“A Calendar of wisdom” is a collection of words of wisdom translated from their original source into Russian by Leo Tolstoy. Peter Sekirin later translated these collections from Russian into English. Here are some words of wisdom taken from Sekirin’s translated version.

(1)       A person who has spoiled his stomach will criticise his meal saying that the food is bad; the same thing happens with people who are not satisfied with their lives in this world.

(2)       We do not have the right to be unhappy with our life. If it seems to us that we are not satisfied with life, we should see this as a reason to be unsatisfied with ourselves.

(3)       Cruel people are busy all the time, as if to find justification for the cruelty of their dealings.

(4)       A good life is given only to those who make efforts to achieve it.

(5)       A man should always feel happy; if he is unhappy, it means he is guilty.

(6)       Do not fear the lack of knowledge, fear false knowledge. All evil in this world comes from false knowledge.

(7)       Not to accept your mistakes is to increase them.

(8)       Happiness is a thing which a person wishes only for himself; goodness is a thing which a person wishes for himself and for others. Happiness can be achieved by struggle; goodness, on the contrary, by being humble.

(9)       Anyone who is engage in really important thing is very simple because he does not have time to create unnecessary things.

(10)     Those who do nothing, do bad things. Those who do nothing, have many associates and supporters. The brain of a lazy and idle person is the favourite stopped place of the devil.

(11)     You should not be ashamed of any work, even the lowest and dirties, but you should be ashamed only of the dirtiest moral state, that is the idleness of your body, which is the necessary result of the consumption of the labour of others.

(12)     If you think someone is guilty of wronging you, forgive him. If you have never forgiven the guilty before, you will experience a new joy: the joy of forgiving.

(13)     The future does not really exist. It is created by us in the present.

(14)     All good things can be achieved only with effort.

(15)     We suffer from the past, and we spoil our future because we neglect the present.

(16)     The more urgently you want to speak, the more likely it is that you will say something foolish.

Source: “A Calendar of Wisdom : Daily Thoughts to Nourish the Soul written and selected from the world’s scared tests” by Leo Tolstoy, translated into English from the Russian by Peter Sekirin. Published by Simon and Schuster Inc, USA.

What is stroke

The term stroke is used to describe an event during which the blood supply to a part of the brain is suddenly interrupted. The symptoms start abruptly and may slowly worsen over a few hours or days. Symptoms always last more than 24 hours and depend on which cerebral blood vessels and which part of the brain are affected.

• Weakness or paralysis of one side of the body
• Speech difficulties
• Sudden severe giddiness
• Nausea and vomiting
• Loss of sensation, e.g. numbness of the face
• Difficulty in swallowing
• Double vision
• Loss of vision in one eye
• Drooping of one upper eyelid with a small pupil and lack of sweating on that side of the face
• Sudden severe headache
• Confusion
• Coma

Symptoms

Transient Ischaemic Attacks (TIAs) are known as ‘mini stroke’. They occur when the blood supply to part of the body is temporarily interrupted, e.g. by a small blood clot or vascular spasm. The symptoms disappear within 24 hours, or even sooner.

Causes

About 80% of strokes are due to a blood clot blocking an artery in the brain while the rest are due to bleeding into brain tissue from a ruptured blood vessel. Either event causes the death of an area of brain tissue and the permanent loss of cells.

The underlying cause of a stroke is usually atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries). In atherosclerosis, fatty plaques and scar tissue form in artery walls, restricting the blood flow; blood clot often form on the plaques, further blocking the arteries. Fragments of clot may detach and circulate in the bloodstream. If a fragment lodges in a smaller blood vessel in the brain, it may block it and cause a stroke.

Risk Factors

• Hypertension (high blood pressure)
• Heart disease
• Weakness in blood vessel walls in the brain
• Blood diseases
• Certain drugs

Diagnosis

• CT scanning – this confirms the presence of a cerebral infarct. In the first few days after stroke, it can differentiate between brain damage caused by bleeding and damage caused by an embolus.
• An MRI scan – this usually shown up abnormality within a few hours of the stroke.
• Lumbar puncture – blood in the cerebrospinal fluid that bathes the spinal cord, suggests a diagnosis of subarachnoid haemorrhage.
• Carotid Doppler and duplex scanning – this specialised form of ultrasound scanning is used to detect narrowing of the carotid arteries, the arteries that supply the brain.
• Angiography – this detects narrowing blood vessels.
• Blood tests – e.g. full blood count, erythrocyte sedimentation rate, blood electrolyte and glucose levels.
• Chest X-ray
• Electrocardiogram (ECG)

Treatment

• Anticoagulant drugs – these may be prescribed if the stroke is caused by a blood clot.
• Surgery – in server continued bleeding, surgery may be carried out to clip a bleeding vessel.
• Rehabilitation – this is essential as many patients are immobile following a stroke and are at risk of developing pressure sores and deep vein thromboses. Difficulty with swallowing is another problem as choking can occur and fluid or food may accidentally be inhaled into the airways. Blood control is vital for patients with hypertension, and readings are closely monitored.

Prevention

• Treat high blood pressure at an early stage
• smoking
• TIAs should be investigated in order to treat the underlying cause

Source: “Inside The Human Body”. Published by Bright Star Publishing PLC.

“A Calendar of wisdom” is a collection of words of wisdom translated from their original source into Russian by Leo Tolstoy. Peter Sekirin later translated these collections from Russian into English. Here are some words of wisdom taken from Sekirin’s translated version.

(1) A scholar knows many books; a well-educated person has knowledge and skills; an enlightened person understands the meaning and purpose of his life.

(2) The only real science is the knowledge of how a person should lives his life. And this knowledge is open to everyone.

(3) Kindness is for soul as health is for your body; you do not notice it when you have it.

(4) If you want to be a clever person, you have to learn how to ask cleverly, how to listen attentively, how to respond quietly, and how to stop talking when there is nothing more to say.

(5) If you have time to think before start talking, think, is it necessary to speak? Will what I have to say harm anyone?

(6) If you love your enemies, you will have no enemies.

(7) When a kind man does not accept his mistakes and tries always to justify himself, he becomes an unkind man.

(8) The best way to live joyfully is to believe that life was given for joy. When joy disappears, look for your mistakes.

(9) A person cannot have complete understanding of the meaning of life. A person can only know its direction.

(10) The greatest knowledge is self-knowledge.

(11) If a person does not believe himself capable of doing the best things in the world, then he starts to create the worst things.

(12) Remember, you do not live in the world, you only pass through it.

(13) You should celebrate each day with a good action, a good deed. This is the best way to start a new day.

(14) When you do a good deed, be grateful that you have had the chance to do it.

(15) Never listen to those who blames others and speak well about you.

Source: “A Calendar of Wisdom : Daily Thoughts to Nourish the Soul written and selected from the world’s scared tests” by Leo Tolstoy, translated into English from the Russian by Peter Sekirin. Published by Simon and Schuster Inc, USA.

Language is a system of finite arbitrary symbols combined according to rules of grammar for the purpose of communication. Individual languages use sounds, gestures and other symbols to represent objects, concepts, emotions, ideas, and thoughts.

A lingua franca is any language widely used beyond its native speakers, primarily for international commerce but extending to other cultural exchanges, such as diplomacy. The origin of the term lingua franca is Italian (literally “Frankish language”), derived from the medieval Arab and Muslim use of “Franks” (ancient Germans) as a generic term for Europeans during the period of the Crusades.

Originally “lingua franca” referred to a mix of mostly Italian with a broad vocabulary drawn from Turkish, Persian, French, Greek and Arabic. This mixed language (pidgin, creole) was used for communication throughout the medieval and early modern Middle East as a diplomatic language; the generic description “lingua franca” has since become common for any language used by speakers of different languages to communicate with one another.

First language (native language, mother tongue, or vernacular) is the language a person learns first. Correspondingly, the person is called a native speaker of the language. Usually a child learns the basics of their first language from their family.

The term “mother tongue” could be misleading. In some paternal societies, mothers are from different places and speak different dialects or languages, yet their children usually only speak their local language. Only a few will learn to speak his or her mother’s language like a native. Mother in this context probably originated from the definition of mother as source, or origin; as in mother-country or land.

Native speakers of English are people whose first language is English. They learned English when they were children. They think in English. They use it naturally. Usually native speakers of English are people from English-speaking countries like the USA, Great Britain, Australia, Canada, Ireland, etc.

Standard English is a general term for a form of written and spoken English that is considered the model for educated people. There are no set rules or vocabulary for “standard English” because, unlike languages such as French or Dutch, English does not have a governing body to establish usage. As a result, the concept of “standard English” tends to be fluid. Various regional and national “standards” exist.

The two most common internationally recognized varieties of standard English are American English and British English (also known as Commonwealth English).

The English language is a West Germanic language that originated from languages brought by Germanic settlers from various parts of north-west Germany, including what later became known as Friesland, during the first half of the first millenium. The language was subsequently influenced by two successive waves of invasion. The first was by speakers of languages in the Scandinavian branch of the Germanic family, who colonised the island in the eighth and ninth centuries. The second wave was by the Normans in the 11th century, who spoke a variety of French. These two invasions caused English to become highly ‘creolised’; creolisation arises from the cohabitation of speakers of different languages, who develop a hybrid tongue for basic communication. Cohabition with the Scandinavians resulted in a significant grammatical simplification and lexical enrichment of the Anglo–Friesian core of English; the later Norman occupation led to the grafting onto that Germanic core a more elaborate layer of words from the Romance branch of European languages; this new layer entered English through use in the courts and government. Thus, English developed into a ‘borrowing’ language of considerable suppleness and huge vocabulary.

We have the OCS briefing on Friday morning. After some discussions, one of the managers presented their action plans. They suggested having bimonthly departmental meeting instead of monthly meeting. The manager explained that having more meetings would enable communications to flow faster. What she meant was to have two meetings a month instead of once a month.

According to the dictionary, the word “bimonthly” means every two months, such as bimonthly magazines. What those managers suggested was to have a meeting every two weeks. In this case, she could have said, “We proposed to have two meetings a month.” She could also use “fortnightly” or “biweekly”.

In Singapore, we do come across people using words differently from the standard usage. Here I have gathered some words that are commonly used locally.

We do hear people say, “He horned at me on the highway”. This is incorrect as “horn” is a noun and it cannot be used as a verb. We should say, ”He sounded his horn at me”.

Many times we heard people saying, “I am so blur”. “Blur” is either a noun meaning something that is not clear or is indistinct, or a verb that means to become indistinct. It is not an adjective. The correct word to use is “confused”.

There are times we heard people say, “I will ask my boss for an off day because I came back to work last Saturday”. In Standard English, an off day is a day when we feel ill or when everything goes wrong. A day off is a day when we do not have to work. So, we should say, “I will ask my boss for an day off”.

Someone came over to the workstation and asked, “Where is she?” Another person answered, “She is on MC”. MC stands for “Medical Certificate”. What we mean is that she is sick and unable to come to work. We should say, “She is ill or she is on medical leave.”

One day I saw a piece of paper pasted on the photocopy machine. It was written, “The photocopy is not working”. Photocopy as a noun is a copy of a document made using a photocopier. We heard people say, “This is a photocopy it is not an original copy”. As a verb, photocopy refers to the process of making copy of a document using the photocopier. If the machine is not working, we could say, “This machine is not working” or “The photocopy machine is not working” or “The photocopier is not working”.

Source: from the book “Grammar Matters”

A pidgin is a language which has no native speakers. Pidgins develop as a means of communication between people who do not have a common language. Pidgin seems particularly likely to arise when two groups of people with different languages are communicating in a situation where there is a third dominant language. In the Caribbean slave plantations in the 17th and 18th centuries, the African salves were deliberately separated from others who used the same language to reduce the risk of their plotting to escape or rebel. In order to communicate with each other, as well as with their overseers, these slaves developed pidgins based on the language of the plantation bosses as well as their own languages.

Pidgins also developed as the languages of trade between traders – those who use colonial language such as Portuguese, Spanish, or English and the Indians, Chinese, Africans or American Indians they were trading with.

Initially, Pidgins develop with a narrow range of functions. These who use them do speak other languages. Pidgin is an addition to their language repertoire used for a specific purpose, such as trade or perhaps administration.

Pidgins often have a short life spend. If they develop for a restricted function, they disappear when the function disappears. In Vietnam a pidgin English developed for use between the American troops and the Vietnamese, but it subsequently dies out. A trading pidgin using disappears when the trade between the groups dies out. Alternatively, if trade grows, then more contacts will generally lead to at least one side learning the other’s language and so the need for the pidgin disappears. In some cases, however, pidgins go on to develop into fully fledged languages or creoles.

A creole is a pidgin which has acquired native speakers. Many of the languages which are called pidgins are in fact now creole language. They are learned by children as their first language and used in a wide range of domains.

A creole is a pidgin which has expanded in structure and vocabulary to express the range of meanings and serve the range of functions required by a first language.

Many present-day Creoles are spoken by descendants of the African salves in America and the Caribbean. The common language of the plantation was generally a pidgin, and children naturally acquired the pidgin as a first language. As the ‘families’ communicative needs expanded, so did the resources of the language they used. The pidgin developed into a creole.

Source : “An Introduction to Sociolinguistics” by Janet Holmes. Published by Pearson Education Limited, UK.

Here are some of the great wonders of the world, created by man and nature.

Wonders of Man’s Creation

(1) The Colosseum in Rome, Italy
This is a symbol of an entire civilisation and an ancient capital’s greatest architectural legacy. Used by the Romans for gladiatorial combats, fights of wild beasts, and other spectacles.

(2) Machu Picchu in Peru, South America
Mysterious niches long hidden in cloud forests high in the Andes. Located at a high altitude on a ridge between two peaks, about 600m (about 1950 ft) above the Urubamba River, the ruined city covers above 13 square km (about 5 square miles) of terraces built around a central plaza and linked by numerous stairways. The city was discovered in 1911.

(3) The Great Wall in China
The well-known Great Wall is a gigantic stone line snaking across the Asian landscape. Fortification along the northern and north-western frontier of China, running from Jinwangdao (Chinwangtao) on the Gulf of Chihli (Bo hai or Po Hai) on the east to the vicinity of Gaodai (Kaotai), Gansu (Kansu) Province, on the west, with an inner wall running southward from the vicinity of Peking almost to Handan (Hantan). The largest portion of the wall was erected by Shih Huang Ti, first emperor of the Ch’in dynasty, as a defence against raids by nomadic people.

(4) The Kremlin in Russia
Protecting the grand churches, cathedrals and palaces of the aristocracy.

(5) Versailles in France
Lavish luxury amid the world’s most stunning palace and gardens.

(6) The Statue of Liberty in New York, U.S.A.
A modern-day colossus symbolising the American dream. Originally called Liberty Enlightening the World, colossal copper and iron sate on Liberty Island, formerly Bedloe’s Island, at the entrance to New York Harbour. The statue, the island, and nearby Ellis Island were declared a national monument in 1924. The statue was given by the French people to the U.S. to commemorate the centennial of American independence. The statue is of a proud woman in flowing robes and with a spiked crown, who holds a torch aloft with her right arm and carries in her left arm a book inscribed “July 4, 1776”. The broken chains of slavery are at her feet. The figure is formed of copper sheets riveted to a iron framework and is bolted to a star-shaped stone base. It rises 93 m (305 ft) from the bottom of the pedestal to the tip of the torch. The figure alone is 42.05 m (151 ft 1 in) high and weights 204 metric tons. The status is conceived as a grand and lasting gesture of international freedom.

(7) The Eiffel Tower in Paris, France
A remnant of Old World elegance that forever altered Parisians’ view of their world. The Eiffel Tower was built for the Paris World’s Fair of 1889.

(8) Mount Rushmore National Monument and Chief Crazy Horse Monument in South Dakota, U.S.A.
Etched in stone, enduring tributes to a nation’s heritage.

Wonders of Nature Creation

(1) The Grand Canyon in Arizona, U.S.A.
Intricate layers of rock reveal the story of life on earth. The Grand Canyon is about 349 km (about 217 miles) long, 6 to 29 km (4 to 18 miles) wide, and more than 1.6 km (more than 1 mile) deep. The Canyon cuts steeply through an arid plateau region that lies between about 1,525 and 1,745 m (about 5000 and 9000 ft) above sea level.

(2) The Serengeti in Kenya/Tanzania, East Africa.
Hundreds of thousands of animals in a death-defying migration unchanged since the dawn of man.

(3) The Sahara Desert in Niger, West Africa.
A waterless sea of sand where one wrong turn can prove fatal. The entire desert, the largest in the world, is about 1,610 km (about 1,000 miles) wide and about 5,150 km (about 3,200 miles) long from East to West. The total area of the Sahara is more than 9,065,000 square km (more than 3,500,000 square miles), of which some 207,200 square km (some 80,000 square miles) consist of partially fertile oases.

(4) Iguazu Falls in Argentina/Brazil, South America
The world’s most spectacular waterfalls, with myriad rainbows appearing and Then vanishing in the mist. The crest of the falls is more than 60 m (200 ft) high; the water falls partly in a large double drop and partly in a series of cataracts. In the dry season two crescents of water are formed, each 732 m (2,400 ft) wide. In the wet season the two merge into one vast fall more than 3 km (2 miles) wide.

(5) The Amazon River in Brazil/Peru, South America
Largest rainforest on the globe, sheltering half of the genetic heritage of life on this planet. This is the world’s largest river, in terms of watershed area, number of tributaries, and volume of water discharged. It measures about 6,275 km (about 3,900 miles) from source to mouth, it is the second in length only to the Nile among the rivers of the world. It is estimated that the Amazon River discharges between 34 to 121 million litres (9 and 32 million gallon) of water per second and deposits a daily average of 3 million tons of sediment near its mouth. The annual outflow from the river accounts for one-fifth of all fresh water that drains into oceans in the world.

(6) Ayers Rock in Australia
This is an enormous island of stone, its colours ever-changing in the rays of the moving sun.

(7) The Himalayas in Nepal
An awesome sanctuary where peaks seem to touch the heavens. Comprising of a series of parallel and converging ranges and forming the highest mountain region in the world. More than 30 peaks of the Himalayas rise to height of 7,620 m (25,000 ft) or more, and one of these, Mt Everest (8,848m or 29,028 ft), is the world’s highest mountain.

Wonders Sacred and Mysterious

(1) Stonehenge in Salisbury Plain, England
Enigmatic stone sentinels create the world’s most mysterious prehistoric site.

(2) The Great Pyramids in Giza, Egypt
The first – and last – of the original Great Wonders of the ancient world.

(3) Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, Turkey
Celebrating the glories of two great empires and the faiths that inspired each.

(4) Borobudur in Java, Indonesia
Intricate “books” carved in stone to be “read” by the faithfully.

(5) St. Peter’s Basilia in Vatican city
Glorious testament to a simple fisherman whose extraordinary faith changed the world.

(6) The Taj Mahal in Agra, India
This is one of the word’s most beautiful buildings – inspired by a timeless love story. A must see if you go to India.

Here are some questions that should not be asked.

(1) Doctor, isn’t it true that when a person dies in his sleep, he doesn’t know about it until the next morning?

(2) The youngest son, the twenty-year-old, how old is he?

(3) Were you present when your picture was taken?

(4) Were you alone or by yourself?

(5) Was it you or your younger brother who was killed in the war?

(6) Did he kill you?

(7) How far apart were the vehicles at the time of the collision?

(8) Q : She had three children, right?
A : Yes.
Q : How many were boys?
A : None.
Q: Were there any girls?

(9) Q : You say the stairs went down to the basement?
A : Yes.
Q : And these stairs, did they go up also?

(10) Q : How was your first marriage terminated?
A : By death.
Q : And by whose death was it terminated?

(11) Q : Can you describe the individual?
A : He was about medium height and have a beard.
Q : Was this a male or a female?

(12) Q : Doctor, before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a pulse?
A : No.
Q : Did you check for blood pressure ?
A : No.
Q : Did you check for breathing?
A : No.
Q : So, then it is possible that the patient was alive when you began the autopsy?
A : No.
Q : How can you be so sure, Doctor?
A : Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar.
Q : But could the patient have still been alive nevertheless?

Source : “Wrong!” by Jane O’Boyle. Published by Michael O’Mara Books Ltd.