My best score at FreeRice: 49 (out of 50). They say that's pretty rare. At this site you play a simple vocabulary game for as long as you like. Each click donates free rice to the poor of the world.
I scored so well because I took a Shakespeare class in grad school, played violin for a decade and know a little Italian, studied French, and of course can ace all Arabic-derived words like felucca, hamal, bulbul and attar. Also I'm just a good guesser - I would say my guess rate on words I don't know is about 75% correct. I never studied Latin or Greek but I was trained in grade school to recognize major Latin and Greek roots that get used in English to form new words. Does anybody teach this stuff to kids anymore?
If I'd studied more biology, anatomy and philology I would get the animal, plant and body part terms. In fact it's usually the terms from the hard sciences that stump me. That's what you need to make 50 - Latin, Greek, Arabic, Spanish or French, Italian, plus an MD or Ph.D. in Chemistry Physics or Biology.
Here's a word I haven't seen on freerice yet, derived from Arabic. I first read it in Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities: noria. I love that word. Go look it up.
I don't usually think about the fact that I have a Masters Degree in English - it's so much less work and learning than a Ph.D. would be - but I can see that it did help my vocabulary!
Update: ooh, I looked up noria on Free Dictionary.com. My Webster's print edition said it was from the Arabic, which is all I knew before, but now Free Dictionary says the Arabic was from Aramaic. Since my father's roots are Aramaic - he grew up singing Aramaic liturgy in church - I find this particularly synchronistic. No wonder I like the word "noria." It's got Jungian resonance to my collective unconscious. Also, the thing itself is a delight.
I kid you not, but my dad has records regarding his gas milage and the price he pays at the pump dating way back to the 70's. We make endless fun of him when we borrow his car and have to fill up, and he asks us to 'keep the slip and write down the kilometers on the odometer' (kilomeyterstand in Dutch). He's got these little bits of paper with numbers all over in his car. Frugal is the word he uses.
I enjoy reading you too, although you do get me worried. But you are right, you do not need things around you, you need friends around you, that is the most important thing. I hope it will all work out. I'll think of you, you never know, maybe it helps.
Posted by: Sietske | February 01, 2008 at 10:47 PM
Sietske is responding to my post at her highly informative Beirut blog - I mentioned how my dad kept meticulous gas mileage records.
Sietske, thanks for thinking of me; I assume your worry is about my health situation. Hey, I am going to be around for quite a while insha'allah. I'll post about this later today.
Posted by: Leila | February 02, 2008 at 11:25 AM
Hey Leila, How are you. I scored 45 on Free Rice after playing for about 2000 grains. Then I started losing and slipped back to 40 and quit. I did ok considering I'm French educated and an agronomist. I got the science words and the Latin words and many others by elimination. But this game is addictive...
Posted by: Rami | February 03, 2008 at 09:32 AM
Hi Rami - glad you like the game. I am *very* impressed with your score since English is your third language.
I'll bet you know what a noria is. Na'ra is the Arabic root supposedly. It's in your line of work...
Posted by: Leila | February 03, 2008 at 01:24 PM
47 with a 12th grade education (I'm, um, 17) and being an English addict. A bit of French and Latin has definitely helped ..
.. and addictive, even if I don't exactly think dumping money into UN coffers for rice aquisition will solve world hunger.
Posted by: the mundu | March 17, 2008 at 09:27 AM
Hi. I've gone to 60 on Free Rice. I'm a bit obsessive about it.
History degree
5 yrs of Latin
Extensive travel in France & Spain.
Also, I'm fairly old. Accumulating knowledge is one of the compensation prizes of long life.
Posted by: Sharilyn Radinsky | July 30, 2008 at 09:58 AM
FreeRice.com is such a good idea.
I'm currently running a campaign to reduce hunger in the World (using freerice.com).
If you wish to find out more about the campaign please visit the following link:
http://learnenglishfromhome.blogspot.com/2009/06/lets-fight-against-24000-daily-deaths.html
Many thanks.
Posted by: David LEO | June 08, 2009 at 04:21 PM