You Can Tigrigna!

If our neighbors say it in English, that’s how they say it. When we’re overheard buying vegetables from market, or having a conversation with a shopowner, bystanders will say in disbelief, “You can Tigrigna?” This is how I always respond:

Daniel’s response is a little less feminine.

After being nine months in Tigray with us, it’s time we give you a crash course in Tigrigna. (Since we’ve lost much of our English, if you want to communicate with us when we come home in 18 days, you’ll need to learn this s’ibuk k’wank’wa [beautiful language].) View the videos to hear our own botched pronunciations.

Lesson one: the Tigrigna h is really more of an hkhkhk hacking sound. According to our own Tigrigna instructor Gebre, “To speak Tigrigna, you must strangle Amharic.” If you’re not choking/growling, it’s not Tigrigna.

The Basics: Greetings and Leave-takings

How are you? (to a male) ------ Kamay leha?

Are you fine? (to a male) ------ Dahan deeha?

Are you fine? (to a female) ----- Dahan deehee?

Are you fine? (when you can’t tell the gender) ----- Dahan doe?

Are you all fine? (to many) ----- Dahan deehoom?

Are you fine this morning? (to a male) ----- Dahan doe hadirka?

Are you fine this afternoon? (to a female) ----- Dahan doe wa-illkee?

Have a nice afternoon/evening ----- Selam (peaceful) mishet, or S’ibuk (beautiful) mishet.

Have a nice day. ----- S’ibuk ma-alti.

Goodnight (to many) ----- Dahan hidaru.

Peace (for hello or goodbye) ----- Selam.

(If you haven’t noticed, when speaking to a male, end in the ah sound. When speaking to a female, end in the eee sound. When speaking to many, end in the ooom sound. When in doubt, use doe.)

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Pronouns

Lesson two: In the present and future tenses, each pronoun has its own tag word that comes after every verb, to identify who’s doing the action. It’s a be-verb/pronoun hybrid: something English does not have. But this is dropped in past tense.

Pronoun (English)	Pronoun (Tigrigna)	Be-Verb/Pronoun Hybrid Thingy
I	ana	eeyay
you (male)	nisiha	eeha
you (female)	nisihee	eehee
you all	nisihatkoom	eehoom
you (respect, male)	nisihoom	eehoom
you (respect, female)	nisihin	eehin
you all (female)	nisihatkin	eehin
he	nissu	eeyu
he (respect)	nissom	eeyom
she	nissa	eeya
she (respect)	nissan	eeyan
they	nissatom	eeyom
they (female)	nissatan	eeyan
we	nihna	eena

For example:

Yes, I know. ----- Iwa, ana ifalit eeyay. (verb and be-verb)

I like Ethiopian food very much. ----- Nay itopiya migbi bet’ami ifatu eeyay.

He is a very rude man (Memorize this one). ----- Nissu bet’ami baalagay sab eeyu. (Here you only need one verb, the be-verb.)

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Lesson three: While English is subject + verb + object, Tigrigna is subject + object + verb. This structure does not change when asking questions—only the inflection does. But when it is a yes or no question, you must add a d to the beginning of the verb.

For example:

You are tall. (to a female) ----- Nisihee nawhah eehee.

Are you tall? (yes/no question) ----- Nisihee nawhah deehee?

Where are you? (open-ended question) ----- Nisihee abay eehee?

Sidenote: Because of the handy be-verb/pronoun hybrid thingy, you can and often do drop the pronoun (nisihee), and are understood—similar to dropping the “yo” in “yo estudio” in Spanish because the conjugation in estudio tells you the pronoun is “yo.”

Some verbs do not take the d prefix; instead, as a separate word after the verb, you add “doe.” Allo (there is) is one of these verbs.

For example:

If you’re at a restaurant and can’t read the 231-character Tigrigna alphabet, you’ll need to ask the waiter what your food options are.

What all is there? (open-ended question) ----- Intay intay allo?

Are there tibs? (yes/no question) ----- Tibs allo doe?

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Lesson four: The word for “no” in Tigrigna is “ay” (“yes” is “iwa”). To make something negative in Tigrigna (in English “no” becomes “not”), you add ay- to the front of the verb, and   –in to the end of the verb, dropping the “be” verb.

For example:

I want mango juice. ----- Mango jus idalee eeyay.

I don’t want mango juice. ----- Mango jus aydalin.

He wants banana juice. ----- Nissu muz jus yidalee eeyu.

He doesn’t want banana juice (because he’s an idiot). ----- Mikniatum fara eeyu, nissu muz jus ayidalin.

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Fun Bonus Information

Thank you ----- yak’anyaylay or yahanyaylay (We’ve heard both, and even a mixture of the two)

You’re welcome ----- ginzabki, or ginzabka, etc., depending on gender and number. (Directly translated, this means “it is your money.” Many foreign languages—including Amharic—do not have an equivalent of “you are welcome,” the sentiment in English being that it is yours anyway, so you are welcome to it. Rather, Amharic and Spanish, for example, use a form of “it’s nothing, don’t mention it.” But Tigrigna does have the what’s-mine-is-yours language gem with its ginzabki, and we like it.)

* The “apostrophe s” of English that shows possession (i.e. Danayit’s avocado) is conveyed by a word in Tigrigna. Put the word “nay” (pronounced “nigh”) before the possessor: Nay Danayit abocado (the v sound is not in Tigrigna and is substituted with b when they borrow words from other languages).

*Where in Tigrigna is abay. You use this for saying where something currently is. But if you ask someone where they are going—essentially, to where?—you add an n. Nabay.

*Our favorite words that have infiltrated our English and I vow to say forever are ishy and gobez. Isn’t ishy just a far-more-natural and smooth way to say okay? It just flows over your front bottom teeth in agreement, and feels so right. Gobez means extremely clever. If our students answer us correctly and unexpectedly, our usual response would be Gobez! The first time I heard the word, it was day 3 or 4 in country (it is an Amharic word borrowed by Tigrigna, Tigrigna’s equivalent not being as cool; same with ishy), and a Mexican-American volunteer addressed our group of 70, saying, “Ya’ll are gobez,” and I just assumed it was really hipster Spanish. Hipster Spanish that I wanted to use forever.

Unfortunately, these cool-sounding words are as follows in Tigrigna: ishy = hiray; gobez = nifu.

(Speaking of day 3 and 4 in country, June 6^th marks our one-year anniversary in Ethiopia. Celebrate!)

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Baka? Wadihoom? Enough? Are you finished? Maybe you’ve already judged from the enormity of pronouns (fourteen), but you probably don’t want to get into verb conjugation. Abiyi churrak eeyu. It’s a big monster. But maybe you also noticed from the be-verb/pronoun hybrid thingies, that some pronouns share a conjugation—like they and he (respect); but this doesn’t make it any easier, does it?

Gina minalbash bizuh tidaleeoo eehoom—selazi, negarihna. (But let us know if you want more.)