Esperanto Viva! Your second lesson - Via dua leciono

Saluton! Yes, this is the 'dua leciono' of 'Esperanto Viva!' [Esperanto Alive!] (The 'c' is pronounced as English 'ts').

I used to spend my dinner hours at school learning German. And then, after taking the exam (GCE - as it was then), I looked around at other languages to dabble in. Among them was Esperanto. After two months of learning Esperanto - spending about the same time each week as I did in German for two years, I found my Esperanto overtaking my German.

I was introduced to Esperanto by the headmaster of a nearby secondary school, in Denton, near Manchester in England, who gave a talk to the whole of my school when I was 13. He had introduced Esperanto to improve his pupils' learning of French. The A stream (the top stream) learned French for four years, but the B stream learned Esperanto for one year, then French for three years. He found that the B stream caught up with the A stream in French by the end of the four years - and they had the advantage of two foreign languages rather than one.

The picture shows a well-known Russian actor, Nikolaj Rytjkov, talking to children at the school in Denton. Nikolaj had spent 16 years in Siberia, exiled by Stalin for his Esperanto activities. He later fled to the West, and frequently gave recitals in Esperanto throughout the world.

Let's continue with our conversation. You can now introduce other people:

Li estas mia edzo / amiko / patro / filo. [He is my husband / friend / father / son] S^i estas mia edzino / amikino / patrino / filino. [She is my wife / girl friend / mother / daughter]

The ending in turns a word into the feminine, like ess in English, except that you can use it quite generally in Esperanto. So you have learned 8 words for the price of 4. Note that s^ is pronounced as English sh, so s^i sounds the same as she. Also, the r (as in patro) is ideally lightly trilled.

Now you can tell me what lia and s^ia mean. Let's play about with some sentences:

Mia filo estas _______; lia patr(in)o estas mi. [Insert a name] Mia filino estas ________; s^ia patr(in)o estas mi. C^u vi estas s^ia amiko? - Jes, saluton! - Saluton! Ankau^ mi estas s^ia amiko.

Get the idea? Li gives lia, meaning his, and s^i gives s^ia, meaning her or hers.

Now:

C^u vi konas min? [Do you know me?]

Konas means know in the sense of know a person , be acquainted with (Scottish ken - C^u vi konas John Peel?). Note that min means me - we just add the n to mi.

So we have: mi - min (I - me); li - lin (he - him); s^i - s^in (she - her). We also have: vi - vin (you - you). You doesn't change in English, but the old thou - thee did. Esperanto is regular.

You may be wondering why we bother with I and me. The Chinese just have one word. But the Chinese have a very rigid word order, and Esperanto has a very flexible word order. Look at the following:

C^u vi konas min? - Ne, vin mi ne konas.

The answer could have been any of:

Ne, mi vin ne konas. Ne, ne vin mi konas. Ne, mi ne konas vin. etc.

This is a useful device for changing emphasis!

We add the n on to the end of nouns (words with the -o ending), too. Practise these dialogues between G^onk-ok and Jas^o and Ahmad. G^onk-ok asks:

Jas^o s^atas vinon.

Jas^o, c^u vi s^atas vinon? [Do you like wine?] Jes, vinon mi s^atas! C^u Esperanto-vinon? [Esperanto wine?] Jes, Esperanto-vinon mi tre s^atas. [Yes, I like Esperanto wine very much.]

Ahmad is a senalkoholulo [abstainer]:

Ahmad ne trinkas alkoholon.

Ahmad, c^u vi s^atas vinon? Ne, dankon, mi ne trinkas vinon. [trinkas = drink] Mi ne trinkas alkoholon. C^u vi s^atas kafon? [kafo = coffee] Jes, mi s^atas kafon kun lakto, kun sukero. [... with milk, with sugar.]

You can think of the n ending as showing direction of the action. So we could say 'Mi -> trinkas -> vinon', where the action goes from the doer (Mi) to the thing done to (vino). We could change the words round giving 'Vinon <- trinkas <- mi'. The n is put on the end of the word representing the thing done to. Note, though that estas doesn't have any direction; it just shows an equivalence, so no n ending is used in a phrase with estas. So it's 'G^i estas kafo', but 'Mi trinkas kafon'.

If in doubt about the n, you can substitute the word I or me (i.e. mi or min). If it's me (min), then add the n on. Thus, if it's 'C^u vi s^atas min?' then it must be 'C^u vi s^atas kafon'. Practise a bit, till you get the hang of it. Notice, though, that after words like with and without (i.e. prepositions) you don't need the n. You say 'kun mi' ['with I' rather than 'with me'].

The word senalkoholulo tells you a lot about word-building in Esperanto. Sen means without. Alkoholo is alcohol, and ulo is a person. So senalkoholulo is a person without alcohol. Practise saying it!

So you come to the service hatch [servejo] in the kongresejo (ejo means place) and say:

Unu [One] vinon kaj unu kafon, mi petas [please]. - C^u Esperanto-vinon? - Jes, mi petas. - Kaj c^u kafon kun au^ [or] sen lakto? - Kun lakto, mi petas. - Ho, kaj unu vinon por mi! - Unu vinon por vi... Ses [six] markojn, mi petas. - Jen [Here you are], ses markoj. - Dankon. - Ne dankinde. [Not at all]

Alessandro servas kafon al G^onk-ok.

Mi petas literally means I request. Note the n in Kaj c^u kafon ...?. It's short for Kaj c^u vi deziras kafon kun au^ sen lakto - And do you want coffee ...? Jen literally means here is, or behold (if you happen to speak Old English). It's a useful little word. Ne dankinde is the usual answer to dankon. Literally it means not worthy of thanks.

Marko is the mark, the currency in Germany, where this dialogue was taken. There used to be a universal currency in use at Esperanto meetings, called the stelo. Stelo means star. The green star is traditionally the emblem of Esperanto. (There's a pub in Stoke-on-Trent, England, called La Verda Stelo - The Green Star). More than one stelo is steloj. (Remember the j is pronounced like a y) This is the same for all plurals. Nowadays many people prefer the more modern Esperanto Centenary Symbol (on the right).

So now you can introduce yourself, and other people, and you can buy coffee and wine at the service hatch, and you can start to make conversation with the people around you. Congratulations!

Here are a few additional expressions which you might find useful.

Bonan tagon. [Good day - in English we would be more likely to say Good afternoon] Bonan matenon. [Good morning] Bonan vesperon. [Good evening] Bonan nokton. [Good night] Bonan apetiton. [Good appetite] Sanon! [Cheers - lit. health] Gratulon. [Congratulations] Sukceson. [Success]

These are all short for 'Mi deziras al vi ...' [I wish you a ...], so they all have an n at the end - just as saluton and dankon do. You will notice that the adjective - the word with the -a ending - has an -n added as well. This helps to make the language clearer when half heard through the hubub of general conversation. Practise saying these phrases, then you'll get the pattern.

Incidentally, there's no word for a or an in Esperanto, so I wish you a good day is simply Mi deziras al vi bonan tagon.

Now for some exercises.

Translate into English:

Bonan tagon! - Bonan tagon! - C^u vi s^atas vinon? - Ne, dankon, sed mi s^atas kafon! Do [Right, OK], mi ac^etos [will buy] por vi kafon. C^u kun lakto kaj sukero, au^ sen? - Sen lakto, kun sukero, mi petas. Dankon.

C^e [at] la servejo: Du [two] kafojn: unu kun lakto kaj unu sen, mi petas. - Unu kun ... kaj unu sen. Kvar [four] markojn, mi petas. - Jen. Kaj kie estas la sukero? - La sukero estas sur [on] la tablo [table]. - Dankon.

Your work will be marked and returned to you as soon as possible.

Two lists of words used in this course are available: Esperanto-English and English-Esperanto.

In the meantime, practise gaining fluency in everything you have just learned.

A list of the contents of the 'Esperanto Viva!' course is available. Next lesson / Previous lesson.