tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Sat Aug 10 11:56:11 1996

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Re: tlhIngan Hol chu' jIH

At 11:29 AM 8/5/96 -0700, you wrote:
>-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
>
>>Date: Sun, 4 Aug 1996 16:36:24 -0700
>>From: Randal Lanning <[email protected]>
>
>A comment on the subject first: "tlhIngan Hol chu' jIH"...  Doesn't quite
>hold together.... I think you mean "tlhIngan Hol ghojwI' chu' jIH" or
>something.  That right?

        I was trying to say that "I am new to the Klingon language."
Although I have been studying the TKD for about a month now off and on, I
decided to write my first letter in it. I read the above as "I am a new
student to the Klingon language." Which if I have read it right, would be
correct also.

>>choja' vIQaghchugh
>... you should say "jIQaghchugh" (if I make a mistake), since there's no object
>involved.

        I started out with "jI...." but then looked at "mistake" as being a
noun. I wasn't sure if "I make" (Subject-verb) "a mistake" (object) was
correct. That is why I asked. :)

        Should an object be defined as something more tangable so that the
implied "it" becomes meaningful? Would "choja' 'oH' vIQaghchugh'e'" be
correct? It doesn't sound right to me for some reason.

>Also, it might make more sense to say
>"tuja'" since you're addressing more than one of us (unless you meant
>someone special)

        I was not sure how a mailing list worked. (In fact I didn't know I
would get flooded with E-mail <Grin>). I thought it might go to a certain
person and then posted after being critiqued. This being the case, I
addressed the pronoun "you" to mean singular. Now that I know better, it
will be plural. :)

>>Qu'wIj ghuntaHwI'
>
>Here too, "My task is a programmer..."  You need 'oH.... 

        I could not find a word for "job". Though I might have said
something like "It is what I do to earn money." However, I could not find
anything to correspond to "Earn" and "Make" felt like I was creating it as
if I was counterfeiting so I avoided that one as well.

>>batlh choghItlhchugh
>
>Hmm.  Not sure I understand this adverbial with -chugh.  "If you(sing.)
>write to me honorably..." then what?

Since Klingon's do not use please and thank you and I do or at least try to
anyway, I tried to say, "I would be honored if you write." Perhaps I should
have stressed it as "batlh jIH'e' choghItlhchugh".

>Very good start!
>
>~mark

        Thank you for your help Mark and your criticisms and compliments.
Learning the language has been fun thus far and I have no one to use it
with. Hopefully when I write again, I won't butcher it so bad. <Grin>

Thank you.

Randy.

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