#but i think the last word was just the present tense first person conjugation of tuszyć

[hanzajesthanza]

and i remembered why i love google translate

(that should not be grasshoppers: it is a type of monster they are talking about. but because sapkowski is fond of taking insect names as monster names, it gives you funny things like this :D)

[mindutme]

Tlette Tlursday #1

For my first post-Lexember Tlette post, I’ll be sharing a few corrections to posts from the last month (in addition to the changes noted in this post). Unfortunately there are quite a few errors to correct! To save space, I’ve put all the Tlette writing at the bottom of the post.

⁕ In the Lexember 5 post the example sentence has a couple of incorrect conjugations (the verb forms are for multiple humans rather than a single non-human) and I forgot to show the pronunciation, so here’s the corrected sentence with IPA:

Fyon lé sankı konenlle ta seq sankı kú. /ˌfjõ.ˌles.ˈsã.kɨ.kõ.ˈnẽl.le.ta.ˈsɛq.ˌsã.kɨ.ku/ The cat took a brush and ran away with it.

⁕ In the Lexember 11 post the example sentence was I hlì latwí lehlláy wi so’’úy, but it should be:

Hlì latı lehlláy wi so’’úy. /ˌɬɨl.ˈla.tɨ.leɬ.ˈɬaj.wi.soʔ.ˈʔuj/ I heard birds singing in the trees.

The change from latwí to latı is due to me deciding after making the post that the word latı should be the collective “birds” rather than the singular “bird” (I later used it in the compound latihì).

Including the first word of the original example wasn’t a mistake per se, but it does give a slightly different meaning. Tlette is a pro-drop language, so first- and second-person pronouns are usually omitted when they’re the subject, since the form of the verb will make it clear which is meant. They can be used, but it would be for some sort of emphasis, like “I’m the one who heard birds singing in the trees” or “Well I heard birds singing in the trees.” Neither of those is really what I was going for, so I should have dropped the pronoun.

The other mistake in the original was translating it into English with present tense, when it should have been in the past tense. To say “I hear birds singing,” the verb form would have to be hli’ì /ɬi.ˈʔɨ/. Technically in Tlette it’s an aspect distinction, not a tense one; the forms of the verb marked only with person agreement are perfective (indicating a completed action, more or less), and the imperfective form (describing an ongoing or continuous action) has an extra marking. In this case, that translates to a present/past tense distinction in English, but it’s not a one-to-one correspondence.

The remaining mistakes were all related to this same aspect difference; while making example sentences I repeatedly forgot that the basic form of the verb is perfective.

⁕ In the Lexember 14 post the second part of the second example requires the imperfective. With most serial verb constructions, aspect is marked on both verbs, though the person agreement only comes on the last one.

Qá tut qhupi te yar tuta’i qhupi’ì pahl! /ˈqɑt.ˌtut.ˈꭓu.pi.te.jaɾ.tu.ˈta.ʔi.ꭓu.pi.ˈʔɨp.ˈpaɬ/ Don’t bother me while I’m frying potatoes!

⁕ In the Lexember 17 post the verb also needs to be imperfective:

Te sán’ikı fyon tlatlawi ı’e: tlatlawi pewi, tlatlawi latı, ta qakhı tlatló khehyomen. /ˌte.ˈsã.ʔi.kɨ.ˈfjõ.tɬa.ˈtɬa.wi.ˈʔɨ.ʔe | tɬa.ˈtɬa.wi.ˈpe.wi | tɬa.ˈtɬa.wi.ˈla.tɨ | ta.ˈqɑ.xɨ.tɬa.ˈtɬox.xeh.ˈjõ.mẽ/ My cat has many toys: mouse toys, bird toys, and even a fruit toy.

⁕ In the Lexember 27 post there are three verbs and they’re all wrong. The last one should just be imperfective, and the first two could either be in the habitual imperfective, or just the plain imperfective. In the original post I didn’t even remember to conjugate the first two verbs at all!

The habitual in Tlette is formed as a serial verb construction with the verb pa /pa/, which otherwise means “stay.” However, the plain imperfective is often used for a habitual meaning when the meaning is clear from context. I think it is in this example, so I’ll avoid the extra syllables and just put lé “make” in the imperfective, as le’’ikúy. Otherwise, it would be pa’i lekkúy instead of just lé, adding the imperfective form of pa and adding the subject agreement to lé.

Tokkúy le’’ikúy hikı pikı ta murréy le’’ikúy hikwí mantáy … qere le’ì pyo tokkúy! /tok.ˈkuj.leʔ.ʔi.ˌkuj.ˈhi.kɨ.ˈpi.kɨ.ta.mur.ˈrej.leʔ.ʔi.ˌkuj.hik.ˈwim.mã.ˈtaj | ˌqɛ.ɾe.le.ˈʔɨp.ˈpjo.tok.ˈkuj/ Drums make a ruckus and violins make nice sounds … but I like drums more!

P.S. Regarding the header: Tlette doesn’t actually have a word for Thursday so that says Tlette Tlurstéy (/tɬuɾs.ˈtej/), which is about as close as I can get!

[ghostflowerhotpotch]

To be honest I am fine with him being bad at the theory because is really bullshit.

Hi, Spanish is my first language and I learned back home, being in a school back home until I move when I was an older teen.

But here is a funny story, when I moved to Canada I only did the last two years of high school, and in my last year I didn't have enough credits in almost all of the classes for my grade, so my own ESL teacher suggested me getting Spanish because that was a class I would be able to attend regardless of credits. I ended up doing it because of a lack of options.

I didn't get a 100%, or even that close, why? The theory part continued tripping me over. Ask me the difference between pretérito perfecto and pretérito imperfecto with a gun pointing at my head and I will be dead.

Want to know the difference? Is basically verbs in the present tense and past tense, and I never remembered because rather than just saying that, they put names that weren't indicative of what they do (At least not for anyone speaking colloquially at this time, maybe this made sense a few centuries ago.) You technically can just ask someone to do X verb in present/future/past, but there are formal names that we were taught both in Spanish classes here in Canada and the ones we had back home.

And no one ever remembers.

No seriously, once my family started making fun of me for not having a 100% at the end, I ask them how many of them remembered these details, like participios (aka the -ing at the end of a verb, because spanish works differently we have more than that,) and other stuff, and then everyone shut up. My own mother, who was a teacher for over 30 years; told me she also couldn't recall most of these details, and she taught classes from kindergarten to high school.

Again, I am only one latine person, and we have a big community, but if I am honest I think if I ask at random about any of these details to any of my friends who speak Spanish as a first language, they wouldn't remember.

The point with all of this is that you can functionally speak Spanish perfectly, even having good grammatical skills, use of the language, and so forth, and still be tripped by the theory because of technicalities.

So it would make perfect sense for Miles to go to a test, have the test ask to separate the participios regulares e irregulares, and have him flunking the test because the question was using such obtuse terminology his mom may not even know what the question is about, and I say this because neither of my parents could answer this question without some explaining and juggling their memory.

If I am honest, the difference in how they teach Spanish in English-speaking countries vs the Spanish I learned back home wasn't really that different? Yeah, there was some different way to conjugate things and some words, but no teacher in their right mind would disqualify Miles' way of speaking Spanish unless they were asking for VERY specific things.

You can even have him trip for things that actually defy the grammar because those words are exceptions and the only way to know is remembering them.

For example, in Spanish rather than having "The" we have "El" and "La", these are normally assigned by what the word ends up in.

La Casa.

El Coche.

(There is obviously more to this but this is the idea.)

Simple enough, right? What would you use for the word "Dentista"? If you said La, that's wrong! It's actually "EL Dentista."

How do you know that? Well you memorize it, there is literally no other way.

Hope this doesn't come as a rant or anything, I understand that Miles speaking Spanish (which while the pronunciation is accurately a bit wonky, is pretty good btw,) is really important not just for the fans, but to remember that he keeps his roots dear to his heart,

This was really just me wanting to talk about how honestly the language can be pretty dumb anyways and if people whose first language is Spanish are forgetting this crap I don't want to imagine someone who speaks it as a second language and also missed 6 classes.

So believe me, is entirely possible to speak this language perfectly and still do the classes poorly regardless.

I prefer the theory that Miles has a B in Spanish because the Spanish they teach in schools is different than the Spanish he speaks at home more than the theory that he’s just bad at Spanish

Also, I’m getting tired of how people keep portraying Miles as more and more terrible at Spanish, like even if he’s not better at home, a B is still good!!

I know it’s mostly just jokes, but I swear it’s gonna cause a ton of people to just believe that Miles is just horrible at Spanish and refuse to give up that characterization, we’re gonna be watching in real time as a fanon version of a character gets popular and unavoidable

[yukusaki]

～ている or ～た?

The following is a very very basic-level concept that took me a lifetime to figure out on my own because it's not used in the same way as its English equivalent (thanks to English having an inordinate amount of conjugations that Japanese just.......doesn't). Also thanks to the fact that no one during my four years of university and 8 months of language school ever explained this, and to the fact that because it deals with two beginner-level grammar points, any google searches on the topic will likely just give you basic conjugations.

In English we have the simple past (ie "did") and the present perfect (ie "has done"), Long story short, "did" emphasizes the action that happened (“I finished my homework”) while 'has done" emphasizes the state of the action having been completed (“I have finished my homework”), and yes I am aware how abstract that is but just keep that in mind and try to bear with me.

Unfortunately for us, Japanese doesn’t have the present perfect. And while we learn that we use ～たことある to talk about something you have experienced once, such as “I have been to Okinawa,” it doesn’t translate the same way when we simply want to express that an action has been completed, such as the above "I have finished my homework." In this case, we should use the ～ている form instead!

Most of the time, using the ～ている form isn’t too different than using the past tense form of a verb (as far as I can tell), just like there isn’t much difference between “I finished my homework” and “I have finished my homework.”

· I have not finished lunch. 私はまだ昼食を終えていません。

· I've finished my homework. 私は宿題を終えた。

· My work is finished.私の仕事は終わっている。

Here’s the example that made this whole concept really click for me. I was at the ward office and I wanted to tell the staff member there that

· はがきはまだ来ていない　The postcard hasn’t come yet.

In this situation I actually (incorrectly) used まだ来なかった instead of 来ていない, and noticed when the person I was talking to confirmed by deliberately saying あ、まだ来ていないんですね. First of all, when using a negative with まだlike in this sentence, you wouldn’t use the simple past—just like in English, it’s better to say “It hasn’t come yet” than “it didn’t come yet,” (though English is a lot more forgiving of “technically incorrect” words in casual conversation so you probably wouldn’t notice if someone did say “didn’t come yet”).

If you get nothing else from this post, just remember that まだ should be used with the ～ていない form (来)ていない, and not the ～なかった form (来)なかった

There are a few situations where it’s common to use the ～ている form of a verb when in English we would use an entirely different word (usually an adjective or something else to describe the current state of things). For example, imagine you are at a party and you want to tell me that a certain friend “A” has arrived. You might want to say Aさんがここにいる since that’s the direct translation of “A is here” but it doesn’t mean that A has arrived, it means that A is in this spot here as opposed to that spot over there (and if A is not, in fact, standing next to you, I would be a bit confused because A is not “here,” A is over there.)

In this case, instead of “here,” it’s better to think of it as “A has come”—in other words, you should say Aさんが来ている.

Earlier I said that there sometimes isn’t much difference between the two forms, but remember that the ている form is talking about the current state of the action having been completed. So if we’re at the party now, you could say Aさんが来た instead of Aさんが来ている, but if the party was last week and everyone has already left, you would say 来た, because the action was completed and is already over, but the state of A having arrived is no longer true.

If this explanation doesn't make much sense to you, don’t worry—changing your way of thinking about something as foundational as how a verb conjugation is used is not intuitive. Do your own research and pay attention to how native speakers use the different conjugations, and over time you should be able to spot the patterns on your own.

[ears-awake-eyes-opened]

Intoxication (Part 3)

(Hayffie 🔥. Sexual content. NSFW. As I reread Mockingjay, I’ve started again writing fics about what life might be like for them in 13. In this part, Haymitch and Effie set boundaries for sex — after they’ve already had it. I view Hayffie with a strong tendency towards enmeshment. They try to set boundaries in an effort to not get too close, not get hurt, and not hurt each other. When their relationship becomes sexual, I imagine certain boundaries are nearly impossible for them to keep up regardless of their motivations and intentions.)

Her mouth moved softly with his, like a slow dance after the band stops playing. “You’re bleeding...” She kissed him where her tooth had caught his lip.

“I’ll live.” The moment was surreal, like a dream he’d woken up from a hundred times with nothing beside him except empty sheets. Only this time he was awake with Effie.

Her body was warm but shaking. Or maybe the shaking was coming from him. He reached for the blanket at the foot of the bunk and pulled it over them. “Are you sure you’re alright?” He asked, holding her loosely, uncertain what would come next.

She closed her eyes and focused on the sensations. Her hips ached where he’d gripped them so hard. Tomorrow she’d have bruises there matching his fingerprints; she could tell that much. She was a bit sore inside. She’d seen him naked before — drunk naked, not fully aroused. She hadn’t anticipated him filling her so completely.

“Haymitch... we had sex.” It was all she could think to say. She was feeling some shock about it.

“Yeah. I noticed.” He chuckled. Static electricity on the pillow caught strands of her hair like a magnet. She was more wild than he’d expected. There was much more to her than she showed on the surface. Under the blanket he traced the path of her tattoo with his fingertips, following it by memory from below her breast to her sacrum and back again.

“Do you have any idea how long I’ve wanted you like this?” she asked openly. The question itself was a confession.

He knew the answer. He’d always known. “Since you held up that paddle at that ridiculous picnic.”

“You spoke about running home, and you looked right at me as you said it. I’ve never forgotten the feeling. I thought I might have a spontaneous orgasm right then.”

“Flickerman would have had something to say about that. He loves an orgasmic audience.”

“My mother would have had something to say about that! Choice words for sure.” Effie laughed. “If she could see us here together, she’d lose her shit!”

Her laughter rang through him like chimes in the wind. His father used to make them out of scraps of metal. Even after he was dead, and time had rusted them all the way through, they always sounded like home.

Haymitch caressed her cheeks in the spots where the laughter crinkled her skin. “Such language coming from the pristine mouth of Euphemia Rosalind?”

“I’m not sure whether Mother would be most appalled right now by the unflattering wardrobe strewn about the floor, my conjugating with rebels, or your semen running down my thigh.”

“Conjugating. Is that what we’re doing?” Haymitch clasped her right hand with his and pulled their arms out from under the blanket. Their purple tattoos matched for ‘22:00–Bathing’. “It looks like Coin has scheduled you and me to shower together,” he teased.

“Sharing a military shower with a guard at the entrance does NOT sound romantic.”

“Are we being romantic now? I thought you just wanted this rough and impersonal.” He said it with their fingers still entwined.

She sighed. “I’m trying to be practical. I’m expecting you to pull away like you always have. Should I expect something different?”

“Hell, I don’t know, Effie. We’ve never done this before.”

He held her hand so tightly that her fingers turned pale. “How long have you been wanting ME like this?” She needed to know.

“Since that same day. ...How many years ago was it?”

“Fifteen.” She knew exactly.

It’s a long time to want somebody.

“If my parents hadn’t kept me from leaving the house that night to meet you, do you think this would have happened way back then?”

“If it did, it wouldn’t have been like this.”

“Define THIS?”

“You want an itemized list?”

“If we’re going to be doing this, I think we need some ground rules.”

“More rules?! Don’t you think Coin’s rule book for society and Plutarch’s play book for a revolution are enough to contend with?”

Effie glanced at the ink imprinted on their arms. He had a valid point, but... “What’s happening in this bed has nothing to do with Coin or Plutarch or society or a revolution. This is between us. We need to know where we stand, so we can draw a line and stay on this side of it.”

“You know, for someone who’s so free when she fucks, you’re goddamn controlling.”

“Haymitch, if we don’t control this, what’s going to happen?”

He thought of fire. The question was sobering. “Okay. Rule 1, I’m not going to fall asleep with you. Ever.”

“Why not?”

“My rule, my business.”

She could live with that. She didn’t like to be seen in the morning before she’d put herself together. “That’s fine.”

She surprised him by agreeing so readily.

“Rule 2,” she said, “When we do this again, you won’t be taking all my clothes off.”

“Why the fuck not!?”

“My rule, my business.”

He’d only just had a taste of nakedness with her. He was feeling it now, the sensuality of her skin against his. He’d been starving for it, and she already wanted to take it away. “Are you saying that to spite me for not wanting to fall asleep with you? Because I have legitimate reasons.”

“So do I. I told you I don’t usually do this naked. Not totally. The truth is I never do. ...except this time.”

He held her tighter, feeling the whole of her body while he had the chance. He didn’t want this rule, but he acquiesced, hoping he could change her mind. “Fine. Rule 3, no kissing during sex.”

“No kissing??”

“I’ve got no problem with before and after, but no kissing on the mouth when my dick is inside you. Kissing then, it’s just... it’s too personal.”

She heard a quiver in his voice. He was afraid of getting attached to her. He’d always been afraid of that. Over the years he’d conveyed his reasons, which were mostly logical. Despite them having sex, or maybe because of it, his fear was very present.

“I can work with that. Rule 4, this relationship can’t be exclusive.”

Every muscle in Haymitch’s body tensed. “Are you fucking somebody else here?”

“No. But as long as you’re reluctant about getting attached, then I can’t get too attached to you either. I’m not willing to find myself suddenly stuck in this alone.”

He didn’t want to think about her being with someone else. He’d never liked thinking about that. Now after being with her like this... No way. “Not here. I want a bottle all the time, Effie. Without liquor, how am I supposed to handle knowing you’re fucking some other guy? Once we’re out of 13, fine, but for now that’s off the table.”

Effie breathed a quiet sigh of relief. “Then you won’t be having sex with anyone else here either?”

“Who else would I have sex with?!”

“I don’t know. ...Coin is pretty. If only she’d do something about that hair!”

“Coin?! Coin gets off on saying no. I’m surprised she doesn’t regulate the number of breaths we each get to take! Why would I want to screw her?”

“I just said she’s pretty. Moving on. Rule 5?”

He thought about how delicious it felt to have her hands in his hair and his forehead against her chest, stroking her, then trying to hold back and make it last. It was all so good. Too good. If they we’re going to be doing this again...

“Slow is dangerous. Rule 5, sex has to be quick.”

“Sex has to be slow enough to make me come, and I’ll agree.”

He moved his thumb back and forth across one of her nipples, feeling her respond to his caress. “I’ll make you come every time.”

“Is that Rule 6?”

“We don’t need a rule for that one. It’s just gonna happen.”

“We’ll see.” She rolled on top of him and gently bit the skin along the side of his neck. She was careful, tender, making up for cutting the hell out of his lip.

He wrapped her in his arms. The weight of her felt better than any blanket ever could. His eyelids were heavy, but the swelling of his dick was a more pressing need than sleep.

“What about birth control?” he asked, while he was still thinking clearly.

“Aren’t you asking that a little late?”

“Effie...”

“Relax. I had a shot in June. Sometimes those can last six months.”

“Sometimes? This world’s a shithole for a kid. Rule 6 has got to be not having any.”

“We’re covered for now, and we can find out what these cave dwellers do to prevent pregnancy.”

“The docs downstairs said an epidemic left a lot of these people infertile. If they have birth control in 13, then they probably keep it under lock and key.”

“Then we’ll just have to be resourceful! Let’s cross that bridge if we come to it. I don’t want to be pregnant any more than you do.”

Reassured, he moved his hands over her body, committing every texture of her to memory. The curves of her ass filled his palms and the most sensitive parts of her brushed against him without hurry.

“What’s happening now is still our first time, right? So the rules aren’t official yet?”

“Semantics. But you’re still naked, so yeah, sure. What are you thinking?”

“I want us to kiss while you’re inside me. Just once, Haymitch. ...Because I need to know.”

“Need to know what?”

“That intimacy.”

A siren sounded in his chest as she kissed his forehead, his eyelids, the bridge of his nose, then the divot above his lip as she nestled against him and enfolded the tip of his dick.

“After all these years,” she whispered, “Don’t you want to know too? Just one kiss, while you’re fucking me...”

Yes. Hell, yes. He thrust inside her, and she claimed his mouth. He threaded his fingers through her hair and held the back of her head when she might have pulled away. ‘Just one kiss’ was going to last as long as he needed to get her out of his system.

This time there was no roughness, no swearing, just fluid motion and murmured consent. He felt her weaving through him like the ribbons inked along her rib cage. Effie was in his system so deep, it occurred to him that he might never get her out. There was no detox for this.

She came twice before he spilled inside her. Their mouths were still dancing slow, long after the band stopped playing.

“Ohh.” Now I know.

“Damn...” I’m so fucked.

[spanishskulduggery]

Hello! My group and I have been studying diligently on zoom every since we’ve been made to go online, but it’s really hard when we’re all struggling and don’t have anyone to turn to. I have a worksheet based off of hypothetical and si clauses. I’m providing what the lesson gives us, and the worksheet as well. 

# 8 – A – FRASES HIPOTÉTICAS

⦁ I would run if I had more energy. – Yo correría si yo tendría más energía.

⦁ If they were home, they would *set the table – Si ellos estarían en casa, ellos pondrían la mesa.

⦁ You (inf.) would chat if you could. - Tú con chantajarías si tú puedes.

⦁ If I studied more, I would *know more vocabulary – Si yo estudiara más, yo sabría más vocabulario.

⦁ You (pl.) would *say more if you (pl.) wanted (to). – Ustedes dirían más si Uds. querrían.

⦁ He would propose tonight if he had a job. – Él proponería este noche si él tendría un trabajo.

⦁ If we conserved more energy, we would pay less money. – Si nosotros conservaríamos más energía, nosotros p_________ más dinero.

⦁ They would develop more new technology if they built a bigger lab.- Ellos d_____________ más technología nuevo si ellos c___________ un laboratorio más grande.

https://i.imgur.com/zt2sHsD.png

https://i.imgur.com/AvnoimZ.png

Here is the lesson, and above is the what we’ve been working on. We’ve been using the conditional for pretty much all of them, but looking at our lesson the conditional isn’t really used. What we’re having issues with is figuring out what sentence falls under what category- hypothetical statements about possible events, improbable events, the past, or habitual conditions and actions in the past. I think we know most of these don’t fall under the last two, but deciding between it being a probably or improbably event is an issue too.

Even then, when we think it’s a probable event, it can be conjugated in four different ways, and that confuses us more. I think when it uses words like “would” or “could” my brain thinks it needs to fall under conditional, while future tense uses “will.” Could you possibly explain why these sentences don’t really use conditional, and how to better tell which it could fall under from the sentences given? I guess the textbook is making it a little confusing for me.

Thank you for any help you can give :) I really appreciate it.

—————————————————————————

[Response from Spanishskulduggery]

For a minute I was really confused because that was a lot of conditional being used instead of what I thought it would be.

First let me say that you should try not to interpret “could” and “would” literally for Spanish as compared to English. English uses similar conjugations for many different tenses which can be confusing.

Just as a quick example: “I could have helped” is past tense [I would personally use imperfect but preterite wouldn’t be wrong], but “you could help” could potentially be present tense or conditional.

Don’t go based off of how it’s translated for “could” and “would”. It doesn’t help as much as you think it will. Instead, try and focus on the general mood being set up.

But based on what they’re trying to have you do, “could” sounds like they’re using it for poder and then “would” is being used for other verbal conjugations of conditional. 

So just for example again:

Podrías hablar. = You could speak. / You would be able to speak.

Hablarías. = You would speak

Second, it sounds like you’re learning conditional and imperfect subjunctive.

These can be boiled down to “if/then” statements.

Typically, the “if” is the contrary to fact statement and/or the hypothetical. “If I had more energy”, “if I studied more”, “if he had a job”

Think about what those “if” statements are… They aren’t actually what the situation is. You’re setting up a hypothetical thing. “If X, then Y”. The X doesn’t exist, it’s not how things actually are. It’s contrary to fact, it’s hypothetical.

In those situations, “if” is imperfect subjunctive. And it’s better translated as “were” for English, but again don’t get too caught up in translation, try thinking about the mood.

For example:

Si fuera a España… = If I were to go to Spain… / If I went to Spain…

Si pudiera… = If I were able to… / If I could…

Si estudiara más… = If I were to study more… / If I studied more…

So take the first sentence…

“If I went to Spain”… the implication is that “I” never went to Spain. That’s hypothetical.

The “then” statement is normally in conditional. It describes what someone “would” do if something “were” to happen.

…viviría en Madrid. = …I would live in Madrid.

…ayudaría. = …I would help.

…sacaría mejores notas. = …I would get better grades.

These are the consequences of the implied hypothetical.

In fact, conditional is often used with deber for the idea of “should’ve”… like debería haber hablado con ella “I should have spoken with her”. 

Conditional gets used a lot with “coulda woulda shoulda” type situations.

But be aware that the if/then statements can be in any order, so you have to be careful:

Estarían enojados si te ayudara. = They would be angry if I helped you.

Si te ayudara, estarían enojados. = If I helped you, they’d be angry.

Si dijera la verdad, nadie me creería. = If I told the truth, no one would believe me.

Nadie me creería si dijera la verdad. = No one would believe me if I told the truth.

And just a quick side note about imperfect subjunctive:

There are some words or phrases that could be imperfect subjunctive or could be something else, but it really depends on context.

Most commonly that’s si “if” and aunque which is “even though/although” or “even if” in subjunctive:

Aunque es verdad… = Although it is true… [it is true; indicative]

Aunque sea verdad… = Even if that is true… [contrary to fact; subjunctive]

Aunque fuera verdad… = Even if that were true… [contrary to fact; subjunctive]

And…

Si tienes tiempo… = If you have time… [normal]

Si tengas tiempo… = If you have the time… [polite; subjunctive]

Si tuvieras tiempo… = If you were to have the time… [overly polite; subjunctive]

Although you can use imperfect subjunctive this way it’s not really recommended because it sounds overly deferential.

But you do see it in hypothetical and contrary to fact statements:

Si tuvieras tiempo, me ayudarías. = If you had the time, you’d help me.

In this case, “if you had the time” is hypothetical. It’s implied that the person doesn’t have time, but IF they did THEN they would help.

Now onto the actual worksheet itself: I’m not going to correct every single thing unless you want me to and you can send me an ask or another submission if you’d like letting me know…

But I’m going to point out some things that are either very wrong or are noteworthy. So I’d encourage you to go back over your worksheet now that you have more information

But really look for “if” and “then” statements, I think that will help.

In particular try and examine the sentence and see if the “if” statement could also make sense as a “if it were”, “if they were to have”, “if they were to” something. That’s your biggest clue that they want imperfect subjunctive. 

Again, this is difficult for English because we don’t have a clear imperfect subjunctive, and even when we do, we don’t have totally unique conjugations.

Now the worksheet:

#3 I think the word they want is conversar which is why it starts with con but that confused me too. Typically the word used for “to chat” is charlar. The word you’re using I don’t think is a word, but it looks very close to chantajear which is “to blackmail”. So I would say that’s conversarías si pudieras “you would converse if you could”

#4 You got that one completely right; si estudiara, sabría where estudiara is imperfect subjunctive “if I were to study” 

#7 conservar would be in imperfect subjunctive though be careful because the nosotros forms have accent marks a lot of the times: conserváramos. The word they want you to use for “pay” is pagar I would bet

#8 The verb they want you to use for “to develop” is probably desarrollar which is regular. And “build” is probably construir which is regular in conditional, but irregular in imperfect subjunctive. Basically construir ends in -uir, and the imperfect subjunctive form for -ir and -er verbs is -iera. They don’t want you to write “construiera” because that looks weird so instead you’d be writing construyera. That pattern happens for oír, leer, destruir and a few others; oyera, leyera, destruyera and it’s not TOTALLY irregular, it’s done for spelling purposes but it does LOOK irregular. And I only say that because I don’t know if they taught you that yet.

#6 The verb is proponer but keep in mind that the same irregularities that apply to the root irregular verbs typically apply to their offshoots. In this case proponer is related to poner so if it’s conditional it’s pondría it would be propondría. You got it right that it was conditional. But if it were imperfect subjunctive [si fuera condicional, sorry I couldn’t stop myself that’s an “if” statement], then it would be pusiera for poner, and propusiera for proponer.  This applies to most of the root irregularities… hacer and satisfacer, poner and proponer, venir and convenir. The exception to that is decir where the offshoots conjugate as if they were regular for future and conditional tense. I don’t know why. Irregular decir is normally diría. But bendecir, maldecir, predecir all come out like bendeciría, maldeciría, predeciría. And most annoying is that they’re totally irregular again for imperfect subjunctive: bendijera, maldijera, predijera taking after dijera for decir. It is maddening I’m so sorry but luckily you don’t have to use those verbs that way very often. They are sometimes curveballs that the exams will throw at you for fluency tests though.

Oh! Important side note:

If you look up imperfect subjunctive in Spanish, you’ll probably find two forms. One will be -iera/-ara, and the other will be -iese/-ase

There’s some historical difference there which is not much use to you now

But the important thing is that if you’re in Latin America you’re going to see -iera/-ara more, and in Spain you’d see -iese/-ase for imperfect subjunctive

Si hubiera estado allí… = If I had been there… [Latin America] Si hubiese estado allí… = If I had been there… [Spain]

Si hablara… = If I were to speak… [Latin America] Si hablase… = If I were to speak… [Spain]

Si comeira… = If I were to eat… [Latin America] Si comiese… = if I were to eat… [Spain]

Si viviera… = If I were to live… [Latin America] Si viviese… = If I were to live… [Spain]

Anyway, let me know if you want something else explained or if you’d like me to talk to you more about the answers in depth. I hope this helps, let me know either way.

EDIT: Also I just want to point out that some of this is entirely contextual.

So for example, #2 “If they were home they would set the table”

That all depends on how the context is.

Is it contrary to fact, or is it not?

Let me put it to you this way:

Si estuvieran en casa, pondrían la mesa. = If they were home, they would set the table.

This implies that they ARE NOT home. You’re in a situation where the people are not home, and you’re like “huh that’s weird, I guess they must not be here, because if they WERE, this is what they WOULD DO”

However...

Si estaban en casa, ponían la mesa. = If they were home, they would set the table.

This only makes sense in the context of recalling a memory. You’re saying what someone USED TO DO.

So “Oh, I remember that whenever they were home, they’d set the table and eat together” would all be in imperfect. You’re recounting an event or talking about someone’s habits.

That’s what your worksheet is talking about with habitual practices.

So in your second image:

Iba a la playa. = I would go to the beach.

Iría a la playa. = I would go to the beach.

This is what I meant by English being unhelpful for translations.

The first iba implies it’s something someone did in the past

The iría implies it’s something that hasn’t happened but someone might want to do it in the future, but possibly can’t.

Putting that together like last time:

Iba a la playa cuando tenía tiempo. = I would go to the beach whenever I had time.

Iría a la playa si tuviera tiempo. = I would go to the beach if I had time.

That first sentence is talking about what someone would do in the past

The second implies the person doesn’t have time so they can’t do that, even though they want to.

[haru-dipthong]

This might be the most interesting word in all of Japanese. The first suggestion you get when you type it into Google is 「違くない　間違い」. It’s widely considered “a mistake” by Japanese people. So why is it SO widely used?

Even jisho.org defines it as a “grammatically incorrect negation of 違う”. Nice prescriptivism jisho 🙄. Why is it considered “incorrect”? Well, 違う is a verb, but 違くない follows the negative conjugation rule for an い-adjective, not a verb. In fact, this paper gives multiple examples of the verb 違う being treated as an adjective in multiple different ways, not just in the form 違くない. 違さ、違ければ、違すぎる and more have all been observed in fairly common use on Twitter.

What’s going on here? How did this happen?

違う kind of ends in い

Let’s talk about verb conjugation in Japanese for a sec. Conjugation rules for verbs in Japanese feel really tidy because every possible vowel gets a chance at being connected to the verb stem.

With an example, 手伝う (since it ends in う, same as 違う):

あ　Negative: 手伝わない (To not help)

い　Nounification: 手伝い (Help)

う　Present/future tense: 手伝う (To help)

え　Hypothetical: 手伝えば (If I help…)

お　Volitional: 手伝おう (Let’s help)

Whatever column the final mora of the base verb is (う for 違う), conjugation just involves moving up or down that column.

Speaking from personal experience, as I acquired Japanese more and more, I stopped thinking about verbs as single words and started thinking about them as stems. Like, 「引く」 isn’t a standalone word. It’s like a pokemon forme change of the verb stem 「引k」. Note the K at the end - since the consonant doesn’t change as the vowel does. I think this is how native Japanese speakers subconsciously think about verbs, even if they don’t realise it.

To phrase it another way, the final vowel sound of a verb isn’t considered important, since it changes whenever you do anything to the verb. What’s more important is what column that last kana belonged to.

Can you see where I’m going with this? 違う ends with う, which is in the same column as い, like an い-adjective. This gives it an adjective-y feeling, more than verbs that don’t end in う. I believe that if 違う didn’t end in う, and it was something like 違す or 違る, this 違くない form would never have come about.

But wait, 違う is the only verb in all of Japanese that has started to do this. If ending in う was the only reason, we’d be seeing other verbs like 笑う and 叶う behaving the same way. So there must be something else.

違う makes sense as an adjective

違う is a stative verb. Stative verbs are verbs that describe the state of a noun. Often, a word that’s a stative verb in one language will be an adjective in another (see: 好き/like; 足りる/enough). Even within the same language, adjectival and verbal forms can coexist (see: 痛む/痛い). It’s easy to see how a stative verb could evolve into an adjective.

On top of this, in Japanese, the grammar for [noun][stative verb] sentences are the same as [noun][adjective] sentences: 「足が痛む・足が痛い」which means that speakers don’t even need to adjust their grammar to start treating it as an adjective.

What seems likely is that people started to think of 違う as an adjective, then eventually began conjugating it like an い-adjective, due to it ending in an あ行 kana.

違う IS an adjective

In that same paper linked above, they note that (regardless of its appearance) if 違う is acting on two nouns at once, it is a verb, but if its acting only on one noun, its an adjective. The reasoning being that verbs assign semantic roles to words in the sentence, while adjectives don’t affect semantic roles at all. Consider the following:

彼の意見は私のと違う His opinion is different to mine.

これは違う This is wrong.

That paper seems to imply that when 違う is acting on a noun followed by と, it isn’t conjugated like an adjective. So the following shouldn't sound natural.

彼の意見は私のと違くない？

I'm not sure if I agree with the paper here. I think the above actually does sound fairly natural, despite it being a case of adjective-y conjugation in a case with two nouns. Which means in every case, 違う is behaving like an adjective.

I believe that 違う isn’t just acting like an adjective in these cases. It IS an adjective! It’s an adjective that has the appearance of a verb!

That said, it is also actually a verb, and can be conjugated as such. It’s just that those conjugations are getting less and less frequent, and less and less natural. Although you wouldn’t use 違くない in a formal piece of writing, I don’t believe you would use 違わない or 違っていない either - you would probably use a different word altogether, like 一致 or 異なっていない. In contrast, conjugating it as if it were an adjective leads to more natural sounding speech. If usage of 違う continues in the direction it’s going, soon “違う is the only い-adjective in Japanese that doesn’t end in い” won’t be a “take”, it’ll just be a fact that all Japanese learners will need to memorise. Hell, they should probably memorise it now.

違う is the only い-adjective in Japanese that doesn’t end in い

[hms-chill]

Secondly: Alex always saying sweet things to Henry in Spanish but won't tell him what any of it means, and he's always google translating them and awe-ing at how cute Alex is and then like maybe he learns how to say something adorable to and says it to Alex and Alex just like melts or something

I present to you: “Speaking My Language”

“¿Lo amas, cierto?”

“Por supuesto. Lo amo más que a nada.”

Henry, resting his head on his boyfriend’s lap, blinks up at Alex and hums a question. He’s too jet lagged to be paying attention to the Diaz conversation happening above him, even if it was in English, but Alex sounds so happy. Henry isn’t used to that tender tone being used for anyone or anything other than him, but Alex just strokes his hair and says, “It’s nothing, baby.”

“Are you talking about me?”

“Nah; we’re talking policy. Boring American things. Sleep, Corazón.”

That hadn’t sounded like Alex’s politics tone, but Henry is too tired to care too much in the moment. Instead, his brain sticks on the last word, and he asks, “What’s that mean?”

“It means I love you.”

“I love you.” Henry turns his head to kiss Alex’s wrist, and as he closes his eyes, he hears Alex say, “Papá, lo amo tanto. Más de lo que nunca pensé que podría amar a nadie en el mundo.”

“Y yo los amo a los dos, mijo. Mis hijos.” Oscar comes to sit on the couch next to Alex, pulling him into a hug, and Alex is so full of love he thinks he might burst. Henry feels Alex’s hand stop moving through his hair and presses a kiss to his boyfriend’s jeans, and Alex squeezes his shoulder gently before going back to playing with Henry’s hair. Just before he falls asleep, Henry hears Alex start to sing in Spanish, Oscar joining him. The last thought that crosses Henry’s jet-lagged mind is that he should learn Spanish.

-

He starts with Duolingo, just like anyone else who wants to learn a language, building his vocabulary in pieces on the way to the shelter or in other stolen moments. Some of the kids at the youth shelter speak Spanish, or are taking it in school, and he practices with them, fumbling his way through sentences and making sure they take him off any princely pedistels they might have him on. When he can, he’ll get lessons from them or, occasionally, from June over the phone. He holds onto the things that made Alex happiest, and once he figures out which kids will tell him the truth, he asks one of them what “Corazón” means. She grins.

“That means ‘heart’. It’s a term of endearment sometimes, like ‘sweetheart’, but without the sweet part and more personal? So more like 'you’re my heart’? It means the person who said it loves you a lot.” Henry smiles, and she asks, “Where’d you hear it?”

“My boyfriend. He and his dad were speaking Spanish, and I asked what they said. He said it was nothing, but I’m not so sure. I think he’s just shy. What about “amo”? I heard that a lot; what does it mean?“

"That’s 'I love’,” the girl says, smiling at him, and Henry blushes. He’s heard that word quite a bit in Alex’s Spanish conversations.

“One more? What… what does "hijos” mean? His dad called us that, and it made him really happy, but I think I keep spelling it wrong when I try to translate it.“

"That’s… 'sons’, translated literally. Or like… 'boys’? But not like 'those boys over there’, more like 'kiddos’ sort of? Did you hear any context?”

“I think it was just 'mis hijos’.”

“'My sons’ or 'my boys’, then. What?”

“It’s… thank you. You’re the best,” Henry says past the lump in his throat.

“Henry? You okay?”

“I’m fine; thank you, really. How’s your homework coming? Want me to proofread your essay?”

“Sure. Then you should tell me more of the things your boyfriend says about you.”

Henry laughs, turning to her essay. Still, there’s a warmth in his chest that he hadn’t expected.

Mis hijos. My boys.

-

Bea finds out what he’s doing, probably from June, and she’s the one who gets him connected with a tutor. It’s a birthday gift, and she makes sure to find someone who can be flexible and chat when Alex isn’t around. Somehow, the lessons feel like something Alex doesn’t need to know about. If he knew, he might stop murmuring Spanish phrases before they go to bed. He might stop talking to his family or the kids at the shelter in Spanish, or at least, it would feel less secretive. Plus, personally, Henry wants to wait until he’s conversational to reveal his newfound ability.

The bonus of Alex’s not knowing Henry can speak a bit of Spanish is that Henry gets to hear his say things he’s too embarrassed or shy to say in English. “Te amo”, I love you, is a common one, murmured before bed or in response to a morning coffee. “Dios mio”, my god, isn’t rare, and neither is “puto/a/x” (fucker/bitch). But then there are things like “me encantas”, which his tutor translates as “you enchant me”, or “eres mi mundo, mi cielo, y todas mis estrellas”. That one comes late enough that Henry can translate some of it on his own, and he makes sure to google “cielo” and “mundo” on the way into work the next morning. He melts in the back of the car. Apparently, he’s Alex’s world, his sky, and all his stars.

-

He’s thought about when to reveal his new talent. He’d considered proposing in Spanish, but being married to a prince could be detrimental to Alex’s career, and they’ve already promised each other forever. They’ve talked about it, but no matter how desperate the world is for another royal wedding, neither of them feel the need to jump through every international legal hoop. They love each other, and besides, Henry’s already given Alex a ring. It hangs around his neck every day, a constant reminder of their promise. Alex had noticed him rubbing the skin where it used to sit and picked up a simple gold band, just big enough to fiddle with, so perhaps they’ve already gotten accidentally engaged.

Instead, he considers Alex’s birthday, waking him up with kisses and Spanish terms of endearment. It would make a nice gift, and it’ll give him time to clean up his conjugation a bit.

As it turns out, he slips up well before March.

Henry never celebrated Thanksgiving before he started dating Alex, and last year, he had to be in London so he could be in DC for Christmas. He knows about the holiday and its turkey-based chaos, of course, but they don’t celebrate it in England. So when he and Alex get dressed up and board the train to DC with a big plate of biscuits and David in a carrier, he’s not entirely sure what to expect. They’re supposed to be meeting Oscar at the train station, then going to the White House for some sort of family dinner tonight and a public appearance or two tomorrow, but beyond that, he’s unsure.

“Henry? It’s going to be fine. My family loves you; there’s no reason to be nervous.”

“I know. I know it’ll be fine; it just feels a bit weird. I’ve never celebrated Thanksgiving.”

“Right, well, I got you something for that.”

Alex pulls out a gift bag, and Henry takes it with a slight frown. “What’s this?”

“Open it.” Alex’s grin is shit-eating, and he beams when Henry sees what’s inside. It’s a tiny t-shirt that says “My First Thanksgiving!”.

“Thanks.”

“There’s a bib too; it came as a set. And as a bonus, I commissioned one in your size, and you’ve got to wear it tomorrow.”

He’s pulled out a crew neck sweatshirt with the same design as the baby shirt, complete with a cartoon turkey holding a knife and fork. It says “Stuffing” on the back, and when he flips the smaller one over, it says “Cornbread”.

“It’s after the turkeys who made me call you that first time. But for real, I thought maybe David could wear the baby one, since it’s his first Thanksgiving, too. And you don’t have to wear it if you don’t want; Nora and I were on Etsy together and–”

Henry cuts him off with a kiss, then says, “I’ll wear it. Es perfecto.” It’s perfect.

“¿Te gusta? ¿De verdad?“ You like it? Of verdad?

"Um, sí?” It comes out more of a question than he was anticipating, and Henry gets the distinct joy of watching Alex’s brain catch up to the rest of him.

“Wait, you know Spanish? You don’t speak Spanish. Do you?”

“Un poco.” A bit.

“You son of a bitch. How long have you known Spanish?”

“Um, a few months? Maybe? I wanted to learn after that night you called me 'Corazón’. Your… you sounded so happy, and I wanted to know what was happening.” And your dad called us his boys. I wanted to know what he said that made you so happy, and it was that he called us his boys.

“You little shit. I love you so much.”

“Te amo,” Henry says, watching Alex’s smile shift into something quieter, more personal. More full of love.

“Te amo para siempre.”

“I… you love me forever?”

“And ever and ever and ever,” Alex says. After a moment, he adds, “Does this mean we can talk shit in public now?”

“I’m not very good yet, but maybe? Right now, I can tell you I love you more publically.”

“That’s more important. Holy shit, now I can tell you how much I love you in front of your family. Henry. Te amo. Te adoro. That’s 'I adore you’. Um, let’s see, what else.” And for the rest of the train ride, Alex teaches Henry the basic Spanish he needs to know, which consists of a lovely mix of insults and terms of endearment.

When they get off at the station, Oscar is waiting for them with a massive grin, big hugs, and a cheer of, “Mis hijos!”

Henry feels Alex tense up for a second before he’s swept into Oscar’s hug, and he makes a mental note to ask about that. But then he’s getting a hug, too, and Alex is opening David’s carrier and getting his leash on, and they’ve got an excited beagle to deal with, and they’re all piling into a van to the White House. Things are equally hectic there, down to the two new turkeys (Potatoes and Green Bean) who’ve taken up residence in Alex’s room.

It isn’t until they’re in bed that night, trying to ignore Green Bean’s stare, that Henry gets a chance to ask, “Everything alright?”

“Everything’s perfect. Tomorrow I get to watch you wear a stupid sweater and eat loads with my family. Why?”

“You… you tensed up when we met up with your dad.”

“Oh, uh, yeah. I… it’s just… he called us hijos, and you… do you know that one yet?”

“Yeah, I… one of the kids explained it to me.”

“I just… I wasn’t sure how you’d feel about it. I know he’s used it before, but I also know you miss your dad a lot, and I didn’t want you to feel uncomfortable. You don’t have to be okay with it; I can ask him to stop if you want and he’ll get it. He doesn’t mean to replace your dad or anything; I know he doesn’t. But he loves you a lot. They all do. We all do. Them not as much as me, obviously, but seriously. You’re… we all think of you as family.”

“I… I know. And it makes me happy. When your dad calls us hijos, I mean. It… it’s nice.”

Alex grins at that, cuddling in closer. Then Green Bean gobbles, and Alex lets out a quiet, “Dios mio.” Henry laughs.

“You sure you don’t want to sleep in my room?”

“I think that might be wise. I thought I could beat them this year, I really did.”

“Hold on a second; get the lights on?” Henry asks. Alex does, and Henry opens his instagram stories.

“So, I’m in the White House, it’s around midnight, maybe? We’ve got to be up for an appearance around nine tomorrow morning, and I’m going to show you all my very favorite Thanksgiving tradition. It’s when this one,” he flips the camera to Alex, who’s eyeing Green Bean suspiciously, “insists on keeping two live turkeys in his room instead of letting them spend a night in a hotel. Then, he gets scared–”

“I am not scared! I’m wary. Intelligently so; I’ve seen Jurassic Park.”

“He gets wary, and he calls me to protect him. That’s right, Alex. Let the motherland look after you. I’ll keep you safe from these vicious American monsters.” He stops the recording on a shot of himself hugging Alex protectively, and Alex agrees to let him post it on two conditions: “You wear the 'my first Thanksgiving’ sweatshirt on live TV, and I get a recording of you speaking Spanish.”

“I’ll butcher the Spanish.”

“It doesn’t matter. If you post that, I get a recording of you speaking Spanish.”

Henry agrees as they make it to his room, falling into bed together, happy to be out from under Green Bean’s watchful eyes. Alex falls asleep first, and Henry reaches for his phone. He’s not sure how often Alex uses voice memos, but there’s a recent recording, so Henry starts another titled “Corazón” and says, softly enough not to wake him, “Alexander Gabriel Claremont-Diaz, eres mi mundo, mi cielo, y todas mis estrellas. Me encantas, y te amo. Te amo muchísimo. Eres el novio de mis fantasías, y soy la persona más feliz del mundo contigo. Te amo, corazón.”

Alexander Gabriel Claremont-Diaz, you are my world, my sky, and all my stars. You enchant me, and I love you. I love you so much. You are the boyfriend of my dreams, and I am happier than anyone in the world with you. I love you, my heart.

On AO3

Notes:

Please excuse my Spanish; I was mediocre four years ago and haven’t practiced since. But here are some (intended) translations for the first conversation, which I believe is the only untranslated bit:“You love him, yeah?”“Of course. I love him more than anything.”…“Dad, I love him so much. More than I ever thought I could love anything in the world.”“And I love you both, son. My boys”

Edit: A massive shoutout to @felinarealista for fixing my Spanish; you’re an angel

[trangs-studyblr]

Question Vocab

Generally, interrogatives are adverbs, which means it does not have a specific location that it needs to be used in sentences. However, the most common position for these adverb-question words is before the verb. If there are other adverbs in the sentence (including 안) the question word is usually placed first.

With these adverb-question words, you can typically just take a statement and change it into a question by inserting the word into the sentence.

왜 = Why

왜 is an adverb. 

만화책을 좋아합니까? = Do you like comic books? 만화책을 왜 좋아합니까? = Why do you like comic books?

(저는) 너무 빨리 먹었어요 = I ate really fast 왜 너무 빨리 먹었어요? = Why did you eat so fast?

왜 is also used to respond when somebody calls your name.

Person 1: 슬기야! = Seulgi! Person 2: 왜 = Why/what do you want?

언제 = When

언제 is used similarly to 왜. As an adverb, it can be used to ask “when” something happens.

그 여자가 사라졌어요 = That girl disappeared 그여자가 언제 사라졌어요? = When did that girl disappear?

아빠가 왔나요? = Did dad come? 아빠가 언제 왔나요? = When did dad come?

Particles like ~부터 and ~까지 (indicate from/until when something happens) can be attached to 언제 to indicate that it is unknown “from/until when” something happens.

어제부터 아팠어요? = I have been sick since yesterday 언제부터 아팠어요? = Since when have you been sick?

한국에서 내년까지 있을 거예요 = I will be in Korea until next year 한국에서 언제까지 있을 거예요? = Until when will you be in Korea?

언제 can also be attached directly to 이다 to ask “when” something is.

결혼식은 내일이야 = The wedding is tomorrow 결혼식은 언제야? = When is the wedding?

방학은 다음 주야 = Vacation is next week 방학은 언제야? = When is vacation?

The grammatical principle ~든지 is commonly attached to 언제 to form 언제든지which means “whenever.”

어디 = Where

어디 works like 언제. It can be used to ask “where” something happened if the place is unknown.

집에 가고 싶어요 = I want to go home 어디 가고 싶어요? = Where do you want to go?

한국에서 살아요 = I live in Korea 어디 살아요? = Where do you live?

~에 is often omitted from 어디. 어디에서 is often contracted to 어디서.

그거를 집에서 하고 싶어요 = I want to do that at home 그거를 어디서 하고 싶어요 = Where do you want to do that?

한국에서 왔어요 = I came from Korea 어디에서 왔어요? = Where are you from (from where did you come?)

The particle ~까지 is commonly attached to 어디 (but not ~부터 for the same reason that it is not commonly attached to a place).

부산까지 가고 싶어요 = I want to go until Busan 어디까지 가고 싶어요 = How far/until where do you want to go?

지하철을 서울역까지 탈 거예요 = We will take/ride the Subway until Seoul Station 지하철을 어디까지 탈 거예요? = Until where will we ride the subway?

Like 언제, it can be used as the noun before 이다 to ask where something “is.” This is really only done if asking somebody directly where they are or where a place is.

어디야? = Where are you? 너의 집이 어다야? = Where is your house? 그 곳이 어다예? = Where is that place? 

When asking where another person or an object is, it is more natural to use 있다.

친구가 어디에 있어요? = Where is your friend? 펜이 어디에 있어요? = Where is the pen? 아빠가 어디야? 아빠가 어디에 있어? = Where is dad? 그 만화책이 어디야? 그 만화책이 어디에 있어? = Where is that comic?

Just like 언제, there are more complicated ways that 어디 can be used.

누구 = Who

누구 functions like a pronoun and can be used in the place of a noun in a sentence. In Korean, instead of always being at the start of the sentence, 'who’ is placed in the location of the noun it’s replacing - subject (usually the start), the object (usually somewhere in the middle) or before 이다.

When 누구 is used as the subject of a sentence, it is changed to 누가 to emphasize the subject.

너는 내일 한국어를 공부할 거야 = You will study Korean tomorrow 누가 내일 한국어를 공부할 거야? = Who will study Korean tomorrow?

Object particles can be used if 누구 is the object.

너는 내일 친구를 만날 거야? = You will meet a friend tomorrow 너는 내일 누구(를) 만날 거야? = Who will you meet tomorrow?

Here is an example of 누구 being used before 이다.

그 사람은 너의 아버지예요 = That person is your dad 그 사람은 누구예요? = Who is that person?

어떻게 = How

어떻게 is actually 어떻다 turned into an adverb by adding ~게. Though 어떻다 and 어떻게 are technically the same word, don’t think of them that way. Just remember that 어떻게 means “how.” 

어떻게 is used to ask how somebody does a verb, but it cannot be placed before an adjective or adverb to mean “how (adjective/adverb).”

어떻게 배웠어요? = How did you learn? (“Learn” is a verb)

“Beautiful” is an adjective. “Often” is an adverb. Thus, 어떻게 can’t be used to say “How beautiful is your girlfriend?” or “How often do you go to school?”

어떻게 is an adverb, so you can place it in sentences very freely to ask questions in the past, present or future tense.

그거를 어떻게 해요? = How do you do that? 그 자리를 어떻게 찾았어요? = How did you find that seat? 그 파일을 어떻게 배낼 거예요? = How are you going to send that file?

To ask “what do you think about…” in Korean, use the equivalent of “how do you think about…”

그 여자에 대해 어떻게 생각해요? = What do you think about that girl?

어때? = How is/was...?

In addition to 어떻게, through conjugation, 어떻다 can change to 어때. 

어떻다 is an adjective

~아/어하다 can be added to some adjectives (eg: 좋다 + ~아/어하다 = 좋아하다)

The addition of ~아/어하다 causes the ㅎ to drop

어떠하다 can conjugate to 어떠해

Say 어떠해 fast enough and it comes out as 어때

어때 is used to say “how is/was the…?” or “what do/did you think about…?” It is used to ask somebody’s opinion/evaluation of something. It sounds more natural to omit the particle on the thing you are asking about with 어때. 

남자 친구 어때? = How is your boyfriend? (is he good/bad/handsome/etc..?)

It is also commonly used in the present tense to say “how about… ?/what do you think of…?” ~요 can be added to 어때 to make it more formal. 

점십 어때? = How about lunch? / What do you think about lunch? 이 사진(이) 어때요? = What do you think about this picture / How about this picture?

어때 can be put into the past tense to ask about something in the past, but note that it is not 100% necessary to use 어때 in the past tense.

시험 어땠어요? = How was the exam?/What did you think about the exam? (was it hard/easy?) 점심 어땠어요? = How was the lunch?/What did you think about the lunch? (was it delicious?)

What (뭐/무엇/무슨)

Essentially, there are three ways to say “what:”

뭐 – which is a pronoun

무엇 – which is a pronoun

무슨 – which is a word that can be placed before nouns to describe them

뭐 and 무엇 essentially have the same meaning and function. 

뭐 can be used similar to 언제, 어디 and 누구 to represent an unknown thing in a sentence. 

밥을 먹었어요 = I ate rice 뭐 먹었어요? = What did you eat?

계란을 샀어요 = I bought eggs 뭐 샀어요? = What did you buy?

Like 누구, 뭐 acts as a pronoun. 

파일을 첨부했어요 = I attached the file 뭐 첨부했어요? = What did you attach?

치마를 입었어요 = I put on a skirt 뭐 입었어요? = What did you put on/wear?

Particles are not usually attached to 뭐 when asking a question like this. For example, these would be unnatural:

뭐를 먹었어요? 뭐를 첨부했어요? 뭐를 입었어요?

One situation where a particle is attached to 뭐 is when asking somebody what they are referring to in a previous sentence where a noun was omitted. 

Person 1: 저는 많이 먹었어요 = I ate a lot Person 2: 뭐를? = what? (you ate a lot of what?)

The first person didn’t specifically indicate what he/she ate. The second person is asking for clarification of what was eaten using 뭐를. Here, 뭐 essentially acts as the noun that was omitted in the previous sentence.

무엇 is very similar to 뭐. However, it is more common to attach ~을 to 무엇 than with 뭐.

무엇을 먹었어요? = What did you eat? 무엇을 입었어요? = What did you put on/wear?

When used before 이다 to ask what something “is,” it is more common to use 뭐 than to use 무엇. 

이름이 무엇이야? 이름이 뭐예요? = What is your name? 점심이 무엇이야? 점심이 뭐야? = What is (for) lunch?

무슨 is instead placed before nouns to describe them.

무서운 영화를 보고 싶어요? = Do you want to see a scary movie? 무슨 영화를 보고 싶어요? = What movie do you want to see?

Despite how it looks, 무슨 is not an adjective. However, it looks and feels like an adjective because of how it is used in sentences.

무슨 is used when the speaker doesn’t know what an object is, and is asking about what it may be. The most common situations are:

그것이 무슨 냄새야? = What is that smell? 무슨 생각(을) 해? = What are you thinking? 그것이 무슨 소리야? = What is that sound? 무슨 말이야? = What do you mean?

(The last two examples are often used to ask “what do you mean” or “I can’t understand what you are trying to say”)

To distinguish it from 어떤 and 어느, 무슨 is used when the speaker is asking a question and has no idea what the answer will be - it could be almost an unlimited choice of options. 

그것이 무슨 냄새야? = What is that smell?

I might use that if I just walk into a room and smell something for the first time. Because of this, I would not know the source of the smell and would have no idea what the answer to my question might be. The answer could be anywhere from “my fart” to “the toaster.”

무슨 생각(을) 해? = What are you thinking?

I might be looking at somebody staring into space. In this case, I would not be able to even guess what that person is thinking, so I have no idea what the answer to my question might be. The answer could be anywhere from “my future” to “eating pizza.”

어떤 = Which / Some

어떤 is another one of these words that, although not an adjective, we can place before a noun to describe it. 

비싼 차를 사고 싶어요? = Do you want to buy an expensive car? 무슨 차를 사고 싶어요?  = What car do you want to buy? 어떤 차를 사고 싶어요? = Which car do you want to buy?

어떤 usually translates to “which” and 무슨 usually translates to “what.” Their meanings are very similar, and the difference is subtle. Using one in place of the other usually creates a sentence with essentially the exact same meaning. 

무슨 영화를 보고 싶어요? = What movie do you want to see? 어떤 영화를 보고 싶어요? = Which movie do you want to see?

When asking questions, 어떤 is used for two main reasons.

To choose from a selection of options 어떤 차를 사고 싶어요? - Maybe you are selling cars and giving a person a selection of cars to choose from. Although you technically don’t know the answer, you can assume it will be from a limited number of choices given.

To ask about the type of properties or characteristics related to a person/object eg: 어떤 차를 사고 싶어요? - Maybe you are asking someone about the type of car (van, SUV, truck,…) they want to buy based on its characteristics

By looking at those two main usages, you can see how 어떤 should not be used to replace 무슨 in most situations. 

무슨 냄새야? = What is that smell?

This would be used when the person doesn’t know the source of the smell, and has no idea what the smell could be. The answer to the question would likely indicate the source of the smell and could literally be anything from “farts” to “the toaster.”

어떤 냄새야? - In most situations, saying this would be unnatural. It could only really be used if you are asking a person to tell you about the characteristics of a smell they are smelling. (eg: put some flowers to your friend’s nose to describe the characteristics of the smell – “Is it a nice smell? A fresh smell? A rosy smell?”) The answer to this question would likely be describing (the characteristics) of the smell.

Despite this distinction, there are many situations where 어떤 and 무슨 could basically be used interchangeably. 

무슨 영화를 보고 싶어요? = What movie do you want to see? (In theory, the speaker has no idea what the answer to the question would be)

어떤 영화를 보고 싶어요? = Which movie do you want to see? (In theory, the speaker has given some choices to choose from, or is asking about the type of movie the listener wants to see - comedy, horror, romance, etc).

Completely unrelated to asking questions, 어떤 is also used to indicate when the speaker is aware of some object, but is unsure of what specific object is in question.

어떤 남자는 어제 여기에 왔어 = Some man came here yesterday (the speaker knew a man came, but is unsure of specifically who he was)

저는 어떤 책을 읽고 있었어요 = I was reading some book (the speaker doesn’t know exactly what book he was reading)

어느 = Which

Another way to ask this type of question is with 어느, which translates to “which.” Like 무슨 and 어떤, 어느 is placed immediately before nouns.

무슨 영화를 보고 싶어요? = What movie do you want to see? 어떤 영화를 보고 싶어요? = Which movie do you want to see? 어느 영화를 보고 싶어요? = Which movie do you want to see?

When asking questions, 어느 is used similarly to the first explanation 어떤 - “to choose from a selection of options.” It would not be used to refer to the type of characteristics or properties of an object, and it would not be used to refer to something unknown.

The usages of 무슨, 어떤 and 어느 overlap on multiple levels, which allows them to be used interchangeably in most cases. It is just as important to realize how not to use each of these words when asking a question.

무슨

Do use this when you can’t expect what the answer will be at all

Don’t use this when giving somebody options to choose from

Don’t use this when asking about the type of characteristics or properties of something

어떤

Don’t use this when you can’t expect what the answer will be at all

Do use this when giving somebody options to choose from

Do use this when asking about the type of characteristics or properties of something

어느

Don’t use this when you can’t expect what the answer will be at all

Do use this when giving somebody options to choose from

Don’t use this when asking about the type of characteristics or properties of something

무슨 대학교를 다녀요? = What university do you go to? 어떤 대학교를 다녀요? = Which university do you go to? 어느 대학교를 다녀요? = Which university do you go to?

무슨 쪽으로 가고 싶어요? – This would generally not be said in Korean. You would most likely say this when standing on a street (or somewhere similar), where you have a selection of options to choose from. Therefore, one of the following would be used instead: 어떤 쪽으로 가고 싶어요? = Which way do you want to go? 어느 쪽으로 가고 싶어요? = Which way do you want to go?

어느

One use of 어느 is to reference a vague place or point in time.

You often see this application in stories, poetry or news reports where the specific location does not need to be given (eg: a long time ago in a far-away castle). In this usage, 어느 is commonly placed before a broad indication of time or place.

어느 날 = some day (an ambiguous day) 어느 여름 = some summer (an ambiguous summer) 어느 마을 = some village (an ambiguous village) 어느 시장 = some market (an ambiguous market)

Here, the person is speaking this way because they do not need to specifically reference the time.

어느 겨울 꽃은 다 사라졌다 = Some winter, all the flowers disappeared 어느 마을에서 애기 두 명이 태어났다 = Two babies were born in some village 그 다음 날, 할머니가 어느 시장을 구경하고 있었다 = The next day, the grandmother was browsing around some market

This table is organizes the main usages of 무슨, 어떤 and 어느. It is a good start, but there are other specific situations when you might use one of these words. For example, 어느 has other usages as well.

몇 = How many...? (words with counters)

Let’s review how to use counters:

저는 차 두 대가 있어요 = I have 2 cars 나는 어제 친구 다섯 명을 만났어 = I met five friends yesterday 그 영화를 다섯 번 봤어요 = I saw that movie five times

If you want to ask “how many ___?” you must include 몇 before the counter:

차가 몇 대 있어요? = How many cars do you have? 친구를 몇 명 만났어요? = How many friends did you meet? 그 종이를 몇 번 찢었어요? = How many times did you rip that paper?

Notice the difference in the placement of the particles. When you say 몇 번 or 몇 대 or 몇 명, you have essentially created a question word. Just like most other question words, particles are not typically attached. Nonetheless, if you placed the particles after “몇 _”, you would still be understood, but it is more natural to place them after the noun that you are asking about, and not after the counter.

차 몇 대가 있어요? = How many cars do you have? 친구 몇 명을 만났어요? = How many friends did you meet?

Make sure not to confuse these types of sentences with similar sentences that are statements, not questions.

(저는) 차 몇 대가 있어요 = I have some cars (저는) 친구를 몇 명 만났어요 = I met some friends

Remember when you are asking a question that the intonation needs to rise at the end of the sentence.

Use “몇 _” to ask about age and time.

몇 시예요? = What time is it? 너의 남동생은 몇 살이야? = How old is your younger brother?

How much, How many: 얼마(나)

얼마 on its own is generally used to ask how much something costs. 

얼마예요? = How much is it? 그거 얼마예요? = How much is that? 얼마 냈어요? = How much did you pay?

얼마나 can be placed before adjectives and adverbs to mean “how.” In these cases, the speaker is asking to what extent something occurs.

여자 친구는 얼마나 예뻐요? = How pretty is your girlfriend? 얼마나 커요? = How big is it? 얼마나 무거워요? = How heavy is it?

한국어를 얼마나 자주 공부해요? = How often do you study Korean? 축구를 얼마나 잘 해요? = How well do you play soccer? 얼마나 빨리 달려요? = How fast do you run?

It can also be used before verbs when the speaker is not making a distinction between countable objects in his/her question. Instead, the speaker’s inquiry falls within an uncountable continuum.

How many pieces did you eat? Speaker is making a distinction between countable objects

How much did you eat? Speaker is not making a distinction between countable objects. Here, the speaker’s inquiry falls within an uncountable continuum.

When used like this with a verb, the most common translation for 얼마나 is “how much.” The adverb 많이 is sometimes used to stress that the speaker knows the answer is “a lot”, and is asking “I know it is a lot, but how much a lot?”.

빵을 얼마나 (많이) 먹었어요? = How much bread did you eat? 그 여자를 얼마나 (만히) 사랑해요? = How much do you love that girl? 물을 얼마나 (많이) 마셨어요? = How much water did you drink? 그 책상은 자리를 얼마나 (많이) 차지해요? = How much space does that desk take up?

—————–

많이 (the adverb) can also be used as 많다 (the adjective) in these sentences. The meaning is still the same, but the structure of the sentence changes so 많다 describes the noun in question.

얼마나 많은 빵을 먹었어요? = How much bread did you eat? 얼마나 많은 돈을 가져갈 거예요? = How much money will you take? 얼마나 많은 물을 마셨어요? = How much water did you drink?

Although correct and understandable, this form is much less natural.

—————–

When the speaker is making a distinction between countable objects, a counter should be used.

빵을 몇 게 먹었어요? = How many pieces of bread did you eat? 몇 명의 여자를 사랑해요? = How many girls do you love?

———————-

Although 얼마나 translates to “how” in all of these usages above. This is different from the usage of 어떻게 which also translates to “how” in English.

한국어를 얼마나 자주 공부해요? = How often do you study Korean? 한국어를 어떻게 배웠어요? = How did you learn Korean?

Question Vocab Individually

It is possible to use most of these question words by themselves to ask for more information about a situation. Add ~요 to speak more formally.

슬기야! = Seulgi! 왜? = Why/what do you want?

저는 내일 캐나다에 갈 거예요 = Tomorrow, I will go to Canada 왜? = Why (will you go to Canada tomorrow)?

저는 캐나다에 갈 거예요 = I will go to Canada 언제? = When (will you go to Canada)?

저는 내일 갈 거예요 = I will go tomorrow 어디? = Where (will you go tomorrow)?

내일 그 사람을 만날 거예요 = I will meet that person tomorrow 누구(를)? = Who(m) (will you meet)?

You can use 누가 by itself when asking about the acting agent of a sentence. 내일 어떤 사람이 여기 올 거예요 = Tomorrow, some person will come here 누가? = Who (will come here)?

저는 공항에 갈 거예요 = I will go to the airport 어떻게? = How (will you go to the airport)?

저는 많이 먹었어요 = I ate a lot 뭐(를)? = what? (you ate a lot of what?)

Question Vocab for Ambiguity

It is also possible to use a question word to refer to an ambiguous place, thing or person.

어디 Person 1: 엄마가 집에 있어? = Is mom at home? Person 2: 아니요. 어디 갔어. = No, she went somewhere

뭐 우리가 이미 뭐 먹었어요 = We already ate something

누구 나는 내일 누구 만날 거야 = Tomorrow I’m going to meet somebody

To make it more confusing, these words are also used in the same way to ask a question. You can distinguish these uses by training your ear correctly. When using 뭐, 어디 or 누구 as the question word in the sentence, the stress of the sentence is on the question word itself. When using them to refer to an ambiguous thing, place or person, the stress of the sentence is on the verb.

뭐 먹었어요? = What did you eat? 뭐 먹었어요? = Did you eat something?

어디 갔어요? = Where did you go? 어디 갔어요? = Did you go somewhere?

누구 만났어요? = Who did you meet? 누구 만났어요? = Did you meet somebody?

~는/은 and ~이/가 Revisited

The particle ~이/가, in its usage as a subject stressor, is used when somebody specifically asks “who” did a particular action.

누가 밥을 먹었어? = Who ate the rice? 내가 (밥을 먹었어) = Me / I did (I ate the rice)

누가 피자를 만들었어? = Who made the pizza? 내가 만들었어 = I made it (me)

Notice “who” translates to 누가 only when the speaker is asking “who” the subject was – and not who the object was.

누가 그녀를 좋아해? = Who likes her? 내가 그녀를 좋아해 = I like her The question is asking who the subject is.

너는 누구를 좋아해? = Who do you like? 나는 그녀를 좋아해 = I like her The question is asking who the object is. The use of ~는 on the subject takes the stress off of the subject and just acts as a subject marker.

The same thing can be done with other question words, as long as the question is asking for the subject.

어떤 것이 더 좋아요? = Which one is better? 이것이 더 좋아요 = This one is better

Remember all these nuances are situational. A particular sentence with ~는/은 can make sense in one situation, but could be awkward in another situation. That same sentence might be awkward with ~이/가 in one situation, but appropriate in another. In some situations, they could be exactly the same.

Resources:

HTSK Unit 1 Lesson 21: Asking Questions in Korean: Why, When, Where, Who TTMIK Level 1 Lesson 5. It’s me. What is it? / 저예요. 뭐예요? TTMIK Level 1 Lesson 6. What is this? This is … / 이거 뭐예요? 이거… TTMIK Level 1 Lesson 18. Particles for Location / 에, 에서 TTMIK Level 1 Lesson 19. When / 언제 TTMIK Level 1 Lesson 23. Who? / 누구? TTMIK Level 1 Lesson 24. Why? How? / 왜? 어떻게? TTMIK Level 6 Lesson 1. How about …? / ~ 어때요?

[lia-jones]

Growing Stronger - Chapter Thirty-Six - Preview of What's to Come

It was the day before the big day! Saturday, March 21st. In twenty-four hours my last name would no longer be Jones, and I would officially belong to a new family, one Victor and I were creating for ourselves. A dream come true. I had butterflies in my stomach since I woke up that morning, I could only imagine how I would be on my wedding day.

Victor and I spent most of the day packing and making the last arrangements for our honeymoon. Our conjugal expedition would last a total of two weeks, which I thought was very ambitious, given LFG would be minus a CEO, but Victor was adamant that we took the time to ourselves, since we had been so busy the last few months.

“We need to learn to take time to ourselves.” Victor pointed out once again later that evening, while we drove to Aunt Terry’s ranch for the wedding rehearsal. “I don’t mean just you, me too. I have been solely focused on work for way too long. Our lives are changing, so should we.”

“You are not wrong, but I still think your no phone policy won’t last long. Eventually, Goldman will need something from you. Two weeks is a long time.” I frowned at him.

“At least just for the first three days. I want those to be just for us.” He turned down the familiar dirt road that led to his aunt’s property, stopping the car right at the entrance. “Ready?” He smiled tenderly. I took a deep breath, my heart starting to beat faster.

“Yes.” I nodded with conviction.

The dusky sky was getting darker, the fiery hues being replaced with dark ones, as we drove down the dirt road. It was like I was entering a fairytale. Every tree lining the road was covered in beautiful colored ribbons, and from them hung jars with flickering candles, lighting our way to the mansion. By the gates, two huge golden letters, V and A, signed the place of what would be called by the media the most important event of the year: our wedding. The gates and the walls by them were adorned with beautiful white roses and peonies, and huge lit candles were strategically placed by them, giving the whole area a whimsical atmosphere. The child in me was expecting to see fairies floating about,  like I was watching one of those Tinkerbell movies.

“I think it’s safe to assume you like it.” Victor gave me a smug smile. “You’re yet to say a word.”

I had helped plan some of the wedding, but the big plans were in Victor’s and the wedding planner’s hands, and Victor insisted on keeping some of it a surprise for me. When I looked at the man I loved, my eyes were brimming with tears of joy.

“It’s perfect.” I couldn’t help my wide grin. I was so happy. And seeing him grin back just as wide made things even more perfect.

As we entered the gates and I observed the garden, perfectly illuminated in the now darkening night, I felt my heart fill with joy and love. I was so distracted with my professional life, only awakening slightly to my personal one, that I completely forgot how romantic and magical Victor could be. This was clearly an ode to our love. It had the care and the tenderness I felt from him every day times a million. It was dazzling.

“This weekend, I want you to be surrounded by nothing but joy, beauty, and love.” He spoke with tender eyes looking at me, containing a million emotions, most of which I couldn’t decipher, but one was very clear.

Bernard met us at the door and we strolled around in the garden for a while, admiring in detail what we were sure we wouldn’t be able to the following day, while he showed us every aspect of the decorations. After spending some time with him, his English was starting to sound more normal to me, although peonies were still a serious trigger for my laughter. Noticing that it was getting late, we headed for the wedding venue. The officiant was already expecting us at the gazebo, along with my family and some of Victor’s family, which included his father, some of his aunts and uncles, aunt Terry and her partner, Susan. Gregory didn’t look happy.

The rehearsal was pretty simple, as we assume our positions, my father walking me down the aisle and taking me to Victor, and the usual exchange of vows that we chose to memorize instead of repeat. It was pretty uneventful, but of course, no wedding is a true wedding without a story to tell. And although this was a Lee wedding, held to the highest of standards, ours wouldn’t be an exception.

After we said our vows and pretended to exchange our rings, the officiant made the dreaded declaration that is always so popular in movies: If anyone has reason to be against this wedding, speak now, or forever hold your peace.

This part was so useless nobody was actually paying much attention. That is, until we heard a loud NOOOOOOOOOO coming from the end of the aisle. It turns out, it was Mia’s assistant, Minor, who was playing something on his cellphone and apparently was not having a great game. But that wasn’t actually the funniest part. Gavin, who was sitting by his side, got up ready to fall on him like a boulder, but not before Mia, red as a tomato, got up from Gavin’s side, smacked Minor hard in the stomach, making him double over and let out a loud ooofff.

Victor witnessed it with an expression that screamed What are these idiots doing now? To me, it was the funniest thing I had ever seen since blue penises. I stifled a laugh, noticing Greg watching us closely with judgemental eyes. But, truth be told, I knew what was coming, and I wouldn’t be able to hold it in. Pretending to show affection to my beloved future husband, I leaned my face against his chest, letting myself laugh a little. Noticing it, Victor rubbed my back.

“Quit it, Andrea.” He whispered between clenched teeth. I was lost. Victor’s reprimand only made me laugh more.

“Is she crying?” I heard Terry ask. “Oh, honey, there’s no reason to cry.”

“No.” I heard Victor’s voice, flat as a board. “She’s laughing.” He turned to me. “Ok, enough already. It wasn’t that funny.”

But it was. I replayed the entire scene again in my mind, picturing Minor’s face getting slightly purple with embarrassment and surprise, and tears started to come.

“The little woman…” I heard the officiant’s voice, strained as he tried not to laugh. “For someone so little she sure does pack a punch!” He let out a hearty laugh.

“Just like the bride!” My brother chimed in, laughing, and soon I could hear my parents laugh too.

They say there is nothing as contagious as laughter. One by one, all the guests present started laughing in unison. Even Victor, who was trying to keep it together, threw composure to the wind and was laughing too, his chest rumbling against my cheeks.

When, after some very long minutes, the laughter stopped and I was able to lift my face from Victor’s shirt, Gavin, Mia and Minor were nowhere to be seen, and Gregory was shooting daggers in my direction, a look of disgust on his face. The officiant was still wiping tears from his cheeks, trying to catch a breath.

“I have to say, in 10 years of practice, I have never heard a single objection, let alone such a heartfelt one!” He chuckled. “Well, let’s finish this practice. Does anyone else object to this wedding? If that’s the case, I think we can summon the little woman again!”.

I laughed loudly and the room followed me again. Victor gave the officiant a stern look.

“Skip that part tomorrow.” Victor instructed the officiant.

There is definitely no cleansing power like laughter. We left the rehearsal in good spirits, Victor particularly excited for the next activity.

It is customary for the groom to plan a dinner with all his favorite things before the wedding, usually during rehearsal dinner. My father and Victor were planning this for weeks, constantly talking on the phone or via Skype, constructing the perfect wine tasting dinner. Victor hired three renowned chefs to cook for us that night, one of them being his teacher Guy Sauvant, and some sommeliers to explain the wines and the pairings to the guests.

The decoration of the tent was truly Victor’s taste, and it somehow reminded me of old cellars and antique parlor rooms, intricate iron candle holders and dark velvet sofas and chairs, images of paintings everywhere, decorating the menus, hanging on the walls or in the background of the bars.

We sat and ate, and I noticed how relaxed Victor seemed to be around my family. Although we were trying to give both families the same attention, we would naturally gravitate towards mine, and Victor seemed to enjoy himself more in their presence, either engaging in light conversations with my parents, or laughing at some joke Joshua had made, or simply holding Ana on his lap when she demanded attention. He had clearly been adopted by the Jones, but it seemed he had adopted them too.

Gregory walked up to us while we were laughing about a story my father was telling from one of his trips.

“Greetings to the happy couple. It seems like my son has such a busy life nowadays that he doesn’t  have time to greet his own father.” Gregory shook our hands, his expression as dry as the desert.

“I was waiting for you to finish your meal.” I noticed Victor’s shoulder’s tense as he shook his father’s hand. “I hope everything was to your liking.”

“I can’t say I’m terribly impressed so far.” Gregory gave me a weird look and turned to Victor. “Make sure your fiancée shows a little more restraint tomorrow. We don’t want that ridiculous scene in front of our guests.”

“You mean your guests.” Victor kept his poker face but his ears became red, revealing his anger. “The people I know nothing about and yet you insisted I’d invite.” He gave Gregory a defiant look. “Moreso, please remind yourself that this is Andrea’s wedding too, and she is allowed to laugh as much as she wants, even if that is disagreeable to your guests.”

Gregory took a step further, ready to charge with some venomous words. I held Victor’s hand tight, anticipating a confrontation.

“Gregory!” My mother touched Gregory’s arm amicably. He looked at his arm and then at her, as if he was considering if he had been infected by something. “Have you tried the cherry wine my husband brought? Come, I’ll serve you some while we chat, I would love to know the father that raised this remarkable young man.”

Wise as always, my mother knew that a stroke of Gregory’s ego would be enough to divert his attention. The flattery made him quickly conclude she was worthy of his attention, and both walked away to get the cherry wine. Sitting by my side, Victor was fuming.

“It’s ok, let it go.” I rubbed his upper arm lovingly.

“That’s exactly why I didn’t want him here.” He mumbled, turning at me after. “How are you not angry? He basically implied you were some idiot I should control.”

“I don’t care what he says.” I shrugged. “Besides, he’s the real idiot if he thinks he’s going to ruin my night. You shouldn’t let him ruin yours either.”

Victor nodded, coming closer for a short sweet kiss. We heard a soft clink from afar. It was my brother, in the center of the room, gathering everyone’s attention.

“Good evening, everyone. For those who don’t know me, my name is Joshua, and I’m Andrea’s twin brother. If you are wondering if that is actually true, because I’m taller and better looking, yes we are twins, no, I didn’t steal all the food in the womb, and yes, despite being the second born, I am the best twin.”

Everybody, especially my family laughed, while I playfully stuck out my tongue to my brother, Victor chuckling with the both of us.

“Hmmm… So what can I say about the bride and the groom? I’ll start with the bride, since I know her since we were two fertilized eggs inside my mother's womb.” Josh continued. ”Growing up, Andrea was a tomboy, refusing to live up to her gender role, always defying the rules and sticking true to what she believed in. I remember at a relative’s wedding, we were eight at the time, she tore her dress trying to show some ‘snotty boy,’” he used air quotes, “that girls could climb trees just as well as boys. The dress caught up in one of the branches and ripped apart, as Andrea dangled happily in one of the branches, her underwear showing.” There was another wave of laughter in the room. “My mother was livid but didn’t ground her, because she did climb the tree faster than the boy, even with her dress tearing apart. And even though she now is a respectable lady of the elite, and such dress ripping habits are frowned upon, I am sure she will still be the Andrea I’ve always known, a small yet concentrated force of nature, defying everyone that tries to put her down and showing us all there can be incredible strength in adversity.” Joshua’s throat caught up with emotion. “I’m so incredibly proud of you, sis.” He turned to Victor. “Now what can we say about our CEO.”

“This should be good.” Victor spoke to me, his flat voice not matching the smile he had in his eyes.

“Perhaps our groom doesn’t know this, but we had heard of him way before the two started dating. The truth was, Andy originally didn’t like Victor very much. Well, that’s an understatement. Every time she referred to him, she used some very original terms. My two favorite still are “Lord Victor, King of Highhorseland” and “Victor Lee, the Slayer of Souls and Destroyer of Joy”.

Again, everybody laughed, including Victor, but he still gave me a dirty look. I could feel myself seriously blush.

“That was before I knew the real you, you know that.” I defended myself. He simply smiled and softly rubbed his nose against mine.

“But the mighty King of Highhorseland must’ve done something right and somehow convince damsel Andrea to ride with him because, to our surprise, he flew across the ocean for about twelve hours just to see Andy defend her thesis and… they seemed pretty intimate, if you know what I mean. And that’s when I found out three undeniable truths about my future brother in law: one, he is persistent, because I bet it was no picnic trying to woo this one.”

Victor shook his head and everybody laughed. Thank you, dear brother.

“Two, he is caring and extremely giving. He flew from a distant country, ready to face our family and Dr. Mariana’s thorough interrogation, just to make my sister happy. And by the way they held each other, the way she looked at him, she was. It’s obvious you make my sister very happy Victor, and I have to thank you for that. Thank you for taking such good care of her.” Joshua was misty-eyed again. “And three!” Joshua cleared his throat. “Victor is a very strong man. Not only did he date hurricane Andrea, he’s marrying her. Now seriously, I wish the best to both of you! Victor, welcome to the family!”

Everybody clapped and we nodded, thanking them for the applause and the best wishes, although it was more of a roast than a best wish speech. Either way, it was the way my brother would say I love you , through comedy and sarcasm, a mask not very different from the one Victor wore with his poker face. Goldman stood up, and took the mic from Joshua.

“Victor, Andrea, it is with great joy that I come here to witness your commitment, and what I believe is the beginning of a lifetime of happiness. I still remember the first day Andy came to LFG and thinking she wouldn’t last a day there. But she was a pleasant surprise, manning the desk in no time and impressing us all. Apart from some minor mishaps with a fountain pen.”

I looked at Victor with wide eyes, feeling like a burglar caught red-handed. Way back when, when I started my internship at LFG and was moved to Victor’s office, I accidentally broke his favorite fountain pen. It was a stupid accident, I unwittingly threw it to the ground while getting some documents from his desk and stepped on it. As I saw the ink spread on what seemed to be a brand new rug, my heart nearly stopped. Fortunately, Goldman entered the room, and, seeing the panic in my eyes, he swiftly exchanged the broken pen with a new one from his front pocket, and spilled coffee on the ink stain to hide my crime. And soon we were partners in crime, joined in a secret that, if revealed, would make Victor have my head.

It looked like it was time for my punishment. I just hoped the wedding would reduce my sentence.

“Stop acting so nervous.” He smiled at me. “I knew it was  you all along.”

“YOU DID?!” I was appalled. “How? Why didn’t you say anything?” He kept quiet this whole time, letting me live with the guilt?

“Unless Goldman was trying to poison me, coffee isn’t blue. And I could tell the pen I was using was brand new. After that, it was a matter of finding out who truly did it. The guilty look on your face the next morning was the final clue.” He came closer, pecking the tip of my nose. “I knew that if I mentioned you would feel bad, and most likely want to leave LFG again. I couldn’t allow that.”

I smiled at him, my heart warm for knowing he wanted me close to him since the very start. We turned to Goldman, who was still giving his speech.

“... a good man, with a heart made of gold. Yes, he may sometimes be demanding, but he is that way for the good of the company and to allow us to keep our jobs. And Andy has changed him deeply in that department as well, he’s very different from what he used to be. I mean, when I started seeing him so happy I started tasting all his drinks, fearing she was putting something in them.”

“WHAT?” I heard Victor shout by my side, making me laugh hard when I saw his disgusted expression.

“And I should probably finish my speech, if I still want to keep my job. Let’s hear it for the happy couple! A happy life for you two!” Goldman rushed to finish. Needless to say, everybody laughed.

After a few more shorts speeches, with guests wishing us a happy life, gushing about how Victor and I looked cute together, some more lively music started playing. Victor and I sat in one of the sofa’s bantering with my parents, his hand on my waist, holding me lovingly, while I occasionally nudged his chest with my head. Eventually, Terry and Susan came to sit with us.

“Are you enjoying yourselves?” Victor asked.

“Actually, I would like to thank you both for inviting me to the wedding.” Susan spoke. “It means a lot to us.”

“No need.” Victor answered with a frank smile. “My pleasure.”

“I’m just sorry I was so oblivious before.” I chimed in, slightly embarrassed. “I didn’t even invite Susan to my bachelor party.”

“It’s alright.” Terry took my hand, turning it. “I can predict a double date in the near future, after you are done honeymooning.”

“That will take a while.” Victor joked.

“What is this I’m hearing now? Terry’s assistant is invited? Is it the theme of this wedding to display the stains of this family for the whole world to see?” We heard Victor’s father say, behind us.

“I have invited them.” I stood up, facing him. “If she’s with your sister, she’s part of the family.”

“Why am I not surprised?” Gregory spat. “You are definitely unfit to be a Lee. You lack the decorum, the finesse-”

“Ok, enough.” My mother approached us, trying to lighten the mood. “We don’t want to start a fight here, Gregory, our kids are getting married tomorrow.” She paused, holding her hands up, urging us all to calm down. “Let’s all get some sleep, tomorrow we’ll all have a big day. Agreed?”

“Either she goes, or I go. You choose.” Gregory warned Victor. Victor was about to retort when my mother intervened again.

“Please, no need to choose.” She looked at Gregory warmly. “This isn’t about any of us, it’s about Victor and Andrea. Let’s get some sleep, come on. Off you go, guys.”

“Do you still think it was a good idea to invite him?” Victor sighed, frustrated, as we walked towards the house.

“Hey, stop worrying about it.” I held his bicep, squeezing it tight. “Tomorrow we will have the wedding and we will be too busy to even know he’s there, and he won’t dare misbehave with all the media around him. And after that, we will only deal with him if we want to. It’ll be over soon.”

“You are right. He will forget all about us the moment all of this ends.” He smiled at me as we walked in, heading to my bedroom. “Go get your things and come sleep with me.”

“No, we should spend this night apart.” I smiled, stroking his chest lovingly. “To make it more special the night after the wedding.”

“We’ll spend the night after the wedding on a plane to Paris.” He grabbed my waist, pulling me closer, luring me in. “Come sleep with me, I can’t sleep without you.” He kissed my neck softly, teasing me.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Lee, but my answer is no.” I pushed him away playfully, only to get a sigh in response. “I’m saving myself for marriage.”

“You can’t even say that with a straight face.” He gave me a flat expression, which only made me laugh.

“I bid you goodnight.” I pecked him on the cheek. “Sleep well.”

Obviously, I wouldn’t get away with it. He pulled me against him once more, kissing me so passionately I had no choice but to melt in his arms.

“Fine.” He broke the kiss and let me go, chuckling when I slightly whimpered. “No, no, don't complain. My fiancée wants to sleep away from me and her wishes are my command. She shall sleep alone tonight.”

Later that night, alone in my bed, I was tossing and turning. Not only did I miss my bed, but mostly I missed Victor, his touch, his smell, his warmth. This was going to be a lot harder than I thought. With a heavy sigh of resignation, I opened my bedroom door and left, taking my pillow with me. Time to get some sleep.

[icouldntresistit]

The hidden language in Jimin’s Birthday Video (Warning: Long)

to Jeongguk. 

So, I’m finally talking about this like I said I would--but not in the same way as everyone else. When this video was first released, some people were endeared that Jimin posted a whole video birthday card, and some were curious as to why he didn’t post more. But me, I was curious for one key reason that I want to explain in detail. I’m calling this “The Impersonal Personal Message”.

I personally like to approach these sorts of things as more or less a lesson in language than a lesson in the nature of two people’s relationship, but you can apply these ideas as you will. Please understand that I’m just interested in looking at the language and not necessarily trying to make any claims here (though I do have my own opinions).

----------------------------------

The Impersonal Personal Message

In this video Jimin says the following: 정국씨! 생일축하합니다! 생일 진심으로 축하하고 맛있는거 많이 드시고...어.....만수무강 하세요. 나중에 술을(?) 합시다!

(Romanization: Jeonggukssi! Saengilchukhahabnida! Saengir jinshimeuro chukhahago mashineungeo mahni deushigo...eo.....mansumugahng haseyo. Najoongeh sooreul(?) habshida!)

The reason why I wrote the Korean is two-fold: A) You probably already know the english translation but haven’t seen the Korean transliteration; and B) The tone of what he’s saying can only really be relayed by explaining the hangul. So, let me explain, line-by-line so to speak.

정국씨!

First, let’s talk about “정국씨! (Jeonggukssi)” - Right off the bat, we can tell he’s being overly formal by his use of “씨 (shi/ssi)”, meaning Mr./Ms. You only really see this type of formality for 2 reasons. 1) The person being spoken to is a stranger and authority figure for the person speaking. And 2) The two people speaking are extremely close and joking around--though this reason can have a romantic undertone

Formal Language Between ‘Close Friends’

Next, “생일축하합니다 (Saengilchukhahabnida)” - This is to be expected as the video is more so toward ARMYS than it is Jeongguk. I say this because it’s released on a public forum for more than just one end user to interpret. However, this usage of “Happy Birthday” gets another layer when you take into account the previously established tone of the video. As many may know, the verb conjugation ~ㅂ니다 (~bnida) is the formal present-tense high respect form. You may recall from my last language-related post that there are generally 3 respect forms to conjugate into in Korean. One is the informal low respect (ILR) form, predicates ending in ~아/어 (~ah/eo); one is the formal low respect (FLR) form, predicates ending in ~요 (yo); and one is the formal high respect (FHR) form, predicates ending in ~ㅂ니다 (~bnida). ILR is commonly used between close friends, individuals of the same age, lovers, and immediate family members. FLR is commonly used between strangers and with individuals who are older than the speaker. FHR is commonly reserved for authority figures (boss, president, CEO, etc.), strangers, and when addressing or speaking in front of large groups of people

I’ve discussed the uses of FHR before (see this post) as it pertains to idols, but not in close relationships. You typically only see this use in close relationships in more of a joking or even flirty tone. It’s almost never seriously used like this in close friendships. This is important to note because the entire tone of the video takes this weird detour when you consider exactly what Jimin is saying. Now, I want to backtrack just a bit to say that 생일축하합니다 is not at all uncommon for idols to say to their fellow members/friends when giving birthday shoutouts. It is really not playful at all in that sense. Even in this case it doesn’t seem playful. BUT, I still needed to point this out because of the overall formal tone of the video and as an excuse to explain respect levels in Korean grammar

Now, let’s look at “생일 진심으로 축하하고 맛있는거 많이 드시고 (Saengir jinshimeuro chukhahago mashineungeo mahni deushigo)” - This stood out to me for one main reason--the use of “드시다 (deushida)” (this is the verb stem of what Jimin actually said, which is “드시고”), instead of “먹다 (meogda)”. Both of these words (먹다 & 드시다) mean “to eat”. The only difference is that ~드시다 is very formal. It’s the honorific version of “들다 (deulda)”, which is another less commonly used version of “to eat”. You only really use this word when the subject of your sentence deserves high respect. It’s very polite. The only way I can even kind of translate this directly is to think of it as “Please eat, kind fellow” lmao. This sentence helps add to the very cold atmosphere the video has. But if you consider that the video is ‘to’ Jeongguk, it makes it seem more playful than cold

Now, I want to take a look at “만수무강 하세요”. This is where meaning can get a little shaky for me because, in my understanding and experiences, “만수무강 (mansumugahng)” is like...something people in their advanced age say more often than young people.... And then you have 하세요 (haseyo), which is common to use with 만수무강. It’s the formal version of 하다 (hada), meaning “to do”, but in this case it simply just makes the noun 만수무강 a verb. 하세요 itself sounds more like a request because of the use of the honorific ~시다 (shida) and the FLR conjugation ~요. Note that ~시다 + ~요 = ~세요, and 하다 + ~세요 = 하세요. The reason why I liken this to a request is because the translation is something like “I hope you live long and prosper/Please live long without any difficulties”. It gives the added sense that the speaker is being polite to the receiver

Now, let’s talk about “나중에 술을(?) 합시다 (Najoongeh sooreul(?) habshida)” - Jimin kind of slurs his words, he also has a bit of a quirky speech pattern and can sometimes speak very quickly as well, so it’s hard to really pick up on every little particle ending, verb conjugation, etc. But, we do know that he says “Let’s have a drink later.” Here, I’m concerned with 합시다 (habshida), which takes 하다 (again, meaning to do), and the FHR propositive verb conjugation ~ㅂ시다 (bshida), which gives the meaning of “let’s do (something).” Propositive mood is when the speaker is making a suggestion (e.g. “Why don’t we go here?” “Shall we do this?” “Let’s have a drink,” etc.) The propositive conjugations are as follows: ~아/어 is ILR, ~자 (~ja) and ~ㅂ시다. Here, Jimin is using a higher respect form than necessary, though not as high as what it could be

The Meaning of It All

So, what does this all mean? It just means that Jimin’s been extremely formal with Jeongguk this whole time as demonstrated by his use of FHR & FLR verb conjugations (~ㅂ니다, ~시다 + ~요, & ~ㅂ시다), honorific verbs (드시다), really old-timey nouns (만수무강), and honorific titles (씨). This is not necessarily strange, but given their closeness it gives off a slightly playful vibe when taken ALONE (i.e. not counting the mood of the video/his perceived nervousness, etc.) I made this post because so many people felt it was cold and impersonal based on the atmosphere, the almost stiltedness of Jimin’s disposition. But, that can be explained by the idea that the video was covering for a surprise of some sort (for whom--I don’t know). When you look at the language, contrast that with the context and relationship (that we know of), the video is actually kind of playful in a sense. He was laying on the formality very thick but it didn’t seem shady at all, just mischievous

Anyway, I hope this was interesting to someone 

[randomaj-aferoj]

some thots® on hebrew

(this being posted at the very end of February is just a coincidence, I'm not as organized as that)

Well, the first impression is that it's hard as hell. This is, I think, the first language I study with any seriousness which doesn't have any relation to any other language I already knew since I started Japanese (8 years ago, but my being old as fuck is beyond the point): Yiddish had quite a few common words with English and with the few German words I knew, so you could always latch into that and reduce the amount of unknown words immensely; Esperanto is of course basically Romance, so just 2 weeks into it I could read any text and sort of understand a good amount of it; and Italian, which I study through osmosis more than actual effort, is obviously quite easy most of the time. Hebrew, on the other hand, does have some Anglicisms, and some words I identify from Yiddish, but most of them are 100% new.

On a personal level, this is the first language ever which I can't study every day, because now I have a job, so I have to limit my studies to the weekend and whichever time I can snatch up on the weekdays. This obviously makes everything much harder than it would otherwise be, and probably explains why this post is so rant-y haha.

Another thing that impressed me greatly is the lack of resources? I mean, Hebrew has like 10 million speakers, and no decent dictionary for learners. Hebrew, the language which basically sprung up from nothing in the last 100 years; you'd think studying it would be a well-trodden path and it'd have a wealth of resources that would make the whole matter trivial, and yet there's very little for learners???

Still, despite that, or rather (knowing me) because of that, I will probably not give up. I mean, there are resources for native speakers, so there are texts I can use when I improve (a lot), which is something I can look up to, and there are textbooks, so I'll just follow them and see where they take me.

As for Hebrew grammar, I can only say I hate verbs lol. The conjugation of the present tense is pretty easy, no complaints there, but the infinitive is frustrating lmao. Nouns and adjectives seem easy and regular, like the language at large, except for random phonetic changes in plurals etc. I'm liking it so far, though I wish I knew more vocabulary.

[helshades]

French prompt! How does one look at être and arrive at fut? (I know "verbs of being" are notoriously unruly, but this was a mystery for me, even though my own language cobbles the tenses from two separate verbs, neither of which have all tenses.) Broader prompt: what used to be the point of passé simple and how did it become "the storybook tense"?

One of my mother’s favourite puns is the following: On ne peut pas naître et avoir été (’One cannot be born and have been’), a play on an old saying, On ne peut pas être et avoir été (’One cannot be and have been’) meaning that one simply cannot live at once in the past and in the present. Grammatically speaking, this isn’t entirely true, though: the French passé composé, like its equivalent the English present perfect, is trying very hard. When you think of it, ‘I have been doing this for the last five minutes’ is telling exactly that: one is performing a continuous action that began some time in the past and is still going at the moment. Every single French pupil learning English was subjected to the example of the vase that one has broken, and is consequently still broken at present. French has one time like this, known as the ‘compound past’, which technically works in the exact same way, except it has come to be used everywhere, replacing even the French equivalent to the preterite, or past simple, to the point that no one uses the French preterite anymore aside from the only people who may get away with reading as highly literary, which isn’t a lot of people nowadays. Children’s books rarely do contain verbs conjugated in the past simple anymore; in (junior) high school, students are only taught the third person of the singular and of the plural for ‘important’ verbs, and a number of people have been pushing for the complete eradication of a tense which they deemed ‘elitist’ for being more complicated than the compound past, which only requires one to know the present-simple forms of auxiliary verb avoir, ‘to have’, plus the past participle of the verb concerned by the action.

Of course, French students used to have no particular difficulty in learning conjugations, no matter how detailed; only, for a few decades now people deeming themselves progressists have imposed new teaching methods based on a supposedly ‘intuitive’ approach to knowledge as well as a downright utilitarian idea of the language itself—what isn’t useful in everyday life will never be of use, and can therefore be dropped altogether. French isn’t taught systemically in French school anymore, grammar rules are generally glossed over and since learning by heart is strongly frowned upon conjugations are more than imperfectly mastered, not to say anything about the basic principles of syntax. Today, it is estimated (by international tests also) that about one third of students enter junior high school (at age 11) without knowing how to read, or write, their own language. Parents usually riot if teachers seek to correct children’s spelling or enunciation, and after each national exam now students take to Twitter to complain about the difficulty of the exceedingly simple tests. In this context, it is very hard to know whether or not the passé simple is meant to fall out of usage definitely—but I suspect it won’t before long, as a matter of fact, as it already serves, along with other grammatical notions, to separate those who do master their own idiom from those who don’t.

In any case, concerning the structure of the simple past and its meaning, I’m reminded of a remark that famous French linguist Émile Benveniste made about the simple past: like narration, in which it is almost exclusively employed, the simple past is non-deictic, whereas discourse as well as the tenses used in it are deictic, meaning they are anchored in the ‘situation of enunciation’, the frame of the dialogue. Being outside the deixis, the simple past operates somewhat remotely from the event which it describes, inducing an impression of temporal and/or spatial distance with it. Quite frankly, it’s hard not to make a parallel here with the postmodern obsession with immediacy and its deep-rooted hatred of the long term...

Speaking of long-term things!

How does one look at être and arrive at fut? Well, that is a splendid question, reaching far into the history of the French language, and in truth all Indo-European languages since they all have the quirky habit of mashing up the conjugations for several verbs expressing slightly different aspects of an action and deciding that they are to be only one verb now—usually, an auxiliary, and the results are just wild. But let’s get a closer look at the conjugation we’re dealing with, here:

You’ll note that I didn’t include (amongst other things) the four tenses of the subjunctive mode, to avoid being too long as I only aim to draw a few explanatory comparisons with Latin, but just in case, I’ll remind you that the present goes que je sois (sois, soit, soyons, soyez, soient) while subjunctive imperfect goes que je fusse (fusses, fût, fussions, fussiez, fussent). And now, hoping you didn’t run away screaming and flailing, I propose a little comparison with the equivalent Latin tenses:

Please fawn over my pedagogical abilities. Once that is over, please note how the conjugation of être was mostly constituted in Old French (from the 9th century onwards), bar a few interesting exceptions, such as the concurrent forms in the future: the older stem, er- or ier-, directly evolved from Latin. Linguists theorised that the stem that ended up in modern French, in ser-, is actually a syntagmatic construction taken from the Latin infinitive (es)sere to which were added special endings borrowed from the conjugation of auxiliary avoir, to have. Romance languages all form their future synthetically. For instance, ‘we will love’, nous aimerons, is literally nous aimer-(av)ons. (Compare to Spanish cantaré, ‘I will sing’, which is cantar + hé.) Where être is concerned, the ser- stem replaced the original infinitive after too many speakers dropped the beginning of infinitive essere, especially in the first person, and a full tense ended up being constituted from that model (hence the ‘syntagmatic construction’ I was mentioning earlier: it didn’t evolve so much as it was reshaped to accommodate usage).

If you know a bit of Latin, you might have frowned upon the infinitive essere, since the classical verb is esse. Esse was a pretty archaic form to begin with, although it was actually conjugated regularly; the -s had mutated to an -r between two vowels in most other verbs pretty early in the evolution of the language, and that is where the French infinitives (-er, -ir, -re) come from. But esse remained unchanged, probably because of its particular role as an auxiliary. On the other hand, in Vulgar Latin, which was Latin as it was spoken by regular people, the strange infinitive got hypercorrected, ‘regularised’, into essere, after getting mistaken for a stem. And since Romance languages are mostly stemming from popular, late-era Latin, rather than the literary language... In Italian, the infinitive is still essere. In Spanish, it evolved into ser. In Occitan, into èser. The t of estre is, as you can see, a French particularity; it’s purely epenthetic, meaning it was only added to ease the pronunciation of the word, in this case after one of the vowels dropped: esre > estre.

The participles of être, however, both in the present (étant) and the past (été, ayant été) don’t come from any version of esse, any more than the imperfect tense, since its Latin equivalent was eram. They come, instead, from an entirely different verb: stare, which evolved into Vulgar Latin estare, which in turn became Old French ester, and which meant ‘to stand, to stay’. Well, it’s actually the origin of verb ‘stay’ in English, which was borrowed from the Old French. In modern French, you’ll find its descendant as rester, ‘to stay, to remain’.

And this is where we come to our strange Latin stem in fui-, and its French equivalence in the simple past. Now where does that come from?! Well, my dear Tatty, it is the last remnant on an archaic verb issued from an Indo-European root °bheu- meaning ‘to grow’, ‘to become’. It’s why the auxiliary in English is ‘to be’, actually! (Proto-Germanic °beuną > Old English bēon > Middle English been). In most languages this Indo-European root gave words beginning in b-. The exceptions are Sanskrit (bh-, with a strong aspiration), Hellenic languages (Ancient Greek φύω, phúô) and Italic languages, where it ended up being pronounced as an f, hence fui. In passing, the original meaning of the Indo-European root, ‘to grow’, has been preserved only in Greek φύσις, phúsis, ‘nature’—hence ‘physics’. Morphologically, though, the root is present everywhere in Indo-European languages, starting with the word ‘future’ itself.

A major difference between Latin (and Greek) and Germanic languages, however, is that fu- in Latin possessed in its meaning the idea of veering towards the completion of an action, but that was expressed differently in the future (participle) and in past-tense narration; eventually, the future aspect was dropped from the language altogether, and all that remained was the stem’s perfective value (the idea of accomplishment, of a done and over thing), which serves to explain how the fu- root came to be specialised in Romance languages as a form destined for the simple past/preterite/perfect tense. (In Germanic languages, the past is defined by the idea of staying in one place, whereas the enunciation is characterised by a general idea of ‘aiming towards’.)

In guise of a conclusion, I heartily recommend the Wikipedia article on the Indo-European copula, which is long and bountiful and makes a few salient points on the topic of this fixture in all Indo-European languages that is a weird, weird little verb corresponding to the English to be, and it tells a lot on the way languages get shaped.

[anathtsurugi]

Day 9 - Serious (NSFW)

Behold, Day 9′s prompt for @kalluzebweddingplan‘s Kalluzeb Valentine challenge! So this one philosophizes a fair amount on my musings on Lasat language and culture while still also managing to be a sex scene. That was fun. Hope it goes well. :)

Serious

 Tinsahn Keeraw.

 The Way of the Bond.

 To the people of Lasan, the Tinsahn Keeraw is more than just words. It is a bond of the spirit. It is two souls who know and understand each other absolutely. Two beings who see the brightest and the darkest of each other and do not flinch from the sight. Two strands of fate bound together by the Light and the Dark. The Tinsahn is a catalyst for change. Whether it be to bring light to the darkness or darkness to the light or to meet somewhere in the middle, when two fated souls come together, the world around them will change.

 It is unknown what shape the Tinsahn will take between two such souls. It can form as either a great friendship or a sworn brotherhood. More than once, even avowed enemies have laid claim to the power of the Tinsahn.

 Most often, though, the Tinsahn forms as a bond of love. Where the Tinsahn exists, there is a depth of understanding and clarity that exists in no other bond, and often enough, this will take form as love – a bond stronger than what many beings look to as partnership, as marriage.

 Whatever else it may be, it is the Tinsahn, and it is the light of the soul – a sacred territory upon which no other being may intrude.

 The Tinsahn Keeraw.

                                                                  -from the writings of Firbog Azurri

                                                            High Sage of the Temple Vyr Ashnahn

 Zeb gave a long groan as he felt Alex settle against his thighs. For several moments, they just held like that, the human still adjusting to the size of the Lasat's length inside him.

 "You all right?" Zeb asked after a time, reaching a hand up to touch his lover's face.

 "Yes," Alex answered breathlessly, smiling as he turned his head to press a kiss to Zeb's palm. Then he began to move, setting a slow, luxuriating pace for their lovemaking as he took Zeb into him over and over again.

 Not for the first time, Zeb caught himself wondering how they had come so far. How they had gone from enemies to...this.

 The Ashla will work her ways in mystery and can't no one tell her different.

 Whatever else it was, it was the Way of the Bond – their bond.

 Tinsahn Keeraw.

 He knew he'd first recognized what was between them as such after Bahryn. His heart opened to the doubting Imperial, he had recognized something of himself in Alexsandr Kallus. He had had little choice but to acknowledge the ties that bound them, even if he couldn't have guessed back then just how deep they could run.

 Alex began to pant harshly as he moved above him, an appetizing flush moving across his pale cheeks.

 "Val Ashla," Zeb moaned at the sight, hips shifting up to meet the human's motions. "Sastyria sova zeban."

 Alex's blush only deepened at his words, but the smile didn't leave his face. "Stop that," he scolded mildly, his golden hair falling into his face.

 "Never," Zeb returned as he caught one of the human's hands in his, drawing it to his mouth for a mirroring kiss to the palm. "An san sastyrial...sastyrial gal- z'astyr."

 Alex shook his head, still smiling as several happy tears slipped from his eyes. "I don't deserve you. La velka zashir li serra menashi gal orror remenir an."

 Zeb shook his head in kind as he drew Alex down into a proper kiss, their bodies bound so tightly together as they moved against one another.

 No. He hadn't known then just how deeply he could love this man, how hard and fast he could fall. He couldn't pinpoint the moment it had become so serious between them, but he was perfectly content to spend the rest of his life making Alex believe just how serious he was if he had to.

 His love...his Tinsana...

 "L'ashkerrir an," he whispered in his ear.

 I love you.

 At this, Alex came completely undone in a single, glorious moment, a tiny, almost-wounded cry escaping his lips as he reached orgasm. The small pulse of his seed left a pleasant tingling against Zeb's belly as he held him tightly.

 Alex whispered several things against his lips in his moment of coital bliss, half in Basic and half in Lasana, all of it largely beyond comprehension as he rode out the wave of his climax. It took several clenches from his still-spasming body to pull Zeb over the edge with him.

 Zeb came with a surprisingly high-pitched grunt, gripping his lover tightly as his barb shot free with his release, holding him fast inside the human.

 Alex gave one last weak cry at the additional stimulation, one last burst of seed pulsing sluggishly from his cock. Zeb could feel the way he trembled in his arms as they clung to each other, that last bit of stimulation almost too much for him. It was a while yet before Alex could form wholly coherent sentences again.

 "Oh, my love...my love," the human mumbled in clear exhaustion, fingers curling insistently in the Lasat's fur. "Ni ashkerra."

 "I'm here. I'm right here. You can sleep if you want," he soothed the former Imperial, knowing how tired he tended to get after making love. He even felt a little tired himself. "I'll still be here."

 "Zeb...Zeb..." Alex whispered several times as he drifted off to sleep. The Lasat smiled, dropping kiss after kiss to the top of his head as his own thoughts drifted.

 Enemy...

 "I was there when Lasan fell. I know why you fear those disruptors. I gave the order to use them!"

 Brother...

 "I didn't take it as a trophy. The Lasat guardsman I faced, he- fought well...died with honor. He gave me the rifle before-"

 Friend...

 "He said to tell you that you were even."

 Lover...

 "I love you, Garazeb Orrelios, and I shall love you until all of reality burns itself out of existence."

 He didn't know how one person could be all of those things. Hells, he'd lived through it and he still didn't think he really had the answer. In the end, all he really had was what he felt, and that was what gave the Tinsahn its strength.

 "L'ashkerrir an," he said one final time before drifting off himself. "I will always love you."

Okay, so some translations are probably in order for the stuff that wasn’t given in context.

Val Ashla, Sastyria sova zeban - By the Ashla, beauty made real

An san sastyrial...sastyrial gal- z'astyr - You are beautiful...beautiful and- so strong

La velka zashir li serra menashi gal orror remenir an - I could live a thousand years and never deserve you

Tinsahn Keeraw is also a concept that appears in my ongoing fic, but I know not everyone’s read that monster, so I wanted to present it here in a way that both explained what it was and also presented something new for all of you who are familiar with it. :D

Gods. I’m conjugating verbs and separating out tense speech for a made up language. I’ve etymologically broken down the meanings of words like Ashla and Garazeb and Lasan. I friggin’ defined karabast! SOMEBODY SEND HELP!

Confound it all. I love it, though.

[hungarian-words]

Almost every post here (so far)

For the people who are leaving and for those who don’t want to scroll through 150 posts. I tagged some triggers I know of (like alcohol or GIFs), but I wouldn’t claim it is 100% foolproof.

(reblog) means it is a reblogged post, (by OP) means the post was made by me. The videos and such are not my work :D

INTRODUCTION TO THE HUNGARIAN LANGUAGE/HUNGARIAN EXPLAINED

Nov 13: The Day of the Hungarian language. 17 Hungarian expressions. Why is this language difficult/easy to learn? (reblog)

The Hungarian Language. Incredible YouTube video by Langfocus. Basic grammar explained. [CC] (reblog) Or: watch it on YouTube.

Stuff you should know about Hungarian part 1. The alphabet. (reblog)

Why Hungarian? (reblog)

Hungarian is actually a very logical and rational language [meme]. (reblog)

A German’s opinion about how OP sounds like when he speaks Hungarian (by OP; short post)

Hungarian language moodboard (reblog)

VOCABULARY LISTS

Top 100 most frequent Hungarian words [with IPA] (reblog)

625 words in Hungarian (reblog)

Numbers 0-100 (by OP)

Ordinal numbers 0-100 (by OP)

Fractions 0-100 (by OP)

How many forms of the word “baszni” are there and what do they mean? Vulgar but educational ;). (reblog)

Three words for home - itthon, otthon and haza (reblog)

Dog vocabulary (by OP)

Tantárgyak / School Subjects (reblog)

Literature in Hungarian (reblog)

Hungarian Vocabulary - Work (reblog)

Sounds that Hungarian animals make (by OP)

Some Hungarian verbs that can take many coverbs -  part 2 (reblog)

A guide to sounding Hungarian – contracted words (reblog)

Guide to sounding Hungarian: shortened words (reblog)

Harry Potter vocab in Hungarian (reblog)

Avatar: The Last Airbender vocabulary (by OP) 

Hungarian slang terms (reblog)

Hungarian slang & everyday language: #1 general stuff (by OP)

Hungarian slang #2: party (by OP; alcohol, drugs, smoking, vomiting)

OMG! equivalents in Hungarian (by OP)

Hungarian LGBT+ vocabulary. main focus on LGB identities (by OP)

Expressing time: Days (by OP)

Nice things to say in Hungarian (reblog)

Weird/funny Hungarian expressions part 1 (reblog)

5 expressions with body parts in Hungarian (reblog)

Useful phrases/Hasznos kifejezések (reblog)

Figures of speech + words that are (almost) the same in Hungarian & German (by OP) 

GRAMMAR RULES

[Hungarian] Vowel Lengthening (reblog)

[Hungarian] Vowel Harmony (reblog)

Névelők / Articles (reblog)

Személyes névmások 1. / Personal pronouns 1. (reblog)

Jelen idő első rész/ Present tense part one (reblog)

Főnevek ragozása első rész / Conjugation of nouns part one (reblog)

The Hungarian diminutive suffix -ka-ke (reblog + addition by OP)

Kötőszók első rész/ Connective words part one (reblog)

Kötőszavak második rész / Connective words part two (reblog)

GENERAL LANGUAGE LEARNING TIPS/ABOUT LEARNING A LANGUAGE

How to learn a language (reblog)

hearing your target language from early on is so important (reblog)

The reason why you need to understand a culture to learn a language (reblog)

I dont think a lot of people realize how big a part of languages culture truly is (reblog)

RESOURCE FOR LEARNING HUNGARIAN

free online dictionary by Akadémiai Kiadó offering Hungarian to/from English, Spanish, German, French and Italian (reblog)

EUROPE VS AMERICA

My favorite thing is that Europe is spooky because it’s old and America is spooky because it’s big (reblog; long post with people telling about their experiences with people from different continents; absolutely worth reading)

How fast does the train go? (reblog)

European culture is hating all other European nations (short, funny post) (reblog)

Eastern Europeans are all Slavic!!!!!! (reblog; funny, not-100%-serious post)

don’t talk shit about my shitty country (reblog; very short, funny post)

Eurovision 2018:

Reaction of Hungarian musicians on making it to the ESC Grand Final 2018 (reblog)

I do appreciate the fact that the Hungarians finally resolved the “english or your own language” dilemma (reblog; funny post)

In the early days, Eurovision was a sober contest (reblog)

English translation of Viszlát Nyár (reblog)

CULTURAL STUFF & INTERESTING THINGS ABOUT HUNGARIANS, THE HUNGARIAN LANGUAGE, OR HUNGARY:

-TEXT AND/OR PICTURES

How to write dates in Hungarian (by OP)

Hungarian name order (by OP)

How to clap in the theatre (by OP, who thought it wasn’t universal. he spent a lot of time making that post tho so it’s here; includes a GIF)

You can see this decal on some glass doors of the CBA supermarket in South Slovakia. It says “We also speak Hungarian”. Little history about Hungary 1920. (reblog)

Eastern European school canteen moodboard (reblog)

Teaching you about early Hungarian culture in meme-format (reblog; short post)

Portraits of Székelys (reblog)

Májusfa/Maypole (reblog)

Most Studied Foreign Language other than English in Lower Secondary Education, 2016. (reblog)

Ballagás (by OP)

Hungarians and English - what accent do we speak? (by OP)

Ukrainian family member about Hungarian cuisine. Hungarian version here.  (by OP; short post)

Hungarian history in Hungarian (advanced) (by OP;  first part of a long video-series about Hungarian history; advanced vocabulary required to understand)

About Hungarian literature. short post; interesting facts, well-known writers & poets. some vocab. (reblog)

Sports in Hungary short post; interesting facts. some vocab. (reblog)

Judit Czinkné Poór is a Hungarian artist and pastry chef that creates the most incredible cookie art I have seen. (reblog; pictures of very nice looking cookies)

“Budapest and the country” (reblog)

Starbucks-os minta alapján: Pilvax Kávéházi kávé Sándornak/Like Starbucks: Coffe from Pilvax for Sándor (reblog; history; március 15)

A chart with Hungary in the middle (reblog)

Excerpt from Kincskereső Kisködmön (by OP)

The pain of the Hungarian keyboard, illustrated in meme-format (by OP)

Hungarian Despacito parody by famous Hungarian YouTubers of Pamkutya (by OP)

What does the C. K. stand for in Louis C. K.’s name? (reblog)

Hungary is not a real place. Despite being Europeans, Germans can’t differentiate between Hungarian and Italian flags. (reblog + addition by OP)

Hungary is not a real place. Despite being Europeans, Germans can’t differentiate between Hungarian and Italian flags. Tourists can’t, either PART 2 (reblog + addition by OP + addition by another reblog)

i’ll never understand why we don’t call countries the names they actually call themselves (reblog + addition by OP about how other countries call Hungary + what we call them)

Freddy Mercury wanted to buy this cool Hungarian building (reblog)

Polish vs Hungarian: How to pronounce “s” and “sz” (reblog)

-INTERESTING MEANINGS OF WORDS

“Leesett a tantusz” (reblog)

In Hungarian we don’t say.... #1 (reblog; alcohol mention)

In Hungarian we don’t say... #2 (reblog)

In Hungarian we don’t say... #3 (reblog)

The word “madárlátta” (reblog)

slang: lepkefing (reblog; short post)

bolgár vs bulgár (reblog; short post)

Head or tails? in Hungarian (reblog)

Raccoon in Hungarian (reblog)

What the Hungarian word for “to explain” literally means (reblog)

Bundáskenyér. Literal and actual meaning. (reblog)

The slang word “letüdőzni” (reblog)

szabi vs Szabi (reblog)

addition to mapsontheweb’s map on how European languages say “wolf”. Some of the countries south from Hungary call it a word that means something else in Hungarian (reblog + addition by OP)

-PICTURES OF HUNGARY

Budapest near the Danube at night (reblog; pictures)

Lake Balaton (reblog; pictures)

Kecskelyuk barlang, Hungary (reblog, picture)

-VIDEOS

Queen concert in Budapest; Freddy Mercury singing a Hungarian song (reblog)

Nehéz nyelv a magyar.../Hungarian is a hard to learn language... [Hungarian captions in the post, no translation] Original YouTube video (by OP)

Pom Pom Meséi: Gombóc Artúr/The Tales of Pom Pom: Gombóc Artúr. [ Hungarian captions in the post, no translation ] Original video (watch it before it gets taken down again) (by OP)

An excerpt from the Czechoslovak film Funebrák (1932) showing us how Hungarian sounds like to them + they parodize our csárdás dance + Markos György makes fun of Russian, while also mixing in some Hungarian words (by OP)

90 years after her great-grandparents left Hungary towards Brazil, Marina visits her ancestors beloved land. The original video has English captions, OP added Hungarian captions in reblog (reblog + addition by OP. OP promised to make a video description in the tags. he lied.)

Charlie Chaplin cutting a mans beard in tune to Brahms Hungarian dance no 5 (reblog)

Vidéki szavak - pesti füleknek – Words from the countryside - for the “ears” of Budapest. Hungarian captions & English translation in the post (by OP)

Romeo and Juliet: Verona (by OP, after he found the “sparkly Hungarian fandom” tag)

Spongebob opening. Link to video in the post. Hungarian captions + translation in the post (by OP)

OP has seen video about future English, talks about Future Hungarian, adds video about Hungarian animated series Mézga család/The family Mézga (reblog)

POSTS THAT DON’T 100% QUALIFY AS LANGBLR POSTS

saying “I love you” when you’re bilingual (reblog + addition by OP; screenshot of a tweet)

playing a game of sports in a foreign country and forgetting in what language you should yell (by OP; short post)

when translating just doesn’t work #1 (by OP; short post)

when translating just doesn’t work #2 (by OP; short post)

how to make memes after article 13 (reblog)

fiókát találtam, mit tegyek? (reblog)

Hungarians (=OP) are unable to watch The Flintstones without rhymes (by OP)

How not to translate “turkey” into Hungarian (reblog)

How not to translate “üzemen kívül” into English (reblog)

How not to translate “üzemen kívül” into German (reblog)

[nastyaphrodite]

Mother Tongue - Demetria Martinez

fyi one of the most poetically written books I’ve ever read, quotes are too good to lose to time.

(will be tagged personal, but this is not personal ...)

pg. 4: and I was one of those women whose fate is to take war out of a man, or at least imagine she is doing so.

pg. 5: before his arrival the chaos of my life had no axis about which to spin, a center far from God that I asked for forgiveness in advance.

pg. 12: Everything else is remembering. Or dismembering. To create a man out of blanks that can never wound me.

pg. 15: From day one I looked for ways to graft a piece of myself onto him, to become indispensable. My gestures were perfectly timed, touching his hand, twisting my hair, excusing myself to touch up my lipstick---ordinary actions that would reverse the tides of my life as in the theories of physicists who say the dance of a butterfly can cause volcanoes to erupt.

pg 16: Love at first sight, this how I explained the urgency that would later shed its skin and reveal pure desperation. Some women fall in love in advance of knowing a man because it is much easier to love a mystery. And I needed a mystery---someone outside of ordinary time would could rescue me from an ordinary life, from my name ... a blessing that had become a curse. At age nineteen, I was looking for a man to tear apart the dry rind of that name so I could see what fruit fermented inside.

pg. 19: Yes, from the very beginning I wanted him. In that time of my life, men were mirrors that allowed me to see myself at different angles. Outside this function, they did not exist. It was a supreme selfishness, the kind that feeds on men’s attentions, a void flourishing in a void. **** In the end, I had no choice but to love him. Desire was not good enough. Love would ripen in the light of time we spent together, like an arranged marriage. Except that I was doing the arranging. And calling it fate.

pg. 20: I swear to God the moment I laid eyes on him I knew he was The One. And it can’t be a coincidence—that he arrived on the scene just as I was asking the universe whether or not there was more to life than just holding down boring jobs. I’d been so depressed. Now everything has changed. Still, I know I should slow these feelings down. Or else I’ll want to act on them—which always ruins everything. I’ve got to remember I can’t “make” anything happen beyond doing the footwork for some greater purpose that may be trying to manifest here. Maybe I’m supposed to just be his friend.

pg. 22: It’s like I’m going for longer and longer periods of time forgetting I’m depressed. Which maybe is a definition of happiness.

pg. 23: Peace. Joy. Openness to the future. How else can I describe what I’m feeling except for the big “L” word, which I don’t dare say out loud. Because it’s like yelling fire in a theater. Men flee and my girlfriends say to me, you fool.

pg. 26: Very often, when I try to remember those days, everything comes to mind except for memories of myself: what I looked like or said or felt. This is where it gets painful. You see, memory does not always serve me. It seeks images and feelings to hook on to, but at times encounters only voids. The facts are easy enough to recite. *** I fled the world, went inside, ceased to feel. You could say I fell asleep. There was no mystery to it. Quite simply, it was easier to sleep and pretend to be awake than to stay awake and pretend to be strong. *** They had words for women like me. Insane fell out of favor as did nervous breakdown. Clinically depressed was, I believe, in vogue. But ask any woman who has had times in her life when she was not all there. She will say she was asleep. And women who fall asleep and don’t know why lack a plot line; this is the secret source of their shame. So I concocted a plot of my own, orchestrating what I could until characters began to say and do things I had never imagined, me included. To prove the gods at least were interested in me, I courted disaster, set out to love a man I knew full well would go away. Falling in love was a way of pinching myself. It proved I was alive only on that thin line between drama and trauma. I handed my body over ... like a torch to help him out of his dark places. I felt no shame. I was utterly unoriginal. To love a man more than one’s self was a socially acceptable way for a woman to be insane.

pg. 32: It was like taking one last look around a hospital room where someone I loved had died. And I cried, I couldn’t stop, it was a surprise. I thought my arroyo of grief had long ago dried up, leaving only an imprint of the storm.

pg. 49: I was young, future tense came naturally to me: Iré, irás.… I will go, you will go. I have always lacked talent for living in the here and now, and back then I was easily transported into luminous, unobtainable futures.

pg. 55: Where others saw indigo, I saw blue; where others saw teal, I saw green. It’s the draining away of color that happens in a woman’s life when she can’t name her own reality. It is only now that I am able to go back and color in the pale places, creating a mural on the walls of the life I now inhabit.

pg. 59-60: The truth is, some of our tenderest moments are the ones I am least likely to remember. It has to do with what I said about sleep, how women like me sometimes flee, letting loving words or glances melt on the hot pavement of some nameless fear. So forgive me if I embellish; even a conjured memory is better than no memory at all if you would dare to give your life what the world did not, a myth, a plot. Besides, I never intended to reconstruct him from memory, just from love, which may be the only way anyone can ever hope to get at the whole truth.

pg. 61: I knew the name but not the man.

pg. 63-64: Now I have reason to improve my Spanish. I have a word and a way of life to conjugate: Quiero, quieres, quiere, queremos.… To want and to love, the same thing! God, make this thing last. Make it last. I sound crazed, I know, but with good reason. My period’s due any moment, and I have found true love. The kind that pulls all of life in one direction. It’s too much. Already, his presence in my life is helping me forget all the sadness (what was it about?) that pulled me down for so long before he came. *** The thought of being with him forever is intoxicating. But I’ve got to be careful. I’ve got to stay in the present. The minute I get hung up on the idea of forever, on what will happen tomorrow, I ruin everything.

pg. 65: But I don’t need sleep, I don’t need food, just you, I answered. I unpeeled myself from him, removed myself like a bandage. The cruelty of limits stung: the need for sleep, food, a paycheck however small. If an hour were a house one could move into for good, I would have built a wall around the 2 o’clock hour, a brick wall arrayed against the disfiguring fury of the future.

pg. 66: We opened each other up like sacred books, Spanish on one side, English on the other, truths simultaneously translated.

pg. 68-69: But I’m deceiving myself again. Lying. For a long time after (he) I continued to believe a man could touch my essence, make me whole. All that time I could have been writing, touching the fires of my being and returning to the world, purified and strong. *** You see, I was one of those women who is at her best when she wants something very badly. The mating dance, the yearning and flirting, surrenders and manipulations—I was good at that, so good at the pursuit that when I actually got what I wanted, terror appeared. Terror that wore the silly mask of disappointment.

pg. 73: The few friends I had during that spell of my life quit calling; the word must have gotten out that (I) was in love. They knew I wouldn’t come out of the house, the house I drew with crayons, a house of primary colors I called love. The first time I fell in love, friends tried to tell me it was not real. To prove them wrong, I drew a keyhole on the front door and invited them to look through to the other side. See for yourselves, I said.

pg. 76: It’s dangerous for a couple to promise to stay married until they die. It’s better to vow to stay together until the marriage dies—and to do everything in their power to keep it alive. If you don’t think of marriage as a plant, fragile and in need of attention, then you’re asking for major trouble.

pg. 77: That’s what I hate about love. Bit by bit you start to give things up. You become like a good parent. But I love him so it’s all worth it. I’ve never felt this way about anyone.

pg. 81-82: Unfortunately (or fortunately?), wounds will often start healing even if you don’t want them to, even if you would rather die quietly in the corner of a cell. The body’s will to live sometimes is greater than that of mind or spirit.

pg. 86: Do I just let things continue until they fall apart? The warmth of her flesh is all I have to make me forget. But alcohol does the same thing. Am I using her? Or is she using me each time she looks at me and loves what is not there?

pg. 87: No, I haven’t forgiven myself for being disappeared from myself any more than I have forgiven him.

pg. 88: He carved that question mark into my heart and kept watch over it until I could wake up and cry out.

pg. 89-90: Things began to happen. There were times he didn’t call, times he didn’t say I love you, nonevents that hurt in little ways, like paper cuts, but that added up. It could be these nonevents had happened all along, the normal ups and downs of relationships. But at a certain point, I began to perceive that he was pulling away from me and thinking about other things. And fear ate at my heart like battery acid. But it’s very likely that I only imagined him pulling away, imagined the whole thing. You see, the fear I am best at is always based upon a myth. *** ... assumption that to survive one sometimes must flee all that is loved. This is what terrified me. His body was branded with the equation, love equals flight.

pg. 94: You see, real love is quiet as snow, without chaos, hard to write about.

pg. 95: They were not like the white God I’d had to kill, that women like me must kill if we are to have any hope of ever finding God. Nothing replaced Him for a long time. But looking back now I can see that the growing chaos inside blazed away dead growth, clearing a space, however violently, for God to be reborn.

pg. 96-97: There were so many moments I would rather not talk about but in this dark night of remembering, they are blooming like night flowers. *** When he didn’t call, my world shriveled. Fetal position. Blistered finger pad. Or when he called and didn’t say, I love you, I shattered, then mistook a piece of me for the whole, a mistake that disfigures women’s lives time and again. But I lacked the nerve to tell him how I was feeling.

pg. 101: Now, as I write this, I can’t remember the real me. It’s terrifying, that you can love someone so much that you lose your own self in the uproar. I can’t remember the me who loves September, who loves to walk or read.

pg. 117: But every woman should have a special place inside where she can think, where no man is allowed, a place that will, you know, endure. Why do you think I took up letter writing? No man is worth falling apart over. Take it from me.

pg. 146: love could not be used like a cage to make a man stay. What if the universe now was telling me that it might take even greater love to let someone go? But I was not capable of detachment.

pg. 155: And as it is at times with bones, my heart needed to be broken and reset properly so it could carry me through life.

pg. 163: I’m tired, frightfully tired. Like snake venom, this story’s medicine had to be drawn from my own body. Maybe you won’t even read this, I don’t know. Long ago I began this tale for reasons I could not yet articulate, maybe for no reason at all. *** Promesas are as dangerous as skydiving, leaps into thin air. Nothing frightens me more than an answered prayer. And nothing taxes a body more than giving something back to God. This is why I am so tired, why I have spent this day crying in my room.

(4-2-19/4-2-19)