The Bible mentions God scattered people after they tried building a tower to reach him, and in order to prevent them from scheming against him, he gave them different languages to speak.
With that said, I’m absolutely baffled at how complex language can be. I’ve learned Chinese, Spanish, English, and now Chichewa. Chinese is hard because it’s the only language that’s based on pictographs, so words are interpreted based on the “pictures” that they represent. Spanish is all about male and female properties. The Bantu language has got to be one of the most complicated languages. For one thing, the “l” and “r” are used interchangeably, so I can never spell anything correctly (I used to be a Spelling Bee buff so that was driving me crazy). And the other thing is that you basically form a sentence out of ONE word. The way that I’d describe Chichewa is like this: since Spanish and French operate on male/female/neutral properties, Chichewa operates on ten noun classes. If you know Spanish, you’d know that you’re supposed to conjugate nouns depending on the male/female properties and the verbs according to I/we/he/she/they/informal you/formal you. Well, in Chichewa, there are ten ways to conjugate I/we/he/she/they/informal you/formal you and the verbs are conjugated depending on the noun subject of the sentence, so there are ten additional ways to conjugate the verbs. (All verbs usually start with “ku-“ and the “ku” is dropped when conjugated in a sentence.) Let me give you an example:
Kusewera – to play
Ndikusewera – I am playing.
Ndinasewera – I played.
Ndidzasewera – I will play.
Ndidzidzasewera – I will play myself (it doesn’t make sense technically but there’s a way to conjugate to indicate an action being done to oneself)
Tikusewerana – We are playing each other.
Mukuseweredwe – You are being played.
Akuseweretsa – They are playing (something).
With that said, I’m absolutely baffled at how complex language can be. I’ve learned Chinese, Spanish, English, and now Chichewa. Chinese is hard because it’s the only language that’s based on pictographs, so words are interpreted based on the “pictures” that they represent. Spanish is all about male and female properties. The Bantu language has got to be one of the most complicated languages. For one thing, the “l” and “r” are used interchangeably, so I can never spell anything correctly (I used to be a Spelling Bee buff so that was driving me crazy). And the other thing is that you basically form a sentence out of ONE word. The way that I’d describe Chichewa is like this: since Spanish and French operate on male/female/neutral properties, Chichewa operates on ten noun classes. If you know Spanish, you’d know that you’re supposed to conjugate nouns depending on the male/female properties and the verbs according to I/we/he/she/they/informal you/formal you. Well, in Chichewa, there are ten ways to conjugate I/we/he/she/they/informal you/formal you and the verbs are conjugated depending on the noun subject of the sentence, so there are ten additional ways to conjugate the verbs. (All verbs usually start with “ku-“ and the “ku” is dropped when conjugated in a sentence.) Let me give you an example:
Kusewera – to play
Ndikusewera – I am playing.
Ndinasewera – I played.
Ndidzasewera – I will play.
Ndidzidzasewera – I will play myself (it doesn’t make sense technically but there’s a way to conjugate to indicate an action being done to oneself)
Tikusewerana – We are playing each other.
Mukuseweredwe – You are being played.
Akuseweretsa – They are playing (something).
Akukuseweretsa - They are playing you.
I’m pretty sure there are other rules that I haven’t learned yet or forgotten. And this is just conjugating verbs! I don’t even want to start with conjugating with the nouns.
That’s Chichewa, people. At least it’s not clicking.
Anyway, this week has been packed with activities. I feasted and played ball at the ambassador’s house (though I was disappointed that there weren’t rackets so I couldn’t play tennis… I know right? The ambassador has a tennis court too? And a swimming pool too!). Then, we played softball with the JICA (Japanese) volunteers. And let’s just say that we were SCHOOLED (I didn’t play, but of course I would’ve led our team to victory!). These Japanese take the sport very seriously! But I did get to play a bit when they decided they had enough of the slaughtering. Then, we went to a Thanksgiving Moon house party that one of the Peace Corps staff was hosting.
Come Monday, I will be returning to my rat-infested house. Welcome home.
I’m pretty sure there are other rules that I haven’t learned yet or forgotten. And this is just conjugating verbs! I don’t even want to start with conjugating with the nouns.
That’s Chichewa, people. At least it’s not clicking.
Anyway, this week has been packed with activities. I feasted and played ball at the ambassador’s house (though I was disappointed that there weren’t rackets so I couldn’t play tennis… I know right? The ambassador has a tennis court too? And a swimming pool too!). Then, we played softball with the JICA (Japanese) volunteers. And let’s just say that we were SCHOOLED (I didn’t play, but of course I would’ve led our team to victory!). These Japanese take the sport very seriously! But I did get to play a bit when they decided they had enough of the slaughtering. Then, we went to a Thanksgiving Moon house party that one of the Peace Corps staff was hosting.
Come Monday, I will be returning to my rat-infested house. Welcome home.
My host family and some neighbors.
My amayi cooking in the kitchen. I probably helped build that fire. haha
My family eating lunch at home. :)
Probably not the most appropriate picture to follow... but this was my chimbudzi ("toilet" = hole in the ground).
Gule Wamgulu ("traditional dance"). Nyau. They're said to be a secret society because they meet in graveyards at night and never reveal themselves in public.