Search This Blog

Friday, May 14, 2010

la computador/el computadora -Go Dutch in beijing

learning spanish

A Spanish teacher was explaining to her class of foreign students that in Spanish, unlike English, nouns are designated as either masculine or feminine. ‘House’, for example, is feminine – ‘la casa’; ‘pencil’, however, is masculine: ‘el lapiz.’



A student asked, ‘And what gender is “computer”?’ Instead of giving the answer, the teacher split the class into two groups, male and female, and asked them to decide for themselves whether ‘computer’ should be a masculine or a feminine noun. Each group was asked to give four reasons for its recommendation.

Same in any Romanic langauge

The men's group decided that ‘computer’ should definitely be of the feminine gender (‘la computadora’) because:



1. No one but their creator understands their internal logic

2. The native language they use to communicate with other computers is incomprehensible to everyone else

3. Even the smallest mistakes are stored in long term memory for possible later retrieval; and

4. As soon as you make a commitment to one, you find yourself spending halfyour pay cheque on accessories for it.



The women's group meanwhile concluded that computers should be masculine (‘el computador’), because:


1. In order to do anything with them, you have to turn them on

2. They have a lot of data but still can't think for themselves

3. They are supposed to help you solve problems, but half the time they ARE the problem; and

4. As soon as you commit to one, you realize that if you had waited a little longer, you could have got a better model.


HAROLD
Fred,the local mortician, was brought the body of Harold Smith

a well known local businesssman. While preparing him for burial he noted that, after hundreds of such ceremonies, Harld's male organ was unbeleveably huge.



Feeling that it should not be buried with him, he removed it , carefully preserved it, and packed it in a case. He, not knowing what exactly what to do with this organ, brought it home to display it to his wife, Hortensia. He told her he had a surprise, close her eyys and then opened the case, said open your eyes and she said Oh, my god ! Harold is dead !

No comments: