A Flair for Khmer

Yesterday morning, I had my first Khmer lesson. After living in Montreal for 5 years and never learning French until 8 months ago in NYC, and then living in India for 1.5 years and only picking up enough Hindi to get around in an autorickshaw and bargain hard at the markets, I have resolved to make my way to at least conversational Khmer while in Cambodia. Khmer is the official language here, and a quick Wikipedia search revealed the following fun facts:

- It is the second most widely spoken Austroasiatic language, after Vietnamese, with over 10 million speakers

- It is heavily influenced by Sanskrit and Pali

- Unlike other languages in this part of the world, Khmer is not tonal, meaning that pitch does not change the meaning of words (thank god for me!)

Granted I've only had one lesson, but I love this language. For one, it's so much fun to speak. The intonations and speech patterns are so dissimilar to any language I've ever spoken before, so I feel like my voice is breaking out of a realm I never new I was in. The pace is sort of a rush of the first few words and then a drawing out of the last... and there are a lot of nasal tones (which makes this Minnesotan feel right at home). It almost reminds me of learning tennis as a kid; I would keep swinging my arms and placing my feet in the hopes that eventually these awkward motions would produce the desired stroke, and eventually my body's phyiscal memory kicked in and it just became automatic. As I learn Khmer, my lips, tongue and mouth all keep working awkwardly and, hopefully, soon the words will flow effortlessly.

And then there are the actual words. My teacher taught us some basic nouns this week, and when she directly translated them I knew I was hooked on Khmer. Here are two of my favorites from this lesson:

- puah wian kang = intestine of a bicycle (bike tube)

- teuk dah keo = liquid from the breast of a cow (milk)

Finally, here's a little video so you too can hear and enjoy Khmer: