The Heelers Diaries

the fantasy world of ireland's greatest living poet

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Location: Kilcullen (Phone 087 7790766), County Kildare, Ireland

Friday, February 10, 2012

heelers dazzles another love struck waif

Me and Miss Korea are rapping intellectually in a cafe.
I have been fascinated to find similarities in vocabulary between her language and languages that have had no historical connection to Korea.
The Korean for excrement is "dong," which is more or less identical to the English word "dung."
The Korean for mother is "uma," which is very close to the Arabic word "um," also meaning mother.
I begin to wax poetical about my linguistic theories.
"If scattered languages contain the same words for the same things, coincidences of terminology that have arisen before any known historical contact between those speaking the languages, why then might not this be an indicator that at some stage there was a single language spoken on the surface of the planet earth. And if that's true we have found an interesting concurrence between linguistic theory and the Bible. You know the bit where God scrambles the languages of the planet earth as a punishment for false pride. If our theories are correct, we might be coming across linguistic evidence that the Bible story might be specifically true."
Miss Korea is way ahead of me.
"Sometimes I wish God hadn't mixed up all the languages at the Tower of Babel," she sighs. "Then I wouldn't have to work so hard learning English."
The mighty Heelers grins with loony linguistic fervour.
"Yes but every language is limitlessly beautiful," I reply. "Every language is wondrous. Every language rewards study more than any of us could imagine. Can't you feel it? We are punished for pride and we receive all these glorious treasure troves of sound and meaning. Isn't it so typical of God! Even his punishments are gifts."

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