As A Dutchman living in Portugal, who has lived in Spain and on the ( Spanish ) Canary Islands in the past and is mainly communicating in English ( online ), I have a tendency to think in several different languages throughout the day.
Yesterday afternoon, while on a walk, the word poema ( Portuguese - as well as Spanish - for poem ) popped up in my mind. I realized that it means cougar or mountain lion in Dutch, like the word puma in English / American.
It also intrigued me that the English a poem is made up of the exact same letters.
This inspired today's creative write up and little poem, that you - depending on your language skills ( or use of Google translate or the recommended DeepL Translator ) - might enjoy or not.
The result is a poem in Portugese, Spanish, Dutch and English, with a tiny story included in it.
Fun fact / Backstory
For over a decade I have thought of writing a book in several languages. I started this ( idea ) back in 2007, when I was first learning Spanish in Salamanca, Spain. Back then, I was intrigued by the Spanish language and the little discoveries that I made while getting to know the language better.
One of my favorite examples was the following: the Spanish word lentejas ( lentils ). As a Dutch person, you would read this as lente jas, which can be translated to Spring jacket.
I remember telling my Spanish teacher, that lentejas was Dutch for Chaqueta de Primavera ( Spring jacket ) but that we only have so called Summer jackets and Winter jackets in The Netherlands, that we use to wear for about two seasons a year each.
Anyhow, if you're into languages, like me, you might enjoy word play. This has been an important part of my upbringing. Let's say that I felt playful today, so what follows is a short poem, that is not really a poem it might be a poema, in four languages:
Poema
Apoem
A poem
Uma poema
A puma
Poem!
Aaaaaa!!!!
End of the poema.
This was ( not ) a poem about a puma.
( Nao ) foi uma poema sobre uma puma.
Es una poema, pero no se trata de pumas, só de uma.
E agora não há ninguna.
Einde van de poema.
Gedicht.
Fim.
El Fin.
Vin.
P.S. I thought of drawing Hypersensitivosaurus and Old Croc talking or philoso(raptoro)phising about a poema but realized there were no pumas in the dinosaur age, so I decided to just draw a puma with a poema instead.
If you liked the above, you might like my earlier creative rambling and scribbling Hypersensitivosaurus Mood Swings Misty Mountains Dreaming about Tigers and Helpful Advice by Old Croc
I have a similar thing with being in very early stages of the languages I'm learning, every so often a word in another language will pop into my head. And also fun was eventually switching to learning Sona after failing to grasp lojban grammar and one of the first things I was trying to work out was how sentence types were marked in Sona (questions have "ke" somewhere in them, but otherwise things like imperatives are done by tone like in most natlangs XD)
Your poem and the backstory behind it made me giggle XD I showed my daughter and she said something along the lines of it being amazing and you should send it to Doki Doki Literature Club (it's a vaguely horror visual novel game thing) XD
Sona and Lojban? Sounds like tongues from another planet :>)
Always a pleasure to make you giggle. I will keep the Doki Doki Literature Club offer in mind haha
This comment inspired me to start doing what I intended for a long time ( another side project ), a book with poems made up of several languages.
They're constructed languages, I can't remember who I explained them to in Be Awesome, probably not you if you don't remember, maybe you weren't there at the time :)
A book of poems made up of several languages sounds entertaining XD
Pretty good! You Dutchies and your language skills never fail to impress.
I recall many years ago in a cafe I frequented on Rembrandplein, one of the waiters would idenify the language the customer was speaking and address them in their language. On one occasion an American couple were discussing how much to tip him...while he stood at their table. 'I assure you it is not necessary to tip me', he announced loudly, 'for unlike in your country I do not depend on gratuities for my living'. Classic!
Thank you for sharing that story :>)
My Ego likes to tell you that I'm not the average Dutch person
but I told it to stop bragging and agree with you instead,
Groetjes!
me gusta el dibujo pero te hace falta practicar mas proporciones uwu
Gracias, no foi dibujado de memoria, pero tenho que admitir que el resulto es bastante gordo ;>)
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You're hilarious, and also clever. thinking in four languages blows me away. i just feel woefully inadequate.
Thank you. You are awesome and clever in so many other ways. No need to feel inadequate at all 🐅