Yesterday I was sitting in Bamboo Corner on Poppies Lane I in Kuta reading my Balinese phrase book. It occured to me that Balinese is a whole different animla than Indonesian. As Steve Martin once said ‘The trouble with learning a new language is they have a different word for everything.’
As the waitress approached I mangled something in Balinese that was sauppoed to be “Nyen adan e?” (What’s your name?) and was majorly surprised when she said “Komang!”. Incidentally my question was in the kasar (rough) form of Balinese. THe same question in alus (high) Balinese would be “Sira wasten jerone?” (In Indonesian it would be “siapa nama?”).
Here are a couple things in Balinese:
Adan tiang madan Nick - inggih. (My name is Nick - indeed).
Tiang Barrie (I (am) Barrie).
Uli dija (Where are you from?)
Tiang uli negara England, inggih. (I am from England, indeed).
Will be great to chat with a grizzled old rice farmer in his own language.
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G’day Nick,
Bought the book last April and its been sitting on my bookshelf since then talking to itself. Had a gecko at it this arvo and hey, all the different levels you got to learn!. Still, I’ll give it a go at learning a few phrases and we can practice when I get back. Try Javanese, its a killer and just as heavy going!!.
http://www.planetmole.org
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