This time we decided to change the day – we understood that on Wednesdays the Guimaraes nightlife was a too much stronger rival for us!

And so, with the biggest humbleness, this time we propose an ELC meeting on Monday – a day in which we expect Erasmus students to be bored enough to join us with the greatest enthusiasm!

For the meeting this time we chose Convívio (Largo da Misericórdia 7 e 8, a square in the historical centre next to Largo de Toural), a place which you should get to know – and yes, you can find Super Bock even there! (read more here: http://conviviogmr.blogspot.com/). The meeting is appointed at 22h.

Since this time we expect a massive participation of people who have never showed up before, we will show once again the by now famous ELC PowerPoint presentation – for the first time in Guimaraes the new extended version will be presented in a professional way with a real projector: one step forward for ELC, an opportunity not to miss for all of you!

So see you all tomorrow, Monday 11th of April, at 22h, in Convivio of Guimaraes!

PS: those who still don’t know what it is all about, can find the description of the activity here:

http://erasmuslanguagecafe.wordpress.com/2011/03/14/talk-dirty-with-culturrum/

This time we will join the followers from BabeliUM and the German speakers of PETRA-Deutsch-Stammtisch.

So do not miss this opportunity to meet a lot of people speaking all the languages of this world!

Tomorrow, Wednesday 6th, in Braga, at Velha-a-Branca (http://www.velha-a-branca.net/), starting around 22.

http://erasmuslanguagecafe.wordpress.com/

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Na quarta-feira, 6 de Abril, as 22, na Velha-a-Branca (http://www.velha-a-branca.net/), estao todos convidados a participar em mais uma edição do Erasmus Language Café. que desta vez combinamos com o encontro dos seguidores do BabeliUM e o PETRA-Deutsch-Stammtisch. Venham e encontrem muitas outras pessoas interessadas em partilhar os palavrões de cada idioma. Vai ser divertido!!!

Onde fica?

http://www.velha.org/ondefica.asp

VELHA-A-BRANCA – ESTALEIRO CULTURAL

Largo da Senhora-a-Branca, 23

4710-433 BRAGA

Portugal

In the meantime Erasmus Language Café is gaining more and more popularity even among our Portuguese friends.

Here it is what Carlos from Braga had to say about it:
“I had the privilege to attend both Erasmus Language Café meetings up till now, the first one in Guimarães and then the second one in Braga, and I must admit that it is getting better and better! It’s hard to believe, but the new expanded version of Andrea’s PowerPoint is really overpassing the old one, and moreover this time, thanks to the presence of a projector, I could enjoy all of its little nuances… Brilliant!”

And here it is what Bruna from Guimarães said:
“Language Cafe it’s so coooooool!!! ;) i’ll go for sure. and after…BA!!!”

So do yourself a pleasure and do the same as Bruna… Let’s go and have some fun with Erasmus Language Café!

Read what Jindra from Czech Republic has to say about the last Wednesday meeting in Guimaraes:
“Erasmus Language Café is really cool!
Before coming I wasn’t really sure about it… I was afraid to get bored…
But then I had an incredible fun, Andrea is very nice and his PowerPoint presentation is really amusing! I will come again for sure, and I suggest everybody to do the same!”.

So Erasmus from Braga, listen to Jindra, and show up tomorrow night in CUSP!

http://wikimapia.org/14384844/pt/C-A-R-Circulo-de-Arte-e-Recreio-Guimaraes

… and don’t forget to bring your pocket dictionary, books, doubts, some friends and a good mood!

Still not sure of what is it all about? So get the long one…

But let me first introduce myself: my name is Andrea, I’m coming from Italy, and I’m here doing an European Voluntary Service (EVS) at cultur@rum (http://cultura.rum.pt/). Together with Agata and Kasia from Poland and two other boys from Turkey (who still have to arrive), during the next months we are going to organize cultural activities aimed at the foreign students of the Universidade do Minho (including a radio program, called Erasmus Voice, which will be aired on RUM, http://www.rum.pt/).

One of these activities will be the second edition of the Erasmus Language Café. This is a project which has been established last year here in Guimarães and Braga by Ewelina, an EVS volunteer at the time (you can get a picture of the past activity by scrolling the old posts of the blog: http://erasmuslanguagecafe.wordpress.com/ – with more info here: http://www.languagecafe.eu/).

The Language Café will take place once a week in different bars and cafés of Braga and Guimarães, and basically it is intended to provide a space for foreign students where to practice Portuguese language with the aid of native speakers, meet new people, discuss about cultural diversity and … being insulted! And I mean being insulted for the sake of knowledge!

This in fact is the novelty for this year’s edition of ELC: I want the participants to compile together a multilingual glossary of a particular category of false friends: those affecting the sense of decency.

When talking about languages, everybody knows what a false friend is: for instance, the very same word burro means ‘butter’ in Italian, and ‘donkey’ in Portuguese and Spanish. That can create just some little misunderstandings in the beginning, but nothing really serious.

But there can be some false friends way more insidious… False friends that can make something click in the mind of the listener, that can evoke an unwanted shade which could distract him/her from the speech and even lead him/her to unexpected and even inappropriate reactions: to provoke an abrupt laughter, to summon up some nasty thoughts, to enrapture him/her to some nostalgic longing…

There are in fact words which possess those powers. For example one should be aware that the very common Portuguese verb ficar (‘to be situated’) carries a very strong sexual connotation to the ears of a native Italian speaker: consequently, when talking to an Italian, according to the case, it would be better to use the more neutral verb estar. Well, unless the purpose of the speaker is to deliberately introduce a subliminal lure into his/her speech.

The examples could be countless: the Italian sciare (‘to ski’), although having a very similar pronunciation, is totally unrelated to the French chier (‘to shit’). And more: anybody would enjoy to accept an invitation to have a French crêpe, but it could take a different taste if you think of it as a crap. A very popular beer here in Portugal is Super Bock, popular even among Turkish students, despite the fact that in their mother language the word bok means ‘shit’. On the menus of Slovakian restaurants it’s very common to find dishes in which ‘chicken’ is the main ingredient: that should sound like a bizarre option to native Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian/Slovenian speakers, in whose languages a very similar sounding word (kurac) means ‘cock’ (and I’m not referring here to a rooster…). And so on and on.

Some of those false friends are so known that they reached the status of a legend (the only Finnish sentence any Italian knows is the one meaning “Look at the sea!”. In Finnish: Katso merta…). But lots of them still need to be pointed out, and for this we need volunteers willing to get insulted, and to insult back on their turn.

So my proposal is to have some insulting sessions, as an ice-breaking warm-up before each regular Language Café meeting. In rotation there will be formed couples composed by two persons of different nationalities that in turn will tell to each other in his/her mother language every kind of profanity, obscenity, taboo-word or everything else could be perceived as offensive or inappropriate in his/her society and culture. The person having the passive role should then take care to note down those words which resemble normal ones in his/her language, and propose a neutral alternative without any sexual or scatological connotation.

The purpose in fact is not only to have some fun by talking dirty: the purpose is to become aware that in some cases, when talking to foreigners, words can say more than what they are supposed to; that sometimes by talking about the apparently most innocent topics (“Do you like chicken?”, “Do you love to ski?”) people can unintentionally touch some sensitive points.

It is a just matter of tact: we don’t want people’s inner child to awake and laugh when hearing the word ‘poop’. And neither we want a naughty grin to appear on the face of those who are vicious minded by nature!

But still I’m aware that this research could also lead to the opposite results: if they just would like to, thanks to it, people would be able to spice up their speeches by adding some subliminal obscenities into them.

One last note: I think that the resulting glossary could be a quite useful tool for people employed in a diversified range of professions: from interpreters to diplomats, or anybody working in an intercultural environment. That’s why I would like the glossary to meet at least some basic scientific standards (a phonetic transcription of the words, an introduction, etc.) – but that goes far beyond my abilities. To do that I will need as well the help of some students with a preparation in linguistics. And, why not, even psychology. And of course, native Portuguese speakers are also more than welcome!

The calendar of the Language Café meetings will be published on the blog http://erasmuslanguagecafe.wordpress.com/, on http://cultura.rum.pt/ and on the Facebook group “Erasmus Voice 2010 – 2011”.

I encourage anybody interested in the project to write me comments, suggestions, even insults (I will need lots of them!) at this e-mail address: andrea.cultura.rum@gmail.com – or contact me through my mobile phone: 963514899 (it’s a tmn moche).

I part – the dinner in Adega dos Caquinhos

II part – C.A.R

“Never, never, never give up.”
W. Churchill

The project of Erasmus Language Café is almost done. I am getting to the end of my EVS project as well. It was a great experience for me to organize the ELC, to cooperate with you. I hope somebody will continue this idea in future, when I will be not here, when new EVS volunteers come, when new Erasmus arrive. Life is changing a lot! Furthermore, I have to be honest and say… before I decided to do it I was full of doubts: I didn’t speak Portuguese, I didn’t know nobody, I didn’t know any places to arrange it. Whatever, I made a decision to try on and I didn’t give up! And what now?
I want to say to everyone THANK YOU. Because this project wouldn’t exist without YOU!!! It is true!!!
Some of you have participated in Language Café every time. I am really impressed, but I want you to know that even if you were there just one time I remember You and I understand that not everything is for everybody. Maybe this project wasn’t exactly for you, anyway you have tried and you get to know it. It’s worth for me. Thanks this I learnt a lot also.

I could talk more and more : -) but this is not a point of that email.

On 1st of July (Thursday) I would like to organize the last meeting of Erasmus Language Café.

I propose to go for a dinner to typical Portuguese restaurant in the centre of Guimarães  and after that to go for a drink to C.A.R – the place where Langauge Café have started.

It could be great to see you there!!! Please let me know, as soon as possible how many of you would like to come for a dinner (I need to make a reservation). You can send me an email or sms, my phone nr 962 561 472.

Thank you once again and I wish for everybody the best!!!!
Keep in touch!!!
bjs & hugs

Ewelina Poleszak
EVS volunteer at Radio RUM & Cultur@rum
phone: 962 561 472
www.rum.pt

The 9th Erasmus Language Café  didn’t have an exact time and date… it happened wherever we were! Different situations, different people, open space, open mind, many opportunities to speak. Because life is the best teacher!!!

Photo relation….