Yekrats.com: Scotto’s Seafud Shanty

For my English-speaking readers, I thought I’d bring to you a little debate raging on in the Esperanto community right now. It’s a debate about what to call some countries. That’s a big deal to some people. (continue reading…)

I’m currently at the “Landa Kongreso” (National Congress) of Esperanto-USA in Saint Louis. It’s a pretty amazing experience - using a language so much that you think in it. In fact, writing this right now, I must concentrate on which part of the brain to use: Esperanto or English. Even more baffling: We are Esperantists, chatting in the hallway or at an excursion among English-speakers… and then an English-speaker talks to me, and I must consciously think whether to say Dankon or Thank you. I never really had that feeling when I spoke French in Quebec, because I don’t think I was ever sufficiently capable to think in French. You might be surprised (not) but we have had more than our fair share of strange looks.

There’s about 100 people here supposedly, all mixing and chatting in Esperanto. This is my first real experience speaking the language (vocally). I’ve become pretty good over the last 10 years of typing and reading it, but since I don’t have a local club, this is my crash course in hearing it and speaking it.

There’s people here from all skill levels, and the veterans are very understanding when I explain my situation. And I try to be very accommodating to the fresh newbies who decided to come.

Last night we went to the Memorial Arch (”Memoriga Arkego”), which was more crowded than I remember in the past (in 1984, I think). Today we have a full slate of Esperanto meetings and presentations.

I found the following video about the Inform programming language, and it made me want to get back into programming IF again. The “natural language” thing I could probably do without (and I can imaging things getting needlessly complicated by making the interface “natural”) but the IDE seemed to be brilliant. I wish TADS had debugging tools like the transcript control and Skein!

Inform 7 screencast

Well, today is the last day for Change.org, a social networking site which promises to present ten ideas to the new Barack Obama administration and lobby for them. Today is the last day of voting.

First, the website had a open call for ideas, and those ideas were voted on. The top vote-getters in each category went on to the second round. Among those ideas was a proposal in the Education category to offer Esperanto as a language in American schools. This caused a furor through Esperanto-land, and the proposal passed to the second round.

Despite voting for it, I’m of two minds about this proposal. Anyone that knows me well knows that I think Esperanto is a great tool. I’ve been using it for a little over 10 years now, and have achieved friendships and understanding that would have not been possible before. It has changed my world-view.

That being said, I’m not sure I want this proposal to be among the 10 chosen (despite me voting for it!) Firstly, this is a political site. I don’t want Esperanto thrown into the middle of politics. I can imagine the howls of derision if the Esperanto proposal would be chosen. If it was pushed as in agenda item, I know there would be push-back. Yes, even Esperanto being offered would raise folks’ hackles. America is ruled by English, and I see xenophobia here. Fact is, I don’t want to see Esperanto picked apart by critics, as politics tends to do.

Also, if you look at the list, there’s some important issues there. This is a really messed up world right now. Can I honestly say that lack of Esperanto is among the 10 biggest problems facing this country right now? Absolutely not! Obama is walking into a hornet nest of problems. I honestly think Esperanto is down the list a bit.

A little more background into the proposal for you non-Esperantists. Generally there are two schools of thought in the Esperanto community, though as always things are not quite so black and white. Firstly, there’s finvenkismo, the ideology that look towards the fina venko (”final victory”). The final victory would be everyone has sufficient knowledge of Esperanto so that everyone could do the most basic of communication, for example, asking for a cup of coffee. (”Mi volus kafon, mi petas.”)

On the other side is ra?mismo. Ra?mistoj just enjoy Esperanto for its own sake, and think that finvenkistoj are wasting their time trying to convince other people. Esperanto has already got original literature, music, and culture… so why not just enjoy the language and enrich it for our own pleasure.

So, this proposal is very finvenkist. Getting the backing of a major government would be a finvenkist’s dream! Me, I’m somewhat in the middle between the finvenkist and raumist agendas. While I think Esperanto would indeed help foster communication for the world, I’m pragmatic enough to know that some people just don’t and would never care. To push it would bring other problems which we don’t even see right now. So, straddling the two ideologies, I voted for it, but I think it winning might be worse than the alternative.

Well, folks… I finally made the plunge. I am now “officially” an Esperantist. I just joined Esperanto-USA, which is the national Esperanto club. I did it mostly because this year’s national Esperanto convention will be within driving distance: St. Louis. I’ve been wanting to go to an E-o convention for - well - the last 10 years since I’ve started doing Esperanto.

I’m a bit nervous about it. I’ll probably do just fine, but I’ve never had the chance to speak the language before. Most of my interactions in the language are eyeball-to-keyboard. I can express myself now without going to a dictionary. However, when I listen to verbal Esperanto, I listen with difficulty because I haven’t yet trained that part of my brain much. (Sometimes I hear a word in a podcast and think, “Oh, that’s how that word is pronounced!” which is really stupid, because the pronunciation in Esperanto is exactly how the word looks. I’ve just never spoken or heard the word being pronounced, so the hearing/translating part of my brain is encountering it for the first time.

Yesterday, the Esperanto Wikipedia achieved 100,000 articles, the 20th Wikipedia to achieve such a feat. The milestone article was “monfalsado” (counterfeiting of money).

Yay, us!