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[moonwise]

*utterly thrilled* I don't know who had a hand in this, but I can put my journal into Irish! Cool. And the fun part is that I can read about half of it!

caoin alerted me a while ago but I'm a little dense sometimes...

Okay, I'm going to post my scéal (story) about Bitsy the kitty even though none of you can read it. :) Because I'm in an Irish mood.

Dé Domhnáigh, ghlaoch m'aintín Máire gutháin a chur orainn. Bhí aon scéal brónach aici. Bhí a cat, Bitsy, in easnamh. Ní raibh sí sa clóisead, san áilear, ó faoin leaba. Bhí Aintín Máire ag feáchaint i ngach an áit. Shíl sí go raibh Bitsy amach áit éigin, agus cá raibh sí? Ní raibh sí a fhíos uirthí. Bhí brón uirthí. Is Bitsy go han-maith liom, agus tá brón orm freisin. Téann Bitsy amuigh gach lá. Tá sí cat beag, agus riaibhe duibhe aici. Tá sí gramhar, agus is maith léi nuair déantar bán bán léi.

An lá dar gcionn, ghlaoch Aintín Máire gutháin a chur ar mo thuismitheoirí arís. Fhaigh sí Bitsy sa bhaile. Téigh Bitsy i bhfolach uirthí sa clóisead éile! Bhí áthas uirthí, agus bhí áthas orm freisin!



Sunday, my Aunt Mary telephoned us. She had a sad story. Her cat, Bitsy, was missing. She wasn't in the closet, in the attic, or under the bed. Aunt Mary looked everywhere. She thought that Bitsy had gone out somewhere, but where was she? Aunt Mary didn’t know. She was sad. I like Bitsy very much, and I was sad too. Bitsy goes outside every day. She is a small cat, and she has black stripes. She is loving, and she likes it when you pet her.

The next day, Aunt Mary telephoned my parents. She found Bitsy in the house. Bitsy was hiding in another closet! She was very happy, and I was happy too.

Comments

[pantswarrior]

Ooh, Irish... I wish I understood it. ;) The old Briton tongues are so neat... and it would come in handy at ren faires. ;) (I think I'm about 50% tech/anime/game geek, and 50% hippie SCA geek.)

And yay for the cat being found! =)

[arafel.livejournal.com]

*pretends to be offended* Briton?! Irish is a Celtic language! ;)

Just kidding. :)

I've been taking lessons, on and off, for about four years now. It's such a beautiful language in the way certain concepts are expressed.

I used to be somewhat involved in the SCA, but that was a looong time ago.

[pantswarrior]

Bah, whatever. The old languages of the Isles, whatever they're technically called. I'm fairly ignorant, really. ;)

Yeah, I used to be involved with a group locally, and worked a few ren faires, but over the last year, since moving back to my parents' place, I've just sort of drifted away from anyone local. Still thinking I might have to find out when the Silver Leaf faire is this year, and see if our group's still heading security. That was kind of fun. ;)

[arafel.livejournal.com]

*laughs* I wasn't really twitting you. Most people don't understand the distinction, that's just for us nitpickers. There are seven Celtic languages, and I think that three are officially dead, so...

Did you have a registered name and everything? I didn't go that far - just went to a couple events and meetings at college.

[pantswarrior]

Nope, I'm terrible at picking out names... closest I ever got was when I was in a skit where I got to pick a fight with one of the Royal Guard, and I took the name Branla for that. Liked it enough I used it for a (not-quite-self-insertion) minor character in later chapters of my VS fic, but I don't know if I'd want to stick with it permanently. Heck, same problem I have online. ;)

[arafel.livejournal.com]

In a moment of insufferability, I decided that the name I'd choose for myself in the SCA would be Angharad Fionnbhar ní Morgan (Angharad the fairhaired daughter of Morgan,) never mind that it was a mishmosh of Irish, Welsh, and too many fantasy novels. Thankfully, I never went through with it.

*grins* It took me forever to pick "Arafel" for the Net, and even that was borrowed first from C. J. Cherryh and again from my 13-year-old days as a Zelda freak and a real mailing list (with stamps and everything, imagine. ^_^)

But it's better to admit you have trouble picking names than to have about five and switch back and forth constantly. It's very confusing.

Does Branla mean anything? I know that for the SCA, you have to have documentation that your name is authentic, so that you don't get a lot of Tolkienesque SCAdians.

[pantswarrior]

Heh... switching constantly... I don't know where I'd be if I didn't do that right now. Used to call myself Ellcrys online, but I got sick of being identified as a little dancing tree. ...It's sort of a long story. :P I've never again found a handle I actually wanted to use permanently, though Mullenkamp works for the time being, because I love the two heads of that cult. ;)

And yeah, Branla was actually decided on with the help of a friend and his notes on authentic Celtic names or some such. Bran was actually listed as a male name, meaning "raven", then we added the female suffix meaning "friend" to it. "Raven friend" seemed like a decent name for a scout, especially one wielding a small black shortsword. ;)

[arafel.livejournal.com]

Hmmm... well brân does mean "crow" or "raven" in Welsh, but I haven't heard that -la suffix. I'll have to look that up.

What is Ellcrys? I admit that I really have no idea. A dancing tree? From what game/novel?

[pantswarrior]

A magical tree in an elven garden in the Shannara novels... it's a lot more complicated than that, but basically it's a big cool tree with reddish leaves, and that was enough for me, because I love trees. =)

The dancing bit came from a user icon I made... ironically, when I considered taking another handle, one of the few I actually liked was a variation on another magical tree from a fantasy series, and I realized I had to veto that. :P

[arafel.livejournal.com]

Err... well I did translate it for those of you who speak Béarla. :) I understand that learning Irish is a chore rather than an interest for most Irish students, but it has some following in the USA.

And it's my understanding that Japanese is one of the toughest languages in the world to learn, so good luck! ^_^

[caoin.livejournal.com]

::looks sheepish:: Are you up for some corrections?

[arafel.livejournal.com]

lol, sure... I'm sure I missed something, I'm not perfect.. and some of it was taken out of the dictionary b/c my vocab is quite limited.

(and to be most fair, our teacher isn't the best, but don't tell him I said so...shhhh)

[caoin.livejournal.com]

OK, I didn't want to be rude...after all I want you to do more of this.

glaoch gutháin a chur ar dhuine
This is equivalent to to telephone someone and like the way you have to remove the to before using the expression as the main part of a sentence in English, you have to reorder the Irish. The a in this kind of construction is actually a reduction of do so the literal translation is "(a) call of phone to put on (a) person". The verb there is "put", so what you want to say is "My Aunt Mary put (a) call of phone on us", which is (verb first of course) Chuir m'aintín Máire glaoch gutháin orainn.

Bhí aon scéal brónach aici.   You don't need aon 'cause scéal by itself means both "a story" or "story".

sa chlóiséad...or sa gclóiséad if you're from Conamara.

nó faoin leaba   Interference with Spanish? o (Spáinnis) = or (Béarla) = nó (Gaeilge)

i ngach aon áit

go raibh Bitsy amach amuigh áit éigin   Amach and isteach are only for movement in that direction. When something's at rest out(side) you must use amuigh instead and if something's inside rather than going inside you must use istigh. English used to have the same kind of thing a millenium ago...úte "outside", út "outward", útan "from outside".

Ní raibh sí a fhíos uirthí aici. "It's knowledge was not at her" -> "She didn't have it's knowledge" -> "She didn't know".

Is Bitsy go han-maith liom. OK, now we're getting a little complicated. Is maith liom x is sort of a set expression so I'm not sure you can stick an- in there. In any case it wouldn't be go han-mhaith because you don't need to use go with is. Difficult to explain without getting into the differences between the two verbs to be. How about using a completely different liking verb construction - taitin x le y Lit: "x shines with y" i.e. "y likes x". So how about...Taitníonn Bitsy go mór liom

agus tá bhí brón orm freisin.   keep the same tense!

Téann Bitsy amuigh amach gach lá.   see above.

Tá sí ina cat beag, agus tá riaibhe duibhe riabha dubha aici uirthi.   You can't define things with tá alone, only describe them. If the definition is a temporary thing, e.g. "she's still a kitten (but she'll grow up)", you can use the formula tá x ina y, e.g. tá sí ina piscín fós. Otherwise you have to use some contruction with is, which you might have noticed doesn't work like any other verb, e.g. Is cat beag í agus tá riabha dubha uirthi.

Tá sí grámhar

nuair a déantar bán bán léi.   Irish needs a "that" in places that English doesn't, e.g. always after when - "when that". Usually a causes some change in the following word, except when it's the form you used here. Although you can use the autonomous form of the verb (déantar) it's best not to unless it's really needed. So how about nuair a dhéanann tú bán bán léi. Actually I don't know that expression - I would have said nuair a dhéanann tú peataireacht léi.

The full monty:

Dé Domhnáigh, chuir m'aintín Máire glaoch gutháin orainn. Bhí scéal brónach aici. Bhí a cat, Bitsy, in easnamh. Ní raibh sí sa chlóiséad, san áilear, nó faoin leaba. Bhí Aintín Máire ag feáchaint i ngach aon áit. Shíl sí go raibh Bitsy amuigh áit éigin, agus cá raibh sí? Ní raibh a fhíos aici. Bhí brón uirthí. Taitníonn Bitsy go mór liom, agus bhí brón orm freisin. Téann Bitsy amach gach lá. Is cat beag í, agus tá riabha dubha uirthi. Tá sí grámhar, agus is maith léi nuair a dhéanann tú bán bán léi.

Class dismissed!

[arafel.livejournal.com]

Maith go leor. :) My teacher didn't correct any of that - go raibh maith agat. I know I screwed up some of my pronouns and I mess up "ar" and "ag" forms.. so I'm glad you pointed them out to me. I'll try to do better next time. :) (forgetting a couple fadas is inevitable; it's such a pain in the arse to do them in Word.)

I'm curious about han-mhaith though - I've been told that the han is an intensifier by my teacher, meaning "very good." Have you not heard of this expression? Perhaps it's regional or the kind of standard Irish no one really uses?

It's quite obvious that we're a bunch of amateurs who meet once a week and chatter along with Buntus Cainte, but it's fun. :)

Re:

[caoin.livejournal.com]

OK. There are two things.

First there's the word go which you put in front of an adjective to make it into an adverb - maith "good", go maith "well". If the adjective starts with a vowel you put an h before it, e.g. iontach "wonderful", go hiontach "wonderfully". You don't need to use go with is because is is a strange kind of verb.

Secondly there's the prefix an- "very". It's not quite the same as English "very" because you can stick it onto both adjectives and nouns, e.g. an-mhaith "very good", an-chluiche "a great game".

If you're using both of these then go causes an h to be added to the beginning of an-mhaith, i.e. go han-mhaith.

But wait! There's more...

[caoin.livejournal.com]

I missed out the last para

mo thuismitheoirí   Although the word exists, it's a little bit like "officialese". Mo mhamaí is mo dhadaí or m'athair is mo mháthair would be more natural. Or just orainn if you want to cheat.

FhaighFuair sí Bitsy   An irregular verb!

TéighChuaigh Bitsy   Another irregular verb!*

Bhí áthas uirthí, agus bhí áthas ormsa freisin!   Since you're contrasting or comparing it seems natural to use the emphatic version - ormsa "on me".

An lá dar gcionn, chuir Aintín Máire glaoch gutháin ar mo thuismitheoirí arís. Fuair sí Bitsy sa bhaile. Chuaigh Bitsy i bhfolach uirthí sa chlóiséad éile! Bhí áthas uirthí, agus bhí áthas ormsa freisin!

* There are 10: Feicim (see), Faighim (get), Téim (go), Tagaim (come), Déanaim (do), Deirim (say), Tugaim (give), Beirim (bear), Cloisim (hear) & Ithim (eat).

Re: But wait! There's more...

[arafel.livejournal.com]

Argh.. forty lashes with a wet noodle. :)

[ssilverfish.livejournal.com]

WOW! That's so cool...

How difficult are the Béarla pronunciations for the standard American to learn? I'm always so self-conscious when speaking another language, like I'm slaughtering it. The Celtic languages are gorgeous, I think.

[arafel.livejournal.com]

Béarla is English, so you know that already. :) Irish is difficult sometimes because the aspiration and the gutturals don't come naturally to the English tongue. There's also the case of broad consonants vs. slender consonants, but most English ears can't hear the difference very well, so we have never gotten into that.

I hear ya, though, I get very self-conscious speaking French. :)

[ssilverfish.livejournal.com]

>> Béarla is English, so you know that already. :)

HEeeeeeee! Or maybe I don't! :)

Ooo...you're online. I see you...

[arafel.livejournal.com]

*wavies* :)

[hidetomatsumoto.livejournal.com]

Glad to hear Bitsy was found. Does she like to play hide-n-seek, or just likes to get lost?

[arafel.livejournal.com]

Well, the rest of the story isn't too happy... she's ill. My aunt is trying to find out what's the matter with her, but Bitsy was hiding because she felt sick...

[caoin.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry to hear that. Much as I like cats, they have very bad habits when it comes to being ill or visiting the vet. They are such difficult patients!

[arafel.livejournal.com]

It's too bad you can't get into a kitty head to ask what isn't feeling well. :(

Re:

[hidetomatsumoto.livejournal.com]

Oh... So a bittersweet ending. I hope it's nothig seriuos.

[arafel.livejournal.com]

We think she might have diabetes... which wouldn't be good at all.

Re:

[hidetomatsumoto.livejournal.com]

Is there any kind of treatment for that? Or does that mean...

[fireceremony.livejournal.com]

I hope Bitsy will get treatment if it is diabetes she's having.

[dawnwalker.livejournal.com]

Such a beautiful set of languages.

I think I need to concentrate more on learning my Gaelic. Ah well, we do what we can. What's the SCA?

[arafel.livejournal.com]

The SCA is the Society for Creative Anachronism, and it's an organization that started in CA for medieval re-creationists. AFAIK it is world-wide, now. I never really got into it, but it's quite complex, and they get together and have wars every so often and crown a king (or queen) through a trial-by-combat etc. It seemed fun but was very involved.