The Wednesday Quiz II:11 -- Countries and Languages

The Wednesday Quiz -- Season II -- Quiz 11

Countries and Languages

The Wednesday Quiz is a "closed-book" test of knowledge and intuition; please do not look up answers, ask others for help, or answer as a team.

Questions about the rules and the ~Fabulous Prizes~ are answered here.

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This week's Quiz gives you a little linguistic profile of ten different countries.

Name that Country!

1. This country has four officially recognized languages. In order of number of speakers, they are: German, French, Italian, and Romansh.

2. This country has eleven official languages: Afrikaans, Ndebele, Northern Sotho, Southern Sotho, Swati, Tsonga, Tswana, Venda, Xhosa, Zulu, and English. The literacy rate is around 50%.

3. This country has three national or official languages: Amharic, English, Tigrigna. That Oromo is not also an official language is a bone of contention to its many speakers. The literacy rate is 23.4%.

4. The first language for about 82% of this country's population is English. The second most common first language is Spanish, representing around 11% of the population.

5. The official language of this country is Dutch. Other major languages include the Sranan Tongo creole, Bhojpuri, and Javanese.

6. The population of this country speak Spanish (60.7%), Quechua (21.2%), Aymara (14.6%), and 36 other languages.

7. This country has three official languages: Dutch (spoken by 59% of the population), French (40%), and German (1%).

8. Portuguese the official and nearly universal language of this country. Mirandese, the only other indiginous language, is spoken by less than 1% of the population.

9. This country has five officially recognized languages. In order of number of speakers, they are: Romanian, Russian, Ukrainian, Gagauz, Bulgarian. For political reasons, they tend to waver on whether to call Romanian "Romanian" or something else.

10. Virtually everyone in this country (but virtually no one anywhere else) speaks the unofficial national language, the earliest texts of which date to the 11th Century. The written language has changed unusually slowly, so that educated residents can read these millennium-old documents without much difficulty. The literacy rate is effectively 100%.

Submit your answers in the comments!

The Great Movies: "It's a Wonderful Life"

It's a Wonderful Life

Frank Capra, 1946

Previous Contact: I saw this movie in its incarnation as a television holiday special two or three years running in late adolescence, when I was way too cool for anything that smacked of conventional family entertainment. I have carried with me the idea that the movie is insufferably treacly and sentimental. It is not coincidence that we reach It's a Wonderful Life so late in the Great Movie project; of the entire list, this is one of the ones that I least looked forward to watching.

- - - -

Not surprisingly, my decades-old teen memories of the movie were not entirely accurate. In fact most of the first hour seemed pretty new, and the part that I thought occupied the bulk of the movie.... Well, before I go on, I should say, on the off chance that you don't know the movie by heart, that I'm going to plunge immediately into spoilers.

So! I had thought that the bulk of the bulk was George Bailey's return to see the world as it would have been if he had never been born. In fact, that sequence and the memorably dopey angel Clarence don't show up until an hour and forty-three minutes into the action. Until then, it's all George's backstory. And although this backstory can be seen as a gradual but unrelenting destruction of a man's hopes and dreams portrayed strangely as upbeat comedy, it is actually pretty charming stuff.

Now mind you, I'm still way too cool to swallow the conventional family entertainment of It's a Wonderful Life without a little bit of ironic detachment. Many aspects of the film really do offer modest insults to our sensibilities and our intelligence:

• Along with some genuinely seedy establishments, the alternative town we are shown to illustrate how horribly things would have gone had our hero never been born features -- a thriving entertainment district! With jazz clubs!
  
• The world is so awful without Mr. Bailey that, had he not been born, his wife would have had to support herself as a professional single woman! As... a librarian! The horror! The horror!
  
• The notion that the inhabitants of any town, anywhere, at any time in history, would spontaneously rise up and pool their money to save a beloved local banker from financial scandal is a far more radical fantasy than the notion that your guardian angel might show up to show you how the world would have looked without you. It's supposed to be heartwarming, but it's so over the top that it's just kind of bizarre and hilarious.
  
• Also: would it work? The bank examiner is standing right there, and he's still kind of legally and ethically obligated to find out why there's money missing from the till in the first place.
  
• Despite very respectable child acting throughout the picture, little Zuzu ("Zuzu"?) Bailey's final-curtain pronouncement that "Teacher says, every time a bell rings an angel gets his wings" is so damn grating that one really does wish in that moment that her dad had never been born.

There is also, I feel obliged to point out, a logical problem in Clarence's shock-and-awe campaign to bring ol' George back to his senses. It is this: the fact that everything he has done in the past has made the world a better place does not by any means guarantee, or even logically suggest, that his continued existence will continue to yield social benefit. Nor does it contradict Mr. Bailey's conviction that, in the present moment, he is worth more to his family dead than he is alive. Just saying.

But having said all that, I will now admit that I also found It's a Wonderful Life pretty delightful. It is funny, charming, and moving, and has its heart in the right place. James Stewart and Donna Reed play the romantic leads with a sort of effortless style and naturalism. The good folks of Bedford Falls embody the middle class virtues, and if the town is a little drab -- you can certainly understand why George Bailey is forever itching to move on -- it is also captures, in a romantic sort of way, some of the best aspects of American town life.

An interesting aside: after an unremarkable theater run, It's a Wonderful Life was pretty much forgotten for thirty years. It was reborn in the 1970s, after a clerical error put its copyright into legal limbo until 1993, as which point Big Media got its claws back into it. In the interim, it became a popular holiday staple for local television stations -- remember those? -- because it was essentially free material. From this yearly exposure, it became the popular and iconic fixture of our national culture that it is today. Having seen the one that got away, it's hard not to grieve for all of those films, books, and recordings, masterpieces doubtlessly among them, that are systematically suppressed by a body of intellectual property law designed to maximize the revenues of vast entertainment media corporations. But I digress.


Plot: A bright and talented young man repeatedly puts service to the community over his personal desires, displaying a level of selfless social virtue that would have made a Soviet propagandist blush. When a relative's foolish error threatens to destroy him and everything he has worked for, a series of miracles occurs to redeem him and return him to beloved wife and children and his life of disappointed self-abnegation.

Visuals: Well-made in black and white, with lots of nice touches in foreground and background. Specific moments I liked: approaching the dinner table in his new house, a "fixer-upper" if ever there was one, Bailey must duck around a small waterfall coming out of the ceiling. Or, when a policeman fires a shot at him in the alternate universe, a letter goes out in the electric "Pottersville" sign in the background.

Dialog: Fun for the whole family, except for surly adolescents. The humor is sometimes pretty broad and obvious, but often subtle and even a bit racy. The dialog helps give the movie a rich texture, too -- the plot is anything but hard to follow, but it's unlikely that anybody will catch everything that's going on the first viewing either.

Prognosis: If you live in the United States of America, this movie needs viewing for the sake of your cultural literacy cred. But gosh, it's unlikely you haven't watched it already.

Bedroom ReModel2010 Staggers Across the Finish Line

Last Sunday, Mrs.5000 & I put the last coats of paint on the what had turned out to be a tedious two months of Castle5000 bedroom remodel. Monday, we rented one of those carpet cleaner dealies and went around cleaning up not just collateral damage from all the construction but six years of wear and tear and the last obvious physical traces of my late barfy cat. Tuesday, we went to the movies. Wednesday, we moved back into our bedroom. It's good to be home.

In response to increasingly belligerent demands for before-and-after pictures from certain quarters, we are pleased to offer this exciting collection of the same. Please keep any comments to the effect of "it looks pretty much like it did before" to yourself, thanks.

Entering the room. I mean, really, it was a poorly painted white room, and now it's a well painted white room. Big whup.



Window Frame: Of course, little details can make a lot of difference.




Here, we see that the new paint job really mostly throws into relief that the right-hand door needs a paint job itself.



Crappy old built-in shelves become gleaming new built-in shelves. They look better now that they have books and stuff on them.

This light fixture turned out to be powered by two knob-and-tube wires just coming out of a hole in the ceiling. Old houses are full of charming surprises! The new fixture is a little on the big side, but a little more contemporary. Meaning, it should be a few decades before it makes too many people wince.




Mrs.5000 did, I think, a splendid job of fixing the massive hole I made in the wall plaster.



...and you have to know where to look to see traces of the obnoxious old outlet:



Finally:

Tours available by appointment only.

Your Sunday Boring Postcard from Michael5000

158 -- THE GARDEN STATE PARKWAY

THE PLEASURE WAY OF THE JERSEY COAST

165 MILES LONG, ALL LOCAL ROADS ARE EITHER OVERPASSED OR UNDERPASSED

Provenance: Gift from Mrs.5000, Christmas 2009.

Want a boring postcard from Michael5000? Request up to one weekly in the comments!

Do I Have a Right?

I haven't been playing many computer games at ALL lately -- online chess doesn't count, that being more of a human-on-human game. A few weeks ago, though, Niece #3 introduced be to an educational game called "Do I Have a Right?" and I went on a brief but thoroughly enjoyable spree with it.

The game is designed to teach familiarity with the specific rights conferred by the (U.S.) Constitution. As the game progresses, you hire attorneys who specialize in various protections (e.g. freedom of speech, right to a speedy trial, etc.)


Then the clients start arriving, and you scamper about trying to decide if they have a valid case, and whether you have a lawyer in your stable that can help them out.


The cases don't tend to be the most subtle -- Niece #3 is an 8th grader -- and because the game aims for complete coverage of the Constitutional rights, there is a hilarious abundance of cases involving both 21st Century attempts at slavery and the billeting of troops. But, the game is very cute, it's fun, it has a surprisingly engaging gameplay for an educational tool, and it will give you a brisk refresher course on your basic Constitutional law. You don't often see an educational game that works both as education and as a game. The designers of "Do I Have a Right?" nailed it.

Flag Friday VII

Hey!! Flag Fridays are now also posted at Vexillophilia -- the new blog of Flags and Flag-related dorkiness co-hosted by Michael5000 and Cartophilia. Come join us and let your flag freak flag fly!!


Flag Friday is a periodic discussion of the world's national flags; the project is explained and indexed here.

These discussions are about graphic design, and perhaps about nationalism and national symbolism in general. They should not be taken as critical of the countries, ideals, cultures, or people that the flags represent.


Cambodia




Parsons: Parsons: Complaining of "graven images," he gives it “C”, 55/100.

Michael5000: Technically, this is a simple three-color flag, with the depiction of Angkor Wat in the center traced out in red. I am of two minds about the Angkor Wat business. On one hand, it's a highly recognizable national symbol rendered fairly simply, and it does make the Cambodian flag easy to identify at a glance. On the other hand, it remains a little more graphically detailed than I like to see in a flag.

Grade: B



Cameroon


Parsons: Calling it a "bad tricolor," he assigns a "B", 70/100.

Michael5000: The country of Cameroon has had an even more arbitrary political history than the other former European colonies in Africa. During the original carving-up, it was awarded to Germany, who apparently ran the colony of German Cameroon under this loveable but absurd flag:


...although in practice the elephant business might have been left out of the tricolor. After WWI, the German colony was split between France and the U.K., meaning that since independence Cameroon has had to work especially hard at establishing national unity. Think about it -- all local traditions of organization swept away, German law and administration imposed, then French and British law and administration imposed in different areas, and then you have to somehow pick up the pieces.

My point in all of this is that the central star in what is otherwise a fairly conventional African tricolor is symbolic of national unity -- an earlier version of the flag had two stars representing the post-French and post-British areas -- and is therefore perhaps more meaningful than your average flag star.

Grade: B+


Canada


Parsons: "Hmm... that maple leaf? A difficult question, but I think not quite stylised enough." He calls the leaf another "graven image." Nevertheless, he assigns an "A-", 80/100.

Michael5000: I live a mere five hours from Canada, a vast nation that has menacingly massed 90% of its population within a few dozen kilometers of my own land. If I disliked the Canadian flag, would I be fool enough to say so?

Fortunately, it's a moot point. I love the Canadian flag. There is nothing busy about the Maple Leaf -- it is stylized just right in my own opinion, and it makes a strong and instantly recognizable national symbol. Further, it creates visual interest within a simple, high-contrast two-color scheme; this is a flag you can find on the darkest night, yet it manages to be almost elegant.

Two more notes: 1) the Canadian flag specs call for a 2:1 ratio. I think many of the actual flags are in a more conventional 5:3ish shape, but Canada's is one of the few flags that still looks attractive when it is twice as long as it is tall. 2) Canada, like Brazil, has a very successful flag. Blessed with a terrific national symbol and -- dare I say it in print? -- possessing of a potent nationalism driven by the presence of a very populous, powerful, and culturally similar neighbor, Canadians display their flag and its central motif seemingly everyplace and at every possible opportunity.

Grade: A+. I consider this to be one of the world's finest flags.


Cape Verde


Parsons: Disliking a "corporate logo" look and calling it "eyewatering," he gives it a "C", 55/100.

Michael5000: I can see what Parsons means by the "corporate logo" factor here, but I'm a little baffled as to why it would be "eyewatering." I like the simple but off-centered elements here -- the horizontal strips and the circle of small stars. A relatively new flag, I personally think it is a big improvement on the 1975-2002 banner, and I bet you are about to agree with me:


Grade (for the current flag): A-


Central African Republic



Parsons: Liking that it's "original" but calling it "too busy," he assigns a "C-", 50/100. "Do not," he adds, "attempt to disprove the four-colour theorem on your flag!"

Michael5000: The poor C.A.R. As if the legacy of Jean-Bédel Bokassa weren't enough for one country, not only does it have the lamest of all country names -- virtually an advertisement of its arbitrary colonial origins -- but it is stuck with one of the worst flags, too. No doubt there is some cultural blinding going on here, but whereas tricolors look great and almost inevitably make a handsome national flag, quadrocolors (a word I am just now making up) look like crap. Adding other design elements just compound the problem. Do not attempt to disprove the four-color theorem on your flag!

Grade: D-

The Library Book Sale CD Trove XVI

The penultimate review of my CD finds from half-price day at the Friends of the Multnomah County Library Annual Booksale.

Bitches Brew

Miles Davis

Whoa. Where has this record been all my life? Around, I guess: it's only two years younger than I am. But damn! It's one long festival of groovy sounds. I think it's been waiting for me to be ready for it.

Prognosis: Cool, man.