Tunaanza kujifunza Kiswahili ["We begin to study Swahili"]

Evening all.

I am resurfacing from my Swahili homework to post an entry for your edification. I doubt I will ever be able to write that sentence in Swahili, but never mind. I have to say, when it comes to the language lessons and homework, I find it a lot harder to think of ideas to talk/write about, that to use the language. Our homework this weekend is to write a dialogue using all the grammar and vocab we have learnt this week. That is just way to open ended for me! I'd much prefer to translate something.

The language training hasn't gone too badly, although Libby has not got on too well with our teacher's style of teaching, which tends to be a bit inflexible and not terribly helpful. However, God has supplied a different (better) teacher for her next week, which is nice! Our 'one-in-the-morning, one-in-the-afternoon' approach seems to be working so far. It was a bit of a struggle for the majority of the week, as I was feeling fairly rough, but I seem to be over that now. So, onward and upward!

Apologies for the lack of photos. I don't know if it's our computer, or something to do with the network, but it has become excrutiatingly slow to upload pictures, and 50%+ of the time it doesn't work at all. Please bear with us.

We went out to lunch this afternoon, which wasn't a terribly encouraging experience (although we did end up with a meal, which I guess was the object of the exercise). Our waitress didn't seem particularly interested in understanding our Swahili, or making it easy for us to understand hers, which was a little bit disheartening. I keep thinking it's amazing how much we've learnt in the last week, but also realising that we've hardly even scratched the surface. I was doing the crossword in the Weekly Telegraph this morning (Thanks mum) and it occurred to me that the ability to do a crossword in another language is the sign of absolute fluency. I don't think we'll ever get there in Swahili, but it would be nice to be able to order a meal!

Anyway, enough rambling, here's something a bit more interactive (for Jane's benefit). Swahili quiz #1 - these are supposed to get progressively harder. (I do know all the answers this time!)

1. Kompyuta

2. Teksi

3. Baiskeli

4. Gari

5. Mzungu

6. Mungu

7. Alhamisi

8. Hamsini

9. Mbinguni

10. Kwa sababu

[You're supposed to guess the English (Kiingereza) meaning, in case it's not obvious! - no cheating]