Languages you didn't know you borrow words from (1)

[pink-o]

7. I thought Tycoon was Chinese.

Tai meaning Great--like typhoon and Taiwan. Of course, the Japanese ripped off a lot from their southern neighbors.

I am pretty comfortable in countries where Latin or Germanic is the basis of the native language (and of course, it's written in Roman letters!). When I was in Japan, I truly felt like a Stranger in a Strange land (with apologies to Heinlen) but I fell in love with it, and the way Japanese can either be spoken so quietly or yelled from the back of a truck in the middle of Shinjuku, by barkers who're trying to get your attention. It mirrors the dichotomy of Tokyo, a city where your senses are overloaded in one neighborhood, abutting another with a Shinto Temple where you only hear the running waterfalls.

Languages are so amazing, they just open a window into the soul of a culture.