Happy Maundy Thursday!

Apparently, the word Maundy is derived from Gospel of John (13:34), where Jesus is cited with ...

Mandatum novum do vobis ut diligatis invicem sicut dilexi vos

which translates to...

A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you

Null

The German term null stands for both zero and looser (in the figurative sense). So please read the following with both meanings in mind (puns are just not translatable).

Hugo, a colleague of mine, has the pastime of reading math textbooks. Recently he was studying one on Fourier transform, in which there was a chapter on zero-padding - the method of of extending a signal (or spectrum) with zeros.



The author's first recommendation is: A lot of zeros are good!. He also noted: This rule is also obeyed in business and politics.

rapt

adj.

1. Deeply moved or delighted; enraptured: listened to the speaker with rapt admiration.
2. Deeply absorbed; engrossed: was rapt in thought all evening.

Word history:

One might be surprised to learn that rapt, a word used in describing states of deep delight or absorption, has a relative with an entirely different emotive force-rape. Now most often used to mean "to force someone to submit to sexual acts," rape once had a much broader application, as it meant "to seize, carry off." In fact, it was often used in positive and nonviolent contexts. From the Middle English period, we have examples of its being used to mean "to carry off to heaven from earth," as in "the visions of seynt poul wan [when] he was rapt in to paradys." As this quotation shows, rapt started out as the past participle of rape. As time went on, rapt became restricted to mental or emotional states, while rape developed a new past participle, raped, and became limited to criminal or violent acts. Source

trouble

I serendipitously came across trouble last night when having some drinks at el Lokal, where I asked Toño to bring me a Saft from the bar.



If you are under the impression that I was in trouble, you are wrong. Because I got exactly what I wanted: an unfiltered cider. The French call this Cidre Trouble. But why they use a French term under the Swiss German brand Burehöfler, I honestly don't know.

Saft

I did not actually came serendipitously across the term Saft, I grew up with it.

Most German speaking people think Saft is a juice or sap. This is so completely wrong! Saft is cider, alcoholic beverage made from the fermented juice of apples. Or at least it is, where I grew up. However, when I here in Zürich order a Saft I get a OJ, this is just so wrong. When will they learn?

This is my father's production line to make Saft.

Peninsula

I serendipitously came across the word peninsula when I serendipitously came across the Marx Brothers. That discovery started in 1989 in Syria...



... were I met a famous Swiss actress. Unfortunately I forgot her name*, however, after my return I went to a production of her company which was based on Flywheel, Shyster, and Flywheel, a situation comedy radio show starring two of the Marx Brothers, Groucho and Chico. This was my first encounter ever with the Marx Brothers.

I have this habit to buy the playbill, and there I found the reference to this book, on which the play was based:



The book is bilingual. There is both the original and the German interpretation. This really helped, then not all lines really worked in German. It was a page turner.

I then went to a film shop in town where I found two records from the Marx Brothers. After I read them and heard them I finally went to the public library to borrow their first film on video. I had to invite myself to friend because I did neither have got a telly nor a VCR. But it was worth the trouble. That is how I came across the term peninsula.



Nevertheless, I still not satisfied. Since, I still haven't spent a night at the Peninsula.

* my mind does not do names & phone numbers

Larmoyanz

I came serendipitously across Larmoyanz in a post by MartininBroda in which he writes about the latest book by German author Sibylle Berg. Martin used there this pretentious term which I woud translate with lachrymosity. We all like, once in a while, to wallow in lachrymosity. Don't we?

incumbent

I serendipitously came across incumbent and its quite temporary nature when reading the introduction of a briefing on the electrification of motoring in The Economist issue of September 5th 2009.

In 1995 Joseph Bower and Clayton Christensen, two researchers of the Harvard Business School, invented a new term: “disruptive technology”. This is the innovation that fulfils the requirements of some, but not most, consumers better than the incumbent does. That gives it a toehold, which allows room for improvement and, eventually, dominance. The risk of incumbent firms is that of the proverbial boiling frog. They may not know when to switch from old to new until it is too late.
The example Dr Brower and Dr Christensen used was a nerdy one: computer hard-drives. But unbeknown to them a more familiar one was in the making. The first digital cameras were coming to sale. These were more expensive than film cameras and had a lower resolution. But they brought two advantages. A user could look at a picture immediately after he had taken it. And he could download it onto his computer and send it to his friends.
Fourteen years on, you would struggle to buy a new camera that uses film. Some of leading camera-makers, such as Panasonic, are firms that had little interest in photography when Dr Brower and Dr Christensen published. And en entire industry, the manufacturing and processing of film, is rapidly disappearing.

Then the article switched to cars.

malarkey

Exaggerated or foolish talk, usually intended to deceive: “snookered by a lot of malarkey” (New Republic).

wilting

I'm wilting too. Here right now, humidity is only 56% and the temperature is at 27.9°C/82.2ºF. Foretasted are 34ºC/93.2ºF. Thus I expect even more wilting for the afternoon.

prepone

The Indians introduced the term prepone into the English language. It means the opposite of postpone - although, I've never experienced anything like that in India. Nevertheless, the Indians use it all the time. The world outside the Indian subcontinent is largely unaware of it.

Monder

A couple of years ago, we had major discussions about monder. According to Alicia (Toño's fabulously charming boss), you can't say that your are blanching and peeling a tomato. It's called monder a tomato.

Obviously, monder is French, the Lingua Franca of cooking. And being a graduate of the famous École Hôtelière de Lausanne, Alicia has to know this.

So how does one monder? It's quite easy. You even may do this at home. Just keep your kiddos away from the boiling water and the sharp knife.

Step 1: Get rid off the stalk of the tomato.



Step 2: Cut a small cross with the point of a knife



Step 3: Plunge the tomato in ebullient water and leave it there for about 30 seconds (which is the time it takes until you can observe that the skin is detaching from the flesh).



Step 4: Put the tomato in ice water.



Step 5: Now peeling is easy like taking candy from a baby.



Why all this effort? Well, I just wanted to make some Roulade Estiva.

à une bouchée

Yesterday evening we enjoyed a relaxed 25 course dinner at Denis Martin in Vevey. If you are facing 25 courses, not all are actually that big. Since the main emphases lies on the taste of the course, to each one specific instruction were given on how it had to be eaten to exploit it to the max. Some of them, like the Lingot d'Or (gold bullion) below, had to be eaten à une bouchée (in one bite).

[so much bigger]

tongue-in-cheek

I so hope it was a tongue-in-cheek statement, when a colleague of mine put this in our coffee room...



... however, I don't think it was one by the maniacs who came up with this poster in the first place.

Verve

I first came across the term verve by discovering the British band The Verve in the 90es. I did not even know that this French word is also used in the German language. However, since then, I use it with verve as often as I can.

Corniche

The word corniche comes from the French route à corniche or road on a ledge.

The word corniche typically refers to a road on the side of a cliff or mountain, with the ground rising on one side of the road and falling away on the other.

In Lebanon and Egypt, the word كورنيش typically describes a waterfront promenade usually paralleled by a main road, such as the renowned Corniche in Beirut or like on the picture in Alexandria.

حَبيبي

Almost 20 years ago, I was for the first time in an Arabic country (July 16.-29, 1989). I had actually planed to travel by train from Moscow to Hong Kong, however the Chinese authorities thwarted this by their massacre on the Tiananmen Square. Nevertheless, I never regretted going to Syria instead.

One of the phrases our guide often used was Yallah Habibi (let's go darling). The phrase kind of engraved itself into my brain and since then, I usually learn it as one of the first in a new language I encounter.

Habibi (حَبيبي) is an Arabic word that literally means my beloved (of a male; the female form is habibati, or colloquially habibti), from the adjective habib (beloved). It is commonly also used for friend, darling, and similar endearments.

And since I'm in Egypt let's listen to how Mohamed Fouad interprets it:

mise en place

Mise en place is a French term referring to having all the ingredients necessary for a dish prepared and ready to combine up to the point of cooking.

Like today, Toño had quite a stirring day at work (they were sold, his boss quit etc.). Thus I did the grocery shopping and made the mise en place so that Toño only had to perform his magic at the stove and select the wine.

home made

home made is quite a strained expression, however, when it is presented at 30000 feet on an airliner and wrapped in cellophane it is nothing more than a blatant lie.

I'm with child

I'm with child is Toño's favourite expression at the moment. He picked it up watching The Tudors and keeps repeating it like a mantra although the women using it in the TV drama tend to end badly.