I had one of those odd moments tonight where I wondered, "Huh, is this really ME? And if so, how on earth did I get here?". The moment happened this evening, around 8:30pm, when I suddenly realized that I was standing outside my house, wearing a tie-dyed dress (admittedly, though, it is nicely tailored to flatter all my curves, instead of the typical "missionary mumu" sort of look), a beaded necklace with matching earrings, bright blue rubber boots (which, by the way, match the bright blue boots and the bright blue trim on my dress), and a headlamp. I was digging in the dirt with some scraps of wood, trying to make a little protective fence around my fledgling baby pumpkin plants, which someone had stomped on earlier in the day.
I really never quite expected to find myself in this sort of situation. And yet, I was completely satisfied and happy with spending a few minutes playing in the dirt, looking like some weird hippy mining granny!
I was probably quite happy because I've had quite a good few days at work. Yesterday, I had a meeting with some folks from our different domains (translation, linguistics and me (literacy) with one of the language teams that we work with. This team has been doing a lot of investigation into how the tones in their language work, and they've realized that they probably don't need to write as many tones as they have been. So this is the beauty of where linguistics and literacy dovetail into each other. And we had a good meeting about what to do and how to go about testing a new sort of writing system! So much fun!
After that meeting, I went to my office, where there was a chap from a different language community wanting to see what resources are available in his language. There were a few people, several years ago, who came up with a writing system for his language, and they prepared a few bits and pieces, like an ABC Chart and a little brochure that talks about the alphabet in his language. So I happily mined through some old computer files and was able to print off a copy of these things for him. And he was as happy as a clam!
And then today, I had a meeting with a new guy on one of the teams who is going to be our "homeland literacy worker". So I got to orient him to some books and teachers guides and training materials. Such fun!
And now, since I know you're not all as excited about this sort of thing as I seem to be tonight, I will let you get back to your regularly scheduled programming...
I really never quite expected to find myself in this sort of situation. And yet, I was completely satisfied and happy with spending a few minutes playing in the dirt, looking like some weird hippy mining granny!
I was probably quite happy because I've had quite a good few days at work. Yesterday, I had a meeting with some folks from our different domains (translation, linguistics and me (literacy) with one of the language teams that we work with. This team has been doing a lot of investigation into how the tones in their language work, and they've realized that they probably don't need to write as many tones as they have been. So this is the beauty of where linguistics and literacy dovetail into each other. And we had a good meeting about what to do and how to go about testing a new sort of writing system! So much fun!
After that meeting, I went to my office, where there was a chap from a different language community wanting to see what resources are available in his language. There were a few people, several years ago, who came up with a writing system for his language, and they prepared a few bits and pieces, like an ABC Chart and a little brochure that talks about the alphabet in his language. So I happily mined through some old computer files and was able to print off a copy of these things for him. And he was as happy as a clam!
And then today, I had a meeting with a new guy on one of the teams who is going to be our "homeland literacy worker". So I got to orient him to some books and teachers guides and training materials. Such fun!
And now, since I know you're not all as excited about this sort of thing as I seem to be tonight, I will let you get back to your regularly scheduled programming...
2 comments:
Great blog post, Tanya. I love it. Hey, I saw on Ronny's facebook your post about "God Grew Tired of Us". Our library has this, and we watched it a few months ago. It was very interesting. (I loved the guy's mom at the airport when she came to visit in the US. Beautiful.)
I know, when I watched the movie the first time, I cried when I saw that part with the mom! Amazing stories of reunited families abound :)
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