tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Feb 22 11:03:04 2000

Back to archive top level

To this year's listing



[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next]

RE: KLBC - of all things: Hair



jatlh HarnIS:

> I've just come home from taking my kids to swimming class.
> At one point,  while they were showering,  one was washing 
> his hair but I couldn't tell if the other had washed his or 
> if it was just wet.

> Naturally I thought how to ask  "Did you wash your hair?" 
> in Klingon.

You have some pretty good ideas here for the different variations, but you
have some problems with the basic "Did you wash your hair?". <Say'> means
"be clean". <Say'> is what the kids' hair is after they wash it. To make it
that way, they have to cause it to be clean - it's time for the suffix
<-moH>. Here's how it works:

Say' jIbwIj - My hair is clean
jIbwIj vISay'moH - I cause my hair to be clean -OR- I wash my hair

You also need to add the appropriate verb prefix to <Say'moH>. If you're
talking to one kid, then the prefix is <Da->, for a subject of "you" and an
object of "it/them" (the hair). If it's multiple kids, then the prefix is
<bo->, for a subject of "you" (plural) and an object of "it/them" again. If
it's multiple kids, the <jIblIj> also needs to become <jIbraj>. This gives:

jIblIj DaSay'moH'a' - Do you wash your hair; Did you wash your hair?

Finally, what you really want to know is if they have completed the task of
washing their hair, so the aspect suffix <-ta'> would be perfect here:

jIblIj DaSay'moHta''a'? - Have you washed your hair?

> Then,  since neither of them will ever give me a straight 
> answer, I thought of his possible responces and how I might 
> emphasize my sentence to stress different aspects:

> jIblij Sayqu''a'
>  did you WASH your hair?  (to forestall 
>  "I thought you asked if I SOLD my hair)

I don't think <-qu'> works here, although I know taD and a few others may
disagree. <jIblIj DaSay'qu'moH> basically means "You washed your hair and
got it really clean". I think the best way to say what you want to say is
just to heavily emphasize the <Say'> when you say it.

> jibna'lij Say'a'
>  I know this means "did you wash your big hair?",  
>  but could this be taken as did you wash your HAIR?
>  (to forestall an answer of "I thought you asked 
>  about my FOREHEAD?")

You're on the right track, but using the wrong tool. This is a perfect place
for the widely misunderstood topic suffix <-'e'>. Read the bit in TKD about
it. There's bonus points if you find the grammatical error in the example.

jIblIj'e' DaSay'moHta''a'?

> jiblij Say'a' SoH
>  did YOU wash your hair?   (to forestall "I thought 
>  you asked about the BIG UGLY GUY in the corner")

This one is perfect - adding the explicit <SoH> (especially with a bit of
verbal emphasis) does exactly what you want. If you want to be really clear
that you're talking about "YOU, and not somebody else", you could also add
<-'e'> to <SoH>.

> Are any of these right?
> I'm pretty sure the last two are not.
> Is there a simple way to make these distinctions or 
> do they have to be recast in a more elaborate fashion?

If you wanted to get really elaborate, you could combine all of them into a
single question:

jIblIj'e' Da*Say'*moHta''a' SoH?


pagh
Beginners' Grammarian

tlhIngan Hol Mailing List FAQ
http://www.bigfoot.com/~dspeers/klingon/faq.htm


Back to archive top level