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n0-eyedtaissa · 3 years

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Christmas Kids — Ruthie Soh-Peterson x Romeo Fogarty (Serpent Siblings!AU)

A/N: Just a little late Christmas/holiday themed moment about Ruthie and Romeo for @hughstheforcelou! Featuring secret Santas and not-so-secret feelings when Ruthie and Romeo take a break from the family Christmas party.

Word Count: 3,707

Holiday season at the Fogarty household was always a big deal. The Abuelas decorated every available surface with knickknack Santa’s and intricate Christmas village sets that included moving pieces and miniature light fixtures that actually worked. Decorating was a weekend-long event that took all hands on deck. Maria and Atzi sat, watching and instructing as Dante and Fangs brought the big boxes down from the rafters so they could pick through which decorations were deemed worthy of the occasion. Dante was getting frustrated with how indecisive Maria was being, like how she would tell him to put a big box away just to have him cart it back down a few minutes later. When Fangs got on the roof to string the icicle lights, Dante grabbed the ladder and ran off with it so Fangs was stuck up there in the cold until Atzi threatened to whack Dante with her cane if he didn’t get his brother down from there this instant. But because the Abuela’s had scheduled extra time on their decorating agenda (space to either be filled by snacking or arguing), they had predicted that something like this would happen so they found a way to work around the two brawling boys, chastising them and letting them know there was still more work to be done. Maria decided it was smart to let Dante get some of his anger out, so she tells him to set up the nativity scene in the front yard and hands him a mallet. Dante laughs as he goes to town staking the hollow plastic pieces into the dry yellowed grass. When he’s done, he pulls out a cigarette and stops to admire his handiwork, basking in the warm glow of the lights. He exhales sharply, unable to distinguish his cigarette smoke from the warm fog of his breath against the cold air.

Christmas on the Southside of Riverdale was never something that felt unnaturally hopeful: you were born knowing that Santa was too good to be true, and that it was always better to get new socks as a present because they’ll be useful long after any toy. Christmas morning was meager at best, but always appreciated regardless. It was humble, and on the Southside you learn early that there was nothing wrong with being humble. Ruthie had this theory that people like the Abuelas would dress up fancy and decorate their houses with bright colorful items as an attempt to brighten up their way of life, to make even the most mundane things feel exciting, even if they weren’t. Like if they could distract someone with bright lights and sparkly tinsel, everything in the outside world wouldn’t feel so shitty by comparison. It still seemed to be working on Sweet Pea and Fangs, but Ruthie had outgrown the sugar-rich feeling of artificial Christmas cheer. Things felt forced this year, though no one could put a finger on why. It felt like the first breath of fresh air that anyone had in a while, but it would prove to be the last breath of fresh air they’d be able to take for the time coming.

When she thinks no one is looking, Ruthie slinks out of the living room and into the Fogarty’s garage in order to sneak out the side door. She makes her way outside unscathed, it was the part of the evening in which everyone was either too full, too buzzed, or too hopped up on sugar. Dante was leaning back in the reclining chair, one hand resting on his stomach from eating one tamale too many. Sweet Pea and Fangs were laying under the Christmas tree playing with the new Lego set Fangs got, looking over their shoulders and snickering as they listened to the Abuelas as they belted along to old Christmas records. It was the perfect diversion tactic. Ruthie shivers as the late December wind picks up, but she’s had enough peppermint Schnapps where she can try her best to pretend that the cold doesn’t bother her as much as it does. She pulls her pack of cigarettes out of the pocket of the dress Atzi made her, but before she can light it a voice pops up from over her shoulder.

“Trying to get away from us already, Shorty?” Ruthie looks up and finds none other than Romeo Fogarty standing in the doorway. He smiles and steps out into the cold, rubbing his hands together.

Ruthie fumbles to light her cigarette and she hopes that Romeo doesn’t notice.

“I just needed a breather, I guess”

Romeo nods, “I feel that.” The two of them stand next to each other quietly in the side yard, the sound of laughter trickling from the windows as everyone inside got their second wind of energy. Neither one of them talk for a little, and neither one of them have a problem with it. It’s always Romeo that breaks the silence, though.

“So do you know who had you for Secret Santa?” The wind picks up and blows loose leaves over the concrete and stirs Ruthie’s hair around her shoulders. Romeo looks over at her and her bare arms starts shrugging off his cardigan before she could say no. Ruthie tries to scowl at him but she knows it’s no use.

“Of course I do,” She laughs “I know who everyone has….And I think I know what everyone got, too” She raises a conspiratorial eyebrow at Romeo as she flicks away her cigarette ash.

“Well, now you’re speakin’ my language!” Romeo laughs, giving Ruthie a nudge in hopes that she’ll divulge some details.

“I’m not telling you shit” She nudges him back and tosses her cigarette on the ground.

“That means you have me, huh Shorty? Am I gonna like my present?” He teases. She shakes her head at him.

Ruthie can’t help but laugh, knowing that Dante had been pestering her about the same thing as well, earlier that evening. Once Maria and Atzi finally declared the Christmas party was over, Ruthie, Romeo, Dante, CD, and Spyder were all planning on heading over to the Soh-Peterson household for their own kind of after party. When the topic of doing a Secret Santa gift exchange came up, Ruthie really didn’t think anyone would follow through with the idea but they did. Earlier that month they had drawn little slips of paper out of one of CD’s old hats, each one with a name on it. She coordinated all of it. She was Spyder’s secret Santa, he was Dante’s, Dante was Romeo’s secret Santa, CD was Ruthie’s, and Romeo was CD’s. And ever since then, Ruthie had been getting pestered with questions by her friends: Do you think he’s gonna like this? What should I get him? What do you even like? For a group of friends that had known each other for years, they were all rather unobservant.

“My lips are sealed for another handful of hours”

Romeo sighs with fake defeat and pulls a joint from behind his ear, where he always put it for safe keeping. He lights it and inhales, the smoke engulfing the shoddily rolled paper. Ruthie watches the smoke seep from the gap between Romeo’s lips, how he blew out small little smoke rings that got carried away on the cold breeze. She puts out her hand out to take the joint but Romeo smiles and leans away. “You’re not gonna get any of this until you tell me some shit”

Ruthie laughs loudly at his persistence and weighs her options. She knows that she’d have no problem divulging any secrets to Romeo, but she also knows that Dante and the rest of her friends took this Secret Santa business very seriously and would be upset that she let Romeo get a leg up in the game. So she does what she’s learn to do best and compromises the best way she can.

“I’m not your Secret Santa, I’m Spyder’s” Ruthie lets it slip and only feels a little bit bad about doing it. “He finally got the speakers in his car fixed so I made him a mix CD for the first time we all go out driving again.” She looks up at Romeo and sees an emotion on his face that looks a little bit like jealousy.

“Well, I’m sure he’s gonna like that, Shorty” Romeo nods curtly and hands the joint over to Ruthie.

Something about his words feel too harsh, heavy with the weight of something not understood fully enough to be well communicated. Ruthie wraps her sweater — Romeo’s sweater— tighter around herself and crosses her arms over her chest, suddenly feeling a lot smaller, like she had done something wrong. She wonders of she’s just already paranoid from the weed, tells herself that she’s being silly and reading into things and nothing was wrong at all. She inhales a big lungful of smoke and tries to act like she doesn’t have to cough when she hands it back to Romeo.

“Yeah he’ll probably like his present, but I’m not too sure you’ll like yours…” Ruthie smirks over at Romeo, trying to probe past the tension that might have been present. She leans closer towards him, opens herself up to him more. Romeo seems to pick up on the shift and smiles down at her.

“What’re my odds?” He winces in preparation.

“About 50-50, I’d say” Ruthie blows a cloud of smoke upwards “You know Dante’s really hit or miss with gifts” She bites at her lip as she divulges that little piece of information, hoping that it might make up for earlier. Romeo laughs and starts nodding in agreement.

There’s some sort of a commotion from inside that brings them back to reality, popping the little bubble of privacy they were able to have for a brief moment. Dante’s voice pipes up loudly and Ruthie guessed that meant Spyder and CD had finally arrived, or that he had finally slept off his food coma. The door that leads from the house into the garage opens and Dante ducks out, grabbing a six-pack of beers from the outside refrigerator before heading outside. “Nah man, I dunno where either one of them ran off to” Dante says, unaware of the fact that Ruthie and Romeo were only a few feet away, just outside of the side door and unseen in the shadows. When the coast is clear the pair break out laughing at their friend’s obliviousness. Now they had a secret just the two of them could keep.

“Guess we should be getting back inside, huh?” Ruthie scuffs the toe of one of her hightop against the handprints that were pressed into the cement ground, not really wanting to meet Romeo’s eye. She feels a little bit deflated, like this was a moment that was hers for the taking yet she didn’t know what to do with it.

Romeo takes a short pull from what’s left of the joint and hands it over to Ruthie one last time. “Nah, I’ll go inside and start corralling those idiots so we can do presents. You kill that joint and then come and join us, you probably need that shit more than I do, any ways.”

“You’re probably right…” She smirks.

“I’m gonna head inside now” Romeo adds, somewhat awkwardly. “You just finish taking your breather, Shorty, don’t even worry about those guys.”

“Why thank you, Romeo” Ruthie rolls her eyes but she smiles afterward, laughs at this unnamed thing they were both experiencing.

“You ain’t gotta thank me” Romeo adds, turning on his heels and starting to walk back through the garage before stopping abruptly. “You look nice tonight by the way…pretty” He tacks the word onto the end of his sentence like it’s a nervous afterthought. He looks at Ruthie in her hand-sewn party dress (made from the green velvet that Atzi got from the fabric store for a great bargain), his own sweater dwarfing her skinny frame, sees the hole in her tights her uneven socks, and her beat-up hightop sneakers. And he thinks, ‘Wow…’ He had meant what he said. He thought Ruthie was one of the prettiest girls he’d ever seen. Hell, he hadn’t seen all that many girls but right then and there he knew that she would top every one of them.

She looks over at Romeo, half flattered and half confused, like she was waiting for a punch line that made her the butt of the joke. “Thank you” She says. “You know, in the entire year or so that I’ve known you, I don’t think you’ve ever called me pretty.” She tries to laugh off her discomfort but Romeo picks up on it easily.

“I mean it” He rebukes, wanting her to realize that he meant what he said because it was true. “But I guess for you to know that, I gotta tell you more often, huh Shorty?” His playful confidence is back again. Same Romeo, charming as ever, but now Ruthie knew that he liked her, and she thought that maybe she could like him to, or that maybe she had liked him this whole time and now she just had a better word to describe what she was feeling.

“Guess so” She smiles through a cloud of smoke, meeting Romeo’s eye one last time before he retreated inside to start gathering up everyone for their secret Santa gift exchange and getting their after-party started. Ruthie lingers for another few moments in the dark, stomping out the joint on the concrete and putting the roach in her pocket. She pushes her thick hair out of her face and sighs, butterflies bounding in her stomach every time she heard the echo of Romeo’s words in her ears, I mean it. She feels her cheeks get hot and goes to rush inside knowing that by now there was no way that her friends didn’t realize she’d been unaccounted for. She waits to sneak back inside until she hears an uproar of CD’s loud laughter, hoping that her return would go unnoticed if the boys were already distracted.

“Where ya been, Ruthless!” CD’s already drunk when he runs up to hug her, his frame feeling heavy and unsteady. “Dante told me you Houdini’d and he’d been looking everywhere for you”

Ruthie rolls her eyes and can’t help but laugh. “He would’ve had a lot easier of a time finding me if he bothered to get his lazy ass up out of Maria’s chair!” Last time she saw Dante, he was taking a nap with his belt undone and his dress pants unbuttoned.

Dante flips her the bird but still hands her a beer, and soon everyone is getting ready to head back over to Ruthie’s for the gift exchange. The Abuela’s make sure that the kids leave with a Tupperware dish full of tamales and the first thing Spyder does once Ruthie unlocks the front door is head over to the microwave (like he usually does). Romeo pours up a round of shots for everyone and Ruthie drinks both hers and CD’s too. He stares at her with wide eyes when she drinks both down without even flinching and Ruthie laughs, giving him a wink that wasn’t at ass as smooth as she hoped it was. The five of them drink more and a heated debate breaks out between CD and Spyder about whether or not it’s sacrilegious to roll a cross-joint on Christmas. They all argue while trying to find a Christmas movie that they could all actually agree on (Home Alone 2, of course), but they spend too much time talking about their respective awkward interactions with distant family to even really pay all that much attention to it in the first place. Dante starts getting impatient (because he always was impatient) and decided that gifts needed to be doled out at that very moment. He hops up from the couch quickly

Ruthie handed Spyder a jewel case with a mix cd covered in sharpie doodles. She hand drew the cover art and wrote all the names of the tracks in her nicest handwriting. “Cause you got your speakers back, I figured you needed some good music.” Spyder puts his hand on her shoulder and gives a tender squeeze, the closest thing one might get to a hug from him.

Spyder hands Dante a cross-joint and a lighter in a ziplock bag. Turns out he was rolling up Dante’s present that whole time. “It’s the gift that keeps on giving, you know?”

CD gets a big mason jar filled with his favorite sour candy from the bodega. He gets so emotional that Romeo remembered all of his favorites that he just about sheds a tear. He watches the candy jar like a hawk for the rest of the evening, a protective hand sitting on the lid at all times.

CD tries to juggle three packs of fancy cigarettes that he knew Ruthie liked to buy from Ignacio’s, ends up tossing them to her one by one. “Nearly risked my life to get this shit” He laughs, launching into an animated story about his attempts and Ruthie tucks her feet up under herself, getting comfortable and unwrapping the plastic from around one of the packets.

Last but never least was Romeo. Now Dante wasn’t always the most sentimental, he’d always say that he was shitty at gift-giving, but Romeo was his cousin and he was having a rough time so Dante wanted to do something nice for him. “If you don’t like it, blame Ruthie cause she was the one who helped me pick it out.” He laughs somewhat awkwardly as he handed Romeo his gift. Tearing away at the newspaper, Romeo reveals the small red leather-bound journal and runs his fingers over the spine. “Thank you” Romeo replies, and Ruthie knows it’s aimed at her more than it is Dante.

Christmas on the Southside was humble, but more often then not the small gifts shared among family and close friends were what always meant the most. A small recognition, a nod towards the gratifying ordeal of being understood by those worthy enough to be close to you. The five of them — Ruthie, Dante, Spyder, CD, and Romeo, knew more about the others than most of the outside world would ever. They knew each others strengths, weaknesses, knew each other well enough to see something and say hey, this made me think of you. They all liked their small gifts more than they would let on. CD shares his candy with his friends, but makes sure that he had enough saved for later. Dante never had a problem sharing his weed, he was sitting back in the big comfy chair and laughing at the end of Home Alone. Ruthie would always share her cigarettes, and never minded all that much when CD launched into one of his many animated stories about the situations only he could find himself in. Spyder knew that next time they went out driving, they had a soundtrack to yell and scream with the windows down, and Romeo could write all about it in his journal, cataloguing the best and the worst and understanding that growing up was hard and the world was cruel, but it was always sweeter when you had good friends by your side.

They let the movie credits roll and they pass around what was left of Dante’s Christmas present. Ruthie doles out glasses of water and painkillers in preparation for the morning. She takes CD’s sticky sugar-covered hand out of his half-empty candy jar and puts a blanket over Dante as he snored. Thinking that everyone was probably asleep by now, Ruthie hikes herself up onto the kitchen counter and opens the window, pulling the white ceramic ashtray from its spot inside of the cabinet. She lights one of her fancy new cigarettes and resists the urge to pull at the too-high collar of the dress that Atzi made her. She blows a thin stream of smoke towards the window and takes a big sip off the discarded bottle of cheap tequila that Spyder brought from home. There’s a creak from the other end of the house and Ruthie snaps her head to attention.

“Can’t sleep?” Romeo asks, rubbing his glassy eyes as he filled a chipped mug full of tap water from the sink. He pushes himself onto the counter next to Ruthie and scoots close to her so that their knees are touching. He takes a big sip of water and offers her some.

“Haven’t got around to trying” She takes the water from his hands and finishes it.

“I feel that” He echoes his words from earlier that evening and suddenly it’s like they’re back outside at the Fogarty’s house again, hiding and smoking in the side yard and trying to navigate their feelings in a way that didn’t seem so scary. Ruthie leans her head down slowly until it comes to rest on Romeo’s shoulder and both of them try hard to pretend like they’re not completely breathless. His skinny fingers play with the ends of her hair and she hums contentedly.

“So did you like your present?” Ruthie asked, her voice tickling Romeo’s ear.

“I loved it” He replies with the same forceful certainty as before. I mean it. I loved it. Like he always wanted to make sure that Ruthie knew that he was serious and to be believed.

“Merry Christmas, Romeo” She whispers into the dark expanse of the kitchen. She can smell his cheap aftershave, can feel the vein in his neck pounding nervously after this bout of newfound contact.

“Merry Christmas, Shorty” He mumbles into her hair, smelling the floral perfume of her shampoo. The two of them sit like that for a few quiet minutes, with Ruthie’s head on Romeo’s shoulder. His hand rests on one of her knees, his thumb tracing around one of the rips in her tights. Ruthie laces her fingers with Romeo’s and slides off of the kitchen counter, leading him down the hallways and towards her bedroom.

#serpent siblings au #oc: ruthie soh peterson #lou's ocs #lou's oc: romeo fogarty #ruthie x romeo #little brother! sweet pea #little brother!fang fogarty #southside serpents au #southside serpents #riverdale oc

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fortheloveofluxuryxo · 4 years

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How to Navigate the World of Online ESL

Written by Gina Gainous

The purpose of this article is to share detailed information about the most popular online ESL companies, along with some of my personal experiences and anecdotes from other teachers I’ve come across in Facebooks groups and teaching blogs. Before we get started, I’ll give a small self introduction. I’m a biracial woman from the United States with a Bachelor’s Degree in English as a Second Language Education (K-12) and my TESOL certificate. I worked in various schools in my hometown and abroad for the first two years of my career. Nowadays, I work 100% remotely for a company called Liulishuo based in Beijing, China. To begin, I’ll cover some of the basics.

Peak Hours If the company is based in China, they will expect you to work peak hours:

6-9 PM Monday through Friday, Beijing Standard Time

9AM-10PM Saturday and Sunday, Beijing Standard Time

Depending on where you reside, this might mean working early mornings. Currently, I reside on the west coast, and I typically teach from 5AM-8AM on weekdays. Make sure to calculate the time difference before applying. These hours aren’t for everyone, especially if you’re not a morning person. Companies based outside of China will offer afternoon and evening classes, but since they’re smaller you may not get that many bookings. The pay is usually lower as well.

Students Children: Most companies you’ll come across only offer classes with children, who are usually between the ages of 5-14. You may have the option of only teaching older children in middle and high school, but if you’re open to younger students you’ll have many more options. Adults: Some companies offer adult classes, if you’re not interested in teaching children. However, the pay is usually lower.

Salary Scale Base pay: This is the rate of pay you’re guaranteed. Most Chinese companies start their base pay between $15-$18. Companies located in other countries, like Russia or Spain, will have a much lower base pay (between $9-13 per hour) and usually won’t offer any bonus pay. Bonus pay: This is what you’ll see in most advertisements - “Up to $22.00 per hour!” - and depends on a number of factors. Some companies will give you a booking bonus or an attendance bonus. For example, if you teach 100 or so more classes a month, they’ll pay you an additional $2.00 per hour. They may also pay a $2.00 bonus if you open slots during peak hours. So if your base pay is $18, adding the extra $4 will bring your total pay to $22.00/hour. Buyout pay: Very few companies offer this pay structure, but if you’re lucky you might be able to score a contract. Basically, the company will pay you just for keeping your slots open, even if they aren’t booked. Sometimes it’s just a portion, sometimes it’s the whole salary. However, this usually means base pay is fairly low and they may not offer additional bonus pay. In the past, Gogo Kid and DaDaABC used to offer this as a perk, but to my knowledge they changed their contracts last year. Current teachers have confirmed this in 2020.

Payment Methods Bank transfer: This is the method I recommend the most, if the company provides it as an option. There are less fees with bank transfer and they are deposited directly into your account on payday. Paypal: The most popular method of payment. Usually involves both a conversion fee and an instant transfer fee, which add up after a while.

Class Types: Private classes (1 to 1): Teachers instruct one student. These are usually 25 minutes long. Some companies, such as SayABC, have 40 or 50 minute long classes. Small group classes (between 3-4 students): Teachers instruct a small group of students. Again, these classes are usually 25 minutes long. Larger group classes (6 or more students): Some companies offer larger group classes. In this case, they’ll expect you to stand up and will project your webcam in a classroom. These classes usually require a teacher’s assistant who is actually present in the room to help with classroom management.

Important things to note: 1. A lot of companies will provide the lessons for you, but they’ll expect you to have your own class materials. Things like whiteboards, markers, letter cut outs, puppets, dolls, toys, models, and more. Keep in mind, teachers can only write off $100 from their taxes if they pay for materials out of pocket, so be careful of your budget. 2. A revolving door is oftentimes a red flag. If you notice that a specific company is always hiring or posting ads, that’s not a good sign. It either means they have too many teachers and not enough students so booking slots stay empty, or that their teachers are constantly quitting. Which leads me to my next point... 3. Many online teachers have turned to recruiting. As recruiters, their companies will pay them a bonus based on how many people were hired after using their affiliate link to apply, and if those applicants teach enough classes. They are responsible for helping their recruits through the interview process, giving them advice for how to pass the assessments, and getting them familiar with the software. However, be wary of this because some people who have signed up via recruiter link have reported their mentors disappearing soon afterwards. This is not meant to be accusatory, but it is a common occurrence as observed on many Facebook Online ESL Teaching groups. 4. Remember, if the offer sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Get all the details, in words you can understand, before signing the contract and making the commitment. 5. Most companies only hire what they consider to be “Native English Speakers”. These are people who hold a passport from the following countries: The United States, The UK, Ireland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand [and sometimes South Africa]. This means that even if you speak English perfectly and have the right credentials, if your passport is from a country not listed above then you are considered a Non-Native English Speaker. There are some companies that hire NNES, but they will offer a significantly lower base pay. (Note: many of the bigger companies only hire people from the United States or Canada. A list of companies that hire Non-Native English Speakers can be found at the end of this article.) 6. Most companies only hire those with Bachelor Degrees. It’s preferred that your degree relates to Education or Child Development, but most of the time they’ll accept anything. You may also need a TEFL or TESOL certificate as well, along with some teaching experience. You can sign up for a short course on Groupon. A few of them cost less than $10. (There are some companies that hire without a degree, which are listed at the end of this article.) 7. You are considered an Independent Contractor, NOT an employee. You do not have the same protections you might be used to at a brick and mortar job. This means that these companies can fire you for any reason, or without a reason, at any time. On the other hand, this also means you can also quit for any reason at any time. However, keep in mind that many companies have been known to withhold the final paycheck if this occurs, and there’s not much you can do about it since they’re based in another country and don’t adhere to your country’s laws. It’s best not to burn bridges. 8. A lot of the bigger and popular online ESL companies are geared towards young students between the ages of 5-14 years old. They’ll want to see high energy, the use of props, and general silliness, hence why online educators have coined the term “edutainer”. You must ask yourself if your personality fits this kind of job, because they will expect you to perform in this way during your interview and also in your classes.

Companies to avoid (and why): VIPKid - suspected of data mining, new teachers wait months before getting regular bookings, mixed success with POC teachers, “edutainers” Likeshuo - racist policies, has been seen advertising for white teachers only Acadsoc - low base pay, non-communicative staff, low quality lesson plans iTutorGroup/51Talk - teachers are rated by students and if they get one low rating for a class they can be fired, unresponsive IT staff, inflexible time off policy, harsh cancellation policy Magic Ears - long training process, slow bookings for new teachers, you MUST teach in their style or else you won’t get bookings

Companies I’ve worked for and liked: Liulishuo - communicative staff, offer professional development, offer buyout schedule, hiring freezes, good quality lesson plans, quick and reliable payment each month, responsive IT team Golden Voice English - high quality lesson plans, good students, communicative staff, quick and reliable payment each month, responsive IT team

Companies I’ve worked for and didn’t like: Micro Language - late pay, wouldn’t put black people/POC in their new program despite being top tutors, poor quality lessons with grammar and spelling errors, non-communicative staff, made multiple changes to teaching contracts without input from teachers DaDaABC - offered low base pay, unfair time off policy, removed many of the perks from their new contracts Cambly - difficult students, women often experience sexual harassment from male students, POC teachers have reported racial microaggressions from students, no structured format, pay is low, lots of student no shows or last minute cancellations with no penalty for students

Companies that only hire from The United States/Canada/UK: QKids (and you MUST be based in The US or Canada) Golden Voice English VIPKids English First (US/UK) OpenEnglish

Companies that hire WITHOUT a degree: Magic Ears Cambly Palfish OpenEnglish LatinHire Preply Verbling Learnship Acadsoc SkimaTalk Italki Learnlight 31ABC (but they require teaching experience)

Companies that hire Non-Native English Speakers: Preply Voxy (must have some college credits) Learnship Yiyi English LatinHire

Companies that offer adult-only classes: Huajing Liulishuo English First Learnlight Italki Cambly OpenEnglish

To wrap things up, I’ll share a few more points to look out for in your job search. GREEN FLAGS - They implement hiring freezes so they don’t overhire teachers. Offers professional development opportunities. Quick responses from IT. Quick responses from HR. RED FLAGS - Spam-like advertisements. Lots of recruiter links on Facebook posts or other websites. I hope this guide helps you find the perfect position! ~~~~~

Gina Gainous is a state licensed ESL teacher that hails from the midwestern United States. She can be reached for further questions or inquiries at [email protected].

#blog #all #remote jobs #tutoring jobs #esl tutoring #make money online #make money from home #make money on your computer #ikigai #education #resources

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arotakaacegen · 5 years

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Hey! I speak cantonese, a common chinese dialect which is one of the most (if not, the most) similar to ancient chinese. Currently, mainland China is discouraging dialects and advocating for everyone to speak only mandarin, and im against this. But while discussing this issue, someone said that old languages were similar to old technology: useless and not worth keeping. And i didnt know how to reply. Heard ure a linguist so i was wondering: how do you explain the importance of a dying dialect?

well that person is stupid because there’s SO MUCH VALUE IN LANGUAGES. ALL OF THEM. EVERY LANGUAGE. EVERY DIALECT. THEYRE ALL SUPER IMPORTANT.

so this person sounds like they won’t be convinced by the argument from culture which is that languages are intrinsically tied with culture and language is also very much tied to identity. So many people will be unhappy if they have to stop using their native languages or dialects because that is important to who they are and who their community is. Especially dialects because they are on an even tighter community level. Not to mention the fact that languages have a bunch of knowledge within them that could easily be lost if people stop using them.

ALSO LINGUISTIC DIVERSITY IS IMPORTANT. okay so what that person needs to hear is that language doesnt work like machines. language isnt updated periodically to a newer fresher model while everyone discards their old one. instead language works the same way living things do. just like biological organisms languages evolve slowly, over time, through sound shifts and new words and maybe even borrowings, eventually differing enough from its previous self to be classified as a different language from it (for example, shakespearean english is still pretty similar to modern english, but the Old English that Beowulf was originally written in? you need to have learned that in order to read it, you cant just rely on footnotes and a knowledge of modern english to understand it. in the biology metaphor, Modern English would be a new species descended from Old English). a new model cant come out because everyone is already speaking the most current version of their language. it would be silly to ask a wolf to upgrade into a dog. theyre both at the top of their evolutionary trees, even if an older kind of wolf eventually split off to become dogs.

So even if they are similar to living organisms, why should that person care? Well if a forest has only one kind of animal in it thats bad, right? its the same with languages. because another thing that languages share with species is that they can go extinct (no fluent speakers left) and there is currently a mass extinction going on. many languages are dying out because they are being pushed out through linguistic imperialism, arent being passed on because parents want their children to only know the prestige language, etc. We are losing so many languages that can never be brought back to the way they were. It is estimated that over half of the worlds languages will be extinct by the end of the century. dont let yours be one of them.

(hopefully this is enough of what you want. I just pulled all of this off the top of my head so im probably missing a lot of stuff and oversimplifying others. but yeah. languages (and also dialects they are like subspecies and are also important) are great and important)

(also i used language a lot up above because I’ve always heard of mandarin and cantonese as separate languages that share a common writing system and arent mutually intelligible so i kept forgetting you said dialect specifically. everything still applies either way)

#linguistics #long post #this concludes todays scheduled linguistics rant #i dont know enough about sinic languages so please someone correct me if i've gotten anything wrong #confusedsiewmai

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captaingondor · 5 years

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Okay, but if you're still looking for romantic prompts, how about Character A saying I love you to Character B without using the words "I love you." (Through actions, or an "as you wish" situation. That kinda thing.)

Thanks for the prompt!!For this, I wrote about probably my favorite of my OC ships. Tragically I probably won’t be able to show as much of their relationship as I’d like in the work itself, and neither of them is the perspective character. This is fortunate in that I can write whatever I want for self-fanfic without stepping on the main narrative’s toes, and unfortunate as I want to just write their whole relationship basically which made this a little hard to pare down. Hope y’all love them too!If you want some dramatic irony, also read this piece I wrote with Corrianne earlier. And, if you are curious, the correct way to pronounce her name is ‘cor-ee- AHN,’ with a French R sound.

How Empress Corrianne Learned to Speak Her Husband’s Language

When they married, Corrianne could not speak to her new husband.

Like most nobility around the continent, she had never studied Pelasian. Even centuries later, the fears birthed by the Speaker Wars lived on. No mage could twist your mind to his will if you couldn't understand the words he needed to do it. (Of course, now Pelasia had grown to power anyway without the use of mind-altering magic, so maybe it had all been for nothing.) And the Emperor, it seemed, had never bothered to learn any language but his own native tongue.

Corrianne studied and practiced until she was able to carry on something of a conversation with him without going through her ladies-in-waiting or his translator. The Emperor could not even say her name right.

But chipping away at the language barrier was not aiding their communication to the level that she had thought it should. True, she did not mind the extent to which he left her to herself - she had encouraged it. No, the Emperor was simply a hard man to understand. So she told herself, and so she held firmly in believing.

She could not have said when she first started noticing a difference.

***

He knocked at the door between their suites late in the evening, when she had retreated to hers from the court but not yet prepared herself for bed. He always knocked - these rooms remained hers, not his. The first few times he’d done this, she’d sent one of her maids to answer instead and give her regrets. When he proved unfailingly polite to them, and did not push past her excuses, she decided this could be allowed and came to the door herself. He never demanded her presence, or even requested - a request from the Emperor was little less than a demand. He merely gave an offer - he had ended his work for the day and would be in his sitting room, and would welcome her company if she wished to join him.

“I usually take this time for some quiet when I can… read for a bit by the fire, have a glass of wine… but if you would like to talk instead -” His eyes flicked to the maid murmuring all his words in Corrianne’s ear. “Perhaps practice your Pelasian?”

He had not offered to practice his Ruveldin, or even Idan, so that time she had refused. But she didn’t really want to spend the rest of her life married to a man that she would not talk to, so the next time she had accepted.

She’d been worried about his intentions that time, though he’d never touched her without her permission. But he really had just sat by the fire with his book and offered her a glass of wine, and did not press her unduly for conversation when she opened her own book. They made a few simple comments to each other on their day, and what they were reading, and spent the rest of the evening in silence together. She wondered how many times he’d had two glasses brought up, hope. She wondered if he’d left a few dregs in each to keep the servants from talking. She felt a little bad, but only a little.

She’d come over many times since then, and it had almost become a little ritual between them. They did not always spend the time reading silently - she truly did wish to practice her Pelasian, and he proved a patient conversation partner.

This time when he knocked, she answered with a smile and stepped through before he even needed to make his offer. She carried a book with her, but did not open it immediately when she sat down, and so he did not reach to pick up his own. “Thank you for joining me.” Even now that it was a regular occurrence, he thanked her. “I enjoy your company. I have little time to myself, but this has been an improvement on solitude.”

She had not thought the Emperor one to seek out solitude. He demanded the attention of the world. Perhaps she had misunderstood him. She smiled politely and asked him about his day. He was a man of routine; she knew the words he would use to speak about that well enough to follow, better than whatever that declaration had been.

***

They were at dinner, which was rarely a private affair. There were always people at court to entertain. But today was no great feast or party, only a regular meal, and while the Emperor’s attention might as ever be demanded at any time, at present Corriane and her husband were left to converse among themselves as they ate, should they choose to.

They did not always. Corrianne preferred practicing her Pelasian when they were in private, and going through a translator was more clunky than casual dinner conversation with her husband ought to be. And besides, it was dinner, and their main focus was eating.

But today, he chose to strike a conversation up. “Have you heard from your sisters lately?”

She’d received a letter from Everrie just that day. Perhaps he’d had mail come in from Ruveld as well, or seen the messenger bring it in. Or perhaps it was a lucky guess, though that seemed less likely. “I have.”

“And how are they?”

A few times, early on, when the Emperor had asked about her family, she had wondered if he were fishing for information on them, for his schemes or politics. But that had been silly. Surely he had plenty of sources for that without her.

“Both are well. Also my father, and -” She paused. She did not know the proper word for stepmother or half-brother. But he knew that they were her stepmother and half-brother, of course, there was no need to explain it to him. “And his wife, and Alairon.”

“Glad to hear it. Your younger sister’s birthday was coming up, wasn’t it?” He didn’t try to say her name - maybe he’d seen Corrianne wince as he mispronounced hers too many times.

“Yes, they had just celebrated it when Everrie wrote me.”

“She could handle planning for it without you, then?”

Oh. He had remembered, from the last time Everrie wrote. She had told him how Everrie was used to following her lead for social events, how she had been so frantic about taking it on herself, how she had wanted to prove she could step up to the task without leaning too heavily on their stepmother. She hadn’t passed on all of Everrie’s pouring out her heart - she did not think she’d have like the Emperor to hear all of it - but she liked to talk about home, and it was a good subject for her to use in practicing her conversation. And, she realized, her husband had been very attentive in asking her about her sisters. He had been since the first time she brought it up.

“It was as I told her, she -” She hesitated, and finished the sentence in Ruveldin for his interpreter to pass on. “She is more competent than she gives herself credit. She just needed to get her time of worrying out of the way and put her mind to it.”

“Still, they must miss you at home. You light up my court so, I can see it would be hard to lose you.”

She hardly knew how to respond to that, and took a bite so that she would not have to.

***

One of her ladies reported to Corrianne that her husband had had a gift sent to her rooms, so she came to them and found the box set on a table. She opened it to find a delicate golden hair comb, set with many small, deep red gems. Beautiful, and very much to her taste. She wondered if he had picked it out himself.

It was hardly the first gift he had given her. Fine cloth for her dresses, a dark bay riding horse, expensive jewelry, books - ones that he thought she would enjoy, or Pelasian translations of ones she had to help in her study. Some she had written off as no more than what might be expected from the Emperor to his wife. The others had confounded her. What did he mean by them? Was he trying to buy her affections, to keep her and thereby her father’s kingdom sweet? Did he wish to flaunt his wealth and power?

But none of those thoughts came to her now - only a desire to find her husband so she could thank him for it.

She made a few inquiries and was glad to be able to find him alone, going over his correspondence. He looked up, and smiled when he saw her. She’d never noticed before how different that smile looked from the one she saw him wear in public, how his eyes brightened with it. He nodded at the comb she clutched in her hand.

“You like it?”

She nodded. “It is -” It is lovely, she wanted to say, but could not find the right word as she filed through her Pelasian vocabulary. “It is very nice.”

He stood up from his desk and walked over to her. “I thought it would look well with your hair.” His eyes lifted to the honey-gold braids crowning her head as he spoke. He hesitated a moment, and then held out his hand. “May I?”

She passed the comb to him, and he slid it into her hair as though he were one of her maids. Her husband stood back, and looked at her admiringly for the space of several second, before frowning.

“I’m sorry - I don’t have a mirror here for you to look at it -”

She smiled softly. “I am sure you put it in straight. Thank you.”

“I’m happy you like it, Corrianne.” He stumbled over the r, and tried again. “Cor - Corrianne -”

It still was not right, but she smiled anyway. “I understand, Seyetto.” And she set her hands on his shoulders, pushed herself up on her toes, and kissed him.

#my ocs #something i wrote #corrianne #seyetto #throwaninkpot

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lamarisabidilla · 6 years

Text

Tips to Learn Any Language Like a Native

If you’ve every tried to learn a language, you’ve probably had that moment where you realize that what you’ve learned in class doesn’t really translate to how natives use the language in day-to-day life. The vocabulary is different, the accents are hard to understand, and you struggle to come up with responses on the fly. These tips will help prepare you for real life conversations, and will make learning more fun along the way!!

1: Interact with one form of media in your target language each day

I can’t stress this enough. This can be anything from listening to a song you like, watching a movie, listening to a podcast, listening to the radio, check out Spotify for podcasts and playlists.... the options are endless, and it will expose you to the real use of the language and will help you perfect your accent!

2: Use children’s media

If you can find Sesame Street or in your target language, you’re off to a great start. Check out your local library and see if they offer children’s books in the language, or try to find an alphabet song on youtube. This is a simple way to hear vocabulary you’ve probably already learned, get exposure to the culture where the language is spoken, and learn vocabulary you won’t get in class.

3: Find a singer/band that you like, and learn the lyrics to their songs

Sometimes language is used differently in songs than it is in conversation, and that’s OK! Find something you like the sound of, print out the lyrics and translate what you don’t know. Learn the song well enough to sing along to. This helps you with vocabulary and learning the culture, and is a great way to open discover new music.

4: Learn dirty words

You need to know when you’re being insulted, right? Slang and dirty words can vary region to region, but learning them for the area you’re most interested in is a great way to make sure you’re not left stranded when speaking with natives.

5: Don’t neglect regions, find differences in accents

Being able to pinpoint where someone comes from while speaking your target language can be difficult, but it’s a great way to learn differences in culture and ways of speaking. It gives you practice understanding what is being said no matter who says it, and it lets you pick which accent you most want to imitate while learning.

6: Rewatch Disney movies dubbed into your target language

You likely already know the story line, which makes the movie easier to follow. It’s a great way to pick up new phrases and vocabulary, and the dubs are usually fairly faithful to what would normally be used. Plus, the speakers speak clearly, and the vocabulary is usually not too far out of reach for beginning learners.

7: Use subtitles in your target language when watching tv in your native language whenever possible

This is another way to keep up with exposure to the language. Plus, it forces you to think about how YOU would say something, and find discrepancies in what is being said and what is written on the screen.

8: Talk to yourself

It might feel a little silly, but this is an excellent way to practice your accent, review learned vocabulary, and make sure that you feel as comfortable speaking as you do reading/writing. There’s no pressure to get anything right, and you can practice catching mistakes as you go!

9: Get a PenPal

Language is all about communication. Finding a buddy to do a language exchange with helps you make connections, meet native speakers, and get corrections on your writing. Some websites like Interpals and PenPal World can be great for this, but be careful if you’re a minor, and never give out your personal info.

10: Enjoy the ride!

Languages are supposed to be fun! It opens you up to new ideas, people, and media that you wouldn’t understand otherwise. Don’t be afraid to reach out, make mistakes, and pick up some embarrassing stories along the way. It’s part of the process!

Good luck learning!

#langblr #studyblr #languages #polyglot #learning languages #French #spanish #korean #chinese #japanese #tipsandtricks

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dr-treyf · 6 years

Text

gut yontiff. on shvues, you're supposed to stay up late learning about jewish stuff, and later tonight i'm going to give the rambly presentation below to my jewish community group. hopefully they don't kick me out. i don't say "death to israel" but i make my allegiances pretty clear. i hope you enjoy the song attached if you've never heard it before.

-----

Yiddish...what is it? what is language? what is culture? what is civilization?

i'm being coy and speaking in silly grandiose terms, but if there's one thing i want people to take away from this, it's is that yiddish was an entire civilization, a way of living and understanding life.

yiddish is a 1,000 year old language -- pieces of yiddish writing have been found in the cairo geniza in egypt -- and it is a global language. one yiddish writer called it the most widely spoken language in terms of geography.

if you've heard of the PEN international association of writers and its clubs that are based on geography...yiddish was the first international PEN club admitted to its ranks and they had to go through a unique application process because they had 'headquaters' in a number of countries.

i also don't think it's a coincidence that the guy who invented esperanto, the universal language, was a native yiddish speaker.

so yiddish is a civilization and for me this has enabled it to fill a unique role.

and i might start speaking in vague terms again...but i have another preface:

in many ways i feel alienated from the normative jewish community, inasmuch as i remain a straight white male. i feel alienated -- or rather, i see alienation and deep division within the jewish community -- because of my politics.

i also want to say that the rest of what follows is in good faith. as i get to know people in this group i don't want to troll anyone. the positions that i've come to come from a long-time engagement with jewish issues in a variety of settings, academic, professional, activist. writing and corresponding with others.

but i would be remiss if i spoke about yiddish without speaking of the jewish radical tradition, which i believe has been suppressed within the jewish community. and so for me my identity as a marxist and anti-zionist -- as well as an atheist, which is not super important because atheism has no real content or goal -- aligns very much with an attachment to yiddish. if it weren't for yiddish i would have a much harder time feeling jewish.

so the point is that -- and i wrote about this for jewish currents -- our way of life does not allow for the adequate cultivation of this thing we call jewish identity. assimilation has a political explanation: jews have become wealthier, and we have become attached to nationalism. this has entailed casting off yiddish-ethnic identity.

and so i'm getting rambly but i want to tie this back to yiddish being civilizational:

you've probably heard the phrase old wives' tale, or in yiddish a bubbe mayse.

well that comes from a yiddish adaption of an italian romance story from the early 15th century called the bovo bukh. bovo was the name of a knight. it sounds similar to bubbe. it was an outrageous tale and thus became associated with made up stories that your grandmother might tell you. this is yiddish language understanding the world and putting its own spin on it.

another example: in the 17th century, after a devastating series of pogroms, a rabbi wanted to help jews cope with and understand the horror. he wrote, in yiddish, about how demons who work in the underworld control the machinations of evil people on earth. so in the absence of any sort of political or scientific understanding, jews turned to yiddish and demons to make sense of bad shit.

and as we move along in the history of yiddish civilization we come to socialism.

we're going to sing a yiddish socialist song shortly, but briefly: as a socialist and yiddish lover living in 5778, what is the role of yiddish absent a robust yiddish society? well, i believe per the literary theorist and marxist frederic jameson, that we can study culture and tease out a buried historical narrative that has important things to say about world events and political economic systems.

so for a language that was created through a series of migrations and oppression and spoken across borders; and then brought to the edge of extinction by fascism; and was suppressed by other jews in the name of building a nation for ourselves (yiddish plays were banned in israel for a while); we can begin to craft a radical yiddish tradition.

This song, called Barikadn (barricades), was written by Shmerke Kaczerginski, a communist who was 15 at the time. He was orphaned in WWI – note the line that describes pots and pans as orphans. He was a member of the Paper Brigades of the Vilna Ghetto in WWII, responsible for rescuing numerous literary and religious works (there’s a new book out about them). He also fought as a partisan with the Soviets. He died in Argentina in 1954 after living mostly in Poland and Paris.

I associate two things with children throwing rocks: in the early 20th century, when the lower east side was mostly immigrants, sight-seeing tour buses would go through and kids would throw rocks at them; second, there are people resisting oppression, which is being carried out by our people, and their only recourse against heavily armed border guards is throwing rocks. the song is linked here.

#jewish #yiddish #zionism #marxism #socialism

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this-brownie · 4 years

Text

3.31.20

it feels therapeutic to write things out and be able to put my thoughts into words that I can visualize. I, sadly, had to stop writing in my old blog because Tumblr locked me out of it because I no longer had access to that Email…fucking yahoo and 2007 emails…anyway. I want to do a continuation from that blog so I will be making quite some posts about my past, starting from around April 2016.

https://somebrownie.tumblr.com

lets begin with a little background. so dad died on April 16 2017, but he had been sick for years before that. it first started off with slurred speech almost like he was drunk or something, which was when I was in tenth grade, and then progressed to him not being able to speak at all, resorting to writing on paper to communicate with us, not being able to eat solid foods anymore, having to get a tube attached onto his throat, bringing in medical equipment that was situated on his bed while he slept, and eventually having to move to a nursing home completely where he spent his final two years. I am not going to discuss what a domineering and prideful man he was, what a workaholic he was, how he tried to show us his love and affection through money and materialism, or how his death impacted me. those can be discussed at a later time.

one positive result that came from this situation is that I had a little more freedom in pursuing the life I wanted. my mom always looked to him for guidance on every decision— I knew I wouldn't be able to marry the person who I loved because he would never allow it. Levi is a jew after all and as a muslim im supposed to hate him, of course. after he died, my mom became severely lost— she had never been completely independent. however, she still had her reservations when I told her who I wanted to marry. I had to be extremely forward, logical, and manipulative about it because old habits and a lifetime of molded mentality don't wash away that easily. a few factors helped me achieve my goal: I was in the process of graduating and had no means to get a job in my field because I didnt have the legal papers to reside in this country. by getting married, I would obtain a green card which would allow me to make money and make use of my degree. also, there was less pressure to uphold an image for our distant family and relatives— people had naturally started distancing themselves the sicker my dad became. less wealth flowed into our house meaning less parties to throw, less opportunities to give gifts to others, and less reasons to cook fancy food. this all contributed to people checking up less on my mom— all these people who she hold so dearly, couldn't give less of a fuck when they had nothing to benefit them. I asked her, are these the people youre trying to impress? is this the reason you want to hold me back? because it won't look good to THEM even tho they don't help us at all? even while we are struggling? the last sneaky tactic I pulled was telling her that there are several friends who are willing to marry me, but at a cost. only one person who is willing to do it without a charge (good old Levi haha). and to my utter shock, she slowly agreed. I wasn't sure if she completely understood so I confirmed…”you know that means I have to live with him right…in case the lawyers check?” she said she understood and was okay with it. sweet success. that was June 2018.. in a couple months we will have been married for two years now.

Levi and I have been seeing each other since 2011. so our marriage was….a long time coming to say the least. luckily I had the chance to meet almost all of his immediate family members before we fully committed. the first people I met were his aunt candy and uncle chuck way back in 2013 for thanksgiving, and then again for Levis graduation ceremony in 2014. I've gone over for thanksgiving and passover dinners throughout the years as well. I met Levis parents for the first time in 2015 (I think) in boston and I was deathly nervous. his dad used to teach Jewish studies at both Harvard and yale—he's retired but still gets invited to conferences to gives speeches around the world. his mom opened a free after school program to teach poor children who don't have access to educational resources. so ofc I was so nervous I could hardly breathe. I wore a cute, not too revealing, dress and minimal makeup. thankfully, they steered the conversation and actually didnt interrogate me too much. we mostly just told stories which was nice. I remember one conversation where I talked about my degree in linguistics, my affinity for learning and understanding how languages work, and seamlessly adding an anecdote from a tv show that Levi and I watched from just the night before. the person on tv, I think he may have been European, wasn't able to pronounce the word “skewer” which I found very interesting because there are many sounds our tongues can't produce because we are not used to moving them in that certain way. something about the brain and tongue not being able to make the connection between the ways a foreign word is spelled and the different areas it has intonations. like, native Spanish speakers would have a difficult time saying an English word that starts with ‘sp’ like “special” or ‘sk’ in “school” because in their language the letter s isn't followed by another consonant; the sound of the letter ‘e’ always precedes the ‘s’ (like if you were to literally sound out the letter ‘s’)-- so a speaker would pronounce it as “especial”. anyway! I told his parents this tidbit that I found intriguing and added that Levi isn't able to pronounce the sound ‘gh’ but his dad was able to make all those sounds perfectly! which impressed me and put a smile on my face. his mom, who is French, was practicing the different sounds herself (not properly) and his dad just makes eye contact with me, rolls his eyes in a goofy way aimed at his wife, which cracked me up because here is this sweet woman trying her best and her silly husband secretly, but lovingly, making fun of her. it touched me because it felt so tender and genuine, when I had never really seen something like that exchanged in between my own parents.

I met his younger sister and middle brother, but only after we got married. his sister alissa is a such a sweet, quiet, docile woman who really looks up to and adores Levi. she used to stay near us while she studied law at nyu. his brother David is animated, quirky yet can be very serious, and is very kind as well. I probably didnt leave a good first impression because the three of us had been walking to a restaurant and this HUGE man and his huge ass fucking dog purposely bumped into me, in order to get by me. I don't think Ive ever gotten that angry at a stranger. I was actually in pain at how hard he smacked into me. I started cursing and Levi was shocked that I was being so loud/violent especially in front of his family member. I just said “did you see his fucking size? did he really need half the block just ti get past me?” in my head im thinking, its because im a small woman that he knows he can get away with it. and then Levi finally realized the gravity of the situation and said “should I go talk to him?” but the man had already walked away at this point. I calmed down at that point thinking, yes im gonna let my tiny husband fight this massive douche bag. I apologized to david and we just continued on.

I never got a chance to meet levi’s eldest brother, wife and youngest kids until I visited Israel (different post!) but I did meet hilly, their oldest daughter when she visited nyc with Levis parents. she's sweet, a bit of a rebel, maybe even hotheaded and insecure like the way I was when I was a teen. I enjoyed spending time with her and gifted her a bunch of lipsticks/glosses and a mascara from Sephora when we all had to say goodbye. I think she felt comfortable that I was younger because she opened up to me about her boyfriend, and told me to keep it a secret. I knew she liked me too because once Levi and I finally got married, she told him that she knew we were going to get married as soon as she met me.

even though I had a lot of luxuries as a child, I never truly experienced unconditional love without trauma or negativity. others may have it worse, but I had what I had. I've dealt with it and come away from it as a better person thanks to Levi. I feel happy to call them my family now, and that they accept me without hesitation despite me being muslim, or much younger. I still feel shy to talk to them on the WhatsApp group chat but im working on it!

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eyedelater · 7 years

Text

post about the rest of the ajin anime (seasons 1 and 2)

(nothing special, just a liveblog post)

ajin episode 6

i see that the animation budget saved by doing CGI was instead spent on the fluttery shifty effects of the black ghosts

so satou's ghost is also anvil-headed

right, nagai doesn't have much empathy... hmm... hmm... that doesn't excuse his being an asshole at times

tosaki sure is eager to jump to conclusions as to why satou didn't bring out his ghost

ohh, ghost-to-ghost head collisions can bump some memories back and forth, interesting, i forgot about that...

huh, what is eriko calling kei "onii-chan" for at a time like this? she called him "nii-san" to his face and i think in front of everyone who talked to her about him, right? was that her way of expressing worry about him...?

episode 7

tosaki's gotta get that dekai kane

right, of course he's motivated by comatose fiance. doesn't excuse any of the shit he's done

episode 8

nakano kou. do we seriously have a kei, a kai, and a kou? sounds like a bit of a natural OT3 tbh

episode 9

there we go, nagai kei finally being an indisputable asshole

oh, right, big pharma makes an appearance as an antagonist

sokabe has a very silly face.

i already forgot what IBM stands for and can only come up with IBM he company or ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missile) without the C

right, ogura's distinguishing feature was not only smoking cigarettes, but being unreasonably dedicated to his brand of smokes in particular. so dumb

episode 10

ogura says a black ghost can only be used once or twice a day, but didn't nagai kei whip em out one after another like it was no thing? is that his special protagonist power that makes him differentiated enough to be the protagonist?

kei's ghost learned how to fell a tree from minecraft

do they really have huge screens up in cities complete with booming audio? the screens are nothing new, but the audio seems unusual to me

episode 11

oh, tosaki finally learned satou's name. from satou's video.

yamanaka-san bought him an oPhone8

"life and money are synonymous" sounds like your typical CEO

omfg satou rode the sinking tower and had a great time

sokabe is still calling satou "hat guy." get with the picture

episode 12

this just in: does satou sometimes substitute a "sh" sound in for an "s" sound?

episode 13

kei demonstrates his shittiness by holding a knife to yamanaka-san's neck after getting sniped. what a dick. oh wait he made it work. well whatever

tosaki says nagai kei is not a fool and as such he probably already scouted out the area, but tosaki immediately also says nagai kei has probably exhausted his black ghost uses for the day, something a fool would do because only a fool doesn't know their own limits and try to use them tactically in such a situation

time for season 2 i guess, episode 2-1

this OP isn't bad i guess

these subs having sokabe say "it's normal for a subordinate to greet his senpai." listen, if you use "senpai," you gotta also use "kohai," and if you use "subordinate," you also gotta use "superior" you can't just pick and choose which words you want to translate

this ending song is horrible

ep 2-2

sakurai emerging from the airplane toilet clearly zipping up his fly out of frame and seeing satou and his eyebrows just turn on a fulcrum and then turn backward like they're pinball flippers

ep 2-3

ah. i was musing over what must be the most popular ship for ajin, thinking maybe kei/kai or kei/kou or tosaki/ogura, but i've had a bit of a realization, and if i know the hearts of the BL community at all, their favorite ship is probably some sinful shit like tosaki/kei. i’ll find out soon enough whether i’m right (haven’t looked at any ajin pixiv tags yet)

ep 2-4

kotobuki, eh. seems like a charming character. oh, this bandanna delinquent is pulling the ol' pee-and-chat

kaito, everyone's favorite punching bag

for the record, i know i've read beyond this point in the manga, but i don't remember shit except that i left off around a chapter where we see shimomura's history.

kotobuki has a small head, maybe he just squeezed through some bars to escape

ah, i just realized the other anime this kinda reminds me of: zankyou no terror. it's got the police/government and the american government trying to intervene aspect to it.

carly meyers doesn't have any kind of american accent... i was kinda hoping she would

neither does doug here. i guess they didn't have voice actors who would have some fun doing a bad accent... or maybe they didn't see it as appropriate

holy FUCK, kaito executed a flying dropkick even though he wasn't on higher ground or anything, what the fuck

kotobuki asks kai what nagai kei is like and i earnestly half-expected him to reply "he's scum" like everyone else does

oh, so kotobuki's got a winged kuro-chan. lucky...

i forgot to write about this in the episode where it was said, but that iowan ajin whose ghost was driving a tractor is such a perfect image i can't stop thinking about it

ep 2-5

so i guess satou's catchphrase is "sssshate" (bc he kinda does a "sha" instead of a "sa") (meaning "now, then.")

the first OP wasn't skippable but i find myself needing to skip this one

there's lots of "pulling up live television broadcasts via a non-television device" in this anime

kou calling shimomura "izumi-san" pls

i like how whoever is nearest the whiteboard is the one to cross the latest victim off the target list

ok, if tosaki is about to be fired (which, hasn't he been for a while now?), that made me think, why is he concerned about his job when he's doing this conspiring with ogura and nagai etc hidden from his superiors? is he concerned about stopping satou, or is he still only concerned about money for his fiancee...? is he getting hella paid for this even though he's less involved in the torture (the real moneymaking activity) than before?

i don't like this dynamic btwn american guy and carly meyers where he keeps correcting her gruffly and she keeps backing off and looking afraid/ashamed.

they had nakano put on a satou hat to be satou ;w;

did shimomura just plug a flash drive into her phone? what kind of compatibility we got in this time period?

how long do neck-stab sedatives take to kick in in real life?

carly meyers's kuro-chan has a gem-shaped head

why don't all ajins just keep a knife or something on them to cut their own throat whenever they get hurt

ep 2-6

tainaka yoko. yup, this is about where i left off in the manga, i believe

whoa there, tosaki just got tased right in the nib nob. that's dirty, american doug

i can't say i feel bad for tosaki getting tortured.

ep 2-7

shut your ungrateful mouth, tosaki, shimomura was LITERALLY just doing her job, which you TOLD HER WAS HER JOB: PROTECTING YOU

how in the fuck did satou get away with playing dead when the other side KNOWS it's ajins they're fighting

why isn't ogura, a native english speaker, the one writing an email to the defense department

ep 2-8

this new OP is ok

ep 2-10

(i spent all of 2-9 doing origami instead of typing)

tosaki don't relapse on your smoking habit :( that's not gonna do anyone any good.

ep 2-11

kai busts in with his signature move and saves the day and he's started calling kotobuki "senpai"

so kei's signature line to kai is "i really have to pee"

kai's like "you're wrong. he (kei) isn't an idiot." that's right, he's actually trash, ask anyone

i can't emphasize enough how bad this ending theme is

ep 2-12

well okuyama-kun has been kind of lovable so far, so if he and others decide to join tosaki's side, that would probably be good

isn't burying someone alive the worst way to try to contain them? because you can't see them directly. they could escape without you noticing

ep 2-13

no kabedonning shimomura >:(

wait wait is tanaka also wearing a satou hat? oh, it's just a baseball cap.

fuck off tanaka don't impale shimomura in the same way twice

oh, one of nagai's new ghost army said the thing that nagai said at the scene where he first saw a ghost :0 about the sick puppy. i like all these ghosts spouting quotes

oh, he cut off satou's head. well, that's the first head we've seen cut off. is he facing the right direction to meet his new self? he closed his eyes too soon for us to find out :\

helicopters are raining in bullets from above like in ghost in the shell (1995) (unless i’m completely misremembering. there were other things that were raining bullets in various directions in that scene so i’m not sure)

so now satou's in custody for the first time.

so satou had an exposition dream

honestly i’m no longer sure where i even left off when i read the manga x years ago, i feel like i may have dropped it because i didn’t care for the boring military shit going on for quite a while, but i feel like i even distantly remember satou being beheaded in the manga...? but anyway i’m gonna (re?)read the whole manga now i guess. overall manga verdict: it had a distant, clammy feel to it, but not bad; the voice for nagai’s ghost was real good; they did a good job with the cgi animation, but it definitely lacks something compared to the art in the manga; the only good OP was the first one; and yeah idk my feeling toward this anime is pretty neutral.

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comicteaparty · 5 years

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August 24th-August 30th, 2019 Creator Babble Archive

The archive for the Creator Babble chat that occurred from August 24th, 2019 to August 30th, 2019. The chat focused on the following question:

What is your favorite aspect when writing character dialogue? What is your least favorite aspect?

HiddenElephant

My favorite aspect when writing character dialogue is when characters get into arguing or other verbal conflict; this stuff writes itself! My least favorite aspect is remembering to put in all the minor character verbal tics, such as no sharkfolk using contractions. Oh, and the obligatory link: http://thewideocean.thecomicseries.com/

spacerocketbunny

I love writing personal or emotional dialogue for characters, it's fun to see how they all express themselves differently in these situations and how they handle it! One thing I struggle with is adding bits of different languages in character dialogue if they're bi/multilingual. I'm not bilingual myself and I don't have the best resources or references to turn to when writing dialogue, so I worry if it comes off a bit silly(edited)

keii4ii

@spacerocketbunny I'm bilingual and know a lot of multilingual folks IRL. I don't know if this is universal, but it seems to be the case among the people I know: if someone is fluent in both languages, they won't switch between languages while talking to someone not fluent in both languages. (This ruined the character Mako for me, in her intro scene in the Pacific Rim movie...)

Someone who's only fluent in one language might very well be different. Also could be different if the two languages share a lot of similarities, e.g. two Latinate languages. Most of the bi/multilingual people I know speak Korean/English, so it's hard to mix them up unintentionally.

deo101

I am also bilingual, though it is in ASL so it would be incredibly difficult for me to even "accidentally" switch between languages. Though, I can attest that all my multilingual friends (usually spanish/english) don't really switch either. I can think of one time a friend yelled angrily in spanish at a videogame which was an accident, but that's it.

spacerocketbunny

In any instances that I have written parts with a bit of different languages it's always been intentional on the character's part, so none of them have been "accidental slips" and whatnot, Thank you for your insight though, that's very helpful!

kayotics

As per the question: dialogue is my favorite part to write, in all honesty. Probably why comics are fun for me. I think my favorite part about dialogue is figuring out how to weave exposition into natural character interactions. Sometimes it doesn’t make sense to do that (like someone explaining a problem), but for things that the characters would naturally know (like how the world works or relationships between other characters) I enjoy trying to tie in exposition for the reader while still making it seem natural. Least favorite is probably just keeping things trimmed down, I tend to get carried away. I also find remembering character voice a little difficult to implement, like one character using specific words or ways of speaking. And the comic plug: https://www.ingress-comic.com/

mariah currey

Lol same X') sometimes it feels more like the plot is directed more by conversations I want the characters to have than anything else. That's kind of an exaggeration, but the most fun part for me is thinking about the emotional exchabge between characters. And yeah my least favorite part is editing the dialogue down. I tend to write long so a lot of the time it's like a puzzle of trying to figure out how to still communicate what I'm trying to get across in half the words I originally wrote it to be. Link: http://rainydaydreams.mariahcurrey.com/

AntiBunny

I don't so much write dialogue, as I do let it play out in my head. The characters of AntiBunny http://antibunny.net/ sort of just write their own. Each has their own mannerisms from Piago's unexplained southern accent, that none of her family shows, to Pooky's use of British slang picked up from watching too many Britcoms. So my favorite part is just playing the scenes out in my head, and letting them form organically. Least favorite part is when it comes to the final draft, and cutting it down to what will fit on the page and flow well with the action. A lot has to go in the name of flow, just like a realistic organic conversation can't really be depicted in fiction and tell a cohesive story. So it has to be distilled down to the message that needs to be delivered, and then that needs to be balanced for what will display properly in sequential art.

FeatherNotes

As far as the bilingual tibit goes- my family has a lot of french /english speaking people and phrases often go in and out of each language when speaking to each other. The sentence doesn't straight up go into another language mid thought, rather its peppered in. Often when the point can't be articulated in the speaking language, in my example, french would be used to emphasize a feeling. And it's something I've done and seen a lot- i think it depends on where the speakers are in these situations. There are specific bilingual provinces and states that show people doing the same (im from quebec and the way the pepper in both languages is very much how they speak.) So, when writing characters, having a sense of environment and placement of culture is something to consider to flesh them out with dialogue. My least fave part of writing is trimming as well to fit the pages and not sound too wordy haha

Tuyetnhi

For me, I have fun writing dialogue when there's conflict and tension between two characters, like a situation where another has to decieve through their words or confessing their feelings. It does play a bit of foreshadowing but I also want it to appear as contingent as possible lol. About the bilingual thing, I'm also bilingual but i often struggle trying to say the right words either in english or vietnamese (such as describing a certain word in english to a Vietnamese speaker and I end up saying the english word of the thing I want to describe lmao. It happens a lot). I think that situation is common with a lot of folks who grown up in a bilingual household (such as both of your parents speak 2 languages, and you end up assorbing most of that native language of the country your in instead your parents native tongue). I'm planning to incorpate this through my MC's dialogue for that kind of naturalism (plus other factors too lmao).(edited)

least fav part is also trying not to be wordy as well. lmao. i do like trimming dialogue just to make it feel kinda punchy in a way depending on the character.(edited)

snuffysam

For Super Galaxy Knights http://sgkdr.thecomicseries.com/, I just love writing dialogue in general. Figuring out how different characters should react in different situations, figuring out a way for it to all sound natural... it's all fun. The one thing I dislike is when I have to explain some concept to the readers in a character's voice. Taci explaining energy usage to Mizuki was fun because he's the type to lord over his knowledge of something. And Pejiba explaining magic abilities to Mizuki made sense, though that dialogue still feels a bit lacking to me. But there's this one upcoming scene in book 3 where I HATE the dialogue, just because there's no other way to explain stuff other than "as you know, only one in every million people can survive the radstream" and it's annoying.

LadyLazuli (Phantomarine)

I love finding moments to slip in random quirky character-building dialogue bits in Phantomarine (http://www.phantomarine.com/). The phenomenon of having a character say one thing - funny, heart-wrenching, relatable, or otherwise - and have the audience immediately fall in love with them (or hate them intensely!) is something I like trying, because I’ve experienced a similar phenomenon many times, both with fictional characters and in real life. Sometimes, all it takes is a single sentence for me to go “Ooh, you’re a unique one. I like you. I want to know more about you. What’s your deal?” My gold standard is the introduction of Lilo in “Lilo and Stitch.” She’s instantly memorable and relatable in her weirdness. My instinct is to streamline dialogue to convey information as clearly and quickly as possible, but adding those non-essential characterization moments is so important - it makes the characters so real, and breaks up the pacing nicely, especially in a story that’s generally pretty serious. Those quirky bits make the experience so much more fun.

Steph (@grandpaseawitch)

I absolutely love writing dialogue for http://oldmanandtheseawitch.tumblr.com/. I think it's really where a lot of characterization shines, especially if you know how to use speech bubbles fluently to do so. Every character has a different beat, a different musicality. Ains (and most of the Pub Lads) tend to have dialects a bit like dropping a rock into a puddle. A sudden beat with few ripples--they're laymen, fishermen, you have to get across a lot in only a short time span. "Yep," "nope," and for Ains, he's especially prone to this. Witchy, comparatively, when he finally talks (minor spoiler but not that surprising), has a purring, flowing, flowery sort of language. Ains is very upfront and forward. Witchy's comes across as having an ulterior motive. Dialogue becomes another means of illustrating their individual personalities. My least favorite part is purely technical: formatting and consolidation. Having to pick where you sacrifice legibility for character and character for legibility. Blurbs don't always fit nicely into bubbles, or I have to add a word so as to not break the rules of bubble formatting too much.

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