| Ssenkahdavic said:
First off, I hope this thread has been good for your English training. So far so good as I think you are doing a great job of it. But I did have a question on your use of punctuation. At the end of a sentence you might do something like this:
! )))
or
)))
What does that mean exactly?
Also, one of my roommates friends told me this on the day I graduated and I have wondered what he meant since then. Its possible one of you guys might be able to shed some light on it. We were having a conversation about where we were from and our convo went something like this:
ME: "Well,where are you from?"
Him: "Belarus"
ME: "So you are Belarusian right? Isnt that the word?"
Him: "Some people are that yes, but Im Russian"
ME: "Would you rather be a Russian from Russia then?"
Him: "No, I love being from Belarus"
Unfortunately, someone interrupted our conversation and I never got to really understand what he meant. Maybe something was lost in translation? I am a North Carolinian and also an American (From the State North Carolina and from USA) could it mean something like that? Also did Russians consider themselves Soviets during Soviet USSR? One of my roommates friends called himself a Soviet and was never 100% sure what he meant.
|
My ')))' are just bad habit of putting smiles.
On the 'Russian' question - yes, it is common that people say about themselves as 'Belarus', 'Ukraine', 'Moscow, 'Saint-Petersburg', 'Siberian' , 'Vologda', 'Tatar', Pomor', 'Cossack' etc. people. But we still Russians - that's not a nation. But more like a 'superethnos'.
On the 'Soviet' thing - people I know was calling themselves 'Russian' even during Soviet times. And people saying about themselves 'Soviet' today are just nostalgic or maybe just positioning themselves more clearly as 'anticapitalist' kind.
