Quechua classes -- 2/14/07

I started Quechua class this week, and am pretty amazed at how much I have learned so far, at the same time as feeling really overwhelmed. During a 6-week period we have the class 2 hours a day, five days a week. I forgot what it’s like to have zero knowledge of a language one day, then be able to speak a sentence in it the next. Pretty empowering, until you realize that you’re ability to actually communicate with people in that language is still almost nil. Quechua is a language in which sentences are formed using suffixes. This means that even if you’re familiar with a word, it’s very likely that you won’t recognize it once it is conjugated and/or has three or four suffixes added on to the end. For instance, “erqe” means “boy”, but “erqechakunallawanmi” means “certainly with children.” “Rimay” means “to speak,” but “rimashasqaraqmi” means “still had been speaking.” Quechua also has some interesting phonetics, so it’s fun to walk around repeating certain words under your breath and thinking it sounds really cool. A lot of Quechua words are onomatopoeic, which makes the language even more fun.

My blog title, "Noqa gringuita kani," means "I am a white girl" in my very own Spanish-infused Quechua.