The Beauty Of The English Language

[nivrip]

1) The bandage was wound around the wound.
2) The farm was used to produce produce.
3) The dump was so full that it had to refuse more refuse.
4) We must polish the Polish furniture..
5) He could lead if he would get the lead out.
6) The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert
7) Since there is no time like the present,he thought it was time to present the present.
8) A bass was painted on the head of the bass drum.
9) When shot at, the dove dove into the bushes.
10) I did not object to the object.
11) The insurance was invalid for the invalid.
12) There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.
13) They were too close to the door to close it.
14) The buck does funny things when the does are present.
15) A seamstress and a sewer fell down into a sewer line.
16) To help with planting, the farmer taught his sow to sow.
17) The wind was too strong to wind the sail.
18) Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear..
19) I had to subject the subject to a series of tests.
20) How can I intimate this to my most intimate friend?


Not an easy language to learn for an outsider. But many do very well.

 

[muckshifter]

ach, laddy, tha edjit English canny tac ol tha creedit fa awl that ...

regards
Robert Burns, Ayrshire.

 

[Taffycat]

I love those - no wonder it's said that English is one of the most difficult languages to learn................. closely followed by Scottish of course!!

 

[cirianz]

Oh, & don't forget "The buck bucked and then began to buckle under the weight of the buckle."

 

[cirianz]

I don't know about the hardest though... I found a lot of the same sort of thing in German & I expect you'd find it in most languages and at least with English you don't have to learn the gender of every noun individually and formal-informal modes of speech aren't really a part of everyday interactions.

I saw an overlap of the latter recently where two friends of mine had a... I don't know... situation when She (an NZder) thought they were having a relationship & He (a German) thought they were just having a bit of fun. he genuinely didn't understand why she was so upset & when the 'relationship' was discussed (I ended up mediating for some reason) he didn't understand. "A relationship? Relationships are important, I would never start a relationship without asking the other person." It had taken quite a while to work out just where the misunderstanding was & I had to explain that here, if you become intimate with a friend (different rules for strangers & aquaintances that i won't go into) it's assumed that you are moving the relationship onto a 'new level' & you would be expected to make it clear beforehand if that was NOT the case rather than the other way around. But it was quite a staggering insight into how language shapes culture Given that in German, outside of certain situations (& age groups), it is very offensive to use the informal when talking to someone (ie assume even a friendship) without 'checking' first. Whereas over here everyone is your "mate", "cuzzie" or "bro" unless otherwise indicated.
Myself I suspect that his continued maintenance of the relationship has more to do with embarrassment over having inadvertantly mislead her than anything.