How do you say - - ?

[Liis]

Contest vs competition
There is a difference "they" say ... A contest is said to be more serious, involving a will to win and prizes.
So the Swallow photo contest was not wrong after all, although competition looked better.
There is an answer - or several - to everything these days! Just google it.

"An age difference between two individuals induces contest competition" ...

[alice44]

Liis I would tend to think the reverse.


There are contests all the time. They may have big prizes but they may or may not be "serious." In a competition their might be some kind of initial screening (or not).

Plus (or maybe it is this usage that influences my reaction to the terms)

The competition for first prize in the Tours de France was fierce

[Jo UK]

Oxford English Dictionary -

Competition - The action of endevouring to gain what another endevours to gain at the same time.
The striving of two or more to gain the same object.
Rivalry.


Contest - Strife in argument. Keen controversy, debate. Struggle for victory.

Well, that wasn't much help!

[Liis]

Jo and all others who know proper English - I am so grateful that these are not legal texts where little differences might bring on disasters, bankruptcies, wars ...

Meanwhile: in or on an island?
When is an island large enough to be lived IN? or are there other things besides size that decide?

(and some continents are really islands ...)

[alice44]

On an island -- on Madagascar the island but in Madagascar the country

BUT

in North America, in Australia, on Greenland or in Greenland, and I think in or on Iceland.


I suspect this is more about traditional usage (which I think is a typical problem of preposition usage) than meaning, or real right or wrong.

[Jo UK]

I agree with Alice - it depends on traditional usage.
I live in UK, which is an island.
No, UK is a collection of islands, but I live in England.
Difficult, isn't it?

[Liis]

I agree with Alice - it depends on traditional usage.
I live in UK, which is an island.
No, UK is a collection of islands, but I live in England.
Difficult, isn't it?

Thank you, Alice and Jo! - so I have been chasing the wrong criterion. Very large islands are often countries, I guess, or administrative units at least, so that was probably why it didn't go wrong altogether.

Language, usage and being used to: when planning for the northern parts of Stockholm began, a name was needed. Brunnsviken, roughly the Brunn bay lake, is one feature of the landscape, so why not Brunnsviken? But - hmmm - "where do you live?" - "In Brunnsviken". - In a lake?? Name was skipped.
Actually there is a great number of traditional -lake, -bay, -river etc place names, and nobody thinks twice.

[juta]

Contest vs competition
There is a difference "they" say ... A contest is said to be more serious, involving a will to win and prizes.
So the Swallow photo contest was not wrong after all, although competition looked better.
There is an answer - or several - to everything these days! Just google it.

"An age difference between two individuals induces contest competition" ...

Hello!
I keep eye on BBC Learning English. From there I got some examples:
"The athletes witness the competition for the first time. It's been arranged to help both teams prepare for the big contest".
"Miss Fitz and Uni5 did not make it through to this next round of the contest and left the competition"

[Liis]

Thank you, Juta and everybody. And please, no more front page notices about - hm, those compare-your-skills events before I manage to forget that I should know the difference.

The unlogic and unfairness of languages, meanwhile. Or an addition to "false friends" list (you think you recognize a familiar word, but is is a stranger dressed up as a friend).
The child of a roe deer is a "kid" in Swedish - nice! BUT: in English kid is the child of a goat, and the roe deer has a fawn ...

[Liis]

Pick, gather, collect, harvest ...?
Berries, mushrooms, apples, nuts, clams, driftwood ... are they all picked?
Do I pick water melons?

Sometimes you get absurdly unsure about words. In your own language you know for sure, of course.
I think I can "pick" them all in Swedish, except driftwood that probably would be "gathered". Or collected.
Nit-picking?

[alice44]

Pick, gather, collect, harvest ...?
Berries, mushrooms, apples, nuts, clams, driftwood ... are they all picked?
Do I pick water melons?

Sometimes you get absurdly unsure about words. In your own language you know for sure, of course.
I think I can "pick" them all in Swedish, except driftwood that probably would be "gathered". Or collected.
Nit-picking?

I don't think I'd pick clams, or driftwood. I suspect we dig clams and gather driftwood -- maybe collect muscles?

Picking nuts suggests pulling them off the tree rather than raking them up. One definitely picks watermelons.

I think one would tend to gather, collect or harvest mushrooms, but I don't think it would sound exceptionally odd to pick mushrooms.

If I went to a berry farm I would probably pick berries, but if I sought out wild patches of berries, I might pick or gather them. Similarly I think we pick apples, but one might gather them if you wanted to suggest a search or admit that you were getting them off the ground.

I am not sure when one would harvest -- to me it suggests a serious endeavor -- collecting the majority of tomatoes from the field, followed by work in the kitchen, or when you need to use another word for variety. (I am helpful )

[Liis]

Thank you, Alice! Always interesting to compare usage, rules and the whys and wherefores!

------------------
I don't think I'd pick clams, or driftwood. I suspect we dig clams and gather driftwood -- maybe collect muscles?

Picking nuts suggests pulling them off the tree rather than raking them up. One definitely picks watermelons.

I think one would tend to gather, collect or harvest mushrooms, but I don't think it would sound exceptionally odd to pick mushrooms.

If I went to a berry farm I would probably pick berries, but if I sought out wild patches of berries, I might pick or gather them. Similarly I think we pick apples, but one might gather them if you wanted to suggest a search or admit that you were getting them off the ground.

I am not sure when one would harvest -- to me it suggests a serious endeavor -- collecting the majority of tomatoes from the field, followed by work in the kitchen, or when you need to use another word for variety. (I am helpful )

I was seriously considering "nut-picking" as a header on front page about the hazelnuts , but abstained ... Nit-picking, literally, is by the way a business on the rise in Sweden, boosted by more foreign travel, togetherness in gyms etc.

Harvesting mushrooms would suggest to me that they were cultivated. So I think they will be firmly picked, possibly gathered, as long as it is about wild ones. I just might go and harvest a favourite wild mushroom spot (before anyone else gets there).
Pick watermelons - hmmm. Somehow I felt that you don't pick big things. On consideration, might simply have to do with the sound of "pick" - a rather thin-sounding word.
Digging / collecting clams, mussels etc: not much done around the Baltic*, at least not since prehistoric times when obviously great amounts of oysters and mussels were eaten. In Swedish I would probably use the equivalent of collect or pick.
(*explanation may be that in the Baltic 1) there are few kinds of shellfish 2) the further north you go, the smaller they become; both due to the low salinity)

[Katinka]

Aha! Liis, as I'm interested in maritime topics, too, I just catched your explanation about the life in the Baltic:

...may be that in the Baltic 1) there are few kinds of shellfish 2) the further north you go, the smaller they become; both due to the low salinity

And the growth is lasting much longer, the more cold the Baltic waters have. So this is another aspect why fishing grounds can no longer recover from our industrial fishing methods in Arctic waters...

But, how to say...?
Baltic Sea in some parts:
Northern part of it - "Bottnischer Meerbusen" (busen is to transform from old Germanic language roots into bucht - which means...and now back to eesti keeles "laht"...
EN: Gulf of Bothnia (Bottnia must be another old-fashioned word for the Balts) - S:Bottniska viken, FI:Pohjanlahti
Eastern part - "Finnischer Meerbusen" the same
EN: Gulf of Finland - FI:Suomenlahti

I like studying other languages!

[Katinka]

Where are the other eesti foorumi liikmed??
Liis- thanks that you are so often present in the forum. Must be a big task, holding the flag high for the rest of Estonians here... I'd be glad to read more than one view on things from LK's country of origin!
How ever - Norge, Suomi, Sverige would be alright, too!

To „vananaistesuve“, of the Sept 23 LK article:
Same expression in different languages??
Liis, you translated it with "old wives summer", literally.
Jo UK, any better suggestion from your native language?
Deutsch "Altweibersommer" is correct, no question!
(http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altweibersommer)

So perhaps in some common Germanic roots (no, not the Vikings!) there are a plenty of words that hint to former different writings - and meanings.
The G. word weiber is derived from old high German (earliest written stage of the German language) weiben, a verb which stands for Estonian jutustama - for weaving.
This describes the often-watched cob webs in this year's time. Some more has led to the nowadays used word composition.
As far as I can say momentarily, the similarity between Estonian and German must be of a different origin - it's too literal!
Vana, naine and suvi come together - but what is discussed about it in Eesti?

Or in Sweden...?

[Katinka]

Everybody around me sleeping...
No matter, but what about old wives summer now?
Anybody reading this with native English speaking??

Some more linguistic intricacies:
Where do I use
autumn - fall
mushroom - fungus ?

[alice44]

Old wives summer is a term I do not know -- I have been trying to think if I know something, but so far no.

When to use
autumn -- when speaking with British people
fall -- when speaking to Americans (we probably use both)
I think we both understand both words, but some Brits (is that a polite term) might have to think again as they might first focus on falling down

mushroom - fungus ?
I am not sure -- typically what you eat is called a mushroom. Things like puff balls that have a different shape might be more likely to be called a fungus.

more properly -- mushroom is the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting body of a fungus

Some of my friends have decided it is cooler to eat fungi than mushrooms. -- so silliness sometimes dictates which term you use

[Kitty KCMO]

Everybody around me sleeping...
No matter, but what about old wives summer now?
Anybody reading this with native English speaking??

Some more linguistic intricacies:
Where do I use
autumn - fall
mushroom - fungus ?

Old wives summer may be similar to what we in the USA call "Indian Summer?" The period of pleasant weather after "official" summer is done, especially after there has been the first light frost. I & most people I know use "autumn" & "fall" interchangeably. Autumn is the season & the use of fall, I think, came about as this is the time when leaves fall from deciduous trees. In areas where there is no season where that specifically happens, I imagine "fall" would not make much sense.

As for fungus vs mushroom, I don't know which would be more appropriate. I tend to think of "fungus" more as things like molds (harmful or at least nasty stuff) & of mushrooms as more the things that may be eaten (unless toxic, of course).

[alice44]

Kitty that is a good take on old wives summer -- I was just so totally sidetracked by old wives tales that I couldn't move on. Also in my part of the country Indian summer isn't really much. I think of it being especially magical time, often after some frost and by then we are into full on winter rain.

[Kitty KCMO]

Here in Missouri, we often have a nice spell of weather after our first frost. The first frost is usually by the 3rd week of October, but it can come as early as right now (no danger of that for the next couple of weeks at least, according to weather forecasts). It has also not come until the first week or so of November, but that is more unusual.

[Katinka]

Thanks a lot, both of you!
It's always good to have more than 1 option...
From my former school time I knew some characteristics to distinguish BE from AE - but if you're not in professional contacts to both countries it's not so important to know...
Ah... but what about your cell phone? We have been so uninspired to call it a handy -the entire rest of the Northern globe seems to use mobile instead.
But recently I was told that more and more people are tending to use our handy as well!? With this a new wave shall be on spreading out with more Germanisms except from kindergarden, kitsch, wanderlust, pretzel, kraut or deli...
schlepping I remember ! (e. g. our neighbour farmer's Schlepper is schlepping the sawing machine over the ground . )
At the same time we are on forgetting the good old rucksack - has been substituted in common by backpack. Sigh...but therefor Schulranzen has turned into Schulrucksack. Only Jupiter knows why...

More Germanisms beyond the country??

For the actual leave colouring in the U.S., HERE's a new tool.