I love learning languages. I really do. There's something beautiful about each language. Sometimes when you learn a word in another language, the translation adds insight that enhances your understanding of that word. Case in point: the word for "hope" in Spanish is "esperanza." It comes from the same root as "esperar", to wait. So then, hope is a sort of expectant waiting, a waiting with happy anticipation. I love that.There's also something frustrating about each language. In German it's the verbs. In English it's that there are no rules for pronunciation (not really). In Spanish it's the possessives (it just takes so long), and in Afrikaans, it's the vowels.
I don't know of any other language that uses twice as many vowels as consonants, which is a rather impressive feat if you think about it. Or a language that can use so many dipthongs - eeu, ooi, oei, oeie, aie, uu, etc. So... without further ado, here are my favourite words in Afrikaans (thus far):
grondboontjiebotter - peanut butter
voëlverskrikker - scarecrow
grillerig - creepy (this is one of those onomatopoeic words that sounds like what it is; seeing it written just doesn't do it justice)
geëet - ate (three e's in a row!)
naar - unpleasant or nausiating (and "naartjie" is NOT the diminutive of "naar")
uie - onions (no consonants!)
seerower - pirate (a good word to know if you have a seven-year-old son!)
seekoeie - plural of hippopotamus (note: two consonants, six vowels. Afrikaans at its best.)
2 comments:
wish I could have used some of those words in some of my Scrabble games with David of late - there were too many turns where I had only or mostly vowels. :)
I am still so impressed by how quickly you pick up on new languages, my dear. It's a great skill. I think Afrikaans is one of the most gorgeous languages in the world (and I'm biased, of course). It's just so... descriptive. Poetic. You just need to read the poems of N.P. Van Wyk Louw to know that Afrikaans is something special.
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