Mandinka- my fourth language ;-)

After less than a month of learning Mandinka I have already learned to love it and have a special soft spot for the language. For starters, 'yo' means good in Mandinka. Any language where I get to constantly say 'yo!!' is awesome in my book.

Everyday here is a language challenge but for how far I have come in less than a month I feel damn good and it is all because:

a) learning a language when you are constantly surrounded by it and have small children quizzing you 24/7 is much easier than when you only work for 5 hours per week with a bunch of other people who are just as lost as you are.

b) it is such a funny, literal and backwards language that is just fascinating to learn! By backwards it is just that all of the sentence structure is backwards from English so instead of saying 'I have a garden' one says 'Naako be mbulu', or 'garden I have'. Keeps you on your toes.

c) You do not conjugate verbs. Yes that is right, for past tense you just add a little 'ta' to the end of the infinite version of the word. Soooo much easier than that etais, etais, etait, etions... or whatever that all is in Spanish.

d) There are not irregular verbs. Ok not totally true but there is like one. The verb 'to say' or 'ko' is sometimes 'fo'. I can live with that.

e) Mandinka is just awesome.

Something that I have found most fascinating about Mandinka is the literal definition of words. They are extremely unique and just bizarre to the Western ear but when you think about it, it is downright clever! One of my current favs is the word for airplane, 'Kuluntiila'. 'Kulungo' means boat and 'tiila' means to fly so it is a flying boat. Not our first instinct when describing an airplane but ya, that is basically an airplane. Also bike, 'foolee suwoo'. 'Foolee' being plastic and 'suwoo' meaning horse. To Mandinka's a bike is a plastic horse but to Malinke speakers or Jaxinke, they prefer to describe bikes as 'metal horses'.

Having a French background (even if it is super rusty) is also extremely helpful because more recent words are the same as the French just with an 'oo' added onto the end. Like 'bowloo' or 'livroo' or 'cahieroo'.

Some phrases that I mastered early on (mainly because they have to do with food, shocker right?) is things such as 'konkoo be naa' meaning 'hunger is upon me'. Or 'nsiita le!' which means it sat with me, as in, I am full. Definitely come in handy as everyone is constantly shoving more rice down my throat.

A common statement that has been made throughout training is that Senegalese people are not analytical. This may seem like a harsh or judgmental comment but just from observing the variety of words and phrases that are available in Mandinka, it is clear that this is not only true, but is hard to even find the means to express oneself in a more analytical manner due to the limitation that language imposes. For instance, I wanted to know how to say 'it is interesting' in Mandinka. I started with asking my teacher who was puzzled and then said, that embarrassingly enough, he did not have a clue. From there I repeated the same conversation with 8 family members, all of whom did not know how to say 'it is interesting' something that I ironically found to be very interesting.

Another action that is clearly restricted by the language is reading and studying. I have yet to see a Senegalese person in my neighborhood reading or studying. Every spare minute is filled with watching horrible Spanish, Indian or Senegalese soap operas that are semi-entertaining in its obscurity to me, but are Oscar winning performances to my family. I will sit there and study or read while they are glued to the TV. Every time I do this I am approached by my family with the shocking question of, 'I be karango la?'. In which I respond, yes I am studying. The word for studying and reading is the same. I always feel the need to elaborate and explain whether or not I am studying Mandinka or reading a trashy novel but they could care less. To them, I am always 'karango'.

With all of this I find extremely important to point out that this does NOT mean that people here are not extremely intelligent, hardworking, productive individuals. The women in my compound impress me every day with their constant labor and their in-depth knowledge on anything even slightly related to housework, children and the 5 plus languages that they speak. While it is partially true the fact that I am the spectacle living with them so they constantly observe me, I remain constantly impressed by how quick they are to know my habits. Every time a new quirk of mine comes up they make humorous, judging but helpful comments on how I do this wrong or am just always dirty. Once again I am just constantly reminded of how my 'Western' idea of intelligence is just as limiting as my understanding of the limitations of the Mandinka language. The Mandinka language may restrain me from expressing my opinions in the way that I have been taught. But in conjunction, my language and habits are just as foreign and restricting to them