[Castafiore]

Originally Posted by acionescu

Typing classes?

You don't have that?

I think it's becoming less important now with computers. When the animals could still talk (= before computers), typing something out was a slow process if you couldn't type properly (in my case, imagine a lot of cursing going on).
You can't go back to correct something in a matter of seconds like you can on a computer. Often, you need to retype the entire damn thing or at least, the page.
+ while you were typing, you had typex to correct but use it too often and your sheet of paper becomes a rag so you still have to retype.

It made sense to learn how to type back then.

[acionescu]

Of course not.

The way of having schools classes in West makes me

All the classes in Romania are mandatory, all the grades count if you want to enter highschool and universities and that makes all the teachers to become extremely bitchy and demanding and give themselves an importance that their object dont have( aka the Romanian way )

My son is 1st grade and studies: language writing, language reading, math, music, drawing, religion, biology, sports, informatics and practic/manual activity.

All mandatory
Until 6th grade when Physics is introduced and 7th grade when Chemistry is introduced too he already will have all the objects in the schedule including: geography, two foreign languages, history, civical education, latin, 3 kinds of mathematics, etc...

All mandatory again

And all the classes are writing/reading, nothing of typing, except informatics, of course

[-Evita-]

Well, typewriters were before my time. I can type without looking at the keyboard if need be (in fact, I'm typing this way right now) but I prefer to have the occasional look, it's way faster that way.

[Castafiore]

We had one of those old typing machines at home (so, not even an electric typing machine). You had to pounce really, really hard on the keys for the ink to stick on the sheet of paper (and if you were too quick, the machine got all mangled up so you had to unravel it).
Many people couldn't handle typing with ten fingers because they didn't have enough strength in their little finger. I have long fingers so that helped.

On the keyboard of a computer, you can fly over the keyboard, you barely have to touch the keys. If you'd apply the same sort of strength on modern keyboards you needed for those old machines, you'd destroy them within weeks, I reckon.
You can still recognise people who have learned how to type on old machines by the heavy pouncing on the keys.

Originally Posted by Andreea

The way of having schools classes in West makes me

Well, I'm talking about the school system for kids aged about 12 to 18.

For the ground schools (6-12), there is no option either. Every kid has the same courses, except for the kids with special needs/learning difficulties who go to specialised schools.

For what we call the middle schools (12-18), that's where you need to pick and select. Nowadays, you have to make a choice on the direction of your studies from the start (aged 12). When I went to the middle school, the first two years (12-14) were the same for everybody so that you could make a more informed choice on the direction of your studies in your third year.

[MariaV]

Originally Posted by acionescu

Of course not.

The way of having schools classes in West makes me

All the classes in Romania are mandatory, all the grades count if you want to enter highschool and universities and that makes all the teachers to become extremely bitchy and demanding and give themselves an importance that their object dont have( aka the Romanian way )

My son is 1st grade and studies: language writing, language reading, math, music, drawing, religion, biology, sports, informatics and practic/manual activity.

All mandatory
Until 6th grade when Physics is introduced and 7th grade when Chemistry is introduced too he already will have all the objects in the schedule including: geography, two foreign languages, history, civical education, latin, 3 kinds of mathematics, etc...

All mandatory again

And all the classes are writing/reading, nothing of typing, except informatics, of course

Latin? Still? Actually wow and !

About the typing classes LMFAO, we had some facultative or additional courses too in the what Hilde calls middle school ie junior high for Star I guess.
When I went to work we already had at least electric typewriters even at the uni (I helped the "absent-minded professors" to type sometimes ya know. ). But during my time there were no computers yet LOL, I graduated in 1992 mind you.
Do you have computers at school Andreea? Some schools here are starting to use those tablet PCs, would be good if kids didn't have to carry those heavy books every day like they do here. No Star & co, our kids don't have any lockers at school where they can keep their things, everything must be carried with you every day.

[acionescu]

No, no computers, except informatics classes of course.

I can see the Romanian teachers fuuuuuuuuuuuming if there were no manuals and all the kids had tablets

And of course everything is carried to and from school, otherwise everything would dissapear

[Castafiore]

We didn't have lockers either but we had school tables with a built-in closet.
We didn't have to carry all our books. We didn't have to buy the books, we could just borrow them from school. I mean, if everybody has the same books they didn't have to pay for, why would anybody bother to steal them?

[MariaV]

Originally Posted by acionescu

No, no computers, except informatics classes of course.

I can see the Romanian teachers fuuuuuuuuuuuming if there were no manuals and all the kids had tablets

And of course everything is carried to and from school, otherwise everything would dissapear

LOL exactly.
And you're lucky if someone doesn't steal your clothes and boots from the cloakroom or some violent kid doesn't cut them or so.
During my school days we had some cases of thefts. These days there are security guards in the bigger schools but thefts still happen. Not to mention mobbing money and mobile phones from younger kids.

[acionescu]

because we are like the scorpion from that frog story

[MariaV]

Originally Posted by Castafiore

We didn't have lockers either but we had school tables with a built-in closet.
We didn't have to carry all our books. We didn't have to buy the books, we could just borrow them from school. I mean, if everybody has the same books they didn't have to pay for, why would anybody bother to steal them?

Naaah, they wouldn't want the books most probably but everything else, sporting clothes and equipment, jackets, scarves, hats, gloves, shoes, painting things or whatever else. And if someone had lost their book? Had to steal it form someone else.
We've ALWAYS carried all the books here and if you forget one book at home - the teacher would write you a reprimand and punish you somehow and be veeeeeery mad.

[-Evita-]

There were no lockers when I was in school either but now there are quite a few schools that already have them (including my own old school). I would have loved the system, I think.

Speaking of classes, I can't imagine being 12 years old and having the freedom to choose something. The only thing I chose was the school (a math-oriented school) so I suppose we had a couple more math classes a week than other schools, that is - up to the 9th grade. The difference in the number of math classes was bigger during the last 3 years (let's call it high school). We had about 180 children in the same grade as me and they were divided into 6 groups. One group had a bit more humanitarian classes, another group had a bit more physics, another group had something else... My group had a bit more computer classes. I wouldn't necessarily have chosen this group but I had no choice because I had learned German up till then, not English. And there were so few "Germaners" among the 180 pupils (14-15 maybe) that they were all put into one group. Discussion over.

So, everyone who was in the same group had the same classes. If you wanted to, you could take some additional classes (like I took French for 3 years) but it was not mandatory. The mandatory classes were the same for everyone in the group.

[Castafiore]

In middle school, we had to wear uniforms so there was not much interest in stealing that either. What you did carry with you was stuff like your pens anc pencils, your calculating machine and the books you need for your home work.

Originally Posted by acionescu

because we are like the scorpion from that frog story

the only frog story I recall is the one where the frog turns into a prince after being kissed by a princess.

Googling:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Scorpion_and_the_Frog
--> I do know that story but it's not with a frog over here, I think. It has some other type of animal.

[Commander Data]

lol...

[Metis]

[Metis]

Originally Posted by wildegirl05

starplus, i have shopped for 30+ people. most of them with only vague directions of what they would like.

me =

Did you have time to do anything else? Unless you got souvenir type gifts for all of them from the same store.

hema, i actually lost weight because of the food poisoning episode my mom is now trying to make up for lost time. so i'll probably put on the pounds in this coming week

Food poisoning? You've been americanized.

Originally Posted by tennizen

For happy Mikey:

The cat is bigger than the baby.


Cat: "Can someone please give this kid a teddybear? "

Originally Posted by Corey Feldman

Originally Posted by Castafiore

Albert II who?

Talking about royalty...
Andreea, did you hear about the Dutch prince Friso's skiing accident?

He went skiing on slopes away from the marked ski runs when there was an avalanche alert type 4 (= 4 out of 5, 5 being no skiing allowed at all).
He was snowed under because of an avalance for about 20 minutes.

On Dutch tv, they were a bit shocked to see how stern the Austrian tv were with the prince (talking about taking unnecessary risks despite warnings from all sides).

Now, a spokesperson tries to take away the criticism by saying that it wasn't that risky given the fact that about 4000 people (did they invent that figure?) were skiing on these unmarked ski runs so he wasn't alone + an avalanche type 4 alert is still no type 5 alert.


In our royal family; prince Laurent - who likes to complain about how tough his life is and how he has to scrape together a living given the fact that he doesn't get a lot of money - bought a new fancy yacht.
Life is tough

When will people wake up and show those parasites the door?

Originally Posted by acionescu

I mean, is he stupid or what?

If they want to spend money, cant they buy a tiara for Paola/Mathilde? I'm sick of seeing them in the same two all the time

It's the economic crisis. We all have to make sacrifices.