My life was actually interesting today...

Four intriguing things from school today:

1. In my history class, I received 100 out of 100 points on a paper that I only thought was pretty good. One thing I've learned from writing college papers is that there is no objective view; it's all about learning what each individual professor is looking for.

2. Also in history class, we will be putting Caesar Augustus on trial tomorrow for the destruction of the Republic, as a whole class. We divided into three groups: defense, prosecution, and judges. Both defense and prosecution may call up witnesses, but they can only be students taking on the role of a historical figure, and those witnesses may only speak the arguments of their historical figures. The lawyer for each side may cross-examine both sides’ witnesses, though, and the judges/jury will decide in the end—so all fairly normal court procedure. I will be taking the part of the defense attorney, and so far all the groups seem to be getting really into the project. So much so, that we all volunteered to come in sheet-togas. Sometimes I just love this class.

3. In Spanish, we learned the concept of “conocer” versus “saber”. Consider this conversation:
Persona Uno: Sabes la poema “The Raven”?
Persona Dos: No, no la conozco.

Basically translated, this conversation is:
Person 1: Do you know the poem “The Raven”?
Person 2: No, I know it.

Strange? In Spanish, though, they have two different words for different *types* of knowing. Better translated, the conversation is:
Person 1: Do you know the poem “The Raven” by heart?
Person 2: No, I only know of it.

4. Likewise, in Spanish, they have two forms of the verb that means “to be”. Like so:
Seattle es nublado. Phoenix está nublado. (Basically translated: Seattle is cloudy. Phoenix is cloudy.)

“Es” means that something is habitually or characteristically so. “Está” means that something is like this right now, but it is probably just a stage. When you use “Es”/”Está” in terms of people, it is helpful in distinguishing whether they are usually like this, or it’s just these circumstances. If someone “es” shy, that means they are always pretty reserved. If they “está” shy, they’re normally just fine in social situations, but this particular one is making them with draw.

(And for anyone who's fluent in Spanish, yes, I simplified things a little—it's the concept that I wanted to share, that's all.)