August 09, 2021

No Scaredy-Cats Here


No Scaredy-Cats Here
I think it's safe to say that Vasya lost one of his nine lives on this day.  Photo by Clickphoto via Pixabay

What appears to have been a lovely family afternoon cooking over the fire in the woods takes a frightful turn when a bear approaches the campsite. Luckily Vasya, the family cat, is there to protect them! 

In this incredible video taken in Yakutsk, you can see the brave black cat firmly stand its ground and arch its back while the curious and altogether startled bear just sort of meanders around it. All the while, the family is cheering from behind the camera for the kitty to be careful and come back over. At one point, the man even tries to convince the cat to give up its hunt saying, "We don't need that much meat." 

Eventually, the bear decides to wander off, perhaps realizing it had received a bit more of a fight than it had bargained for (or to head back to the country club?) The cat walks away from the confrontation unscathed, and everyone is quite proud of the little warrior he ended up being. So, tell that to the next person who tries to convince you that cats only care about themselves

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Every language has concepts, ideas, words and idioms that are nearly impossible to translate into another language. This book looks at nearly 100 such Russian words and offers paths to their understanding and translation by way of examples from literature and everyday life. Difficult to translate words and concepts are introduced with dictionary definitions, then elucidated with citations from literature, speech and prose, helping the student of Russian comprehend the word/concept in context.

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