Happy New Year!
Pension-Sprachschule.de would like to wish you
A HAPPY NEW YEAR
Chimney sweeps are a good-luck charm for the New Year. When I was a child, I was told if we happened to see three chimney sweeps at once, we would have especially good luck during that year. Nowadays, finding one chimney sweep walking on the street is a rare occasion….
When was the last time you saw a chimney sweep?
GOOD LUCK TO ALL OF YOU!!
December 30th, 2007 at 4:06 pm
I have rarely seen a chimney sweeper in my life, and never around the area that I am currently living in! I guess this is why seeing 3 at once is a really lucky thing! Since nowadays it’s already hard to spot one, I think one should count oneself lucky even seeing one.
December 31st, 2007 at 10:39 pm
Well, I don’t know that I have seen a chimney sweep since I last had my own chimney swept, about twenty years ago.
By the way, in English , we don’t say “Chimney Sweepers” . Not correct English. It is A Chimney Sweep. Plural is Sweeps, not Sweepers. Just to let you know, for future use, not a criticism ! So, it should have been written , “Chimney Sweeps”.
December 31st, 2007 at 11:05 pm
the goodluck is just waht i need right now. But may be i already have it and just don’t know it. well, in any case i guess luck is what i would make of my situations.
i have never seen any chimney sweeper! or sweeps. we don’t have chimney in Japanese homes.
i wish you all a happy new year!! Love, nobuko
January 1st, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Hi Gay,
Thanks so much for your contribution!
Quite frankly, I had not been sure whether it was chimney sweep or sweeper. I thought I remembered having learnt (or learned…) sweeper, but usually heard chimney sweep.
So I consulted the Leo dictionary on-line and it gave me both versions.
click here
Are both right?
January 1st, 2008 at 11:06 pm
Dear Maria
I am pretty sure that it is never correct to say chimney sweepers. I have never heard anyone say that in all my life. I suppose it’s possible that it is used in America.. but it isn’t English!!
January 2nd, 2008 at 11:17 am
Dear Gay
I rechecked with a few more dictionaries.
Some had no entry for “sweeper”, others allowed for this version.
Merriam-Webster
click here
The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language
click here
I have decided to change it.
In a way “chimney sweeper” might sound annoying to your ears just like “cooker” does to mine. Now cooker is definitely wrong, right?:)
January 2nd, 2008 at 3:15 pm
That depends, we definitely have a “pressure cooker”
January 2nd, 2008 at 4:37 pm
We also have a rice cooker….
but my students sometimes refer to a person cooking in a restaurant as a cooker:)
January 3rd, 2008 at 4:57 pm
Yes, a cooker is an inanimate object, it is the thing you cook ON and IN! A cooker is never a person.
However to add to your confusion about Sweeps and Sweepers!…. We do have Road Sweepers, and they can be people OR machines!!
But chimney sweeps , in Englands, are always sweeps , not sweepers!
January 4th, 2008 at 1:15 pm
@Gay
Next time I see a chimney sweep – whenever that may be – I will definitely think of you!
BTW, in American English chimney sweeps are also mentioned as chimney cleaners.
In German: Schornsteinfeger