OT: plato, meseta or plateau ... Intro to Spanish 101

[Jay R. Ashworth]

On Wed, Mar 16, 2005 at 09:57:36AM -0600, Lerebours, Jose wrote:
> Jay brought to our attention:
> > > JP wondered:
> > > > | John post was offensive to me as a reader let alone to Brian.  I
> > > > | think it was insulting and as usual, questioned a 
> > member's skills
> > > > | and intelligence.  Why should John denounce Brian 
> > skills as lower
> > > > | than Howie?  I have seen some of Howie's post to this 
> > list and they
> > > > | leave much to question coming from Howie - They are proof that
> > > > | even Howie does NOT know it all (John is on that plato 
> > on his own).
> > > > 
> > > > Plato? What does Plato have to do with any of this?  Or 
> > Socrates or
> > > > Aristophanes or Homer or any other of those ancient Greeks?
> > > 
> > > >From the Spanish word "plato" which means "platform" or 
> > "level" ... 
> > > or at least as intended.  I guess I should have enclosed it within 
> > > quotes or something.
> > > 
> > > You disappoint me.  You know enough Spanish to have picked that up!
> > 
> > "plateau".
> > 
> > According to Merriam Webster, from the Old French, as the orthography
> > had led me to believe.  BabelFish says the Spanish equivalent is
> > "meseta".
> 
> "meseta" is more like a "counter top" ...  I sure hope you are not using
> these translators to translate business documents  ;-)

Indeed.  :-)  I *did* qualify the translation, did I not?

> "plato" in Spanish can be defined as "dish" you eat in, the "roof top" 
> (which is also known in Spanish as sotea which in turn could mean "attic").
> However, "plato" is commonly employed to define building levels.  So, if
> you build layers on top of one another, each can be viewed as a "plato"
> or "floor" (in Spanish also translated to "piso").  So, if you build a 
> building with 20 floors, you have a building with 20 "platos" and the 
> very last one has "sotea" while the rest simply have "techo" better known
> as "ceiling".

Well, you do speak the language, and I don't.  :-)

> Now that you posted "plateau", I am sure this is the word I was looking
> for but ended up writing it in Spanish instead.  

Common roots, likely.  The assimilated English word, though, yes, is
plateau.

Cheers,
-- jra
-- 
Jay R. Ashworth                                                jra at baylink.com
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