The Young Man and the Tiger

On By Schyuler LujanIn Chamorro StoriesLeave a comment

Håfa adai! It has been a quieter than usual on the blog these past few weeks, mostly due to me being frequently unwell. I’ve been trying to rest more, but I’ve missed posting on the blog. Jay and I are also on vacation for most of June, so it may be continue to be quieter than usual until July. But I will try to post when I can. Enjoy summer and take care of yourselves 🙂

In this post is a Chamorro story that our Saturday morning practice group read and translated a few Saturdays ago. Jay had an unexpected business trip that week and was unable to record the narration ahead of time. So he ended up reading the story live to the group. This is a fun (and long) story that is a Chamorro retelling, by Dolores Marciano, of a folktale from Thailand. And it’s another great find from the KPV Collection 🙂 This post includes a Chamorro narration by Jay Che’le, the Chamorro text, and an English translation. Happy reading!

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Kottura: I Taotaomo’na

On By Schyuler LujanIn Chamorro StoriesLeave a comment

Our Saturday morning practice group will finish reading and translating The Dolphin and the Two Children this week, so the new story for this week is a bit shorter. It’s from a book written by Carmen C. Blas about different Chamorro cultural beliefs and practices, which I found in the KPV Collection. This short piece discusses beliefs about the taotaomo’na, or ancestral spirits. The Chamorro text, an English translation, and a Chamorro audio narration by Jay Che’le is included in this post. Happy reading!

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How to Say “The Woman Danced” in Chamorro – Using Nouns as the Subject with Intransitive Verbs

On By Schyuler LujanIn Chamorro Lessons: Beginner3 Comments

In this lesson, we’ll learn how to make simple action sentences where a person is the one doing the action — sentences like “The woman ate” or “The child will run.” Up to now, we’ve only used pronouns as our subjects so you could focus on word order and how the verbs change. Now we’ll add real people into our sentences to make them feel more natural and varied. You’ll practice building past, present, and future sentences, and every Chamorro example comes with audio so you can hear how it all sounds. Happy studying!

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How to Say “The Woman Drank the Coffee” in Chamorro – Using Nouns as the Subject With Transitive Verbs

On By Schyuler LujanIn Chamorro Lessons: Beginner3 Comments

In this lesson, we’ll look at how to show who is doing an action in a sentence. Up to now, we’ve mostly used pronouns like he, she, and it so you could focus on learning verbs and word order. Now we’ll put that knowledge to use with sentences like “The woman drank the coffee,” where the subject—the one doing the action—is a noun. We’ll build sentences in the past, present, and future so you can practice the patterns for including a person as the doer of the action. Every Chamorro example comes with audio so you can hear how it all sounds. Happy studying!

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