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The Local - The year’s new Swedish words
The year’s new Swedish words

Published: 30th December 2005 13:06 CET

The year’s end heralds one of the more spirit-crushing days for students of Swedish: the annual announcement by the Swedish Language Council of the new words which have become part of Sweden’s linguistic currency over the past twelve months.

Not all of the words were first used in 2005, but to make it to the prestigious list they must have increased significantly in use or been particularly relevant during the year, said the council.

What follows are a few examples - with The Local’s best effort at a translation. Some may be more useful than others - and one or two may have a hint of familiarity about them.

* Blinga: adorn oneself with glittery items, such as jewellery, with the intention of displaying wealth.

* Gala in: collect a large amount of money for charitable causes via a celebrity-studded gala event.

* Industrisafari: a tour of old industrial areas to look at the architecture and soak up the atmosphere of how work used to be.

* Kollektomat: a machine for contributing to church collections with a bank card rather than cash.

* Nätfiske: computer fraud in which an individual is lured into logging into a fake web site where they then provide, for example, their bank account details. From the English phishing.

* Plusjobb: temporary work within the public sector, set aside for the long-term unemployed. An example of the kind of work is hanging up curtains for elderly people. Hence the opposition’s alternative word, curtain-hanger job (gardinhängarjobb).

* Podda: download music to an mp3 player, such as Apple’s Ipod, and then organise and listen to that music. Also: poddare, one who engages in such activity.

* Snackis: a current subject of discussion.

* Sudoku: a popular and infuriating number puzzle.

* Tjock-tv: a television which is not of the flat screen variety. Literally ‘fat TV’.

Latvia’s Parliament blocks gay marriage
Latvia’s Parliament blocks gay marriage

RIGA, Latvia, Dec. 16 (UPI) — Latvia’s Parliament has passed a constitutional amendment that will ensure that gay couples cannot marry.

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I wonder if the U.S. government gives any thought to the image projected to countries where industrial hemp is an honored tradition, and “marijuana” is illegal.
Most would call it ignorant, oppresive, and foolish policy from the eco-, health and energy perspectives.
Industrial Hemp: South Dakota Indians Go to Federal Court in Effort to Grow Crop
Industrial Hemp: South Dakota Indians Go to Federal Court in Effort to Grow Crop 12/16/05
http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/415/whiteplume.shtml

Pine Ridge Indian Reservation resident Alex White Plume and his family were in federal appeals court Tuesday in a bid to force a lower court to consider whether hemp is in fact an illegal crop. In 2000 and 2001, White Plume and his family sowed hemp crops, only to have them destroyed by federal raiders. The following year, the federal government sought and won an injunction to bar White Plume from planting again.

The judges of the US 8th Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis heard White Plume attorney Bruce Ellison argue that both tribal ordinance and the Fort Laramie treaty of 1868 gave the family the legal right to grow the industrial crop. “Our contention is we’re not growing a drug, and since we’re not growing a drug, we don’t need to apply to the government for permission,” said Ellison.

The Congress distinguished between hemp and marijuana in 1937, Ellison argued. “As a non-drug crop, it’s the same thing as squash or potatoes,” he said. “We don’t need to get permission from anyone because we’re not growing a drug.”

US Attorney Mark Salter unsurprisingly disagreed. “Until and unless someone changes the definition of marijuana, it’s marijuana,” he said. Nor does White Plume or the tribe have any treaty right to determine what they grow. “Nowhere in there does it say signatory tribes have the right to grow whatever they want on that land,” Salter said.

While the appeals court judges wondered why the White Plumes had not applied for a permit to grow, Frankl explained that the DEA simply failed to ever issue commercial industrial hemp permits. “While there is a process technically, in this case, it’s to no avail,” he said.

The 8th Circuit Court of Appeals did not set a date for their ruling, which could come down in weeks or months.

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A 79-year-old Brazilian woman with terminal cancer who weighs 88 pounds has been sentenced to four years in prison, sparking an international campaign to set her free. Iolanda Figeuiral was convicted Tuesday of drug trafficking after 17 grams of crack cocaine were found in the house she shares with her adult son, who was also charged. Figeuiral and her son, Carlos Almeida, cannot be bailed out on appeal because under Brazilian law the crime is considered “hideous.”

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An anonymous reader writes “This inventor is working on a method of creating artificial tornadoes to generate electricity which he calls the “Atmospheric Vortex Engine”. He is claiming that it is possible to create a man-made tornado and use wind turbines to capture the energy from the tornado. On the website there is some video footage of some experime