Re: poH nI'

[PeHruS9@aol.com]

In a message dated 8/16/2002 4:23:19 AM Mountain Daylight Time, 
agnpau1@hotmail.com writes:


> SuStel:
> >>Actually, you have to say /qaStaHvIS poH nI' jIloStaH/.
> >
> >Not so fast.  I noticed that {loS} is glossed "wait for" not just "wait", 
> >which means it can take an object.  The question is: Wait for what?  A 
> >person or a time period?  Unfortunately, our two examples from canon do 
> not 
> >show an object:
> >
> >......
> >
> >Although I admit that this is not quite the same thing, but the original 
> >poster may well have been right, though s/he should have used the object 
> >prefix:
> >
> >   poH nI' vIloStaH.
> >   I was waiting for a long time.
> 

SuStel is absolutely correctly for the idea you are trying to express.  Let's 
look at the final "wrong" example.  "I continue waiting for a long time" has 
the subject "I" the verb "waiting for" and the object "a long time."  How can 
poH nI' (a long time) be a noun and the object of the sentence?  When will 
this noun occur?  Obviously that's not what we intended to say in the first 
place; we wanted to express that we were waiting and the process took up a 
long period of time.  {loS} gets translated as a single verb meaning "waiting 
for" even though many English teachers in America call "for" a preposition.  
I prefer to think of "for" as part of the verb, an inseparable part.

peHruS