cellio | Ivrit

Tonight was the last night of the ulpan (Hebrew class). I have mixed feelings about it, but there was enough that was positive that I let myself get talked into a weekly follow-on class (five sessions), after hearing who would be teaching it. :-)

I'm going to try an experiment. Occasionally I'll post short passages in Hebrew. I'll never include anything important only in Hebrew, so you're not missing anything if you don't read the language, but if you do read, I welcome corrections, replies in Hebrew, comments, etc. If you reply in Hebrew and you don't use vowels, try not to be too subtle -- I'm not too good with unpointed text yet. And my vocabulary isn't very large yet, but I have a dictionary and 501 Hebrew Verbs. Until I find a reasonable way to typeset, I'm going to take advantage of LJ's vast stores of disk space to store scanned handwriting.

Here's the first one:

(The first word on the last line is a little sloppy; it's ha-hi. That mark below it is a smudge on the paper that I couldn't quite crop out.)

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I never really learnt Hebrew. Thus, one of the things I never learnt was nikudot and dagesh, the pointings and similar indicators. Given that most of the text in Israel is unpointed, it was much simpler to get to grips with unpointed text from day one. (The only place where I have seen pointed text in street signs was Jerusalem).

The challenge for me is that sometimes the vowels are the only thing that change to change the meaning of a word (e.g. a verb tense), and I'm still learning those rules. Without the pointing, sometimes I know the broad word ("it's some variant on X"), but I neither know the specific nor know how to pronounce it. With total immersion I imagine you learn pretty quickly; alas, I have only limited exposure.

But hey, I'm doing better with unpointed text than I used to, so that's progress. (I used to just freeze.)

Children's books also sometimes have nikudot. I'm at a child's level, so that works for me. :-)

I think your mems are left-right reflected (ie, s/b more like capital Ns). Personally, I tend to make both pieces of hays curvy, which helps distinguish between them and koofs.

Wow. I never noticed that I had mis-learned that. Thanks for pointing it out.

The way I write them seems more evocative of the letter than the correct way, which is presumably how I made the mistake. I guess I think of a mem as having a vertical-ish stroke on the left (to support the serif-like thing at the top left), so a vertical stroke on the right doesn't seem natural. But I can now see the reasoning the other way, particularly if that diagonal stroke ends up being more curvy. Now, to beat the correct way into my head. :-)

Personally, I tend to make both pieces of hays curvy, which helps distinguish between them and koofs.

Thanks. Good point.

By the way, were you able to understand what I was trying to say? I think I now see one grammar error, but I'm curious about how close I actually got to coherent text. (Second line, third word -- et -- I think should really be l'.)

I remember seeing some Hebrew school kids writing mems as actual Ns, starting from the left, which just felt wrong to me; I'd learned them starting top right. No curviness at all in script, despite how it is in print. (I had to learn how to write in print the year I taught Hebrew school; it felt odd, every time I had to do it.)

I pretty much understood what you were trying to say.

I agree that the et s/b something else; my first thought was el, rather than l', but I can't explain why (too much of my Hebrew grammar is "because it sounds right", not actual rules).
I think I expected hayah twice in the second sentence (rather than the understood 'is'), because you'd already said that this was yesterday.
I haven't seen sherut used that way before; my associations are either a shared cab (for the singular), or bathroom (for the plural). (Which just means I haven't run into that usage before; not meant as something to change.)
I think that your last bit is about going to the restaurant again. If so, it s/b nailech (double dots) for the 1st person plural future tense. And I think od isn't quite right (again with the "I'm not sure why"); I'd tend to say either 'kaasher nashuv' (when we return), or 'pa'am acher' (another time).

I think your first "et" should be "el". Better, drop the word, and change misadah to l'misadah.

"et" is the particle that denotes the indirect object of the sentence. English has no such particle.

I think you mean the direct object of the sentence, specifically a definite direct object (i.e. I read "et" the book but not I read "et" a book).

My Biblical-Hebrew book says "et" is for direct objects and doesn't specify definite/indefinite -- but it does say that the word "can" appear (or maybe "usually appears") but might not. One of the ulpan teachers corrected me when I used it indefinitely, saying (as you do) that it's only for definite objects.

my first thought was el, rather than l', but I can't explain why

Neither can Dani. :-) So far I understand el and l' to be interchangable, but I gather they're not, really, and saying why is hard.

I think I expected hayah twice in the second sentence (rather than the understood 'is'), because you'd already said that this was yesterday.

Thanks. I wasn't sure if the past tense from the previous sentence would logically carry through, or if I had to say it explicitly -- and if the latter, once or twice?

I haven't seen sherut used that way before

While we were waiting, and waiting, and waiting... for the check, I asked Dani what the word for service was, so that's where I got that. (To be clear: Dani hasn't used the language on a regular basis for about 40 years.) I was wondering if it was related to avodah, and he said no, completely different word, and then said sherut. Not saying it's right -- just where I got it.

I think that your last bit is about going to the restaurant again.

Yes. Specifically, my intended meaning was: "I hope that restaurant is faster when we go again". Thanks for the corrections. "Ka-asher nashuv" is much cleaner.

el/l': Thinking about it more, I think it might have to do (in this case, anyway), with actual motion. You're going to the restaurant physically, which is a different use of 'to' than when you're writing a letter to someone. Maybe.

hayah: Just like in English, if you're going to use a verb, it should be in the right tense. As for one or two, I think two, because you've got two clauses joined by and. If it were "the restaurant was green and tiled", only one hayah, just as English.

sherut: Really, I'm not doubting Dani; it was just a reaction to the word in the contexts I've seen it. I obviously didn't go out to enough restaurants in Israel :-).

El/l': thanks; that seems plausible.

Hayah: you're right; as I've structured it I would need both. One question was whether to use a verb at all. Hebrew seems to do a lot with implied "to be" forms, and biblical, at least, doesn't say that an implied verb is always "is" (present tense). Maybe modern does, though. After all, if you've got an implied "to be" in biblical text it's almost certainly past tense anyway, so that might just be expedience that I shouldn't generalize from.

Ivrit

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