megane-kun

I sometimes get that feeling when I run across someone’s personal blog, and it hasn’t seen updates in quite a long while (yeah, like in ten years or so). However, as with most of the other replies here, I tend to just assume they’ve lost interest and moved on.

I’ve had some blogs like that myself, and I’m certainly still alive (I hope, lol!) Some of them already gone with the sites themselves like Multiply, if you ever remember that, also, Friendster blogs—all this in the late 2000’s and early 2010’s. Then there’s some Wordpress blogs I used for a while back in 2015~2018. I just got lazy, lost interest, and so left them in the dust.

Thus, yeah, I simply assume they’re doing just fine, and have just moved on with their lives.

However, there’s a different feeling for when I browse the blog/social media profile of someone I definitely knew has already passed on. It hits different. It’s like a frozen snapshot of their life. Their final post just there. A lot of times, the final post doesn’t even indicate anything. Their lives just went on as normal until it didn’t, and it just hits me differently than someone who I would just assume have just stopped posting.

The way I’ve been using (and heard it being used) is more about the act. For example: “Nakiki-usyoso ka pa dyan! Pumasok ka na nga!” (“You’re even spectating over therel! Come right back in, you!”)

There’s another word, usisa, which I would characterize as more like “to investigate, to look into” but is also akin to usyoso in a way I just can’t put my finger on. I think it got conflated with usyoso as the colloquial uzi (from usisero/a, “someone who is overly-curious”) took hold (example: "Uy! Wag ka ngang uzi! Kita mo na ngang nag-aamok na yang si Mang Torio eh. Pumasok ka na dito, bago ka pa madamay dyan!" [“Hey! Stop being an onlooker! You already see Mang Torio running amok. Come back inside before you get involved.”])

I’d use neither to refer to the feeling of “wanting to find out about someone I’m spectating on” though. Personally, I’d just use something like na-intriga (“got intrigued/curious”). For example: “Na-intriga ako dun sa nabasa kong blog kagabi. Ano na kayang nangyari sa kanya. Huling post nya 2020 pa, tapos depressing pa yung post.” (“I’m curious about the blog I read last night. I wonder what happened to them. Their last post was on 2020, and the post itself was depressing.”)

If you have such a problem with too many people existing, do something about it. IDK.

I’ve started doing this when I noticed the space savings. First, I’ve done it with underwear, then with my undershirts. Now, only those shirts I need to be ironed (and immaculately folded) don’t get rolled.

Wait, what? Peel avocados? ‌ Just why?

But then again, I grew up eating ripe, if not nearly overripe avocados, the kind whose flesh would turn into mush if you try to grab them. So, yeah, I would just slice the avocado in half (going around the pit), remove the pit, and then scoop out the flesh.

Both can be true, that we’re experiencing record low birth rates globally and that the global population is still increasing at the moment.

How?

1. While birth rates in many countries have fallen below replacement rate, it’s still not zero, which means people are still having babies.
2. Due to advances in health science, the death rate has fallen.

These two factors, especially decades earlier, mean that population hasn’t yet fallen. However:

3. Non-existent humans will not produce babies.
4. The older the population is on the average, the higher the death rate will be.

This means that if I don’t produce offspring, my non-existent offspring will not produce babies. The less babies are produced, the older the population would be, and the higher the death rate will be. If current trends continue, the death rate will overtake the birth rate, and the population will shrink.

Outside of a worldwide disaster that kills off people of child-bearing age, population will still rise before it levels off and then fall off as more and more people find less and less appealing to raise children. This is just a consequence of us humans not dying immediately after childbirth, and us humans as a whole making offspring at a certain age (say, 20 years old). These two factors explain the lag between childbirth figures and population growth.

I’d be worried about not really being able to make my own decisions and not having someone there to help me out.

I don’t know about you, but I sure hope I’d be able to check out before that time comes for me. Before my mind and body becomes too feeble, I’d like to be able to just nope out.

Even if it were possible, I still would not prefer to have any kids.

First off, I haven’t even been a “proper adult”, and probably would never be. How can I be expected to raise a child with the care and love they deserve when I don’t even have my life sorted out? Even if you argue that I’d have to change once having a child, I’ve also seen people fail to change even after having children they swore they loved even more than their own life.

Secondly, we’ve already got enough people that are unwanted and abandoned. Why not take better care of people we already have now?

Lastly, parenting is a huge commitment. It’s not just about you and your “legacy”, but another life that will suffer for your mistakes. For those who are up to the task and willingly take on the responsibility, thank you and best of luck!

Because why not? I’m alive by default, and I’m too lazy to change that.

I agree about being able to grasp the gist of the message with some basic Japanese, but IDK about being able to actually read the message.

お願い

この先は危険ですので、これ以上前へ行かないようお願い致します。

There are some parts of the message that I don’t think is included in basic Japanese lessons:

• 危険 → dangerous
• 以上 → exceeding, beyond
• 行かないよう → probably related to the V+ようだ construction, which with the following bit, might be a polite way of making a request.
• お願い致します → probably some polite way of saying ‘please’

If I were to translate the message with my meager self-taught Japanese, I’d probably render it as something like

Request

Because of the danger ahead, not going beyond here is humbly requested.

Though I don’t think that fully captures the nuance of the message itself.

First OS: Windows 3.1 running on top of MS-DOS 6.2

First Linux distro: Ubuntu (forgot the version, but it was circa 2018).

If I’d count an OS/Linux distro that I’ve used even if not in a machine I own, it’d be Linux Mint of circa 2006.

Tagalog, my native language, has one that I’ve always wondered about: ‘umay.’ I would translate it as “too delicious, it’s almost sickening.”

Imagine a cake that’s too delicious, overwhelms your senses with sweetness, tartness, bitterness and all the good things that in moderation, would have made for a perfectly delicious cake. For example, “Masarap naman yung cake ni Maria, kaso nakaka-umay” (“Maria’s cake is delicious, really, but it’s a bit too much for me”). I guess one can put it as ‘too much,’ or ‘overwhelming,’ but there’s this additional element of “it’s actually kinda good, you know, but it went a bit too far.”

Now, I’ve been wondering if it’s related to the Japanese 美味い (うまい), and the wiktionary entry I linked earlier has it as a possible origin. I find it kinda (morbidly) funny wondering if it got its present meaning during the second world war, when the Japanese invaded the Philippines. I’d imagine Filipinos would just keep saying “it’s delicious, it’s delicious,” just to placate the Japanese, even if they’re already too sick and tired of it.

Ah, my bad. I didn’t mean to imply that it being done in a religious context invalidates it, just that the religious context would inform us more about the man’s intent and whether or not they’d continue on doing so regardless of the result.

I used the term “pledge” earlier, but maybe it’s better to use the word “vow” to refer this. The term in Filipino is “panata” (which wiktionary translates to “vow”). It usually isn’t as dramatic as this, however. And as far as I’ve observed, a lot would do these vows after they deem their prayers to have been heard (usually recovery from illness or accidents, or recovery from financial ruin), and thereafter, no matter what, they’d try to fulfill their vows, whether that’d be a crucifixion reenactment, or attending processions, or even just as simple as foregoing alcohol or vices or letting their hair grow.

edit:

I must clarify my position here, I‌ guess. I am neither in favor nor against the practice. But having grown up in the country where these practices occur, I just felt I have to clarify some things. Personally? I don’t mind. They’re doing these things with good intentions, and they’re hurting no one. As far as I know, they don’t force anyone to join them, but rather, make sure that those who are following their footsteps are sure they want to.

I agree with your sentiment, but I felt compelled to comment on one crucial element here: what he has been doing isn’t a protest, but some form of a religious pledge. It just so happened that this year, he’s praying for world peace. This is akin to some traditions in India and other parts where self-flagellation is part of religious ritual, but only for those who pledge themselves to it. It’s touched upon in the article, but he’s been doing it since the 1980’s as thanksgiving for his survival in an accident. Some people just do it once, but some devote their lives to it, and it seems to me that he’s one of the latter.

Whether or not his actions will lead to results doesn’t matter, as far as I see it. He’s already devoted to the bit, and only old age (and poor health) will likely stop him.