User talk:Rydel/Archive1

Welcome

Welcome!

The right place to discuss the Ruthenia article is Talk:Ruthenia. Similarly for any other article. This has been a rather controversial subject area, which is why I am very suspicious of any removal of information without due explanation (since it's relatively hard to notice an absence). I'm not at all a subject-matter expert on this one: my concerns are from a pure process point of view.

For what it's worth, my feeling is that the coverage of this area is a bit long on assertion and short on citation. -- Jmabel 22:18, Jul 5, 2004 (UTC)

Thanks! For several days I was busy with some other things, but finally I had time to sort out my thoughts on this issue and I wrote it in Talk:Ruthenia. I think there is absolutely nothing to argue about. I don't see an issue there. It's a fact that Belarusan people were never together with the Russians. If they ever were under the risk of being Russified, it's right now, in 2004. Not back then. Nobody "separated" anybody. rydel 17:21, 9 Jul 2004 (UTC)

"Wit-Russisch"

Hello Rydel, did you just make an edit on the nl:Wit-Russisch page. The anonymous IP makes a reference to your site. If it was you than I want to ask you to put your comments on a talk page so somebody can have a look at it. For now I reverted it as is policy on the NL wikipedia with regards to strange edits from anonymous IP addresses. Waerth 01:03, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Hello Waerth, yes I made that edit on the nl:Wit-Russisch page. It was an anonymous IP because I am not registered on the Dutch Wiki (nor planning to do that). You are right. This probably goes against Wikipedia's netiquette, and I understand why you reverted it.

As for the issue itself I am just very-very curious: is there a single Dutch person on this planet that knows at least something about Belarusan language?

And one more question: do you think you guys will ever stop calling our country "White-damn-Russia" and our language "White-damn-Russian"? I really think you should read this: http://www.pravapis.org/art_weissrussland.asp

Not that I really care about 10 million Dutch speakers who by virtue of using this "White ---- Russia" just bluntly offend another culture of 10 million people, but maybe for you personally it would be educational to learn something about that country and that language. -- rydel 12:20, 18 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Closest we have is a Russian speaker, but than again ... . Dutch has over 20 million speakers btw (also count flemish). And their will be Dutch persons whom know something about the Belarusan language. They just haven't found their way to us yet. You can help us though. At the talk page please make a like 5 - 10 sentences English draft which I will translate/incorporate into the original article. That way at least we will have a short but good entry.

As for White Russian ... well take it up with the official grammar committee of the Dutch language. They have decided that that is the official name in Dutch for your country. And we follow the official guidelines. We have similar issues with some Polish/German names. we just follow the official guidelines for our language. If they decide to change that we'll change with it. Remember Wikipedia is not a place for original research. We follow the trends and do not make them.

As for me not reacting sooner ... I had forgotten to put ypur page on my watchlist, which in all languages I edit in combined constitutes over 2.000 pages. So sorry for that Waerth 04:28, 26 Sep 2004 (UTC)

"Closest we have is a Russian speaker, but then again..." - You see how the word influences your way of thinking? I'll tell you. Closest to Belarusan (by far) is Ukrainian. There is an amazing similarity in grammar and vocabulary, just phonetics are quite different. Then the next closest language in terms of lexicon is Polish. And only after them is probably Russian, but you in Dutch have the word that already gives you a lot of "knowledge" about our language. ;)

"make a like 5 - 10 sentences English draft which I will translate/incorporate into the original article" - That sounds like a good solution for the time being.

"We follow the trends and..." I understand that. And don't think you are alone, this a common issue with all Germanic languages except English, where they were very receptive and now everyone in English says and writes Belarus and Belarusian (with [s] not [sh]) or Belarusan. So there is the same issue not only in Dutch, but in German, Norwegian, Danish and Swedish.

Fortunately, Germans are using "Weissrussland" less and less, and are slowly switching to "Belarus". I see a good trend there. There is a letter that my friends wrote that he sends sometimes to German-speaking people and mass-media, I think it will be interesting for you as well, so that you have better understanding of the matter: http://www.pravapis.org/art_weissrussland.asp

"In all languages I edit in combined constitutes over 2.000 pages". That's truly impressive. Wow! -- rydel 12:51, 26 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Hey, I just saw your user info page. Rowing is done in a row boat. Kayaking is done in a kayak. Canoeing is done in a canoe. They are for different kinds of use, in different places, used differently. Search google image for "kayak", "row boat" and "canoe" seperately and you will see the different kinds of crafts those are.--172.175.225.101 05:58, 21 Sep 2004 (UTC)

2Halibutt

Oh, yes, you did get my point. And I don't want to discuss it anymore. Leave it as it is. An examplary case - how Polish nationalists claim things that don't belong to them and then claim the ownership of Jews that have no association with Poland or Polish culture whatsoever. Sick. -- rydel 11:18, 27 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Rydel, please, explain to me why do you find my ideas sick or nationalist in any way? There is a List of Jews by country, what would be wrong with creating a List of Belarusian Jews? Why do you thing it would be better to rename the list of Polish Jews to list of Polish and Belarusan Jews? It's not an example of Polish nationalism or any nationalism whatsoever, or at least I couldn't find any traces of nationalism in it. For me it is just a matter of common sense, especially that I think that two lists are always better than one.

I fully agree that some of these people were born in what is now Belarus. Some of them were born in what is now Ukraine. If someone was born in Lemberg as a Polish Jew, it is perfectly ok to place him on the:

List of Polish Jews as someone who spoke Polish
List of Austro-Hungarian Jews as someone who was born in Austria-Hungary
List of Ukrainian Jews as someone who was born in what later became Ukraine.

Do you really find my arguments sick? [[User:Halibutt|Halibu tt]] 06:52, Sep 28, 2004 (UTC)

Here is one example, one guy I know something about -- Shimon Peres. As a journalist I covered his visit to Belarus in January 1998 when he came to visit his native land. And I've been to his native Vishnia (not Vishniev, or something!) twice. It's a nice little Belarusan village. There is not a single Pole there. People there are Catholics and they speak Belarusian and trasianka. And before the WWII there were also about 200 Jewish families in the village. And Shimon Peres said himself that in the family they spoke three languages: Hebrew, Yiddish and Russian. He did not speak any Polish, nor had any association with Polish culture. The only thing is that at the time of his birth Western Belarus was under Polish rule. That's all. Now can you explain to me why on all those hundreds pages including your "Polish Jews" page he is called a Polish Jew? I simply don't understand. -- rydel 11:33, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Don't ask me! It's neither mine page nor I placed his name anywhere. Just look at my list of contributions to the List of Polish Jews, I never added Peres there. As a student journalist I took part in his visit to Poland back in 1998 when he said he was sorry for not learning Polish and that he couldn't speak with us in our own language. He also said that he emigrated to early to remember much from Poland. If you feel/know/think that some names simply do not belong to the list- just erase them or copy and paste them to some other list. Renaming the list, as you proposed, to List of Polish and Belarusan Jews doesn't make much sense to me. Just copy the names to where they belong. Otherwise we'd have to rename the article to List of Polish, Belarusan, Cassubian, Masovian, Pomeranian, Silesian, Ukrainian and Austro-Hungarian Jews. Such a term would be much more precise, but I doubt anyone would like it.

And please, do not ever accuse me of nationalism, it's extremely offensive to me and especially so when you have no proof of my misbehaviour. WikiLove, my friend. BTW, you might find it interesting that I'm also partially a Belarusan myself (my grandma is from Kobryn and her maiden name was Kobryn too). [[User:Halibutt|Halibu tt]] 23:53, Sep 28, 2004 (UTC)

Belarussian language

I have corrected the spelling on the source page, as you requested. Changed to the source page sometimes take 24 hours or so to show up on the target page, so you might not notice the change immediately, but it has been made. David Cannon 11:42, 29 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Thingz'n'stuff

Aloha!

30.08.2004. As I was working on articles about Ekaterina Karsten and Uladzimir Parfianovich I realized that I don't really understand the difference between the terms rowing/canoeing/kayaking. They all seem to be synonymous, but I have to find out what are the differences. (If anyone knows, please, comment here).

Rowing is when you sit in the middle, hold 2 oars in your hands and face backwards.
Kayaking is when you have an oar with 2 slightly rotated ends and you row one in the left, then on the right (a bit rotating it), then left again, etc. Face forward.
Canoeing is when you have an oar with one end which you usually use only on one side (like rafting), and you either sit on the side or lean to one. Face forward here, too.

(I may mix up the last two, check Wikipedia :))

Apart from that you made an edit on hu: wikipedia which was reverted. I do not know why do you believe it would have been useful to translate a hungarian text to english in hungarian wikipedia, but we simply changed it back. Hungarian wikipedia uses Hungarian language, so please respect that and don't translate it to anything else. :-) [Belorussia is called "Fehéroroszország" in Hungarian, which means, by mere chance, "white-russia" :)]

Be correct: Fehéroroszország comes from Ruthenia Alba and have been in use (mainly in latin form Ruthenia Alba) from 13-14 century, from the times of Jaggeloian kings in Hungary.

Thanks! --grin ✎ 18:07, 2004 Oct 6 (UTC)

Thank you for your comment, Grin.

I already learned the differences between those terms - http://www.livejournal.com/community/linguaphiles/988448.html - But thanks anyway. Koszonom szepen.

> Belorussia is called "Fehéroroszország" in Hungarian, which means, by mere chance, "white-russia" :)

FYI, dear Grin, the name of our country in English is Belarus, not "Belorussia". And, furthermore, it does not mean White Russia.

Second, dear Grin, I lived in Budapest for one year, and I know Hungarian a little bit, and I can tell you, all Hungarian people that I know never used the word Fehéroroszország. They used Belarusz. Furthermore, I still have official residence permit from Hungary and job permit from Hungary, and on both of these official you can see the name of my country typed in big letters - it's Belarusz. There is not a single mention of this ridiculous and misleading term Fehéroroszország there. Do you want me to scan it for you?

So. I urge you, Hungarian Wikipedians, to use "Belarusz" in the Hungarian version or explain to me why you will not use it.

PS. You are also welcome to read this: http://www.pravapis.org/art_weissrussland.asp

--rydel 21:00, 6 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Ты думаеш плахо. Unfortunately you knock the wrong door. The official form is "Fehéroroszország", check maps, globes, dictionaries. I accept that you are well informed about Hungarian language but I happen to use it for more than 3 decades now and I can assure you that that is the word you meant to use.

Now, I accept that it is inconvenient for you to have a misleading name for your country, but it's not Wikipedia who make the spellbooks and maps and decide the official spelling. We in Hungarian Wikipedia have the (sometimes unfortunate) policy of following the official spelling and usage, so we cannot generally change that. You have to convince your government to convince our academics to change the word (which is, I believe, pretty unlikely to happen). We won't use an incorrect word for political reasons.

Until then we can include your reasoning in the article called "Fehéroroszország" if you insists (and I believe I would insist, since it seems to be important for you). That's the most we can do. We don't and won't change the article titles and references until the official spelling changes. Please refrain from changing it again, it is going to be reverted and you may make it harder to communicate.

About your official permits: government offices are not famous of their knowledge which includes spelling. They misspell my name twice a year. They usually massively misspell template documents they use in 10000+ cases. If you're interested in what they ought to write, check the dictionaries. (I checked The Official spelling book, which says: "belorusz" (the language), and "Belorusszia: see Fehéroroszország". [Magyar Helyesírási Szótár {hungarian spelling dictionary}, 2003], and the largest map provider in Hungary: Cartographia, Inc. And I tel you that this question was already arise in hu:wikipedia and we have voted and it is rude to ignore that and start changing things. I'll translate briefly what you've said, but it's just an additional comment.) --grin ✎ 01:03, 2004 Oct 7 (UTC)

Additional info: Hungarian wikipedians try to figure out what could be done. We're a helpful bunch after all. It is still hazy who should decide the correct form, because, for example, the Belarus Embassy mostly uses a form nobody else does... We'll try to look around a bit and help you proud people to clear the russians from your name :) . --grin ✎ 10:29, 2004 Oct 7 (UTC)

Btw I noticed Newsweek uses Belarus when referring to your country. Yeah! :-) Good luck. --grin ✎ 11:34, 2004 Dec 10 (UTC)

You have Newsweek in Hungarian? --rydel 21:55, 10 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Be correct: Fehéroroszország comes from Ruthenia Alba and have been in use (mainly in latin form Ruthenia Alba) from 13-14 century, from the times of Jagiellon kings in Hungary. This is a very old, historical name for this territory! 82.141.138.34 10:11, 7 March 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Alemannic/Schwyzerdütsch/Alsatian

Hi!

You’ve left a request on the Alemannic Wikipedia regarding status and syntax of the Alemannic language. In deed it is disputed whether Alemannic should be treated as a dialect rather than a distinct language. However, it comprises various characteristics of a standard language:

Alemannic did not participate in the second German vowel shift (like dutch, unlike yiddish)
Thus it is not functionally intelligible to speakers of Standard German.
It is the spoken everyday language of all social levels. Using dialect conveys no social or educational inferiority.
Alemannic is a written language (in newspapers, e.g., inside headings or quotations, in advertisments, childrens’ books, mainly for private correspondence/SMS/eMail)

I may draw your attention to the corresponding articles on Wikipedia. It is known as Schwyzerdütsch in Switzerland, Elsässerditsch in France and Alemannisch in Germany and Austria.

The Alemannic dialects vary a lot in their syntax. One of the best known phenomens is the “verb doubling”:

German: Ich gehe einkaufen. (I go shopping.)

Schwyzerdütsch:	I	gang	go	poschte
	I	go[1.p]	go[inf]	shopping[inf]

German: Gut, dass Sie da sind! (Good, that you there are!)
Schwyzerdütsch: Guet sind Si då! (Good are you there!)

German: Wen hast du angerufen? (Who[akk.] have you called?)
Schwyzerdütsch: I wämm häsch aaglüte? (At who[dat.] have[2.p] called?)

Weblinks

—Transalpin

Actually, the second sample of Transalpin isn't a difference between Alemannic and modern standard German, it's just two different ways to express the same:

German: Gut, dass er da ist. Gut, ist er da.

Alemannic: Guet, das er da isch. Guet, isch er da.

In the third sample, the difference is in the dative. The particle before the question word depends on what alemannic dialect you're referring to. I suspect it's a similar phenomenon as in words like so (thus, so) or kei (German kein: adjectival no) that may have a schwa before: eso, ekei.

The lack of the personal pronoun in the third sample has a phonological explanation: /hESt du/ --> /hESt d@/ --> /hESt d/ = /hESt/. The final /t/ in of the second person singular was lost, so that the resulting form is /hES/.

An interesting feature may be the so-called "nomaccusative": All accusative articles are the same as the nominative articles:

Alemannic: I gseh der Ma. - German: Ich sehe den Mann. (I see the man.)

There are many differences in vocabulary.

grüess, J. 'mach' wust 07:23, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)

1) *“Gut ist er da.” is ungrammatical in Standard German, even if a lot of Swiss are not aware of that! (One reason for the Germans’ mocking of Swiss who are trying to speak Standard German)

2) The difference I wanted to bring out in the third example is not the dative, the crucial point is the prepositional dative marker:

German: Wem will er diese schönen Blumen bringen? (Who[dat.] wants he this beautiful flowers bring?)
Schwyzerdütsch: I wämm wotter echt die schöne Blueme bringe? (To who[dat.] wants he this beautiful Flowers bring?)

The prep. “i” is just a variant. One may answer: “A de Mueter” or “I de Mueter” (To the[dat.] Mother). Standard German: “Der Mutter.”

3) The reason why we say “eso” instead of “so” is: The Middle High German word was “alsó”! In other Germanic dialects (eg, Bavarian-Austrian) you say “aso”. I’m not quite sure about that in Yiddish.

The only point I agree with in J. 'mach' wust’s post is the nomaccusative.

—Transalpin

(1) Gut, ist er da may be unusual in standard German, but it's definitly not ungrammatical. The elliptic sentence "(es ist) gut" demands for a subordinated clause as predicativum (Gleichsetzungsnominativ). The subordinated sentence can e.g. be of the type "conjunction 'dass', indicative verb last" (e.g. dass er da ist) or of the type "no conjunction, indicative verb first" (e.g. ist er da).

(2) That prepositional dative marker must be a peculiarity of Transalpin's dialect. I still suspect that it isn't used but very initially (after pause), since I can't imagine that people'd say i ha i/a der Mueter aaglütte (I have called the mother) or i ha i/a iren aaglütte (I have called her). If we'd assume it were really prepositions, then I wonder how you could explain that two different prepositions could be used indifferently.

(3)Plausible hypothesis, though I think this is difficult to prove. Additionally, there's also "also" in the alemannic dialects.

grüess, J. 'mach' wust 11:50, 13 Oct 2004 (UTC)

1) This is ludicrous! If you don’t want to embarrass yourself in Germany or Austria please don’t use “Schön, ist er da”! This may be a peculiarity of the Swiss standard, but it is likely to raise a laugh among native speakers (if not confusion). You can ask any (non Alemannic) German speaker on the German Wikipedia.

2) I’m referring to Guido Seiler’s excellent research work on prepositional dative markers (as he named them). Given that not every Swiss speaks your local Bernese dialect, you will be surprised to discover many more variations you’ve never consciously noticed before.

3) “esó”/“asó” is primarily used for the English equivalent “like this”/“that way” (German: “so”, Yiddish: אַזוי – azoy). The Alemannic German word “a(l)so” has the same orgin, but is used for “as”/“thus”/“so”. It’s neither a hypothesis nor difficult to prove, just look it up in any German etymological or Middle High German dictionary!

Bregs, Transalpin 18:31, 13 Oct 2004 (UTC)

(1) This doesn't make it ungrammatical. You're affirming that it may occur in (Swiss) standard German, so it's not a peculiarity of the dialect.

(2) He doesn't only affirm that only certain Alemannic dialects use it, but also that it's used in other dialects as well, that is, in certain dialects of Bavarian. So it's not a feature of Alemannic at all. He also affirms that even in the dialects which can have it, most datives don't have it. And I don't like his habit of calling it 'prepositional', since appearently this isn't based but on hypothesis.

(3) Unfortunately, there are no etymological dictionaries for Alemannic.

grüess, J. 'mach' wust 08:08, 14 Oct 2004 (UTC)

schön sprichst du deutsch

Bashing others on my userpages

...is a very very very stupid thing to do. Stop it. It does not help your case. It does the opposite. --grin ✎ 17:31, 2004 Nov 19 (UTC)

Sorry for trashing your talkpage. As for this little conflict with a Dutch Wikipedia member, I don't think we should call it "bashing." I was not really attacking him, if you don't count a bit of teasing with this "White German" thingy. As for the "case", I don't have one. He is absolutely right - if they use "Wit-rusland" there is nothing anyone can do about it. It will remain "Wit-rusland". I merely informed them about the situation. The fact that one of them got a bit upset maybe says something about his character or about my presentation skills. ;) --rydel 17:45, 19 Nov 2004 (UTC)

"White German" (moved from another user's talk page)

Hello I was looking at user:Rydell's talkpage and saw that he is trying to do the same in the Hungarian wikipedia as he is trying to do in the Dutch. Change his country's name. Waerth 09:44, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I suspect so. His reasons are good, and we voted about it, and got an ambiguous result... yet to be decided. --grin ✎ 21:30, 2004 Nov 17 (UTC)

Relax, my dear "White German" Wearth. ;) I am not hiding my actions. I am not hiding my reasoning. I am not hiding my sources. I am not hiding my opinions. I am totally open. Maybe you should just stop jumping around Wikipedia "reporting" on me (whatever it is that you are reporting on). And hear me. In German language I have nothing to do with the tendency. Indeed, Germans in the last 10 years use "Weissrussland" less and less, and they use "Belarus" much more often these days (Just check Google). That's a trend which I have nothing to do with. And even if I wanted, I couldn't do anything. One person, a foreigner, can not change the way one hundred million people speak. It is simply not possible. Take it easy, White German friend. ;) --rydel 18:13, 18 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Please stop calling me white german it is an insult and thus against wikipedia policy to do so. Yes I checked it, I read the German talkpage and it seems that all media are using weissrussland. Anyway, I am not interested in what the Germans say. What I am saying and trying to get through your belorussian head is that we speak a language .... Dutch .... the name of which has been "mistranslated" for over 200 years so have been many of our citynames and even the name of our country. You do not hear us complaining about that. There is no history of the usage of the word Belorussia in our language as we have always referred to it as Wit-Rusland. If the tendency in my language changes than lucky for you. But as long as 99% of the Dutch (again the dreaded word) people say wit-rusland and all the publications say so I think you should rest your case at least in the Dutch wikipedia. As you can see your case has 0% support in the reactions sofar. Waerth 05:58, 19 Nov 2004 (UTC)

::Please stop calling me white german it is an insult

Oh, Really? So sorry, man! Did Germans kill millions of White Germans too? Anyway, at least you got the parallel finally. You know, knowledge and wisdom never make one happy. It's always a burden. And the more you learn about the world outside the sadder you'll be, my White German friend.

:: I read the German talkpage and it seems that all media are using weissrussland

Beg to disagree. Here are today's Google results:

Weissrussland site:.de — 131,000
Belarus — 348,000

Although that includes certain number of English pages in ".de" domain, but still, "Belarus" outnumbers "Weissrussland" by a factor of 3. And I remember the first time I checked (I think sometime back in 1999-2000, I should have it on backup discs somewhere), the word "Weissrussland" was used 10 times more than "Belarus". So it means in the last four-five years the proportion Belarus/Weissrussland on German sites changed 30 (thirty!) times in advantage for "Belarus". If you deny there is a strong trend there, then I'm sorry, it just tells something about your mental capacity. (And, again, I have nothing to do with it. I wrote the article http://www.pravapis.org/art_weissrussland.asp like 5-6 months ago, and maybe a couple hundred people read it, that's all).

::I think you should rest your case at least in the Dutch wikipedia

I just informed Dutch Wikipedia about the situation. Now you know. My task is accomplished. What you will do afterwards, is totally up to you, of course. Sure. If a user came in to http://be.wikipedia.org/ from http://nl.wikipedia.org/ and informed us about some linguistic/translation issue, of course people would be interested to know, but he would have no chance and no voice in terms of any decision making or changes in the language. But, yes, his information would be taken into account, my dear White German friend.

:::Dutch (again the dreaded word)

It's not such a good parallel. Now if Americans and Brits and all other English speaking people on this planet called you "Dutch" and Germans "White/Blue/Yellow/Purple Dutch" or vice versa, then it'd be a very nice parallel indeed. Otherwise, it's only obvious for people who are interested in language studies and now "Dutch"-"Deutsch" etymology, while "Wit-f...ing-Rusland" is right there for anyone to see and to be misled.

--rydel 11:57, 19 Nov 2004 (UTC)

According to your logic Dutch people should be called Netherlanders (becaus the word Dutch comes from the word "dütsch" or "diutsch", wich actually meant German in medieval times) and the Germans/Germany should be called the Deutsh/Deutshland in English. Also the French would have to stop calling us Allemand (although being an Alemanne myself I do like that) and start calling us le Doïtch, or something? Many names for many countries are wrong and antiquated. Actually China is an insult to most Chinese nowadays, we should change that countryname in the European languages, too. Then we also would have to fix Japan to be called Nippon as this is the official Japanese name for it. "Korea" is actually totally wrong, too. And what about France? You surely can't call that country after a Germanic tribe, the Franks, can you? Then the "Indians" in America... you know this is endless Kilian

The examples that you provide are very good, yet each of them has a totally different history, and you have to talk about each case separately, not bunch together Holland, China, Germany, Belarus, Japan, France, and Korea. I assure you I am well aware of those issues with country names. And I had this discussion 100 times, and I'm not going to argue about it one more time. I presented my (our) case clearly enough. This "White Russia" thingy is STUPID, ILLOGICAL, WRONG and also offensive to some people. Period. You want to hear the details? I talked about it hundred times in other locations. You are welcome to read it, dear Kilian Kilian:

Kind regards. --rydel 12:25, 15 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Rowing and paddling

Hey Rydel. Just a note to fill in the blanks.

Rowing is how you propel a row-boat, galley, or other craft with oars, which typically pivot on oarlocks.

Paddling is how you propel a craft with a paddle, held in the hands. This includes canoes and kayaks.

Sculling, by the way, is propelling a boat with a single oar which points to the rear. The oar applies force back and forth, like a fish's tail.

Canoeing and kayaking means travelling in the respective type of craft; you propel either by paddling. You can also say "to paddle a canoe" or kayak. A canoe paddle has one end, and a kayak paddle two. A canoe can be manned by one, two, or many if it is a long "war canoe". A kayak is usually made for one, or sometimes two.

—Michael Z.

PS: Thanks for cleaning up the little package someone left on my user page. —MZ

NRM redirect page

Hi, Rydel. On the Talk:New religious movement page I have placed instructions for you on how to create the NRM redirect page you asked about. Let me know if you have any problems. Cheers! --Gary D 19:20, Dec 7, 2004 (UTC)

Wikispam?

(1) What's your REAL objective? (2) Why does your announcement is spreading like spam on our talk pages? --rydel 01:19, 11 Dec 2004 (UTC)

(1) There is a lot of discussion about this on this page which you can read. My REAL objective is twofold, but both entail multi-licensing everyone's contributions into the CC-by-sa licenses. I am primarily focused on the state/city/county articles and secondarily focused on the remaining articles. I've found that most users prefer to multi-license all of their articles rather than a subset. My real objective is ideologically based and it is shared by lots of other users. Essentially I believe that while the GFDL is free and open, it is only free and open to other GFDL projects. It is not free and open to Creative Commons Licensed projects, which use a free and open license. And so I believe that my contributions should be able to be shared with those free and open projects even if that means that they won't be shared back. But I don't want everyone to use public domain because then it could become non-free. Fortunately that should never be a problem because a majority of users will not use the public domain. I am trying to find others who either share my ideology or just plain don't care about retaining their rights. Honestly, I'm trying to be as open as possible, that's why I created the FAQ.

(2) Because I used a bot to help speed the process up. I did about 400 comments manually and about 1,000 using the bot. The manual edits were over the last couple of weeks. The 1,000 were in one day. After complaints though, I've been taking in advice on how to do things differently for everyone else. A smaller less obtrusive message seems to be winning the day.

Lastly, I hope that the message did not cause you to ignore my message. In any case, hope I've answered your questions. – Ram-Man ^{(comment) (talk)}[[]] 01:55, Dec 14, 2004 (UTC)

Old Ruthenian

Hi there, long time no see :) I saw you took part in the Talk:Old Ruthenian language discussion. Could you also add your vote to the Wikipedia:Requested_moves#December_22? That would really help. By the way, by taking part in the discussion you can chose to be a Polish pan or Ukrainian nationalist. Isn't it great? :D Halibu tt 01:40, Dec 24, 2004 (UTC)

A Panslavic Pan, sorry for Pun. ;) Unfortunately I don't have much free time to write in English Wikipedia, but I've written several dozens of articles on http://be.wikipedia.org/ --rydel 15:37, 24 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Pan as tough as every Slav :) It's good to know that someone is working on the be. wiki. Last time I checked it looked a tad deserted. Hopefully it will spring off now. Halibu tt 03:01, Dec 25, 2004 (UTC)

why rename?

The proposal is not mine. It was an original name, and there were at least two atempts to restore it. So I decided to make this public. The logic is simple. In English, adjectives ro Rus and Russia are both "Russian". This is unfortunate, but not ther reason to be afraid. The word "Ruthenia" in English means something different now; look at any of dictionaries; so "Old Ruthenian language" is unrecognizable for the world. The plague of wikipedia is that it is mostly written by people of limited expertise, but big ego. I quickly understood this about myself, and now write articles and make edits only on 100% factual material. In our case I didn't hear the voice of expertise so far. Mikkalai 16:17, 24 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Join RWNB!

Hello, Rydel! Sorry about the "Belorussian language" thing at the Requested moves forum. Didn't mean to hurt anybody's feelings. I thought you might be interested in the Russian wikipedians' notice board. Come check it out! We could use more help! KNewman 02:48, Dec 24, 2004 (UTC)

I'll keep an eye on it. ;)

ruthienie blanche

Please provide the soure of the map. Image:BNR ruthienie blanche.jpg. Sole claim of PD is insufficient; it must be reasonably proved. Mikkalai 02:54, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

The map is from the wall of my colleague's office. It's a copy of the original map (1918) that was made in 1960's by the Radio I think (have to check that). He scanned it several years ago. And since then it's been all over internet. And the colleague, btw, is mr. Shupa himself, the author of Архівы БНР. I wish he had time to join Wikipedia and re-write the stupid currrent entry about BNR. --rydel 13:49, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Please list the drawbacks of the article in its talk page. I started it as a stub, because there was no mention about it at all. I have a limited knowledge about it. I wrote everything either out of my head or from the BNR Rada website, which is unfortunately very scarce about its own history. I didn't use any Russian language sources, for natural reasons. And by the way, there seems to be a problem with the name. Mikkalai 18:29, 4 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Białoruś

I'm curious why you reverted my change on the Belarus page wherein I added the bolded material "This literal translation is also used in a number of other languages, e.g., Germanic languages ("Weißrussland" in German, "Wit-Rusland" in Dutch), "Λευκορωσία" in Greek, "Baltkrievija" in Latvian, "Białoruś" in Polish and "Baltarusija" in Lithuanian."

Am I wrong?Milicz 22:46, 14 Jan 2005 (UTC)

You are not wrong, Milicz. You are right, and Polish version is great and correct. It's the other versions that are wrong. :)

In other words, "Białoruś" is a very correct and good translation, because in Polish language just like in Belarusian and Ukrainian (and some other languages) there is a distinction between Rus' (Ruś, Ruthenia) and modern Russia (Rosja).

Unfortunately, in many other languages, especially Germanic languages (luckily, with the exception of English), there is no such distinction. So the examples given in that first paragraph serve the purpose to show the "bad" examples, on how this incorrect rendering "White Russia" propagated into other languages.

I hope I explained that clearly enough. Do you think that it's not explained very well in the article (Belarus and also in White Russia) and needs a rewrite?

--rydel 00:17, 15 Jan 2005 (UTC)

That clears it up for me, I guess it wasn't very clear to me when I read it through, because the word literal is used, and it seems to indicate to my brain "correct". Maybe incorporate the two sentences to make it read:

Historically, in English, Belarus was sometimes referred to as "White Russia" or "White Ruthenia"; this literal though not entirely correct translation of its name (see White Russia), is currently used in a number of other languages, e.g., Thanks for clearing this up for me and keep up the good work! Milicz 03:07, 15 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Music of Belarus

Why did you revert my change at music of Belarus? Tuf-Kat 21:58, Jan 15, 2005 (UTC)

Because it showed that you don't know much (if anything at all) neither about Belarusan music, nor about demographics and migration patterns of Belarusians. In other words, wrong information. --rydel 22:37, 15 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Please be more specific. Do you dispute that Belarus' recent history is closely intertwined with the Soviet Union or Russia? Or that many Belarusians live in Russia to the present? Do you feel that this is irrelevant? Shall I keep guessing? Or would you like to explain what you don't like about it? Perhaps even use the talk page? Tuf-Kat 23:54, Jan 15, 2005 (UTC)

The statement about "history" belongs to the Belarus history page, if anywhere. Besides, it sounds like an excerpt from some Russian imperial propaganda booklet, and has no relevance on the page Music of Belarus. Have you heard any Belarusan music? Our musical tradition is very different from Russian, and has very little similarity with the Russian one (ever since the times of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania till modern times). But there is another, though totally different problem. The problem is that current regime in Belarus is kind of pro-Russian, and some of our rock-music is banned or or has no chances for promotion at all. And another even bigger problem is that most of Belarus citizens are exposed to huuuuge amounts of Russian music, rock, pop and what have you. But that's a social-society issue, not a question of music of Belarus and its history. What is interesting though is that even our pro-Russian authocratic ruler Lukashenka ordered that all FM stations put at least 50% of Belarusan music two years ago, and now he ordered to make the rule even tougher - since January 1, 2005 all FM stations are required by law put at least 75% Belarusan music every day.
No. There are relatively few Belarusans living in Russia. And again, that's not relevant at all. How is it relevant to the history of music?
May I dare asking what have you listened? And may I dare asking what have you read about the music of Belarus and its history? --rydel 01:41, 16 Jan 2005 (UTC)

See talk:Music of Belarus Tuf-Kat 02:54, Jan 16, 2005 (UTC)

Kalink(o/a)vichi

Hi there! Could you help us with the articles on Kalinkovichi and Kalinkavichy? We're not sure if it's the same place or not... Halibu tt 16:56, Jan 19, 2005 (UTC)

Yes, it's the same place, the articles should be merged. The Russian spelling is Калинковичи (Kalinkovichi), and Belarusan spelling is Калінкавічы (Kalinkavichy). As for the population, their "semi-official" website http://kalinkovichi.by.ru/ says that Kalinkavichy distict has 71,500 people, of them 31,300 are rural population, and 40,200 are urban population. --rydel 17:32, 19 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Personal attacks

Please note that calling other users Nazis is a personal attack, which is not allowed under Wikipedia policy. Snowspinner 22:48, Jan 27, 2005 (UTC)

POV pushing

Stop pushing POV on the nl.wikipedia, or we will put a vote in for banning you. Waerth 18:48, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

What are refering to? --rydel 19:25, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

You know what I am talking about. Your disruptive actions on NL: Wikipedia. I am glad you decided to stop. It is not our wikipedia btw. It is everybody's. We just like to use our language our way without being prescribed by an Alexander Loekasjenko clone how to use it. Waerth 20:14, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Thank you for showing your true colours on nl.wikipedia .... it would have actually been better for us to meet as you would have never said this in real life. I hope we do meet! So we can talk it over and laugh about. Waerth 21:29, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Banned on nl

You have been banned for now on Dutch wikipedia, not by me, but by another moderator. Waerth 21:44, 27 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Polska wikipedia

Ad. Stanisław Szuszkiewicz

Dzięki za Twoje korekty w notce o prezydencie Szuszkiewiczu. Słowo <<kierownik>> pozwoliłem sobie zastąpić stwierdzeniem <<przewodniczącym Rady Najwyższej BSRR>>. Spelling po białorusku rzeczywiście mi się nie udał, korekty zostały zaakceptowane.

Zapraszam do tworzenia artykułów w polskiej wikipedii na tematy białoruskie, brakuje wyczerpujących haseł, szczególnie jeśli chodzi o postaci z historii Białorusi (Franciszek Skoryna, Roman Skirmunt, Jan Sereda), ale również współczesnych polityków.

Pozdrawiam

pl:Tomas 01:03, 30 sty 2005 (CET)

In reaction to your blog

Now that you understand that you might be reacting over the top. You might consider offering some apologies on the "White-German" wikipedia .... . Everybody is waiting for it .... not in the least me.

What you said was very bad. Has it never crossed your mind that eastern Europe although hardest hit wasn't the only area hit during WWII? Or don't over 100.000 Dutch people count? according to your comments they do not. Just for your information I have some familymembers that I lost also during WWII.

I asked both of my grandfathers, who were in the resistance, when I was young. Why were you still going on holidays to Germany, even so quick after WWII (I was looking throught their photoalbums of the 50's / 60's). Their answer was simple. We should never forget what has been done during this period, never. But we cannot blame an entire "people" for what has been done in their name and certainly not the young generations after WWII. Hatred leads to more hatred and leads to war and genocide. If we keep on hating for something that has happened, it will happen again. We do not need to hate, but we should not forget either. Because only understanding and not forgetting without hating will lead to a better future.

Nationalism leads to hatred that is why WWII started.

Waerth 04:07, 3 Feb 2005 (UTC)