Wewe Unasema Kiswahili? Do You Speak Swahili?

Mimi ninasema Kiswahili... sort of

About a week ago, I received in the mail the book and CD's which are to help me learn Swahili (a major language in East Africa. As a part of my preparations, I will be learning as much Swahili as I can so that I can communicate easier with the Tanzanians I will be working with and for.

Learning a new language is never easy. My experiences with French in middle and high school have given me enough proof of that. Lately, however, I have been trying to not only improve my French, but I have also been trying to learn Korean - a language made more difficult due to a different alphabet.

For the most part, I have had had to rely on books and CD's for my language learning because pretty much everyone at my school here in Seoul speaks English and if they don't a translator is always nearby. Despite this, I have become able to read and write some Korean, as well as speak in small, broken sentences. I can also understand a word every now and then when the other teachers are talking to the students in Korean.

So far - in my one week of concentrated efforts - I have managed to learn a few greetings and I feel c0nfident that I can get to at least a semi-useful level of Swahili by the time September rolls around and I'm off to Tanzania.

So for the above reasons you have read, I will likely be using more than one language in my posts. I'll try to oost in English if I do write in one of the other three languages. It's all part of my efforts to be able to work in different areas of the world.

Mchana mwema! Have a good evening!