The Frying Pan

Then he pointed at the right bank and said, "And this is France too. On this stretch, the border runs on the right channel of the Rhine, from which we crossed to come to this, left, channel. So, now we are in France proper."

At which point I remembered how nice a thing the EU is, despite all the grumble from the Germans

Sixty years ago, we'd have been shot to death by border guards

now we didn't even notice that we are crossing a national border

Cerberus

@rumtscho Haha, exactly!

That's really nice.

rumtscho

sadly, there are no restaurants selling quiche in the middle of the Rhine

hmm, there might be some, as there are cruise ships. But they probably only sell to passengers :)

Cerberus

There is a lot to be said about the effects of the concentration of power in the EU, but the open borders and the common coin are a huge blessing.

@rumtscho You could pose as a passenger!

Board the ship and walk confidently to the...what is a ship's kitchen called?

rumtscho

5:44 PM

combuse? I don't know how it's spelled in the Latin alphabet, back when I read pirate adventures I only read in Bulgarian

Cerberus

Ahh.

Kombuis in Dutch.

Or maybe combuis.

But no English variant springs to mind...

Ah, galley, of course. It was somewhere at the back of my heads.

rumtscho

There is a caboose wagon on trains, but I don't think it's the same term for ship kitchens, even though the etymology is probably the same

Cerberus

Yes, my dictionary also has caboose for a ship's kitchen!

Sounds vaguely familiar.

rumtscho

maybe the English navy corrupted the pronunciation of the Dutch word when they got the word. Historically, they probably exchanged ship related terms.

Cerberus

Quite possibly!

Although I think they took more words from us than vice versa.

But is kombuis originally Dutch?

It doesn't make much sense as a word.

rumtscho

5:53 PM

you are the one who knows how to track the heritage of a word

I don't have the right dictionaries

ElendilTheTall

Evening, Euro-chums

Cerberus

> Vnnl. cabuyse is ontleend aan Middelnederduits kebuse ‘beschot, hok’ (Riga) [1360; Paul], kabusen (mv.) ‘kleine houten hokjes op een schip’ (Wrocław) [1422,; Grimm]. Kiliaan (1599) noemt kabuyse ‘voorraadkamer, eetkamer of keuken op een schip’ nog Saksisch en Rijnlands, naast ongemarkeerd kombuys, dat de Nederlandse variant van het Nederduitse woord is, met -a- > -o- in voortonige lettergreep als in kozijn 1, en met epenthetische -m- voor labiale occlusief zoals in pompoen.
De verdere herkomst is onbekend. Samenstelling uit huis en een onzeker eerste lid (Kluge), bijv. kabane ‘hut’ is zee…

@ElendilTheTall Hello, fellow Euro-chum.

ElendilTheTall

How are things over there in Europe?

rumtscho

hello, islander

ElendilTheTall

Feeling the full benefit of being all the way to China if necessary?

*Being able to walk

My thumbs move faster than my brain

rumtscho

5:56 PM

eh, when I think back to The hundred year old who got out of the window and disappeared, no thanks, I don't want to walk from China to Europe or the other way round

Cerberus

@rumtscho So it was originally from lower Germany, but Dutch borrowed in the Middle Ages. Some of the modern words are from Dutch, others from lower German. The English word can be from either. It meant "little shed" originally in lower German, but its provenance cannot be traced further back.

rumtscho

@ElendilTheTall I have this problem sometimes too.

Cerberus

@ElendilTheTall Have we talked about the up arrow...

Besides, what stops you from walking through the tunnel?

ElendilTheTall

We have, but we have also talked about Android, and then we have talked about my unwillingness to take up screen real estate with arrow buttons

What stops me from walking through the tunnel is a team of security guards

While my motto is usually 'keep walking briskly until someone points a gun', I have no desire to bring about the situation for the dubious pleasure of walking 23 miles and even then ending up only in Calais

rumtscho

at least you have the opportunity of driving to China without encountering security guys this side of Russia

which is more than your grandpa could do

@Cerberus Yes, I could follow the text. Even though some words were unclear. I wonder what a pompoen is, my only association is a hat pompom.

ElendilTheTall

6:02 PM

My grandpa got to the far east by way of a troop ship as it happens. Russian security didn't signify

Cerberus

Ahh, the droid again.

I hear Calais is actually quite nice?

rumtscho

@ElendilTheTall was he invading Japan for silk and opium?

Cerberus

@rumtscho Pumpkin!

What is it in German/Bulgarian?

rumtscho

@Cerberus "en met epenthetische -m- voor labiale occlusief zoals in pompoen. " -> I don't see how this sentence includes a pumpkin

@Cerberus "pumpkin" is тиква (tikva), and pompom is помпон, pompon, but probably has synonyms

Cerberus

@rumtscho It does!

The -p- is a labial occlusive.

Occlusive because it stops the air, you can't say ppppp continuously.

Labial because you make it with your lips.

Ep-en-thetisch = in addition, in between, put.

So an additional -m- that you put in between.

rumtscho

6:06 PM

ah, they are comparing the sounds in kombuis to these in a pumpkin.

Cerberus

Yup.

rumtscho

Now I get it.

Cerberus

To explain why it has an m while other variants do not.

Maybe also subconsciously because they'd like to prepare pumpkin in a caboose, but...

rumtscho

now I wonder if pumpkin and pompom are related

maybe somebody looked and said "hey, that wide ball on top of your hat looks like a pumpkin"

ElendilTheTall

@rumtscho no, he was liberating people (including my Dutch grandmother) from Japanese death camps

Cerberus

6:15 PM

@rumtscho I don't know, my guess would be no.

rumtscho

@ElendilTheTall your family has a colorful history, it seems

ElendilTheTall

@cerberus Calais is a hole, as far as I recall

And not just because of the tunnel

@rumtscho perhaps. Plenty of people my age have grandfathers who fought in WW2 though.

rumtscho

but imprisoned foreign grandmothers?

Cerberus

Hah.

rumtscho

my own grandfather was in the army at the time. But as far as I know, he never took part in a battle.

Cerberus

6:19 PM

rumtscho

I don't think our army fought much at all

ElendilTheTall

@rumtscho in fact, I have 3 sets of grandparents. How's that for intriguing

3 of whom I never met

Cerberus

rumtscho

@ElendilTheTall In today's nonnuclear families, nobody would bat a lash. But yes, it sounds intriguing for your grandparents' generation

@ElendilTheTall I hope you mean three individuals, not three sets :)

@Cerberus is this Christo?

ElendilTheTall

@rumtscho Yes. I never met my paternal grandfather, or either biological grandparents

rumtscho

6:23 PM

@ElendilTheTall I'm sorry. Family is always worth knowing, even in the cases when you're better off not living with them.

How did you come by so many grandparents, was your father adopted? And which set is the soldier grandfather with the rescued grandmother?

Cerberus

@rumtscho What? It is Calais.

rumtscho

@Cerberus The most friendly explanation I can come up with for the "packed in plastic" part is that it is one of Christo's artworks. You know, the guy who packed the Reichstag in plastic.

ElendilTheTall

My mother was adopted. She never knew her father, and her mother died when she was 14. My other grandfather died before I was born

The soldier and the Dutch lady adopted my mother

Cerberus

Ahh that Christo.

I thought the Count of Monte Christo.

rumtscho

@ElendilTheTall how romantic. And then their daughter met a Hungarian guy, and her son met a Scottish woman? Very cosmopolitan.

ElendilTheTall

6:42 PM

No, my mother is Hungarian

Transcript for