(no subject)
Today, my Swahili teacher was talking about how odd he finds it that we (Americans) measure distance in time (city X is so many hours from city Y). I'd never consciously noticed this before, because it seems so natural to me. But apparently in Kenya, you'd never do this; you'll always give an actual distance in miles. Which makes perfect sense, since you can know pretty accurately how far away you are, physically, but you can't always know how long it will take you to get somewhere: you could be eaten by a lion (or hit by a car) and never make it to your destination at all.
The more I think about it, the weirder and yet more natural it seems that we use time like this.
Another thing he mentioned is that in Swahili, like English, women are "beautiful" (not men). However, in his native language Kikuyu, men are "beautiful", and it sounds really odd to say that a woman is.
Other things I learned:
1) Swahili has several demonstrative pronouns, each of which agrees with the class of the noun it modifies. The two that I know are "this" (near me) and "that" (near you). There's at least one more, but I haven't learned it yet.
2) The word "amba-" means "that/which/who" (marks a relative clause). The end agrees with the class of the noun it's modifying in the same pattern as "that (near you)" does, except for class 1 singular (animate beings).
3) The suffix added to "amba-" can be added to a verb as a prefix between the tense and object prefixes, taking the place of the word "amba-". Thus: mtu ambaye ninampenda = mtu ninayempenda = the person who I love
Somehow, being able to form relative clauses makes writing in the language seem vastly more approachable.
The more I think about it, the weirder and yet more natural it seems that we use time like this.
Another thing he mentioned is that in Swahili, like English, women are "beautiful" (not men). However, in his native language Kikuyu, men are "beautiful", and it sounds really odd to say that a woman is.
Other things I learned:
1) Swahili has several demonstrative pronouns, each of which agrees with the class of the noun it modifies. The two that I know are "this" (near me) and "that" (near you). There's at least one more, but I haven't learned it yet.
2) The word "amba-" means "that/which/who" (marks a relative clause). The end agrees with the class of the noun it's modifying in the same pattern as "that (near you)" does, except for class 1 singular (animate beings).
3) The suffix added to "amba-" can be added to a verb as a prefix between the tense and object prefixes, taking the place of the word "amba-". Thus: mtu ambaye ninampenda = mtu ninayempenda = the person who I love
Somehow, being able to form relative clauses makes writing in the language seem vastly more approachable.