Notes from my sit in Kichwa class

verb conjugation of the word kana- "to be"

yo- Nuka Kani
tu- Kan Kanki
usted- Kikin Kanki
el/ella- Pay Kan
nos.- Nukanchik Kanchik
tu(plur)-Kankuna Kankichik
ustedes- Kikinkuna Kankichik
ellos- Paykuna Kankuna

*add kuna to any word to make it plural

basic greeting: "alli chishi. imanalla kapanki? Nuka shuti Hannah kani. Ima shuti Kanki?"
*if a k follows an n, it makes a "G" sound.

*between 2 sisters, they call each other "nana" meaning sister. but if a boy is talking about his sister, he calls her his"pani" meaning sister also, but spoken from a male. if a girl wants to speak of her brother, she calls him "turi" meaning brother, but if a brother talks about his brother, he calls him "wawki" meaning brother as well. (between 2 boys)

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So we've obviously been doing a lot of thinking about this Kichwa thing. It's a big commitment with a lot of obstacles it seems. The more thinking we do, the more we realize what a challenge it would be. But also, the pay off would probably be great, as it usually is when we extend ourselves for Jehovah. We would have to dedicate hours each day to learning this difficult language from the very beginning. We'd have to eventually leave our spanish congregation just as we are getting comfortable and have reached a productive stage in our ministry here. We've now put in all the work of mastering spanish and are ready to start receiving the rewards of our labor (the reward is that it's finally getting easier) And we're thinking about giving that up and starting all over!! All over, right from the beginning. As for the territory, part of it would be right here in our current territory, but most of it would be further away in rougher areas of the mountains, which many times would require much hiking and long days tracking down the Kichwa speaking people. As for the people themselves that we'd be preaching to, they are the Indigenous population, in which we would stand out even more so than we already do. And the circumstances and education of the people would be a very different situation than we are use to.

Learning the language will have an additional challenge for us, as we will be learning the new language in spanish, our already "foreign language", not learning it from English. And unlike spanish, Kichwa is not a latin based language, so there are absolutely no similarities between Kichwa and English or even Spanish for that matter. Whereas in Spanish, many words are similar to, or even the same as, English words ( predicar = preach) that will never be the case with Kichwa (preach= willana). So basically it would be all memorization. Good thing I loved playing memory as a kid. Maybe that will come in handy.

There is a Kichwa congregation in Quito, and recently they formed a new group, consisting of 10 publishers, that meets at our Kingdom Hall next door. They had their first meeting there last Sunday, and i went to check it out. Very interesting. As the Watchtower is not translated into the language, the paragraphs are read in Spanish, then the conductor translates the questions, and people answer in Kichwa. But you still hear a lot of spanish because some words just dont translate, or because a lot of people are still just learning, when they dont know how to say something, they just say it in spanish. Sometimes you will hear the first part of a comment in Kichwa, but by the end they have switched over completely to Spanish.

They will be having a language course, sponsered by the society, probably starting in March or April. It will last three months, and will be at our Kingdom Hall. Saturday morning from 9-12, then a few hours of service. But even before the course starts, they are going to have some classes at a brothers house to get everyone started.

But the good thing is that since the group meets right next door, we wouldn't have to move or anything, so we could still go to our spanish meetings when we wanted, keep some of our studies maybe. It could be a slow, but exciting, transition. So all in all, we have a lot to consider. But we are praying very hard about it, and are just waiting for our answer. But for now, until we decide if it's for us, I'll try and pick up as much as I can by sitting in on more classes.