Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2013 March 12

Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

March 12

Chinese help: Musings of the Ape Immortal

How exactly would one say "Musings of the Ape Immortal" in Chinese. Would it be 猿仙的沉思? --Ghostexorcist (talk) 01:17, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

沉思 sounds so serious! I tend to think "胡思乱想" is the most apt translation for "musings", but probably would not work in all contexts. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 20:44, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

French, Portuguese, and German help

What is the following in German, Portuguese, and French?

• "To view the subtitles along with the video (an example; there are other ways):

download this video file (right click → save target as) download a subtitle file (.srt file format) from below (right click → save target as) to the same folder and name it Closed cap.srt view the video with VLC media player (subtitles will be usually be automatically shown) Vollständige Liste." WhisperToMe (talk) 06:33, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

German:

"Um die Untertitel zusammen mit dem Video zu sehen (nur als ein Beispiel, es gibt andere Möglichkeiten): - Dieses Video herunterladen (rechter Mausklick → Ziel speichern unter). - Eine Untertitel-Datei von weiter unten in den selben Ordner herunterladen (.srt Datei Format) (rechter Mausklick → Ziel speichern unter), und sie mit dem Namen "Closed cap.srt" versehen. - Das Video mit dem VLC media player ansehen (Untertitel sollten automatisch erscheinen). Vollständige Liste (zur Anzeige der verfügbaren Sprachen)"

I am not sure if 'full list' is part of the file name or not, though. Lectonar (talk) 09:16, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

• Thank you for your help! "Full list" AFAIK is a button to click to show a full list of subtitles available WhisperToMe (talk) 17:46, 12 March 2013 (UTC)
  • Ok, I have changed the translation accordingly. How do you always come up with these strange translation requests? And yes, the question is rhetorical....I enjoy doing quirky things. If you want German, and it is not too long, you can ping me directly. Lectonar (talk) 21:00, 12 March 2013 (UTC)
    • Thank you! What I do is I search around the Commons and other Wikimedia projects and look for topics or things which need articles or content in another language. I.E. if it's an Algerian topic without a French or Arabic article, I make requests so that the Algerian article has a topic in those languages. If an organization has a website in X language, I make a request for an article to be started in that language (the website content makes it easy to use that language in writing the article). That's why Peel District School Board has so many languages-they have content in many languages spoken in the Peel Region in Ontario, and accordingly I made requests for Hindi, Korean, Tamil, Telugu, etc. If it's something "general" (like the Common Closed Captioning) I try to make sure it is supported in the six UN languages plus German, Italian, Portuguese, Japanese, Korean, Hindi, and/or other common languages. WhisperToMe (talk) 22:20, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

French

"Pour afficher des sous-titres avec la vidéo (c'est un exemple, il est possible de faire autrement) : ‑ Télécharger ce fichier vidéo (clic droit → Enregistrer la cible sous) ‑ Télécharger un des fichiers de sous-titres (fichier au format .srt) ci-dessous dans le même dossier (clic droit → Enregistrer la cible sous) et nommer le "Closed cap.srt" ‑ Visionner la vidéo avec VLC media player (normalement les sous-titres sont affichés automatiquement) Liste complète (pour avoir la liste des langues dans lesquelles les sous-titres sont disponibles). — AldoSyrt (talk) 19:00, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Thank you very much! WhisperToMe (talk) 22:29, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Ooops! French spelling error: "click" should read "clic". Corrected in my translation here above. — AldoSyrt (talk) 09:39, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Ok. Thank you very much! WhisperToMe (talk) 16:27, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Last newsreel of Die Deutsche Wochenschau - translate?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kr5-Qo-D8zk

According to the video's summary, it was released in April 1945, not too long before the unconditional surrender of the 3rd Reich.

No longer does it show battlefield scenes. It shows children and teens instead for some reason.

What do the narrators say, and what is the overall topic? Also, do they admit or hint at the impending defeat? --70.179.161.230 (talk) 08:48, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

First, I do not think that this even is a real Deutsche Wochenschau at all (It might be something from the Red Cross). I also think this might be something from even after the capitulation, because shown are children, mentioned by name, searching for their parents. The summary on the youtube video is very misleading and simply wrong. Lectonar (talk) 09:04, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

The narrators only say the childrens name, their hometown, and the name of the parents. Lectonar (talk) 09:05, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Found a comment by the uploader now:"I got this from a source in Germany which had this at the end of their list of pre and wartime German newsreels. This is indeed a postwar short made in the future East Germany. I'd wrongly assumed it was made before the end of the war. Sorry. This is weekly newsreel "Der Augenzeuge" (English: The Eyewitness) directed/edited 1st by Kurt Maetzig...who died at 101yrs last year! "Kinder suchen ihre Eltern" or 'children in search of their Parents' ". Lectonar (talk) 09:07, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

So if this was not from Die Deutsche Wochenschau, then what was the last Die Deutsche Wochenschau newsreel, and did they admit to impending defeat then? --129.130.37.233 (talk) 02:36, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

According to the german article about Die Deutsche Wochenschau, the last production was Nr. 755 from march 22 1945. It shows the last public appearance of Adolf Hitler, shortly before his 56. birthday, giving out medals to 20 Hitlerjungen. So, as I have seen this footage some time ago, there was no hint of impending defeat, if you do not count Hitlers rather haunted look. Lectonar (talk) 07:58, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps the collection of clips from de:Der Augenzeuge (Wochenschau) (copyrighted material, the first clip is from 1946/13) was uploaded under a wrong title in order to obfuscate it. --Pp.paul.4 (talk) 23:36, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

German Language

Dear all.

I am learning German, and I wanted to know, if my grammar is okay:

"Mein Name ist Richard, ich lebe in einem Haus in New York. Das Wetter ist an diesem Ort da angenehm kühl und die feuchte Luft gefällt mir sehr."

Was the sentence good or would you suggest some better learning? Do you have some tips for me? I really love the German language and even started reading the German books of Goethe and comics like "Perry Rhodan rettet das Universum"! i really wish that one day i'll be able to understand Mozart's breath-taking, brilliant arias, my personal favorite is "Der Vogelfänger bin ich ja". I have noticed the heavy resemblance between English and German (for comparison, Haus means house, Maus means mouse and bettel originally meant battle), they are both Germanic languages, what beautiful languages!

Thank you for your responses

Kind regards--92.105.188.31 (talk) 22:02, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Not bad at all. The first sentence is ok. The second sentence would be better as: "Das Wetter hier ist angenhem kühl, und die feuchte Luft gefällt mir sehr." A little explanation: if you use an diesem Ort da, it means that somehow you are at a distance from it, while in the first sentence you already said you live in New York. Why you tell somebody that you enjoy moist/humid air is beyond me, though. Lectonar (talk) 22:09, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Hi Lectonar! Thank you very much for your critical analysis. I will memorize your tips. I am living right now next to a river, the air here is really, really moisty.--92.105.188.31 (talk) 22:13, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Yes, but why do you enjoy (mir gefällt) the moist air. Or is it good for you, healthwise? Lectonar (talk) 22:18, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

I have a very agressive type of bronchitis, so the moist air really helps. The healthy air was one of the reasons, why I took a house at the riverside. I have got a question (I have noticed that you are from Germany): do you have a German book recommendation for me? I would really love to read more books.--92.105.188.31 (talk) 22:48, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

I would find book recommendations useful too. Itsmejudith (talk) 22:56, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Books about what and at what proficiency level?. Because without restricting the search patterns, so to speak, I would be typing recommendations all day. Let me just tell you that Perry Rhodan is not considered good German :). Lectonar (talk) 08:02, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Shouldn't that be <<Ich heiße Richard, und, obwohl ich in New York wohne, stammt meine IP-Adresse aus Graubünden, Schweiz>>? μηδείς (talk) 01:50, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

What on earth are you talking about, Medeis? If you don't have anything useful to add to the discussion, please stay out of it. --Viennese Waltz 08:21, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

@Medeis: Didnt I tell you, that I am currently learning German? Am I not allowed to travel in my holidays to a hospital in German speaking Grisons? If you want to meet me, please come to the Hochgebirgsklinik Davos for pneumology (http://www.hochgebirgsklinik.ch). Chronic bronchitis really sucks, believe me! Anyway, it is wonderful to experience Europe (I would also love to see Munich and Salzburg)! @Lectonar: I know that Perry Rhodan ist not the finest representation of German "literature";-), but I am a big fan of sci-fi, and Perry Rhodans adventures are great! All the very best.--92.105.188.31 (talk) 10:40, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

For old-fashioned German Sci-fi, try to find books by Hans Dominik (writer). Lectonar (talk) 11:16, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Oh, there is a thing I noticed in the little city Chur in Grisons: most book stores here are not selling German classic literature like Johann Wolfgang von Goethes or Richard Wagners works. It seems, that Switzerland does not want to be associated with Germany! PS: does someone of you have a good tip for books about the famous German academic fencing? Thank you very much and kind regards.--92.105.188.31 (talk) 11:06, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Try: Hermann Rink: Die Mensur, ein wesentliches Merkmal des Verbandes. In: Rolf-Joachim Baum (Hrsg.): „Wir wollen Männer, wir wollen Taten!“ Deutsche Corpsstudenten 1848 bis heute. Siedler, Berlin 1998, ISBN 3-88680-653-7

Thank you very much for the tip! I will order the book as soon as I can! Kind regards.--92.105.188.31 (talk) 11:37, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Regardless of my curiosity over where a New Yorker might spend his "holidays", shouldn't we be talking about "heißen" and "wohnen"? I was taught saying "Mein Name" and "Ich lebe" would mark you out as an English speaker. μηδείς (talk) 17:05, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Just curious: where were you taught? The sentence as it is not so far out from what I would say. I never use "ich heiße", and "ich lebe in einem Haus" does not sound that strange to me, either. Lectonar (talk) 17:43, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Three years in high school, one with an American and two with a native speaker from Hamburg, and two years in University with an Austrian. Mein Name wouldn't have been a big issue. But "leben" instead of "wohnen" would have gotten marked wrong. Obviously my intuition counts for squat, but leben for wohnen sounds as odd to me as vivre would for habiter. μηδείς (talk) 18:05, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Even the French does not sound that wrong to me, and I am really quite fluent in French; anyway, there seem to be regional differences, and about my French I am no longer sure after I followed the discussion we had here about the pronounciation of the name of the cardinal from Québec, Ouellet. I would have betted fair money that the "t" was silent. Lectonar (talk) 18:22, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

"Not that wrong" does seem to imply a certain degree of wrongness. There are plenty of things that one could say in English, but one doesn't, like a "fat big yellow old bird", instead of a "big fat yellow old bird", which one could say, but which is not the most usual and least marked form.

Thank you for your submission. The Swiss hospitals are by far superior to ours! Well, thanks for the tip about "marking", German ist great, but extremely hard to learn. I do not think, that I will ever be fluent in this fantastic language. If I may ask: what was your motivation to learn German? Mine was clearly Mozart:)--92.105.188.31 (talk) 17:22, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

I agree with Medeis on "my name is (first name)" and "I live in ..." (Anglicisms) and other peculiarities in the construction. While the grammar is o.k., the semantics is dubious and the sentences seem to mean something else than intended. You say Mein Name ist Erwin Lindemann (a famous Loriot sketch Der Lottogewinner, watch it on YouTube), not Mein Name ist Erwin. And hier-da-dort corresponds to here-there-over there. I suppose you wanted to say dort (over there), wheras Lectonar above understood hier (here) and I still wonder what was meant. I wonder what the OP's first language is. --Pp.paul.4 (talk) 00:17, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

My very first language is Spanish!--92.105.188.31 (talk) 11:15, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

In German, Name without further modification is often interpreted to mean "last name", so if you say mein Name ist Richard you may find people addressing you as Herr Richard. I agree that ich heiße Richard sounds more idiomatic, but mein Name ist Richard XYZ isn't wrong or foreign-sounding either. Angr (talk) 17:32, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

Very interesting, thank you Angr!--92.105.188.31 (talk) 18:41, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

North (America)

I've already read the article Northern United States, where it says that e.g. Minnesota is in Midwest and Montana is definitely a western state, but would it be completely wrong to call Washington a Northern State? Is the general mindset exclusively the North, the South, and the West? I suppose no one would call New Mexico a southern state either? --Pxos (talk) 23:03, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

An additional question: Is there an East, or is it only the East Coast? Would someone from California who moves to Illinois say that they are moving to East? --Pxos (talk) 23:11, 12 March 2013 (UTC)

Interesting question; unfortunately, the answer is somewhat ambiguous. Many states fall within multiple categories. In general, the USA is divided by the Mississippi River into Eastern and Western halves, and North is divided approximately by a line extending from the Mason-Dixon line. However, the "Midwest states" are on both sides of the Mississippi, and are in the northern half. "The South" is sometimes considered to be the "Dixie" states, but usually refers to the "Deep south". One might think of Texas as a western state, but ironically, not a mid-western state, nor a south-western state state. Re: additional question; yes, someone from California would be moving "to the east" if moving to Illinois (although Illinois is in the 'Midwest'). Sorry that this is confusing -- but, such is life!    ;)  ~E:74.60.29.141 (talk) 00:30, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Someone told me recently that Florida, the most southern mainland state, is not part of "The South" HiLo48 (talk) 00:41, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia has at least 3 different maps defining "South" in the US (with some states in different shades of color, implying varying degrees of "south-ness") -lol- See: Southern United States, Deep South, Dixie -- Not to mention Hawaii - please don't, 'cuz that'll complicate things even more, since it is the southern-most state, but not a "southern state". ~E:74.60.29.141 (talk) 00:53, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

And then there's Southern Florida, which is so far south, it's not Southern any more. That is, it's mostly vacationers, retirees and ex-Cubans, not rednecks, until you get to the swamp. StuRat (talk) 01:15, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

More directly to your question, the article Northern United States does not include a map -- an oversight that should be corrected. ~E:74.60.29.141 (talk) 01:11, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

(ec)Florida was a slave state and was part of the Confederacy. The reason it's often not considered a true "southern" state is that except for the northern portion and panhandle, its character has become rather different from the typical "southern" state. Texas is also in the broader definition of "southern" states, but the average Texan would say he's not a southerner, he's a Texan. Texas is as much "western" as "southern". And the west coast states of both Oregon and California were free states, hence could be considered "northern" states, even though much of Cali is geographically "south". Cali is more like "western", while Oregon is part of the "Pacific Northwest". As regards Minnesota, it is part of the midwest's "northern tier", but it is also called "The Old Northwest", as it once represented the northwest corner of the contiguous states. So the USA's two "northwests" are well over a thousand miles apart. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:19, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Or the Great Northwest (Bob Dylan)165.212.189.187 (talk) 14:12, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

• The question is largely arbitrary, but there is definitely no such thing as an "Easterner". The area is too historically, culturally, and linguistically diverse. One might call oneself a New Englander, a North Easterner, a Virginian, Carolinan, Georgian, or Southerner. There are Westerners, and Down Easterners, even. But no Easterners. μηδείς (talk) 01:34, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Sure there is. An Easterner is anyone who lives east of Denver. --Trovatore (talk) 19:49, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Does anyone call himself a Northener? Not as opposed to "the South" but as in "I'm from the North, I'm used to the snow." Or does it sound odd? As far as I know (and I don't know much) people in countries consisting of "independent" states associate themselves with the state they are citizens of, not with geographical regions unless they are making a point. Might a person from Michigan ever say that they are "from the North"? --Pxos (talk) 01:49, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

When talking with a southerner about the relative merits of both regions. Although the accent would make it obvious anyway. It's relative. In Minnesota, Iowa is considered to be "south". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 09:54, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

I live in Michigan and would say north - to the right audience from farther south. But Michigan itself is divided into three parts: the heavily populated southern part, "up north" and "the UP"; the last two which both get far more snow than where most Michiganders live. Rmhermen (talk) 13:38, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Hence the band called "Da Yoopers". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 21:17, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Also from Michigan here (Detroit), and I should clarify your remark. Others will read "UP" as just capital "up". What we say is "the U.P.", with each letter pronounced separately, meaning the "upper peninsula". StuRat (talk) 15:29, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

• List of regions of the United States covers some of this, but it's too big and dense. If you had to divide the U.S. up into the smallest number of regions possible, I think the smallest you could get away with is 4, with a lot of bleed through at the edges: The Northeast, the South, the Midwest, and the West. Roughly, the Northeast would be anything east of the Appalachians and north of the Mason-Dixon line. The South would be south of Ohio River-Mason Dixon line, and including Oklahoma, Texas, and Arkansas. The Midwest is north of the Mason-Dixon-Ohio River-Arkansas-Oklahoma line and between the Appalachians and the Rockies, and the West is from the Rockies west. If you break it into smaller, more cohesive cultural-geographic units, it would take a lot more bits, but the most likely would be:
  • New England: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island
  • Mid Atlantic: New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland
  • "Upper South", "Atlantic South", "New South": Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, northeastern Florida, maybe south Florida (in parts)
  • Appalachia: West Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee
  • Deep South: Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, northwestern Florida
  • Great Lakes region: Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin
  • Texas
  • Great Plains: Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, South Dakota
  • Mountain West: Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, Colorado, Wyoming, Montana
  • Pacific Northwest: Oregon, Washington, Idaho
  • California
  • Hawaii
  • Alaska

Some states like California, Texas, Louisiana, and Florida pose a real problem for placing into cultural-geographic zones. Florida, in particular, fits into three regions: South Florida (anything from I-4 southward, excepting the Everglades) is culturally much more "Northern", while North Florida can be divided into the Jacksonville-Daytona area (which more resembles the rest of the "New South" of the Atlantic Seaboard) while the quadrant north of Tampa and west of Jacksonville (i.e. the "Redneck Riviera) fits squarely in the Deep South. Louisiana too is usually classified as a "Deep South" state, but the Cajun and Creole culture gives it a unique culture entirely unlike the rest of the deep south. Plus there are smaller insular regions, like the extreme Atlantic Coast (the N.C. Outer Banks, Tidewater Virginia, Gullah South Carolina & Georgia) or the Ozarks which have their own distinct character. --Jayron32 02:13, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

I've never heard of Idaho being included in the Pacific Northwest (kinda short of Pacific if you ask me). Clarityfiend (talk) 06:34, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Pacific Northwest refers to a region roughly coinciding with the Oregon Country. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 09:51, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

I've often heard movie characters and others use the expression "back East", but I've never head "back West" or "back South" or "back North". Is there a reason for this? -- Jack of Oz ^[Talk] 04:01, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

You must be watching too many Westerns, where the city folk come from back east. Occasionally, people go "back up north" or "back down south". Clarityfiend (talk) 06:34, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

The book The Nine Nations of North America is an interesting take on the issue. --Xuxl (talk) 09:18, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

• Although this may have been alluded to: there are four set demographic regions [1] Northeast, Midwest, South and West. But yes there are all kinds of ways to divide them. Alanscottwalker (talk) 13:55, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

There are two main ways Americans conceive of their country regionally: 1) In discrete regions with some geographic and/or cultural unity: The largest such regions, as has already been indicated, are the Northeast, the Midwest, the South, and the West. The Northeast and Midwest can be combined to form a region called "the North", though that term is typically used only when a distinction is being made with the South on cultural or historical grounds. Each of the four macroregions can be divided into smaller regions, although the dividing lines between these regions might be disputed. 2) In relative terms: This is where terms like "East" come in. In this context, "East" can mean either the east coast or everything that is not the "West". To answer Jack's question, there is an expression "back East", and its opposite is "out West" (not *back West). The reason for this distinction is historical. Up until a generation or two ago, most people in the West had either moved west from another region of the United States or had a remembered family history of westward migration. So movement east was movement back to the part of the country where a person or his progenitors had originated. Similarly, a person from the east goes out West because historically the economic and cultural center and the part of the United States with the greatest population density was the area east of the Mississippi or Missouri Rivers. Any movement west from that region was movement out into the open and still largely unsettled countries. These concepts are no longer really accurate, given high population densities and economic productivity in California and other parts of the West, and considering that the ancestors of many people in the West today came from Latin America or Asia, not the eastern United States. Still, those historic expressions live on. Marco polo (talk) 15:30, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Makes sense, thanks. Now, if a person had been born and raised in California, then went to live in New York for a while, but decided to go back where they came from, would they say "I'm going back West", or is that just not something people say? -- Jack of Oz ^[Talk] 18:02, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

Marco Polo has put it very well. Yes, people would say "back west" (or better, back out west), but it would be relative (like northerners and easterners really only using those terms when talking in relation to Southerners and Westerners) and just using the language while "Out West" and "Back East" are more like set phrases. What you would never ever hear would be "Out East". μηδείς (talk) 18:13, 13 March 2013 (UTC)

My mother was born in Colorado and moved to California as a small child. At some point, someone asked her where she was originally from, and she answered, "Back east." When it came out that she was from Colorado, the others laughed at her, because while Colorado may be east of California, it is most definitely not "back east"! Angr (talk) 17:37, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

Geography is usually a very friendly field, but in the terminology of regional geography people can get very irate. ...would it be completely wrong to call Washington a Northern State? Is the general mindset exclusively the North, the South, and the West? I suppose no one would call New Mexico a southern state either? In the right context Washington is certainly a northern state. For example, I grew up in Buffalo, NY, and now live in Washington, and feel overall very much a "northerner". When I visit the South I feel more out of place than I do when visiting Canada. In this context Washington is certainly a northern state. In the same way New Mexico could be called a southern state. It isn't part of the Old South, but it is definitely in the south. Context. When it comes to regional terms there is little general agrement on most issues, and a surprising (to me) amount of animosity on certainly issues (eg, is Maryland part of the South? is Kentucky part of the Midwest?). There are no right or wrong answers to most such questions, but there is a lot of hard feelings. The most well-defined region of the US must be New England, although even there there are some arguments. The South is probably the next most well defined region, which isn't saying a lot, as there are endless debates regarding the "southernness" of Texas, Florida, Maryland, and so on. Other regions are even more poorly agreed upon. And, for what it's worth, having said all that, Idaho is often considered part of the Pacific Northwest, largely due to its historic (and present) links to the Pacific coast via the Snake and Columbia rivers. The same can be said for western Montana. On the other hand, these regions could also be called part of the West—as could eastern Washington and Idaho. Pfly (talk) 06:42, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

I just finished reading Crichton's Micro, set in Hawaii, and "back East" is used twice to refer to US Mainland (probably specifically the MIT campus). μηδείς (talk) 19:34, 16 March 2013 (UTC)