Learn how to talk about actions
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Louise: Hi everyone, and welcome back to SwahiliPod101.com This is Absolute Beginner Season 1 Lesson 21 - What’s Your Favorite Kenyan Food? I’m Louise. |
| Medina: Hello, and I'm Medina. |
| Louise: In this lesson, you’ll learn words and phrases about foods, and how to talk about actions in Swahili. The conversation takes place at a restaurant. |
| Medina: It's between Amina and Juma. |
| Louise: The speakers are close friends, so they’ll be using informal Swahili. Okay, let's listen to the conversation. |
Lesson conversation |
|---|
| Amina: Juma, ungependa kukula nini? Je, utakula wali? |
| Juma: Bila shaka. Nitakula wali, ni chakula nikipendacho zaidi. |
| Amina: Ukweli? Nami pia! |
| Louise: Listen to the conversation one time slowly. |
| Amina: Juma, ungependa kukula nini? Je, utakula wali? |
| Juma: Bila shaka. Nitakula wali, ni chakula nikipendacho zaidi. |
| Amina: Ukweli? Nami pia! |
| Louise: Listen to the conversation with the English translation |
| Amina: Juma, what would you like to eat? Will you eat rice? |
| Juma: Yes, of course. I will eat rice. It's my favorite food. |
| Amina: Really? Me too! |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Louise: Medina, it seems that Kenyans really like to cook rice, especially those who live in coastal areas. |
| Medina: That’s right. It’s easier to grow rice around there because there are more rivers. The method of cooking rice also varies depending on the region. |
| Louise: What’s your favorite rice dish, Medina? |
| Medina: Well. My favorite is coconut rice, vegetable rice and pilau. |
| Louise: Pilau is the most common way to make rice, right? |
| Medina: That’s right. Pilau is rice cooked in a seasoned broth. It’s very spicy and delicious, so Kenyan people love it. |
| Louise: And pilau with chicken is popular too. |
| Medina: Definitely. If you ever go to a party hosted by someone from Kenya, you’ll almost certainly get a chance to taste Pilau. It’s just not a party without Pilau in Kenya! |
| Louise: (laughs) Sounds delicious! Okay, now onto the vocab. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Louise: Let’s take a look at the vocabulary from this lesson. The first word is.. |
| Medina: Ungependa [natural native speed] |
| Louise: would you like |
| Medina: Ungependa[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Medina: Ungependa [natural native speed] |
| Louise: Next we have.. |
| Medina: kukula [natural native speed] |
| Louise: to eat |
| Medina: kukula [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Medina: kukula [natural native speed] |
| Louise: Next we have.. |
| Medina: chakula [natural native speed] |
| Louise: food |
| Medina: chakula[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Medina: chakula [natural native speed] |
| Louise: Next we have.. |
| Medina: wali [natural native speed] |
| Louise: rice |
| Medina: wali[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Medina: wali [natural native speed] |
| Louise: Next we have.. |
| Medina: ukweli [natural native speed] |
| Louise: really |
| Medina: ukweli [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Medina: ukweli [natural native speed] |
| Louise: Next we have.. |
| Medina: bila shaka [natural native speed] |
| Louise: of course |
| Medina: bila shaka [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Medina: bila shaka [natural native speed] |
| Louise: Next we have.. |
| Medina: nikipendacho [natural native speed] |
| Louise: my favorite |
| Medina: nikipendacho [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Medina: nikipendacho [natural native speed] |
| Louise: Next we have.. |
| Medina: nami [natural native speed] |
| Louise: me |
| Medina: nami [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Medina: nami [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Louise: Let's have a closer look at the usage of some of the words and phrases from this lesson. The first word is... |
| Medina: Ungependa |
| Louise: And it means “would you like” as a question. You can use this phrase when you’re offering someone something. It’s a question you can use in order to ask someone if they like to do something or not. |
| Medina: The word unge is rooted in the Swahili word penda which means “like”. |
| Louise: Okay, what’s the next word? |
| Medina: Kukula |
| Louise: And it means “to eat” What’s the Swahili word for “food”? |
| Medina: That would be chakula. All together, you can say kukula chakula to mean “to eat food.” |
| Louise: Of course, you can also substitute the name of any food here too. |
| Medina: For example, for “to eat pilau”, you can say kukula pilau. |
| Louise: Can you give us a sentence using the phrase? |
| Medina: Sure. For example, Watu wale wanataka kukula pilau. |
| Louise: This means...“Those people want to eat pilau.” Okay, now onto the grammar. |
Lesson focus |
| Louise: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to describe actions in Swahili. Verbs in Swahili are actually very similar to English. You just use the verb first, followed by the object. |
| Medina: For example, when you describe the action of eating, you can use the verb kukula meaning “to eat”, then the object name, such as pilau. |
| Louise: And this verb can be used for both first and second person singular. |
| Medina: Right. kukula means “to eat”. |
| Louise: Let’s say you want to ask if someone wants to do an action - how can you ask the question? |
| Medina: For example, if you want to ask “What would you like to eat?” you can use the word Ungependa, which we learned in the previous section. |
| Louise: In English that means “Would you like to..” |
| Medina: That’s right. Since it can only be used as a question tag, you can put it at the beginning of the sentence, followed by the verb. For example, Ungependa kukula. |
| Louise: Which means “Would you like to eat?” |
| Medina: At the end you can add nini, which means “what.” Altogether it would be Ungependa kukula nini? |
| Louise: Meaning “What would you like to eat?” |
| Medina: You can put any verb into this form, to ask if someone would like to do something. |
| Louise: Can you use the same question word for the plural too? |
| Medina: No. For the plural form, you need to use the word mngependa instead of ungependa. Unge is for the singular, and mnge is for the plural. |
| Louise: So how do you ask, “What would you guys like to eat?” |
| Medina: That would be Mngependa kukula chakula gani? Note that kukula and chakula stay the same, although the subject becomes plural. |
| Louise: In this lesson, we only presented the verb “to eat”, but you could also use the same structure with other verbs, so keep practicing. |
| Medina: For example, if you want to say “What would you like to read?” you can use the verb kusoma meaning “to read,” as in Ungependa kusoma nini? |
| Louise: Or in English, “What would you like to read?” |
Outro |
| Louise: Okay, that’s all for this lesson. Thanks for listening, everyone, and we’ll see you next time! Bye! |
| Medina: Bye. |
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