepens how you experience the life and culture.

Benefits of Being Bilingual

A brain lifting weights to signify the brain power of being bilingual (Image courtesy of Thinkstock)

Flex your brain with a second language and build bilingual brain power

Connecting across cultures is one benefit of being bilingual, but there are many more.

Across the last decade, numerous research studies, beginning with those from York University and Northwestern University, have shown that people who speak more than one language have an increased ability to concentrate, to multi-task, and to set priorities. They may also be building strong defenses against dementia.

So . . . if you’re someone who would love to build bilingual brain power, get started—it may be easier than you think!

The Power of Cognates

Take French, for example, which has many words in common with English. Such words are called cognates, and you can use them to learn a second language.

Try it! Here’s a paragraph from France-Amérique about Julia Child (1912–2004) who had many careers but found her love of cooking in Rouen, France. As you read about Julia Child, see how many French words look familiar to you:

Julia Child a eu plusieurs vies : rédactrice, volontaire pour la croix-rouge, agent secret… Mariée à Paul Child, un représentant des affaires étrangères américaines, elle part pour Paris à l’âge de 37 ans. Pour la petite histoire, c’est au cours d’une promenade à Rouen qu’elle a sa révélation culinaire, en goûtant une sole meunière accompagnée de vin. Ce repas sera comme « une ouverture de son âme et de son esprit » pour elle.

Does this list of cognates help?

volontaire / volunteer

agent secret / secret agent

mariée / married

représentant / representative

affaires étrangères américaines / American foreign (stranger) affairs

âge / age

histoire / history, story

au cours d’une promenade / in the course of a promenade

révélation / revelation

sole meunière accompagnée de vin / sole meunière accompanied by wine

esprit / spirit

Oh I know, there are still gaps to fill in, but in an “Oh, I see” moment, did you realize that you already know about 25% of the French in this article? That’s a pretty good start! Maybe it’s time for a ticket to Paris.

Comment on this post below.

Brain image courtesy of Thinkstock

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Becoming Bilingual/Crossing Cultures/France/Language & Culture

Sep

Life After Technology: To Correct or Auto-Correct?

by Sheron Long on September 20, 2012

Help key, symbolizing challenges of life after technology, especially with the auto-correct feature

Help is what we need in life after technology!
© Thinkstock

How I Got the Wrong Spelling and the Right Answer

The other day on a talk show about cars, the caller identified herself as a software engineer for Microsoft in charge of spell-check.

The car conversation made a sudden U-turn into how technology affects our lives, specifically the perils of spell-check. Finally, the software engineer wriggled her way out of a tight spot and shared one of life’s secrets: for spell-check to work, “you have to get close.”

For me, one who almost won the school-wide spelling bee in sixth grade, getting close is not the problem. It’s the technology advancements that moved manual spell-check into rapid-fire Auto-Correct, or “Oughtta-Correct,” as I call it.

Somehow the technology thinks it knows what you oughtta say and takes over, changing a perfectly good word into an embarrassing moment.

Technology and Life—Not Always a Good Mix

Take for example, a colleague of mine who was in charge of manufacturing books for a publishing company. He worked against one deadline after another, and printers (who are generally not an understanding lot) were pressuring hard for the final files.

man embarrassed by an auto-correct error and dubious about technology advancements

We had been late with the delivery for four consecutive weeks, and our reserved press time was evaporating.

After one last promise to deliver failed, my colleague wrote a lovely letter of apology with a new file-to-printer date. Right above his signature lurked the words:

Sorry for the incontinence.

Now, of course, he meant “inconvenience,” but Auto-Correct converted his message to use a more appropriate word. He had peed on the printer yet again.

For more on such life experiences, see this recent Auto-Correct post on Here and Now, especially the Comment section.

Love and Divorce After iPhone

I still remember when I got my first iPhone, I was sure that my life after technology would be rosy. And I did really love my iPhone, but I fell in and out of love with Oughtta-Correct.

If the suggested word was right, I was grateful. It saved me time typing on that flat keyboard. But when it was wrong, I kept forgetting to hit the little x, and the word popped in. Then I ended up spending even more time deleting the wrong word and starting over.

I began to ask my oh-so-smart phone, “What makes you think you know what I want to say?”

Divorce came after Oughtta-Correct guessed wrong big-time, and I was sure I oughtta apologize.

I apologized. Then I went to Settings to General to Keyboard, flipped ON to OFF by Auto-Correction, and—ahhhh—I was back to thinking for myself again.

Now I Know: Being Wrong Is More Fun than Being Right

Life went on, but something was missing in my life after technology. I began to long for the daily chuckles I used to get from Oughtta-Correct’s brain.

In an Oh, I See Moment, I realized another of life’s secrets: more laughs in the day are worth the miscommunications. And besides, having to apologize for life’s little typos are a good way to cement a friendship.

That’s when I went back to Settings and gave Auto-Correct new life.

I also adopted a new regimen to build up my WRS (Write-Read-Send). It’s better for avoiding embarrassment, but maybe not as good as WSR (Write-Send-Read) for sharing Auto-Correct’s funnies with a friend. Do U agree?