Run ... Not!

Immersion is an excellent way to learn a language. The more time you spend with a language, the faster you will learn. My best leçons take place in the middle of the night, via silly conversations. Listening, reading, writing, speaking and studying words and phrases are most effective when it is learned in a meaningful social context.

Yesterday I got a Creole word that amused me to giggles.

SNAIL.

In French it is escargot. In Belgique you can get these from food trucks on the street, along with burgers, frites etc. Fast food. But not really when it comes to snails.

It's s n a i l s... In Mauritian Creole snails are called COURPA.

Derived from the words courir (Fr. verb 'to run') and pas (Fr. negative adverb), when put together and it literally translates to 'it runs, not!'. Which is so true of snails. Runners they are not. lol I love it.

Don't be surprised if I start calling them runnots from now on.

(: Biz


For Parrot's more 'serious-y' writing, it's moved to tumbleoui.tumblr.com. Parrot is nomadic like that.

Countin' Cats

Number: an arithmetical value, expressed by a word, symbol, or figure, representing a particular quantity and used in counting and making calculations and for showing order in a series or for identification.

Numbers are important which is why it is often one of the first lessons learned.

Les Numero en Francais:
1 un 2 deux 3 trois 4 quatre 5 cinq 6 six 7 sept 8 huit 9 neuf 10 dix


En Creole:
Sounds like the above but being paress we take skip out on some letters.
N (ene), D (des), trois, kat (like kit kat!), cinq, sis, set, wit, nef, dis


Time for a cat joke!

K, we have 2 cats, one British, one French. We'll call the Brit cat Onetwothree and Chat Francais, Undeuxtrois. They decided to have a race. First one across the English Channel wins Jaguar's stash of Doritos. Both cats jumped into the water and cat-paddled across. Which cat won the race?

The British cat! Because Undeuxtrois cat sank! Geddit? Geddit? Quatre cinq (:
...this joke goes much better told. But still, cat!


All kats are winners.
(: Biz






p.s. bon anniversaire papa!

The Way of the Bird

Halfway through 2012!
   Wedding, done.
      Euro, won.
         Kreol lecons, ...non.


(I've been told) Creole is not the most difficult language to speak but it is difficult to write. It is after all a language that is meant to be spoken rather than written. That sure makes it difficult to learn when one is 3000 nautical miles away!

So far on my journey I've seen several words written 3 different ways. Take 'bird'.


The French: oiseau
Creole: zoizo, zwazo, zozo


If this was an audio file, you'd think I said the same word 3 times. And I did.


It's alright that the spelling is inconsistent, we just Parrot and imitate the French pronunciation of the original word.


Sometimes though, it doesn't work. I'll get to that as soon as Jaguar finishes playing with banana leaves.


(: biz