I wanted to post an addendum to my previous post about learning Pulaar, because I feel I left out several important aspects of Pulaar that might lend some insight into the Pulaar culture.
The first thing you should know is that greeting is very important. Keep in mind that I still have not mastered the language by any means, so it's entirely possible I might be completely mistranslating things. Having said that, I thought you might like to get a sense of what conversation is like here, so I'll give the translation a shot. Again, greetings are about ninety five percent of interactions, so once you get those down, you're pretty well set to get around town. In the morning, a typical greeting between two neighbors might be:
Wait, hang on. The first neighbor is probably named Aissata. I've concluded that approximately every third person in my village is named Aissata. I include myself in that tally- I received a new name when I got to my site. I am now Aissata Lo, named after my father's first wife. But for our purposes, this is just some random Aissata. We'll call the second neighbor Fatimata. Thank God my father isn't married to anyone named Fatimata- I would have been really unhappy if everyone was calling me Fati, which is a common nickname. Okay, back to greeting and translations...
Aissata Lo: Jam walli?/ Is the morning passing in peace?
Fatimata Sow: Yawur. / I don't actually know what this means, but I think it's something like 'may we have long life,' or something. I'll let you know if I figure it out.
Aissata: Wallen e jam. / May we pass the morning in peace.
Fatimata: A fini?/ Did you wake up? (At first I thought this was a trick question and people thought I was really stupid because I stared at them blankly when they asked it. But really, I thought it was fairly obvious that I had woken up and thought maybe I had misunderstood the question. I was similarly confused by the question always posed to me when I enter the family compound- 'did you come home?' Again, obviously, I did come home. But now I know the response to this question is, 'yes, I did come home.'
Aissata: Ko mawdoum./ It is big. (For a long time I thought this just meant 'fine,' as in 'how are you? - I'm fine,' but I recently learned that no, it actually means, 'it is big.' It turns out that 'did you wake up?' actually is a trick question, because the answer is 'fine,' or as a Pulaar would say, 'it is big').
Fatimata: Jam fin toon? / Did they wake up in peace there? (The English equivalent of 'how is your family?').
Aissata: No mbad-daa? / How are you?
Fatimata: Jam tan. /Peace only.
Aissata: Ada selli?/ Are you in health?
Fatimata: Mawdoum. /It is big.
Aissata: No jom galle ma wadi?/ How is your husband? (On a side note, the word for husband I used here translates as 'master of the house' and the word for wife translates as 'master of the bedroom,' which I find hilarious. The informal term for husband is gorko, which also means boy and man, and the corresponding word for wife is debbo, which also means woman and girl).
Fatimata: Omoy jam. / He is in peace.
Aissata: No sukaabe ma mbadi? / How are your children?
Fatimata: Ebe e jam. / They are in peace.
Aissata: Alhamdillilah. / Thanks be to God.
Fatimata: No mbad-daa? / How are you?
Aissata: Jam tan. / Peace only.
Fatimata: No mbad-daa e tampere? / How are you doing with fatigue?
Aissata: Mawdoum. / It is big.
Fatimata: No mbad-daa e bowdi? / How are you doing with the mosquitos?
Aissata: Mawdoum. / It is big.
Fatimata: No mbad-daa e liggey? / How are you doing with work?
Aissata: Mawdoum. / It is big.
Fatimata: No mbad-daa e nguleeki? / How are you doing with the heat?
Aissata: Mawdoum. / It is big.(If you wanted to spice things up a bit, which I usually do by this point in the conversation, you could also respond by saying, 'ina wonda' ('it is there) or 'mbido wondi heen' (I am in it').
Fatimata: To pah-daa? / Where are you going?
Aissata: Mi yehii jeere. / I'm going to the market.
Fatimata: Haa boya. / See you later.
Aissata: Adiarama. /Be thanked.
Fatimata: Adiarama. Lo. / Be thanked. Lo. (Aissata's last name. When you part company with someone, it's a sign of respect to repeat each other's last names, even as you're walking away from each other.)
Aissata: Sow. (Fatimata's last name).
Fatimata: Lo. (Fatimata is probably well on her way now).
Aissata: Sow. (Nodding and smiling, but not really paying attention anymore.)
Fatimata: Lo. (By this point she might be halfway across the compound).
Aissata: Sow. (Aissata has probably turned back to her cooking by now, and is just raising her voice to the rice to be heard).
Fatimata: Lo. (She's not even looking at Aissata anymore, she's halfway to the market now. Bear in mind that this whole conversation is probably happening in the amount of time it takes Fatimata to cross through the compound on the way to the market, without either of them stopping what they are doing).
Tuesday, June 27, 2006
Letter to Casey
I thought some of you might be interested in reading a letter I wrote to my friend Casey about the trials of learning Pulaar. I wrote this when I was in the middle of training, but I find a lot of it is still relevant as I try to improve my language skills here at my site. So without further ado...
Dear Casey,
I'm going to take this opportunity to answer your question about Pulaar. I guess the hardest thing about learning it is that people talk really freaking fast and all the words sound the same... But I guess maybe you were looking for something a bit more specific. There really are quite a lot of words that sound very similar, especially when spoken fast. For example, yihde, yitde, yahde, yarde, arde (to see, to like/love/want, to go, to drink, to come, respectively) all sound quite similar when conjugated. Another thing is that there are completely different words (well, same roots but different endings) to express doing something and doing something with someone, etc. For example, haccitaade means to eat breakfast, haccitodaade means to eat breakfast with someone, and haccitoraade means to eat something (specific) for breakfast. There are also different words for passive verbs vs. active verbs, i.e., neesaade (to inject) vs. neeseede (to receive an injection). On the other hand, verb conjugations are generally the same for all of the different subjects, and you hardly ever have to worry about prepositions. In my class, we spend a lot of time learning how to insult Serers. Pulaars and Serers are cousins, so according to Senegalese tradition, they can say anything to each other without being offended. For example, Simone, the language coordinator here is a Serer, and she likes to greet my class by saying, 'Hello, my slaves.' A typical response to this is, 'Oh, look, a Serer. Serers are cats.' Saying Serers are monkeys is another favorite insult. For some reason, it's also a good insult to say, 'Oh, Serers eat a lot. They eat everything.' Which is ironic, considering that the Senegalese like nothing better than to shove food down your throat. Or so it seems. Anyway, my class knows how to tell someone they smell bad and several different ways of saying why someone smells bad - the other classes know how to say they came to Senegal to help people learn about health. Time will tell which of these will come in more handy. Hope all is well with you.
Love,
Christine
Dear Casey,
I'm going to take this opportunity to answer your question about Pulaar. I guess the hardest thing about learning it is that people talk really freaking fast and all the words sound the same... But I guess maybe you were looking for something a bit more specific. There really are quite a lot of words that sound very similar, especially when spoken fast. For example, yihde, yitde, yahde, yarde, arde (to see, to like/love/want, to go, to drink, to come, respectively) all sound quite similar when conjugated. Another thing is that there are completely different words (well, same roots but different endings) to express doing something and doing something with someone, etc. For example, haccitaade means to eat breakfast, haccitodaade means to eat breakfast with someone, and haccitoraade means to eat something (specific) for breakfast. There are also different words for passive verbs vs. active verbs, i.e., neesaade (to inject) vs. neeseede (to receive an injection). On the other hand, verb conjugations are generally the same for all of the different subjects, and you hardly ever have to worry about prepositions. In my class, we spend a lot of time learning how to insult Serers. Pulaars and Serers are cousins, so according to Senegalese tradition, they can say anything to each other without being offended. For example, Simone, the language coordinator here is a Serer, and she likes to greet my class by saying, 'Hello, my slaves.' A typical response to this is, 'Oh, look, a Serer. Serers are cats.' Saying Serers are monkeys is another favorite insult. For some reason, it's also a good insult to say, 'Oh, Serers eat a lot. They eat everything.' Which is ironic, considering that the Senegalese like nothing better than to shove food down your throat. Or so it seems. Anyway, my class knows how to tell someone they smell bad and several different ways of saying why someone smells bad - the other classes know how to say they came to Senegal to help people learn about health. Time will tell which of these will come in more handy. Hope all is well with you.
Love,
Christine
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