Big Word Wednesday-Week 17

BWW returns after a 1 week sabbatical.  In recognition of the Olympics, we’ll feature some words that are influenced either by China or the Olympics.  Seemed like a simple enough plan, until I started looking for big words exclusive to the Olympics and China.  So, rather than big words, we’ll just give you some interesting words this week.  You know, Nixon went to China once.  The results of the trip?  We got a couple of Panda bears; they got missle technology and access to Wal-Mart’s shelves.  Oh, and Hong Kong; we gave them Hong Kong too.  Nixon forgot to tell the English about that part of the deal. 

Doesn’t seem fair all these years later, does it?  13 Trillion dollars in exportable consumer goods and a city in exchange for two sterile Panda bears.  So much for that zoo breeding program.  I still wonder how the Chinese are able to extract all that lead from their polluted air and put it in things like dog food and paint for children’s toys.  Maybe that was one of the things that Nixon gave them that the government never told us about; Lead technology.  Erstwhiles.

Our first word this week is Yangtze.  The Yangtze river is the third longest river in the world, but it is one of the deadliest.  Floods have claimed over half a million lives since 1911 alone.  To control flooding, the Chinese are building The Three Gorges Dam.  When they are done in 2009, it will be one and a quarter miles across and over 600 feet high, making it the largest dam in the world.  All the Chinese had to do to accomplish this is displace over 1.3 million people, submerge over 1,500 cities, towns and villages, and put between 20,000 and 30,000 men to work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for 15 years.  THAT is some serious overtime.  Oh, yeah, almost forgot; some say it will be the biggest environmental disaster ever.  Guess that’s not Inconvenient enough for Al Gore.  Wow.  I went all Robert Kennedy Jr. there for a minute, sorry.  Whether you are for it or against it, it is an amazing project; what the future holds is anyone’s guess.     

After searching for a good word related to the Olympics, I come up empty.  So I made one up.  Phelped will soon enter the lexicon as a verb meaning; to get beaten soundly; trounced; obliterated.  Seemed like a logical word to make up seeing how the only competition Michael Phelps has is dolphins and Cuban refugees.  Don’t send hate mail, I’m friends with some Cubans and they laughed when I tested it on them.  So there you have it; an unconventional BWW, but interesting still the same.  I’ll provide you with a link for Phelped once Urban Dictionary puts it up.  Provided; that is, that they accept it.  Check out the BWW Home Page for your Medal of vocabulary Gold.