HOME | DD

ltiana355 In reply to undefinedreference [2017-09-06 20:36:33 +0000 UTC]

good stuff

something equally hysterical (but unrelated): youtu.be/GP3Gho5qe4Y

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

undefinedreference In reply to ltiana355 [2017-09-07 05:31:25 +0000 UTC]

They're an intense lot indeed. One theory about the origins of flamenco is that it's Arab music, reworked so as to not attract too much attention from extremely oppressive Christian authorities. Also I once read that a sense of "Please bring back the Arabs and deliver us from these Christian assholes" exists in southern parts of Spain to this day. An interesting viewpoint, given the "superiority" of our "civilization"

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

ltiana355 In reply to undefinedreference [2017-09-07 10:06:47 +0000 UTC]

i've never encountered this viewpoint (maybe because i haven't communicated with the right 'viewholders'). but it looks like the arabs are being 'broungt back' to europe anyways

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

undefinedreference In reply to ltiana355 [2017-09-07 12:31:36 +0000 UTC]

The Jews were expelled from Spain under Christian rule, not Islamic rule, so there's some food for thought.. Not to mention the Inquisition. I'm more worried about the Turks than about the Arabs as far as Europe is concerned. I wouldn't be surprised at all if within a decade the US will turn their back on Europe (or simply collapse under the weight of their own defense budget) and in a kind of Molotov-Ribbentrop pact will have Europe secretly divided among Russia and Turkey, along the lines of the former Iron Curtain. Their chest-drumming victorious ecstasy will be short-lived though, because soon enough the Chinese will decide they're ready to step in. While the [stupid] Europeans, Americans and Russians are bickering over "who has the biggest one", the Chinese are busy building a "friendly" trade network, the likes of which the world has never seen, under our very eyes and as we speak. And a network that can be transformed into a highly effective military infrastructure at the flick of a switch. And there are over a billion of them, so.. My best guess is that by the end of this century all of Eurasia will be a Chinese province, and the rest of the planet a vassal state, and all our worries about preserving our "superior" culture will have gone with the wind. And nobody will care either. Humanity can do perfectly well without our superior Western culture. Painful perhaps (for us), but true.

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

ltiana355 In reply to undefinedreference [2017-09-07 14:58:59 +0000 UTC]

it is a likely scenario (but you forgot to include kim's nuclear missile tests)

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

undefinedreference In reply to ltiana355 [2017-09-07 17:18:46 +0000 UTC]

Kim is just a sideshow, although it certainly is quite scary, the way he seems to see this as just a big and exciting game. But given his background he can be forgiven for being completely detached from what we mere mortals consider reality. A bit like if you would tell Donald Trump you can't afford to go to a hospital, and he would answer "Why don't you buy a hospital then?". Not sure that that has ever happened, but I wouldn't be surprised at all if it did. The nuclear arsenals of the US and Russia are a lot more to be worried about. In the case of Russia, here we have a nation that has increasingly little to lose and feels offended when labeled a regional power, yet still has the largest nuclear arsenal on the planet in terms of warheads (many of which are tactical nuclear warheads, so the US might still beat them in terms of megatons). And with the US, well, basically anything can happen, it's such a political-ideological powder keg. I mean, with Evangelical ministers begging politicians to please nuke Iran as a means of setting the Second Coming of Christ Procedure in motion, what can you NOT expect? Imagine such idiots grabbing power. If they haven't already, one has to add

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

ltiana355 In reply to undefinedreference [2017-09-07 18:54:04 +0000 UTC]

worrying won't help . and it doesn't matter on a universal scale, anyway. 

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

undefinedreference In reply to ltiana355 [2017-09-08 09:44:58 +0000 UTC]

I used to be somewhat into geology. On a geological timescale anything to do with human concerns does indeed become VERY insignificant. Btw I already knew that the Chinese have been de facto colonizing Siberia for decades. According to this page, since two years ago it is official policy: oleg-leusenko.livejournal.com/… . I haven't checked any of the backgrounds from that page, so it could  be a load of hot air. In reverse, did you know that the RUSSIANS built the Great Wall of China Russia? www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvCCET… . I'm very well-introduced into the backgrounds of that video. It's in the same COMEDY/GARBAGE category as "aliens built the pyramids" and the like

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

ltiana355 In reply to undefinedreference [2017-09-10 19:38:15 +0000 UTC]

as far as i know (from the local newspapers), the chinese are buying or trying to buy stuff also in norway. 
the only thing we can do is wait and see. 

i've managed 15 min. of the russian wall video so far, but i got an overdose of ideological claptrap

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

undefinedreference In reply to ltiana355 [2017-09-11 08:42:49 +0000 UTC]

The good thing about those garbage videos is that, thanks to a combination of the fact that they're being created for rather simple minds and the hyped-up overdriven narrative style, they're quite easy to follow for a language learner. I've decided to leave them for what they are though for the time being, and focus on this movie, which I'm sure you know very well: www.youtube.com/watch?v=a50qT9… . It's lame, dumb, and absolutely brilliant! Many thanks to the Bogdan Titomir video about Moscow for that one!

As for the ideology, I'm not sure is this video is part of the Kremlin's propaganda outlet, or among Putin's personal sources of inspiration.The relationship between government propaganda and, let's say, ground-breaking volunteer work seems quite complex in Russia.

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

ltiana355 In reply to undefinedreference [2017-09-11 09:38:47 +0000 UTC]

this movie is one of my parents' favorites

but it's a long time i've seen it - i remember it had at least 2 parts

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

undefinedreference In reply to ltiana355 [2017-09-11 16:38:49 +0000 UTC]

The acting in that movie is epic. I have no other word for it. Whenever I watch a movie, which is almost never, I tend to pay more attention to the acting than to the story itself, as a source of enjoyment in its own right. This movie leaves me fully satisfied. It's in the same league as Spaceballs, Adams Family Values, John Cleese and Rick Mayall, to name a few.

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

ltiana355 In reply to undefinedreference [2017-09-11 18:24:51 +0000 UTC]

yes, old soviet comedies are quite good.

of the related videos suggested under 'ivan vasiljevich', i'm quite fond of m.youtube.com/watch?v=GqnqFhc9… and m.youtube.com/watch?v=fNBGnV_I… .

(i would even see them on my own, without visiting my parents

👍: 0 ⏩: 1

undefinedreference In reply to ltiana355 [2017-09-12 07:25:13 +0000 UTC]

Thanks, they have been bookmarked for future viewing. They do talk really fast in that Ivan Vassilyevich movie, I was watching Gogol's "The Revisor" yesterday and it's much easier to follow. Not word-for-word, but at least I have an idea of what it's about. When I watched Ivan Vassilyevich for the fist time, I hadn't even the beginning of a clue. Here's my sleeping pill for when I get woken up all the time by noisy downstairs neighbors: www.russianmentor.net/RussianL… . There's 470 audio files on that site, news clips from the 1990s, which I downloaded one by one, and when I get woken up over and over again to the point where I'm left entirely sleepless, I put on my headphones and play them all at once. That way, at least I don't feel like the party people downstairs are wasting my precious time (I'm talking about being kept awake until 3, 4, 5 AM). At the same time, these clips are utterly sleep-inducing. My list always starts with this one www.russianmentor.net/RussianL… , so you can probably imagine. And I do always get my revenge the next morning, I still always wake up early and the guy sleeps in until around 1 PM, which leaves him vulnerable to loud music, door banging, dropping heavy objects onto the floor, hammering and whatever I can come up with. I should buy myself a hammer drill one of these days..

👍: 0 ⏩: 0

ltiana355 In reply to Vrinda-the-Wistful [2017-08-20 07:43:03 +0000 UTC]

thanks

👍: 0 ⏩: 0

ltiana355 In reply to bear48 [2017-08-17 19:03:36 +0000 UTC]

👍: 0 ⏩: 0