Swahili is a nice language. I like it. Called Kiswahili by Kiswahili speakers, the language forces me to look at my world differently.
To pluralize a word, the change comes at the front of the word instead of at the end, as in English. A verb consists of the verb itself as well as the subject, the tense and the object all combined into one long word and it all has to "agree" with the class of the subject. Whew. For example, the one word "nitamsaidia" means "I will help him". "Tulimendesha (mjini)" means "We drove him (to town)". I won't even tell you how to make it into a negative statement! Some of these more difficult concepts are offset by the fact that Kiswahili is fairly easy to pronounce and very easy to spell.
Kiswahili has also turned my English-speaking sense of time into a tail-spin. 8 a.m. is the 2nd hour or more literally, the hour of 2 and 4 p.m. is the hour of 10. Kiswahili time is relative to sunrise, which is 6 a.m. If I want to meet a friend at 9 a.m. I must tell her to meet me at the 3 in the morning or I will be stood-up at 9 a.m. and she will be wondering where I am at 3 in the afternoon. Makes sense?
The English days of the week are irrelevant here too. In the West our calendars usually start with Sunday and end on Saturday. In East Africa the first day of the week is Saturday and Monday is day three. This is due to the Islamic influence with Friday being their holy day. Many things that we have somehow always accepted as facts are being revealed as mere concepts.
As I struggle to find the time for my language lessons and homework, I hope to be counted as a Kiswahili speaker some day. Soon would be good!!
2 comments:
Hi Jan
You will return to Canada and miss our golf tee time - we will never keep Kiswahili and English straight!!
PS I finally have golfed since I'm on holidays - 3 times this week - missed you lots as I golfed with all men and that's just not the same!!
Wendy
I like having my paradigms shifted regularily. I like to immerse myself in someone else's world and realize that my way isn't always the high way. It's sweet that you and Jeff get to live that out!
When you come back for a visit, we'll make sure to double check times and dates with you ;) What's John's excuse for being late then??? Just kidding...
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