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In a previous post I mentioned that the Royal Nepal Airlines had mistakenly published a poster with a picture of Machu Picchu and the heading "Have you seen Nepal?"

About the same time, my daughter wrote to me asking if I had heard the latest news from Nepal, and, knowing she was really talking about the encouraging news of the Maoists joining the government, I jokingly sent her a link to the article on the poster goof instead and asked if that was the news she was talking about.

She said that there is a mountain in Nepal named Machhapuchre - surprisingly close to Machu Picchu in letters and possibly pronunciation (my Nepali is limited to three words - amma, didi and ba, meaning mom, sister and dad so I'm not really sure of how Machhapuchre is pronounced). Still, it makes me think twice about flying on Nepal Airlines. (Don't ask me about sacrificing goats, blood and airplane tires.)

Here's a picture of Machhapuchre, which, from some angles looks a bit like the Matterhorn, but not really like Machu Picchu! Machhapuchre is part of the Annapurna range and is located more or less north of Pokhara, which is to the west and slightly north of Khatmandu.

News this week from the Kingdom of Nepal - come visit!

Well, you may be disappointed to learn that the photo displayed in the Royal Nepal Airlines advertisement for tourism was of the well known Inca ruins of Machu Picchu. Royal Nepal has apologized to Peru for putting the picture on a poster under the slogan "Have you seen Nepal?"

Apparently, for Royal Nepal Airlines, the answer is NO. Kinda gives you pause when you think about flying with them, doesn't it?

Nepal has just emerged from a very difficult time when there was a Maoist revolt underway. Politics have settled down, and things are better in the kingdom. Now they are hoping for the tourists to return.

Our family has had a personal connection with Nepal for about a dozen years now, from the time when our daughter, Amanda, did a homestay with the Karki family in a village some distance from Khatmandu. Amanda and Meena are the ones in the photo with the flower leis. The photo was taken in 2005 when Meena went back to see her family for the first time in four years.

Nearly six years ago, Meena, one of the daughters in the family, came to the US, went to high school in Marquette, Michigan, for a year and then on to study nursing at Northern Michigan University, graduating in May 2006.

Much credit goes to Sally (pictured here with Meena) and Bruce Closser who hosted her in their home for her high school year and guided her through NMU as well. All those who know Meena feel we cannot thank them enough for all they have done for her.

Several years back we had the opportunity to live in a small town in Normandy, France. The nearest large city was Rouen, where Joan of Arc met her demise in 1431. Legend has it that when she was burned at the stake, her ashes and heart were thrown into the Seine, which courses through the city of Rouen. The Roman Catholic church purports to have fragments of her bones which are about to undergo DNA testing to see if they could be from the martyred young woman.

No matter what the tests prove, even more fascinating to me is the indisputable fact that had you been outside of the restaurant La Couronne (pictured to the left, it was established in 1345 and is STILL serving up meals) you could have looked across the Place du Vieux Marche and watched her bruleed yourself! The website for La Couronne states that "The location of the stake can be seen from the windows of the dining room." How's that for ambiance?

One thing that has always amused me about the French is that they have had an official group that approves (or disapproves) a word's entrance into the language in hopes of guarding its purity. They do not care to have words like "le babysitter" or "le weekend" to be considered equal to historic, pure French. (Anyone who saw the original 1973 version of "La Cage aux Folles" will remember that Geroges' son's fiance's father had a title something like "minister of the moral order.") When we lived in Normandy it was very popular to have the names of American universities on shirts -- whether they existed or not!! Also popular on shirts were the words "training" and "jogging." Go figure.

From where we are located at TheBigDay in Portland, Oregon, we can't look out on anything as historic as where Joan of Arc was burned, but we do have our connections with France. One of our founders has been traveling to la Belle France twice a year for many years. When they married a year and a half ago, many of their guests had the opportunity to use our website from across the pond, visiting Terry and Pascale's "enregistrement de lune de miel."

Here are a few more phrases that just might come in handy on your next trip to Japan.

What is your name? - Onamae wa nan desu ka?

My name is ________. - I've seen several different versions of this: Watashi no namae wa __________ desu. or Watashi wa _________ desu. or Namae wa _________ desu. I think we used the last in my Japanese class. Good luck!

How are you? - Ogenki desu ka?

Fine, thank you. - Genki desu.

Yes. - Hai.

No - Iie.

You might see a couple of patterns in some of the above. Questions often end in "desu ka" - pronounced dess ka.

The "o" at the beginning of the words for name (namae) and what is essentially "health" is a term of politeness used when referring to others. Note in the responses when you are talking about yourself it is not used. So, you ask "Ogenki desu ka?" but answer "Genki desu."

Japanese has, like German and French, different layers of language. I can still remember my French teacher in high school telling us that the personal form of verbs in French was used for mothers, fathers, children, cats and dogs. The French acually have a verb that is used when you talk about someone who is trying to use the personal form of verbs with you - tutoyer. Our friend Becky in Paris talked about some guy who was tutoyering her and how she kept using other verb forms back at him to keep distance between them.

In Japanese you can find three layers - one for talking to peers, one for those above you (teachers, bosses, etc.) and one for those of lower status.

Communication among those of different linguistic backgrounds can often be a comedy of errors, as anyone who has traveled to a country where his native language and its native language are not the same. Similarly, trying to help a non-English speaker out in the US can be, at the same time, rewarding and suprising.

Several years ago I was standing near the day lodge on Mt. Hood in Oregon and overheard two young women speaking Japanese. They were taking one another's pictures. Figuring they might want a picture of the two of them together, I cautiously approached and in my best (think 5 or 6 phrases gleaned from one year of Japanese many years previous) Japanese, asked "Nihon no kata desu ka?" - "Are you Japanese?" They looked delighted to hear something even vaguely familiar and responded with such a flurry of words that I nearly fell off the mountain! I was able to communicate that I really coudn't speak any more Japanese, but that I would be delighted to take their picture. They hugged one another, and I snapped the photo. Next, they insisted that I get in a picture with one of them while the other. What would they tell their friends and family I wondered?

There have been numerous attempts at creating an artificial "universal language". Esperanto is one was developed at the end of the 19th Century that still has its adherents today. You can check out the Esperanto USA site at www.esperanto-usa.org to see examples of the language and read up on activities of the organization. The librarian in my high school, Miss Glidden ("the Glider" to the students, behind her back, of course), was a big Esperanto fan, had books on it and could actually speak it, much to everyone's amazement.

Another appears in the one-act play "Universal Language" in which playwright David Ives creates "Unamunda", "an absurdist variation on Esperanto (already absurd enough) that blithely substitutes proper names, brand names and ludicrous distortions of familiar foreign phrases for their English equivalents. ("Harvard U" means "How are you?"; "Velcro" is "Welcome.")" - NY Time review of December 3, 1993. This is but one of many one act plays from the collection "All in the Timing" by the playwright, and if it's ever being done in town, wherever "in town" is to you, buy a couple of tickets, get a friend to go with you, and be prepared for a totally enjoyable evening.

The honeymoon registry where I work has seen a number of registries created in different languages. American English is the most common, of course, followed by British, Australian and Canadian (eh?) English, but we have seen registries in French, Portuguese, Spanish and others. For those who wish to translate "honeymoon registry" into one of several languages, click here!