Thread: vocabulary with post-its

If you are learning vocab it can be great fun to write words on those smallest size sticky post-it notes. You can write the translation and the grammatical info on the back. Then you can stick them to every day objects. For example: you can stick "молоко" on our milk bottle in the fridge "масло" on the butter and "холодильник" on the fridge door. This is not only a good method to learn your vocab, it also helps your brain to become quicker at recognising word imagery. Have fun. It also impresses the visitors.

Consumer warning, Post it notes will make a fat rich yank, fatter and richer.

What happens if someone switches all the notes while you're gone?

Masking tape them down. In fact, why not just use little bits of paper with sticky tape, then instead of making the fat yank rich, you can help promote slave labor in china and india.

A better method would be to tie yourself to a chair and have someone shout the words at you. If you can't memorize them they hurl the food item at your face until you learn.

Alright, we can really get bad here, why don't you get some one to tie you up and shoot your toes off if you get words wrong. Kinda reminds me of the American police.

Well - that is a good system if you only want to learn 10 words. punitive electroshocks might improve memory

You guys only have ten toes? Losers.

Yerh sorry mike, only 10 toes here too. We only have one nuclear thing in Australia, and it's on the other side of the country.

Originally Posted by z80

Alright, we can really get bad here, why don't you get some one to tie you up and shoot your toes off if you get words wrong. Kinda reminds me of the American police.

Umm, as opposed to what? Chinese police? Iraqi police? Lay off our cops, 99.99% of them are great, just like in the UK or Australia or France or wherever. A couple of loose nuts in California and NYC do not make a system of torture, just as a couple of major escapes do not make the French police lax.

Okay, politicizing over, return to your normal conversation. "Ten ways to memorize words using torture techniques", I think.

I think most police generally believe they are doing the right thing and do a good job. What annoys me is not so much the rampant, almost romanticized corruption in places like New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco, but the attitude of authority many of them exert over citizens. They are civil servants. Yeah, the job is rough, boring and sometimes dangerous. That's why we devote tax money to paying for their salaries instead of making it 70% voluntary like the fire department. Stuff like this is inexcusable.

Originally Posted by mike

I think most police generally believe they are doing the right thing and do a good job. What annoys me is not so much the rampant, almost romanticized corruption in places like New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco, but the attitude of authority many of them exert over citizens. They are civil servants. Yeah, the job is rough, boring and sometimes dangerous. That's why we devote tax money to paying for their salaries instead of making it 70% voluntary like the fire department. Stuff like this is inexcusable.

Yeah, that is a problem, I'll admit. I think one of the reasons it's a little worse in the U.S. than in similar westernized countries like Japan and England is the gun culture. In a country full of firearms (but with a very open social system), you end up with a police force that is (A) armed with the power of life and death, and (B) under a constant death threat themselves. This leads to extra "machismo" among cops, which can lead to the attitudes you mentioned.

But still, the vast vast majority of cops in the U.S. are conscientious and follow the law very closely. It's not a police state, you won't be beaten for a confession, you're free to criticize the police, and you have the right to an attorney and a speedy trial. Not enough countries in the world can say that as I'd like.

Well, some people are beaten for a confession. Look at the four men (I can't remember their names, I'll look them up) recently released from death row in Illinois because their confessions were obtained after they were physically tortured by the police.

Here it is: Aaron Patterson, Madison Hobley, Stanley Howard and Leroy Orange. This is an excerpt from a CNN article:

The four pardoned men are part of the so-called "Burge 10" death row inmates who say they had confessions tortured out of them by police under the direction of Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge. He was fired after internal police investigators found systemic evidence of physical abuse of suspects.

The four men "were tortured," the governor said. "There isn't any question about that."

[Governor Ryan] discussed their cases in his speech.

• Police said Patterson, 38, confessed to the April 1986 stabbing of an elderly couple in Chicago. Patterson never signed the confession and during his interrogation scrawled, "I lie about murders, police threaten me with violence," into a bench with a paper clip.

• Hobley, 42, was convicted of killing seven people in an arson fire in 1987. Private investigators later developed evidence that a metal gas can found at the scene used to connect Hobley to the arson was planted. He long contended he was a torture victim, too.

• Orange, 52, was sentenced to die for taking part in the stabbing of his former girlfriend, her 10-year-old son and two others. The conviction came despite Orange's description of torture and testimony that his half brother, Leonard Kidd, was the one who stabbed the victims. Kidd, also on death row, claims he too was tortured into confessing.

• Howard, 40, was convicted in a 1987 murder and also contended he had been tortured.

They "four men did not know each other," Ryan said, "all getting beaten and tortured and convicted on the same basis of the confessions that they allegedly provided. They are perfect examples of what is so terribly broken about our system."

Originally Posted by garmonistka

For example: you can stick "молоко" on our milk bottle in the fridge "масло" on the butter and "холодильник" on the fridge door.

When you see an elephant walking outside your house, don't forget to stick слон to it.

I have some better advice: If you see an elephant walking around outside your house, stick Бегу to yourself.

I bet they where black fellows too.

Yes.

Why do american govoment hate there black people for? Do most white americans hate there black people too? If you do, I propose a swap. We'll have your black fellows, and you can have ours!

I don't think it's the government. It's just local people that happen to be cops. They take their idiotic beliefs into the force with them, but suddenly have a nightstick to back them up with. Also, bad experiences can cause a lot of it. My uncle in Texas used to have a lot of black friends, but once he was breaking up a fight in this roller disco (he was a policeman) and some black lady smashed a bottle on his head and the two or three men that were there just kept kicking him while he was on the ground. Now he won't let minorities anywhere near his house.

Yerh, i don't like minorities ether.

Bad news everyone, your a minority unless your Chinese or is it India that has the largest population now?