Hunting for mice

5 01 2026

“The limits of my language means the limits of my world.”

– Ludwig Wittgenstein

I love a good word; knowing the right word for something makes me very happy, maybe even a little smug. And knowing words for things in other languages is even better … if what you know changes your attitude and widens your horizons, I’m all for knowing as much as possible.

I currently have a plan. For the Brits in the room, it’s a cunning plan*. My plan is that if I watch enough French hockey, with French commentary, the level of my French will magically improve. So far, it’s sort of working. I certainly feel more confident in French and I’m learning more colloquial phrases, albeit very hockey specific, than I’ve ever known. I also now know that French people absolutely use the phrase ‘encore un fois’ which up ’til now I believed was only a phrase in a song I remember from way back. They may not use the clichéd ‘Ooh la la’, but they certainly (or at least hockey commentators do) say ‘Lo lo lo lo lol’ … A LOT.

*For anyone else, that was a Blackadder reference and you probably have no idea what I’m on about.

I now know that the French for a shambles is ‘un cafouillage’ and that it happens (and is used) much more often than you think. My sister shortened this to ‘cauliflower’ (don’t ask; she’s not a linguist by any stretch) and this is now used interchangeably with the word ‘handbags’.

I was very proud to find out that ‘un bagarre’ is a fight. When I bounced into work and told my language teacher friend at work this, she told me it’s much more colloquial than I thought it was.

I can tell you that hooking is known as ‘accrochage’ despite the fact that the dictionary tells me it means ‘hanging’, that slashing is called as ‘cinglage’ and that (and this one I absolutely love) tripping is known as ‘faire trébucher’. Literally, to make into a medieval catapult that was used to fling dead bodies, carcasses, and boulders over the walls of besieged castles.  And if that’s not in the spirit of hockey nomenclature, I don’t know what is.

So anyway, for those who don’t know, the space between a netminder’s legs is, in hockey, referred to as the five-hole. It’s a great name, but I’ve known it for ages. It’s lost its novelty factor. So, when I discovered that in French, it’s called the ‘trou de souris’ or ‘mousehole’, I was over the moon. It’s made even better by the fact that the Ducs d’Angers are named after the  Eurasian eagle owl, le Grand-Duc, which absolutely hunts mice. What a fantastic name for the tiny space through which pucks, against all known laws of physics, are able to slide into the back of the net.

But hopefully not our net!


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Categories : Angers, appreciation, hockey, knowledge, languages, learning, positivity, words

Castle in the Carpathians

12 05 2025

“Wenn ihm der Vogel hat gemacht
Ein Nest darein sein Eyer bracht
So fleucht er nicht auß frucht davon
Vnd thut ein andern sitzen lan
Oluff seine Eyer in dem Nest
Sondern sich drauff erwürgen left”

“When a bird builds a nest
To lay its eggs in it
Then it never flies away again
But stays in it
On the eggs in its nest
Even while strangled”

– Inscription above the doorway of Castelul Bran

I may not, as I stated in my previous post, know anything about Romania, but I have heard of the Carpathian Mountains. They feature in an awful lot of fantasy novels featuring various supernatural creatures and mythology. So I’d definitely heard of them. I just (ridiculously, I know) didn’t know exactly where they were.

The way I found out where they were was a conversation my sister and I were having about whether various animals were present in the wild in Romania. Moose, bison, wolves, and bears, for reasons that have a lot to do with a day spent wandering the wilderness in Denmark to try and locate creatures that we were promised really did exist, and turned out to be somewhere else (or non-existant if you’re being uncharitable). If you were wondering, some rapid Googling informed me that the answers were no, yes, yes, and yes in that order. The answer to the question, “Did we see any of them?” was a resounding “No!” But in the process of answering the original question, I discovered that the beautiful, towering peaks through which we were driving belonged to the Southern Carpathians. This did go some way towards answering another question. As we drove out of Ploiesti, there was a …. something. It was something that had obviously been hit by a car, and neither of us could identify it. We looked at each other, confusion heavy in our eyes.

“Was that a ….?”

“That looked like a ….”

It looked like nothing more than a dead werewolf. And now we knew why. I really do try to be sensible and only believe in real things. But sometimes there’s a dead werewolf at the side of the road. What’s a girl to think?

Anyway, when you’ve flown all the way to Romania on a Saturday morning for the IIHF World Championships, seen GB win gold and promotion to the top level of world hockey next year, what could you possibly do on the Sunday that would even half-way match up? Well, when you also find yourself slap bang in the middle of the Carpathian Mountains, home of the supernatural, there’s really only one thing you can do …. and that’s visit Dracula’s Castle, obviously!

So, on Sunday morning, at a reasonable hour (following a meander down to the not-so-bustling, but very pretty, centre of Sfântu Gheorghe for a coffee and a look-see), we set off to find it. We drove across to Brasov, discovering on the way that not only do they have a hockey team, but it’s where one of my favourite netminders from the Panthers has ended up. Guess we’ll have to come back to see him play next season (Oh, the hardship!!). From Brasov, we took an ever so slightly winding road through the mountains to Bran.

That’s Bran, not Bram. Sometimes, it’s like the universe is aiming for a beautiful symmetry but gets it infinitesimally wrong somewhere along the way. Sadly, Bran is not the wind-scoured, desolate, snow-blasted town perched in an inaccessible mountain pass that you would imagine (alright … that I was imagining). In fact, it’s irritatingly touristy. Parking was a challenge. But we prevailed and made our way through the front gates of the legendary castle. To be faced with many, many steps.

The castle itself was much less focused on the legend of Dracula, or even on the history of Vlad Tepes, the Wallachian ruler on whom the legend is said to be based than we were expecting. Given that Vlad Tepes was never resident at Castelul Bran, and Bram Stoker never visited Romania, that’s perhaps not surprising. Yet another example of us knowing absolutely nothing about Romania and going into our visit half cocked. We managed not to say anything stupid out loud, though, which made me feel better. The history of a castle that was, at various points, occupied by the  Teutons, Hungarians, Germans, the Russians, and the Turks, was fascinating. Thankfully, all the signs were in both Romanian and English. I’m not properly comfortable travelling to countries where I have no knowledge of the language … I always feel like I’ve failed. I also wasn’t finding it easy to figure words out. Romanian is a Romance language, and I felt that, using French/Spanish/Italian, it should be possible to work things out and understand the basics, but it didn’t seem to be quite as easy as all that!

One of the bits I very much appreciated was the verse on the external wall, just above the front door, dating from 1622 (see quotation at the top of this post). This is the Chatelaine’s Vow, spoken whenever a new custodian of the Castle was sworn into office. It is written in mediaeval German (I’m assuming that’s because of the Teutons) and is a stubborn declaration of an intent to stay.

In the spring sunshine, with blue skies overhead, I can see why. I’m not sure I’d feel quite the same way in driving rain or thick snow, but the fierce love and pride that every Romanian I’ve spoken to has for their country suggests that they do. That’s yet another reason to come back and visit again. They’re stacking up!!


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Categories : appreciation, castle, connections, holiday, knowledge, languages, learning, literature, memories, moments, observation, positivity, Romania, spring, travel

Incongruity incarnate

15 04 2025

“The yellow glistens.
It glistens with various yellows,
Citrons, oranges and greens
Flowering over the skin.”

– Wallace Stevens, ‘Study of Two Pears‘

The Norfolk countryside is in spring mode; it may still be predominantly beige, but there is a definite haze of green washing across it. This week, the skies are a beautiful, clear blue. Still quite pale, not the deep azure blue of summer, but definitely better than the cold, leaden grey that we got used to over winter. Although the blackthorn blossom is in overdrive, and the hawthorn is getting ready for the next wave, there are still not that many grassland flowers out and about. A few dandelions here and there, the beginning of speedwell banks, but not much else.

But as I walk along the gravel paths around Grimes Graves, there’s an enticing scent carried on the breeze. It smells of sunscreen. Or bodywash. Or maybe shampoo. Weird.

What’s weirder is that the aroma comes from one of the few plants that has been present, with flowers (albeit not as many as now), all winter. This hardy, seemingly indestructible plant is the Common Gorse (Ulex europaeus). Its wiry, evergreen stems create dense, impenetrable thickets which surely provide excellent shelter for many species. I mean, they’re so densely spiky, you can’t imagine even the wind being able to find its way through.

In the past, Gorse has been collected for many purposes; it’s been used to fuel bread ovens as it burns fiercely hot, to feed livestock (although that feels somewhat mean – how did they make it non-spiky?), to make chimney brushes, and (in true seasonal fashion) to dye Easter eggs an ethereally pale yellow.

Gorse is, indeed, so entrenched in history in the UK and Ireland that it was used to represent the letter O (pronounced Onn) in the Early Medieval Ogham alphabet (otherwise known as the Gaelic Tree Alphabet). This is the alphabet in which Irish, Welsh, Pictish, and Latin were written from the fourth to the ninth centuries AD. In it, each letter is named after a tree: for example, b is ‘beithe’ or birch, s is ‘sail’ or willow, and d is ‘dair’ or oak. I’ve heard of Ogham before but had never realised how botanical (arboreal?) it actually was. I suppose it reflected the importance of trees to people at that point in time.

The Celts believed that Gorse offered protection against misfortune and was symbolic of optimism and resilience. Perhaps this was due to the cheeriness of its yellow flowers, even on the greyest day. Or maybe its habit of regenerating very quickly after it has been damaged.

The flowers are apparently edible, although I’ve never tried them and can’t imagine many things more painful than trying to pick them! Those little spines are surprisingly sturdy while still being needle fine and able to inflict the most painful wounds. The smell would definitely tempt you to try, though, redolent as it is of tropical drinks, beaches, and lazy sunshine days. Incongruous in the extreme in a decidedly less than tropical Norfolk.


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Categories : appreciation, botany, connections, flowers, knowledge, languages, learning, moments, nature, Norfolk, observation, positivity, spring, walking

Knowledge is power

26 02 2025

“I‘m up here most o’ the time anyway, because I’m studying to become a gonnagle.” The young Feegle flourished a set of mousepipes. “An’ they willnae let me play doon there on acoount o’ them sayin’ my playin’ sounds like a spider tryin’ to fart through its ears, mistress.”

– Terry Pratchett, ‘Wee Free Men’

Do you ever have that moment when you work out that you know something that you didn’t know you knew?

The thing I know today is that the German for bagpipes is Dudelsack.

I don’t have a single clue how I know this, or where I might have gleaned this knowledge. I mean, why would a fact like this ever be useful? But I do know it, and it’s a wonderful thing. It does, however, give rise to an awful lot more questions:

Do the Germans play bagpipes, or do they just have a word for the Scottish sort?

Do they all play Amazing Grace on them, overlapping, like the pipers along Edinburgh’s Princes Street?

Do German bagpipes sound just as much like a cat being strangled as Scottish ones?

Which came first, bagpipes or Dudelsack?

Is this like convergent evolution, or did one country share with the other?

Was this an act of warfare?

What about the countries in between? Do they have bagpipes?

What are they called?

Excuse me, I’ll be back soon; I have some research to do. Knowledge might be power, but it takes an awful lot of work to maintain!


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Categories : answers, appreciation, connections, knowledge, languages, learning, moments, observation, positivity, questions, words

What did you just say?

19 12 2024

“They call me hell
They call me Stacey
They call me her
They call me Jane

That’s not my name”

– The Ting Tings, ‘That’s Not My Name’

Toponymy: noun: the study of place names

From the Greek topos, meaning place and onuma, meaning name.

Living in Norfolk, I am surrounded by an excess of random letters that have been crammed into place names with joyous abandon … and zero intention of ever actually pronouncing them.

A long, long time ago, in a huge office in a distant Yorkshire town, I started work in Credit Sevices for a national builders merchant. It was a peculiar job; effectively combining customer services with debt collection (which really shouldn’t have worked, but somehow did), and I loved it! I got to spend my days on the phone, gossiping with my branches, chatting to customers, and basically finding out everything that was going on in my patch. For someone who likes to keep her finger on the pulse (it sounds better than being hopelessly nosy!), it was a brilliant job.

Having completed my initial training (I set up a new filing system for the whole country that actually worked … unlike the previous one, which was basically a very large pile of cardboard boxes that was constantly threatening to fall over and crush someone), I was allocated an area that comprised Lincolnshire, Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire. I initially had only four branches, but my company was in the process of acquiring another merchant and taking on board another seven, all of which were destined to be part of my patch. I was talking to one of my mates in the Norwich depot about the new branches and telling him that I was coming down to visit and introduce myself in person. When he asked which branch I was starting with, I happily informed him that Why-mond-ham was first on my list. Cue several minutes of helpless giggles, followed by ill-concealed sniggers as he informed me that the town was pronounced Win-dum. I never lived that one down*.

But seriously, who crams that many letters into a word, spells it Wymondham, and then pronounces it win-dum? It’s a ridiculous state of affairs. When I eventually moved down to Norfolk a few years later, I discovered that it’s not even that unusual. The following list are some of the worst offenders that I’ve found. I’ve probably still missed more than a few. I’m still not happy about the field trip to Happisburgh when I was at uni. Let’s just say there were an awful lot of ‘p’s when I pronounced it; none of which the locals are admitting to.

☆  Costessey (cossey)

☆  Happisburgh (haysbruh)

☆  Mundesley (munslee)

☆  Shipdham (shibdum)

☆  Stiffkey (stookey)

☆  Wretham (retum)

☆  Wymondham (windum)

* Until I managed to get completely lost in Norwich’s one-way system and had to ring the branch, tell them what I could see and ask them to talk me in … from which time they laughed at me for that instead! I was an endless source of amusement for them.

If you ever get on a train to Thetford just after Christmas, you’ll find it filled with young men, carrying very large bags who are reporting for basic training at Wretham army camp. I have been asked on multiple occasions for the best way to get to Wreath-ham … I was never sure which was funniest; the way they were pronouncing the name of this village, or the fact that they truly believed that there was any form of public transport that would get them there. For reference, the only way to get from Thetford to Wretham camp in the evening is by taxi. For further reference, the number of squaddies that will believe you when you tell them this is very, very small.

As a final note, I’d love to tell you that Norfolk is the only player in this game of placenames-which-only-the-locals-can-pronounce – but I would be lying. When I was in Yorkshire, I lived in a place called West Slaithwaite. From this placename, not only could you tell who was new to the area, you could tell (to a reasonable degree of accuracy) how long they’d been there. The first bit is easy; even in Yorkshire, the word ‘west’ is pronounced in the normal way. It’s the second bit that causes some issues … anyone who was not native invariably pronounced it slay-th-wait (with a very strong t on the end). Once they’d been around for a while (read several years), this shifted to slath-wait (with the terminal t enunciated far less). But, to any of the locals, the only possible way to say it was ‘slawit’**. 

This placename makes up part of my email address, and to this day, I spend countless hours of my life spelling it out to people who have the misfortune to ask me for it!! I mean, the whole thing is not helped by the way I spell my name either (Sali, rather than Sally) … in hindsight, this email address was not well chosen for convenience; never mind, we live and learn.

** Just in case you couldn’t hear it, there is an implicit ‘duh’ at the end of this sentence – the locals have never worked out why people cannot say this properly!


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Categories : languages, moments, Norfolk, positivity, stories, words, Yorkshire

The joy of languages

28 09 2024

“Les hiboux sont connus pour être des oiseaux solitaires; mais on ignore qu’ils ont la forêt comme meilleure amie.”

“Owls are known to be solitary birds; but we ignore the fact that they have the forest as their best friend.”

– Mehmet Murat Ildan

I love languages. I mean, I teach English, so you have to assume I love English. And I do, I really do, but I am fascinated by other languages as well; the weird little foibles they have, the strange idioms, and the links between them are a constant source of entertainment. Which is why I really don’t understand it when students come and tell me that they “hate French.” I’m not sure why they tell me, given my propensity to add layers of it whenever I’m teaching vocabulary. (The joy on students’ faces when they understand the word ‘blanched’ in Jane Eyre based solely on their knowledge of the French word for white (fem) is amazing.)

If I’m honest, they get short shrift. And a lecture about why languages are just the most fascinating subject. Occasionally, by the end, they seem to have bought into my explanation. Mostly, they roll their eyes and loudly regret ever mentioning it to me.

Maybe it’s mostly because I like to talk, and I really like to be understood, but I have, at various points in my life, learned French, German, Spanish, and Italian.

Sadly, the Italian is now merely a distant memory, and the only thing I can now remember is how to ask ‘Dov’è il duomo?’ (Where is the cathedral?), although it really wouldn’t help if anyone answered as I would no longer be able to understand them! I can obviously (as everyone should be able to do in every language) order ‘due birra per favore’, but I’m really not sure that counts as knowing a language.

I also tried very hard (and utterly failed) to learn Arabic, but found it impossible to wrap my head round learning a new script at the same time as words, phrases, and grammatical structure. I can manage a civil greeting, but that is pretty much it. My wonderful fact about Arabic is that the word for caterpillar is ‘dood’ or ‘دود‘. I’m not sure when I’m ever going to use this, but it makes me inordinately happy to know it.

My German is rusty, but comes back to me when I need it. I have vivid memories of a student who was struggling with her German GCSE pitching up in my office in tears, asking for help. We (re)learned that content together and had an absolute ball doing it. I still have the habit of asking, “Wirklich?” whenever I’m told something ridiculous … something about the tone of voice gets my point across with no other knowledge. I am also very proud of the word ‘wellensittich’, which is the most sweary non swear I’ve ever had the pleasure to know. Something about the German accent makes it the perfect response when you drop something on your foot. And no one can be mad about you muttering ‘budgerigar’. Enjoy that one!

French is probably my strongest language as it’s the one I’ve used most often over the years. I’ve even, in past years, been asked to teach it at KS3. I visit France on a semi-regular basis, and I can’t even fathom the concept of being in a country where I can’t understand the nuances of what’s going on around me. That doesn’t mean that I’m fluent; I would still grade myself at intermediate level, but I can deal with the basics.

For the last couple of years, I’ve had a new classroom neighbour … the French teacher, Anna. Anyone who has ever worked in a school will tell you it’s good practice to keep an eye on your neighbours and how their days are going; you never know when they might need you to check in, or when you yourself might need a check in! Given that I work in a building that seems to have been primarily constructed using a mixture of papier maché and cardboard, checking in on next door is often as easy as keeping my ears open at key times. When Anna’s having a difficult day, I can hear her writing angrily on her whiteboard (and who knew angry-board-writing was an actual thing?) or hear her classroom door being thrown against the wall as a student exits. She swears blind she can’t hear me, but I’m pretty sure she’s just being nice; I’m just not that quiet!

Anyway, the other joy of having a next-door-neighbour is that we pop into each other’s rooms to catch up in our breaks, lunchtimes, and after school. In our case, that means chatting about random bits of language that one or other of us has been teaching or come across elsewhere. (At the moment, we’re also planning a trip to Gonville and Caius College in Cambridge to show the students undergrad language lectures in action, which is very exciting 🤞 I’m allowed to go on that one.) As she was preparing for Open Evening on Monday, she was trying to find promotional material for the new Duolingo app she’s using with students and walked into my room holding a stuffed green owl that had just arrived. This is the prize for the form group that completes the most Duolingo time in a week. Kids are motivated by the weirdest things! We decided that it needed a name and were trying to figure one out (all suggestions gratefully received). Slightly lacking inspiration, we were trying to remember the French word for owl as a possible starting point. I knew I’d looked it up at some point, but was having a mind blank. A quick conversation with Google later, we discovered a mind-blowing fact: The French language has not one, but two words for owl. The simple ‘chouette’ is used when talking about an owl without ear tufts, and the more unusual ‘hibou’ is for owls with ear tufts.

🦉🦉🦉

How cool is that?

Who knew the French felt the need to be so specific about owls?

🦉🦉🦉


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Categories : birds, connections, education, friends, friendship, knowledge, languages, learning, moments, positivity, school, students, teacher, teachers, teaching, words


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