Glossary entry

English term or phrase:

one-Mississippi, two-Mississippi, three-Mississippi. four-Mississippi

Spanish translation:

(device used for counting) un elefante, dos elefantes, tres elefantes, cuatro elefantes

Added to glossary by Michael Powers (PhD)
Apr 10, 2009 15:58
15 yrs ago
7 viewers *
English term

one-Mississippi, two-Mississippi, three-Mississippi. four-Mississippi

English to Spanish Social Sciences Linguistics terminology for counting
I do NOT want a literal translation. I want the equivalency in meaning, assuming there is one, that is used in Spanish-speaking countries that children learn, and/or adults also use, when counting seconds or other short units of time.

TIA



You can conduct an interesting study of hugging by also keeping track of time. As a child I learned to say "one-Mississippi" to count of the seconds. Count "one-Mississippi, two-Mississippi, three-Mississippi, four Mississippi"to youself as our watch your relatives embrace.
Change log

Apr 10, 2009 16:02: MPGS changed "Language pair" from "Spanish to English" to "English to Spanish"

Discussion

Michael Powers (PhD) (asker) Apr 10, 2009:
counting time between in US for lightening In the US, for lightening we wouldl use: one thousand one, one thousand two, etc. But I was told taht it is 1,000 feet (1/5 mile) for each second.
Noni Gilbert Riley Apr 10, 2009:
Mississippi one, Mississippi two... In the UK as a child we used this to count the seconds between lightning and the thunder to find out how far away the storm was - one second was supposed to mean a mile, I seem to remember. Not what you might call exact, but v exciting if it turned out the storm was coming closer.

And the local rivers were obviously much too short, in several senses (Thames, Severn, Avon....)!

Proposed translations

+4
1 hr
Selected

un elefante, dos elefantes, tres elefantes ...

Another example...
Peer comment(s):

agree JoseMiron : No es común escucharlo, pero en el contexto de enseñarles a contar a niños, me parece más adecuada.
27 mins
gracias
agree Carmen Valentin-Rodriguez
1 hr
gracias
agree Christine Walsh : Aquí es bastante común
4 hrs
gracias
agree De Novi
5 hrs
gracias
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4 KudoZ points awarded for this answer. Comment: "Lot's of good answers, and I am going to go with "elefante" because it is readily understandable and quite descriptive, and fits in nicely with "MIssissippi" - Mike :)"
6 mins

cien mil uno |cien mil dos |cien mil tres ...

así me enseñaron a mí a contar segundos
(por cierto no funciona muy bien, y en una ocasión -usándolo- llegue a Cerdeña cuando iba a Córcega)
Lo mejor es un Casio, hacer 3 lecturas y la media
Best
MP
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+1
22 mins

uno scooby doo, dos scooby doo... / diez mil uno, deez mil dos...

la primera opció n es la que escuché hace muchos años en unos dibujos animados en la tele y se me quedó grabada. La segunda es la que usábamos en el colegio a la hora del recreo.

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Note added at 22 mins (2009-04-10 16:21:39 GMT)
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perdón, no "deez mil" sino diez mil

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Note added at 31 mins (2009-04-10 16:30:03 GMT)
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un ejemplo: "Es muy importante no retener la respiración al hacerlos; si quieres puedes contar los segundos en voz alta (diez mil uno, diez mil dos, etc.) para asegurarte de que respiras todo el tiempo." en http://www.todamujer.com/articulosimprimir/10130.html

Peer comment(s):

agree Silvia Vallejo : diez mil uno, diez mil dos...
32 mins
Gracias, Silvia. ¡Felices Pascuas!
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39 mins

un segundo, dos segundos, tres segundos, cuatro segundos

I don't think there is an established term for "mississippi" in this context. I would go with this.
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54 mins

es un segundo, son dos segundos, son tres segundos...

This how it appeared in the ESL Teacher's Guide I used many years ago...
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1 hr

un mil uno, un mil dos, un mil tres...

Por experiencia propia México de seguro y, por lo que encuentro en otras referencias, en América Latina, se utiliza esta forma para el conteo de segundos.

La primera referencia es de una página que da servicio como Autoescuela de autocapacitación en Argentina, Uruguay y Perú.

La segunda referencia es de una página venezolana.

En ambos encuentran la referencia buscando "un mil uno".
Espero ayude.
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