The twenty-ninth text, and the second rung on the reading ladder: only the roots the lessons have taught by Lesson 08, and no rule beyond Lesson 07.
Text 28 opened the ladder at Lesson 06 with a day that nobody speaks in. This is the other thing eight lessons buy: a conversation. Lesson 07 gives the question words, and almost every line here is a question or an answer to one.
Eight lessons in there is still no aur, no no before a predicate, no es, no ini or itu, no preposition and no verb chain. A question, a possessor and the two tense markers are the whole apparatus.
Mama mi go market. Mi go market.
— Hi! Yu mau ke?
— Mi mau pan.
— Berapa pan?
— Du pan.
— Des pesa.
— Mi beri des pesa. Mersi!
— Yu mau ca?
— Ya. Ca garam?
— Ya, ca garam.
— Mi mau ca. Mi mau akua barid.
Insan lai. Insan kan foto mi.
— Kim?
— Papa mi.
— Ta lai kab?
— Ta saufa lai aksam.
— Yu go nali?
— Mi go dom. Mama mi go dom.
— Bai!
— Bai!
Mi kula pan. Mi nomu ca.
Mama mi nomu akua.
Din hao.
Line by line
| Amadunia | English |
|---|---|
| Mama mi go market. Mi go market. | My mother goes to the market. I go to the market. |
| — Hi! Yu mau ke? | — Hello! What do you want? |
| — Mi mau pan. | — I want bread. |
| — Berapa pan? | — How many breads? |
| — Du pan. | — Two breads. |
| — Des pesa. | — Ten money. |
| — Mi beri des pesa. Mersi! | — I give ten money. Thank you! |
| — Yu mau ca? | — Do you want tea? |
| — Ya. Ca garam? | — Yes. Is the tea hot? |
| — Ya, ca garam. | — Yes, the tea is hot. |
| — Mi mau ca. Mi mau akua barid. | — I want tea. I want cold water. |
| Insan lai. Insan kan foto mi. | A person comes. The person looks at my photo. |
| — Kim? | — Who? |
| — Papa mi. | — My father. |
| — Ta lai kab? | — When does he come? |
| — Ta saufa lai aksam. | — He will come in the evening. |
| — Yu go nali? | — Where are you going? |
| — Mi go dom. Mama mi go dom. | — I am going home. My mother is going home. |
| — Bai! — Bai! | — Goodbye! — Goodbye! |
| Mi kula pan. Mi nomu ca. | I eat bread. I drink tea. |
| Mama mi nomu akua. | My mother drinks water. |
| Din hao. | The day is good. |
Two kinds of question, and both are here
Ke, berapa, kim, kab and nali stand exactly where the answer will stand — Yu mau ke? is answered Mi mau pan, with the word swapped and nothing else moved. That is the Lesson 07 rule and it is the reason this page can be a conversation at all.
Ca garam? has no question word in it. It is a statement asked on a rising tone, and the lessons have been doing that since Lesson 01 — which is why the reading ladder counts the two separately, and why this text is dated by its words rather than by its questions.
A fragment answers most of them. Du pan, Des pesa, Papa mi, Kim — four turns with no verb in them. Nothing was added to allow that; a phrase may stand alone when the question makes it clear.
Gaps
A price cannot be named, only counted. Des pesa is “ten money”, and the shopkeeper who says it is doing arithmetic out loud. harga, price, arrives in Lesson 21 — thirteen lessons after a learner can walk into a market and ask for bread. Text 16 records the same gap at 300 roots for a different reason: a price cannot be named cheap or dear either.
Nothing can be asked with kaifa. How is in Lesson 07 with the other five question words and there is nothing here to ask it about: it wants a verb of making or doing, and suru, to make, arrives in Lesson 22. The word is taught nine lessons before the first sentence that can use it.
Two turns cannot be joined and none can be denied. aur and predicate no are both Lesson 14, so the shopkeeper cannot say I have bread and tea and cannot say there is no tea. Every answer on this page is yes.
And nobody can be asked who they are. Kim yu? would need es to be answered — Mi es doktor — and the copula is Lesson 11. Kim here can only ask about a person already in the room, which is why it asks about a photograph.
Roots used
37 of 300.