tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Sep 20 22:19:52 2005

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Re: (Newbie help ) and anecdote(dolt?)

QeS lagh ([email protected]) 

qavan, GD! My name's QeS la', and I'm the official list Beginners' 
Grammarian (BG), and it's my task to greet newcomers to the list and help 
them with their Klingon. Whenever you want some help with a sentence in 
{tlhIngan Hol}, just put the letters KLBC in the subject line of your email; 
that will mark the message for my attention. No other list members can make 
comments on the grammar of a message marked KLBC until after I have. They 
can respond to the *content* of the message, but not correct its grammar, 
until I've had my shot. After that, anyone may add to the corrections I've 
made; they may make suggestions I haven't thought of, or they may have other 
ideas about how to translate something.

You may find the following couple of sites useful:

The list's FAQ:
http://www.bigfoot.com/~dspeers/klingon/faq.htm

Another good resource is the KLI's postal course, for which the first few 
lessons can be found at:
/study/postcourse.html

Now, to business. :)

bIja'pu':
>NuqhneH!

This should be {nuqneH}. In Klingon, sentences do not need to begin with a 
capital letter. Capital letters are used for an entirely different purpose. 
{q} and {Q} are two different letters in Klingon, and the difference can be 
very important:

qab "face" / Qab "theragen (nerve gas)"
qap "insist" / Qap "succeed, function"
qagh "gagh (food)" / Qagh "error, mistake"

Imagine this: you're trying to compliment a Klingon chef on the way he 
prepares gagh, and instead of saying {qaghvetlh vItIvqu'} "I really enjoyed 
that gagh", you say {Qaghvetlh vItIvqu'} "I really enjoyed that mistake". 
Not the right thing to say to a Klingon. :) Always use capitals exactly as 
they are written in The Klingon Dictionary; otherwise, you risk obscuring or 
mistranslating your message.

As well, {nuqneH} literally means "what do you want?" It's often used as a 
greeting, but it's normally only used if someone comes up to you and doesn't 
state their business right away. Marc Okrand has used {Qapla'} as a 
greeting, as well. But really, all you need to do is come right out and say 
what you want to say. Klingons aren't worried about formal niceties; they 
like to be direct. No-one on the list will think you're rude if you do the 
same.

bIja'taH:
>Meep I am nothing more than how did Gawron say in Klingon(TM)-in tlingHoq?

Looks like you mean {tlhInganqoq} "a so-called Klingon". {-qoq}, a type 3 
suffix, marks the noun {tlhIngan} "Klingon" as being used in a sarcastic or 
ironic way.

>Sounded something like a veqkol on my horrible speakers-
>though I doubt that's correct.

The only thing I can work out that fits the context is {veQ Hol} "garbage 
language". But if you hear Klingon on Star Trek, don't count on it being 
correct. The Klingon from the movies is mostly grammatical, but the 
producers on the TV series rarely get the grammar right - if they use 
Okrand's dictionary at all. (A couple of episodes have had grammatical 
examples of Klingon, but I can't recall which ones they were.)

>For all my proffs, and friends who say gee why learn this? Today is good 
>day, apparently Klingon sounds enough like some russian and check dialects 
>to "get buy".

Actually, Klingon has very little in common with either of those languages, 
and a Czech speaker will have no more hope of understanding a Klingon 
sentence than an English speaker would. In terms of sounds, it's closer to 
some North American languages - but in vocabulary and grammar, it's got very 
little in common with any Earth language.

bIja'taH:
>Also please enlighten me on the proper conventions of the e-mail list so 
>that I am not on the receiving end of bad klingon jokes (or someone thinks 
>I am possed by the Feckler{sp})

In English, it's spelled Fek'lhr; in Klingon, it's spelled {veqlargh}.

The only rule about posting to the list is that you can post either in 
English (about Klingon) or in Klingon (about anything at all). English posts 
on any other subject are considered off-topic, and while many of us are 
proficient in other languages, English is the only language (aside from 
Klingon) we have in common.

>My dictionary is in storage so most of this is from rote memory

Well, you should probably get your dictionary out of storage then. ;) 
Okrand's "The Klingon Dictionary" absolutely must be your starting point. 
Without TKD, you probably won't be able to get very far. I also recommend 
the tapes "Conversational Klingon" (CK) and "Power Klingon" (PK), as well as 
the later book "Klingon for the Galactic Traveller" (KGT).

>(If you can picture two poor trembling Terrans looking for a good walk that 
>*barely* speek english and mostly point-They are a couple)
>Her: *what sounds like ExKuseme-Me-vlast?)
>Me: NeH?
>Her: Lost---loking vor zish Kanyon Rrroad---what languages do you speek
>I happily volunteered my horrible highschool spanish, and even worst 
>grammar school 'High' english and few others---and somehow Klingon came up- 
>Apparently she had a few words of it--and it sounded close enough to what 
>ever dialect of  I think she said check-
>Her-Tling-Hol?
>Me:Hija'!

{HIja'}. We use a capital letter for the {I} to remind us that the vowel is 
like in the English word "bit", not like the "i" sound in Italian or 
Spanish.

>She pointed at a map proudly proclaiming what sounded like vaj-Daq'- at a 
>few places

{vaj} means "therefore, thus, so", and {Daq} means "place". She may have 
been asking "Do you know this place?"  However, you can't have a sentence in 
Klingon without a verb; to ask "Do you know this place?", she would need to 
use {Daqvam DaSov'a'?}.

>and then with dismay I think it was NhDaj---

{-Daj} is a type 4 noun suffix meaning "its"... but I can't work out what 
the first part might have been.

>and something about time-
>To avoid making this a rambling I bumbled along with what few numbers I 
>remembered from Klingon and pointed at the map-To my delight something 
>struck a chord as she rambled off in spanish thank you-
>And what sounded like: Bathwe' beaming happily proceeded down the street.

Maybe it was something to do with {batlh} "honour".

bIja'taH:
>Help, help, help.
>I need a good place to start to be much more competent.

If you have The Klingon Dictionary (TKD), I'd get that out of storage ASAP. 
That's the only thing I'd say you absolutely have to have to get a decent 
command of Klingon. You can get by without KGT or the tapes (although it's 
not a great idea), but you need to read the grammar part of TKD a number of 
times so that everything sinks in. If you can get your hands on a few old 
issues of HolQeD (the KLI's journal), they're a great help too.

The key with Klingon is to use it as often as you can. Make flashcards. 
Translate the names of things you see around you. Read the old issues of 
{Qo'noS QonoS}. And above all, post in Klingon as often as you can to this 
mailing list: some of the best Klingon speakers in the world frequent the 
list, and we're all willing to help. Don't be afraid to ask questions; we 
were all newbies once. :)

bIja'taH:
>-QUAPLA'!!!-

{Qapla'} "success!" Watch out for the capitals: if you capitalise the whole 
word, then the first "Q" could be either {q} or {Q}.

bIQapjaj SoH je!

Savan,

QeS la'
taghwI' pabpo' / Beginners' Grammarian


not nItoj Hemey ngo' juppu' ngo' je
(Old roads and old friends will never deceive you)
     - Ubykh Hol vIttlhegh

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