Old Hand-Painted Signs in Paris

Some lovely old photographs of Paris with hand-painted signs




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The Archaic Language of the Ukrainian Diaspora

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Please go to my new website Forgotten Galicia to read this post (an updated version). Click here . Over the last several years my interest in languages and dialects has grown. I have become very fascinated by the way the Ukrainian language has developed in the diaspora vs. Ukraine. The Ukrainian language spoken in the diaspora is the language that was spoken in western Ukraine before WWII. The majority of Ukrainian immigrants who went to the West during and right after WWII were from Galicia and Western Ukraine. Galicia had had a long history of Polish rule and influence, thus the language spoken there had a lot of Polonisms. This language didn’t evolve much in the diaspora, so Ukrainians still speak this language. (Though there has been some English influence on the language.) Furthermore, it retained several archaic words relating to technology (for example, in the diaspora we still usually say загасити світло (extinguish the light) , which harks back to a time when fire was us...
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A third update on the Hungarian-made roller shutters on Kopernyka Street. After many years or even decades, this old pharmacy has reopened - but rather than selling medication, now it's a store that sells fancy soaps. A lot of the old wooden furniture is still in place, as well as an old mural on the ceiling. And fortunately, the original shutter is also in place - freshly painted over (though already graffitied) and now in use once again. The building was built in 1892, and the shutter could date from that time too, making it well over 100 years old. I first posted pictures of these shutters a few years ago, found here ,  and up update after it had been graffitied . Last time I was in Mukachevo, I found a shutter made by the same Hungarian company, as seen  here .
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