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The Citizen, 1991-09-04, Page 5THE CITIZEN, WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 4,1991. PAGE 5. Smokers: the guys everybody loves to pick on A small smouldering exerpt from a letter to the columnist: Guess which of these groups are non- smokers: (A) Adolph Hitler, Saddam Hussein, Richard Nixon, Idi Amin, Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker. (B) Farley Mowat, Monsignor Athol Murray, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, Mark Twain. Ah the sharp, plaintive cry of an endangered, one could almost say extinguished, species -- the yellow-taloned nicotine sucker. I know the critters well, and this one in particular. He is Walt Humphries, an amiable, artistic and thoughtful prospector up Yellowknife way. Walt's a perfect gentleman. With emphasis on the ‘gentle’. Until you come between him and his smokes, that is. Then Walt exhibits all the affability of a beestung grizzly. “In the past four years my tobacco costs have risen from $8 to $35 a tin — just ask me how p—d off I Any words you don't recognize? BY RAYMOND CANON I'm sure there are a number of times when you are reading something and run across a word, or maybe more than one, that you don't recognize. If so, don't feel badly; you are not alone by any stretch of the imagination. I am writing this article simply because it is not yet noon and I have already encountered two words whose meanings are totally unknown to me. If you are interested in improving your vocabulary, you might do what I do. I consider a new word to be something of a challenge; I write it down, look it up in the dictionary and look again to see how it was used in a sentence. I then make an effort to use it once or twice in any conversation for which I might find it suitable. Before I know it, it is part of my vocabulary. One of the reasons why there are so many words in English that you might find difficult to understand or even totally incomprehensible is that our language is something like a blotter; over the years it has continuously been absorbing words from other languages. Sometimes it swallows them whole; other times it digests them and brings them out in an anglicized version. Sometimes the digestion is so thorough that it is difficult to tell that they came from a specific foreign word. When I was a kid, I was quarantined for a period of time. There are probably some older readers who remember the days when the local Medical Officer of Health used to put a sign on your door saying that this house was quarantined for a specific disease for a specific period of time. It think that mine was for measles and not bubonic plague but at any rale I was quite fascinated by the sign. It gave my measles a touch of class. But what about the word? Would you be Walt's fuming — and who can blame him? Smokers are polite society's last official scapegoats, hijacked by government tax weasels, lectured in editorials, chastised by their children and scored by waiters, shop attendants and recorded announcements. "For your comfort and convenience, Flight 347 is a non-smoking flight and the washrooms are equipped with smoke detectors." Translation: Light that butt and we'll kick yours. Even if the beleaguered smoker manages to withstand the wrath of the pink-lunged portion of the human race, he or she still gets mugged at the comer store. Nicotine addicts arc all but grabbed by the heels and shaken looniless every time they attempt to feed their habit. Taxes on cigarettes are so prohibitive that nobody this side of Conrad Black is buying premium brands. In fact, there's a convenience store in Kitchener, Ontario that offers "home-made" ciggies. The proprietor hand rolls the gaspers. He sells them for a dollar a package less than the price of pre-packaged cigarettes. He was doing great business until the feds informed him it was illegal. No-name smokes. It had to come. I think it's just the beginning. In Spain, there are wizened little guys standing on street comers who will sell you cigarettes in tens, fives, even one at a time. If Ottawa and the provinces keep slapping on tobacco taxes it won't be long before "one at a time" is surprised to learn that its origin is foreign. It comes directly from the French word "quarantaine" which as any student of that language can tell you means "about 40". This is how long the French medical authorities used to keep you confined; somehow the English latched on to it, digested it somewhat and out it came as quarantine. Sometimes as I said a foreign word stays in English without any change. Ever since World War II the word "Blitzkrieg" has been frequently used in English to describe a certain type of war. Ils meaning you will grasp when I tell you that it is a combination of two German words, "Blitz" meaning "lightning" and "Krieg" meaning "war". In short, a war that is over in a short period of time. Younger readers might recall the story about Santa Claus and the reindeer, one of whose name is "Blitzen". There is the same word cropping up again. Ditto for another reindeer's name "Donner" which is the German word for "thunder". Perhaps you now have an idea where the story came from. Given the role that the Soviet Union has played in world history during the last 50 years, it is not surprising that some of our words come from Russian. We often refer to Russian Communists as "bolshevists" although the word has nothing directly to do with that ideology. It comes from the Russian word "bolshinstvo" meaning Letter to the editor policy Letters to the editor must be signed and the name must also be clearly printed and the telephone number and address included. While letters may be printed under a pseudonym, we must be able to verify the identi­ ty of the writer. In addition, although the identity of the writer may be withheld in print, it may be revealed to parties directly involved on per­ sonal appearance at The Citizen's offices. about all Walt and his friends will be able to afford. Our governments are singularly hypocritical about tobacco. They publicly denounce it, while privately wringing every possible shekel out if its victims. It is the modus operandi of the drug pusher, writ large. Am I saying that smoking should be lionized, rendered "Hollywood sexy" once again. No. Smoking is an addiction — and a smelly, messy, lethal one at that. Besides, I like riding in smoke-free airplanes and buses. I appreciate eating a restaurant meal. unperfumed by human smudge pots al the next table. All I'm saying is, it might be nice if we could all go a little easier on smokers. Their vice is an unglamourous one, and they know it. They've got enough to handle with the monkey on their back and the taxmen nibbling somewhat lower. Let me leave you with a fag-end of tobacco trivia. Feel free to use it at your next smoke-free cocktail party: Who said "What this country needs is a good five cent cigar"? Answer: Thomas R. Marshall, U.S. Vice President, 1913-21. About which the humorist Will Rogers observed: "This country has plenty of five cent cigars. Trouble is, they charge fifteen cents for them." I think Walt Humphries would say amen to all of that. "majority" and you have to know a bit of history to understand that. After that death of Karl Marx, the communist movement used to get into long-winded arguments over the interpretation of the founder's writings. One such argument led to an irrevocable split, in which the majority of the delegates, led by Vladimir Lenin, chose one interpretation which became Communist doctrine. The minority group were seldom heard from again. Sometimes a word is just too big to swallow. A prime example is the German word "Fliegerabwehrkanone" which means "anti-aircraft gun". English speakers took four letter from it-flak - and it came to mean not the gun itself but the collective firing at enemy aircraft. In its current form it has taken on an additional meaning - trouble, criticism as in "He got a lot of flak over his comments." Another prime example is the KGB. Everybody knows that this refers to the Russian secret police but where does it come from. Are you ready? It is the first letter of three Russian words - Komitet gosudarstvennoy bezopastnost which means committee of state security. When you look at that mouthful, you can understand why we chose just to take the first letters. English is a lot richer because of these verbal invaders. The stories behind them are seldom dull and frequently fascinating and give a colour to our language that would otherwise be missing. The dangers of us versus them By Keith Roulston From the killing between Serbs and Croats in what was once Yugoslavia to race riots in the U.S. to the postal strike in Canada, we're seeing the price that is paid when things get down to an "us" versus "them" situation. Our society these days seems bent on dividing people up into little camps of "good guys" and "bad guys", making it easily identifiable who is on our side and who is the enemy. We're obsessed with "political correctness" which, a friend pointed out recently, neatly puts people in little boxes so we can judge them. Use the wrong term, and you can safely be put in the "bad guy" group (is using the term "bad guy" making me a bad guy?) Strangely enough in these days of "inclusive" language, not using the right language can put you on the outside. It seems to be part of our confrontational attitudes these days. We keep dividing into smaller and smaller units, hoping we’ll finally get a group that can agree with each other. The Soviet Union is breaking up into independent republics. Quebec wants to separate from Canada and many westerners would like their part of the country to follow. In a wealthy New York area, blacks and Jews are battling after a car accident that killed a young black boy touched off old grievances between the two peoples that share the area. Even the family is under attack as people feel it's easier to live without their partners than live with them. People keep thinking they can hide away from having to live with other people, from having to compromise and tolerate differences. But what's going on in Croatia is instructive. Croatia, long feeling abused by the Serbian majority in Yugoslavia, declared its independence. But there is a Serbian minority within the Croatian majority and now they too are rebelling against the new Croatian government (urged on by the old Yugoslavian government). Many are dying because people find it easier to fight than live together. The situation in the Soviet Union seems to hold similar danger. While it may be comforting from far away to think that the Soviet Union, which we treated as our greatest threat for 40 years, is now splintering into dozens of harmless pieces, the potential for conflict is now greater than ever within that country itself. The giant Russian republic, for instance, feels the borders of these republics give land that should be part of Russia to other jurisdictions. . Take a look closer to home on what could happen in Canada if Quebec separates. While dreamers like Parti Quebecois Leader Jacques Parizeau sees no problems: the borders of Quebec are inviolate: if Quebec decides to separate, the whole province as we know it will automatically become a separate country. But wait a minute! If we believe in the right of the Quebec people to democratically decide to separate, shouldn't we also believe in the rights of people in areas of Quebec to separate from Quebec? What about English areas of the province where people don’t want to be locked into a French-only administration designed to eventually eliminate the English heritage? What about past boundary disputes with Newfoundland? The potential for more heartache and even violence, is there We've made so much progress toward harmony in the last 50 years. We healed the wounds of World War II and turned losing nations into world leaders. We have broken down the Berlin wall and with it the hatred between the East and West. We have seen American blacks make huge strides from the time they couldn't vole in the Southern U.S. Continued on page 21