have we got any other raw beginners mangling pronunciation and getting their heads around word order? I'd love some company in learning word lists.... also sharing tips we pick up along the way.
Hàlo, à Ghaedeal-pàisde, Hi Gaelicbabe. Tha i gu ḍigheil. I''m fine, thank you.
'S ann à Astràili a tha mi. I come from Australia. Mo phàrantan a`Alba. My parents come from Scotland. (not sure about the form of Alba there - )
I've just started learning. I'm going to try to write as much Gàidhligh as I can, so you'll have to excuse the mistakes, feel free to correct me. On the old forum the mods did the grammar correcting to ensure people didn't get it wrong, with more advanced learners contributing as well. Perhaps this will continue here, I don't know.
I just had a look at the link to the BBC beag air bheag site that Graisg linked to on another thread, its terrific - very good for pronunciation.
interesting hearing 'tapadh leibh' - it sounds like 'taf bu lef' - kind of run together. Its one of the things I like about the sound of Gaelic, the flowing rhythm. There's a woman on the radio station has an amazing up-and-down musical voice, reminds me of my cousins in Fife.
Mar sin leat! Bye for now!
Helen (Eilidh is the Gaelic version, but we already have an Eilidh on the board, so I'll stick with Helen to save confusion. My username is an attempt at 'ignorant foreigner'!)
I am not a complete newbie to the language - I take Gaelic classes at the university. But my oral is terrible and my writing isn't much better, so this is probably a good place for me to be.
I did notice a couple of things when I was reading the posts, if no one minds me pointing them out. Gaelicbabe ... you don't lenite words beginning with h, so it would just be a Helen. And Helen ... in the first line of your last post, you referred to yourself as she - i, instead of me - mi. I'm not sure about the third sentence regarding where you're from. It doesn't look right to me. I would say - Tha mi a Ceap Breatainn. Tha mi a' fuireach ann an Sudnaidh a Tuath. I am from Cape Breton. I am living in North Sydney. But that doesn't necessarily mean your way is wrong ... hmm, maybe someone will clarify that for me because now I'm curious.
You can count me in the raw beginner class as well.
And Seona, I think we're looking for any help we can get
I've been going through some of colin and cumberland on bbc. It's been pretty helpful. They have a lot of mini word-learning games. One of the tougher ones for me (which I need to learn more words to do right) involves having a calendar of events which you're doing, and your granny calling up and asking (in gaidhlig) what you're doing on a certain day in the morning or evening or whatnot. But there's a nice one to learn the names of food, family, and all kinds of things. It's really put together well in my opinion.
Now I just need to figure out how to say hope that helps in gaidhlig... cuidich a ḍchas! (how was that?)
Tha mi a Ceap Breatainn. tha mi à ... (don't forget the accent!)
'S ann à Astràilia a tha mi that's ok for emphasis.
Tapadh leibh...pronunciation! well... tachpu leev, tappu leev, tachpu layv... all is possible. the -u is more a shwa sound like in a very short but... the chp is a slightly pre-aspirated p and is subject to dialect.
Helen, if you want to be an Eilidh, I wouldn't mind changing my name... but be aware people might think you are me, no, I am you
I didn't forget the accent. I couldn't get it to come on properly and then got annoyed at fiddling with it and gave up. LOL I'm having a bit of a problem getting them to work. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't ....
*grumble*
Eventually, I'll just go around the board and copy them all. Do it the easy way.
The structure for the 'where I'm from' I copied from my book. I think its literally "it is ---- that I'm from". The closest thing I could find to "I live in -- " Aparrently in Gaidhlig the question "Where are you from" - C̣ às a tha thu? - means 'where are you born' (though I can't find the bit referring to that, perhaps I read it on the net)
I think the 'i' instead of 'mi' was a typo... daft.....
What are you using, Seona Mac or PC? I was able to use the international settings on my Mac to get an Irish keyboard map that has easy accent keys. Took a while to figure out how to get it tho!
Eilidh, no, dinnae be daft. Helen is just fine.
My plan for this week is to do the first two chapters of my book - maybe 15 minutes a day - and to listen to some Beag air Bheag each time I log on.
Does anyone have some 'goodbyes'? I've been looking for "see you later" or sometihng like that!
I have a PC. I did have a US/Ireland Extended keyboard downloaded, but I was attacked by spyware, had to have my hard drive cleared, and lost it [along with a bunch of other handy stuff]. I've tried downloading it again, but I'm having a horrid time. I've been using a file from SMO and it isn't downloading properly. So in the interim, I'm just copying and pasting accented letters. Sometimes I can get ... ctrl + ` ... to work, but it seems to depend on where I am when I try to use it. Copying seems to be the fastest way.
Hey! I'm New here And Have absolutely No Idea How To Begin.. I'm Interested In Learning The LAnguage But AHve NO Background About It At All.. If Someone Could Lend A helping Hand..
