Archives For linguistic

So I started watching We Got Married for the first time. I had previously just watched clips when GaIn used to be on it, but never got into it full on. But since I’m in my complete Mamamoo fan mood, I just couldn’t miss Solar (my bias, though… this keeps changing) in all her dork splendor!

I was not disappoint~ xD

solar-we-got-married-stuffed-dragon

I mean, when has Mamamoo failed to make me crack up? I wonder how this went when editing the episode, they probably laughed their butts off because…

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Though Fitoor might get trapped by remaking Alfonso Cuaron’s version of Great Expectations… I’m still looking forward to Tabu as Begum. I’m also looking forward to see Haminasto (aka. also romanized as Haminastu) [YouTube] because it’s my favorite track in the whole soundtrack, even though I’ve been butchering some of the other songs out loud late at night. xD I like the song so much that I ended up looking for Zeb Bangash, found Pakistani duo Zeb and Haniya, discovered Coke Studio [1][2][3][4][5 non-Zeb related], and downloaded the compilations on iTunes [S2][S6].

It messed up my language library because there’s so much Punjabi, Urdu and Pashtu, and Turkish… I don’t know which is which xD

ANWYAY~ OCD frustrations aside~

Fitoor promotions are at full throttle~ and it includes the release of this micro clips of dialog, which I don’t understand at all… but Tabu’s just saying “Firdaus, Firdaus, Firdaus” gives me the chills.

More: Duur, Qubool.

Ooh, Tamil Looks Intimidating

December 22, 2014 — 4 Comments

I was watching Madharasapattinam last night, and I said to myself “let’s see about that Tamil.” If Amy Jackson could try, so could this Amy, amirite? However, I’m not gonna lie to you- Tamil intimidated me from the get-go. There’s something about those long *VERY LONG) words and all those Rs, Ps, Ks that just made my tongue a mess. But at least I can sorta tell the Tamil alphabet apart, which isn’t the case with Telugu and Malayalam. You have to admit it MUST look really foreigner to outsiders~

tamil-alphabet

I sorta can guess how it works, but I need a place/link where they teach you how to write the alphabet in order. For example, how do you begin writing the symbol for Ai (ஐ)- is it in one stroke? Do I do it like a toppled over 3 with an inverted one, or does it start more like an incomplete heart. Is A (அ) more like two strokes? And what about Aa (ஆ). And the I (இ) looks suuuuuper complicated. Is that on one go?

If anyone stumbling on this post knows Tamil, please, give me some pointers ;) I, at least, would love to pick some up.

Quickies on Hu Tu Tu

October 9, 2014 — 4 Comments

You do probably know that my Hindi should suck, but that doesn’t stop me from keeping my iTunes library in order… which means I take all of the tracks from Indian movies that I’ve downloaded and try to give an English translation — after all, I should know, at least, what the title of a song means! That, of course, means that titles from hard-to-find movies/OSTs have to do with my own interpretation. One of them is Hu Tu Tu, because no one’s bothered to translate the songs… and my copy of the movie doesn’t come with subtitles in the sung parts.

Most of the titles are easy- Chhai Chhapa Chhai is classic onomatopoeic Gulzar (Jhini Mini Jhini from Maqbool gave me a clue), Jai Hind Hind (Hail, India!), Bandobast Hai (It’s the System), Ghapla Hai Bhai (It’s a Mess, Brother), and Jago Jago Jagte Raho (Get Up, Always Be Awake) seem quite straight forward. Even Yeh Nam Aankhein (These Drenched Eyes) can seem easy when compared to Itna Lamba Kash Lo Yaaron and Nikla Neem Ke Talese Nikla.

So what do those last titles mean?

I’ve sort of translated Itna Lamba Kash Lo Yaaron– since Itna refers to a Quantity (this much or so much), Lamba refers to the Length (height or otherwise), Kash means to Take a Puff or a Smoke (considering the scene), and Yaaron refers to Friends. I sorta translated it to It’s Such a Long Smoke, My Friend. And in the lyrics~

Itna lamba kash lo yaaron, dam nikal jaaye
Zindagi sulagaao yaaron, gam nikal jaaye
Yaaron, yaaron

Dam = (staying) Power
Nikal = Get out/get lost
Sulagaao/Sulagana = Ignite/set on fire
Gam = Regret

It’s such a long smoke, my friend.
Power, be gone.
Life is set on fire, my friend.
Regret, be gone.

How did I do with that?

Though, Nikla Neem Ke Talese Nikla escapes my comprehension. It doesn’t even look Hindi to me- oh, wait. Never mind. *goes crazy* Why is Talese together when it should be Tale Se? As in Nikla Neem Ke Tale Se Nikla (निकला नीम के तले से निकला) *growls*

Anyone ANYONE who is able to help me out with that title and make my life easier?- I’ll love you forever! LOL From the deep Google that I did, Nikla seemed to refer to “being out,” or “something that sticks out” and I know Neem can refer to the bitterness of the Neem tree [1] or the tree itself, and Tale is “the bottom or base of something” — Does that mean… The Bottom of the Neem Tree Turned Upside Down? LOL, I need to watch this movie again. xD

It’s always interesting to see educational (short) clips about different languages; did you guys ever see the one about the guy that could speak like 20 languages? At that time, my niece (6) and nephew (5) were struggling with picking up Italian and English at school, while they spoke Spanish and Swedish at home. That was, of course, on top of their other school subjects like math, because schooling is just incredibly ridiculous nowadays.

The only bad thing about the clip is the incredibly boring tone of the voice over. In any case, I thought it was funny they lumped Mandarin, Cantonese, etc into one big chunk of Chinese language. I thought the formal label was “Sino-Tibetan language,” even though Tibetan feels more like it would be more like Indo-Aryan, no? Isn’t Sanskrit both part of Tibetan and Indo-Aryan languages? Sighs.

I don’t exactly understand how branching works with languages, how does Indo-European come about? Isn’t that like stretching things out? What would languages like Spanish, German and Hindi have in common with each other? And how does Japonic or Koreanic come about? And how do they have more in common with Mongolian than with Chinese?