I’ve spent so much time in Kyrgyz language class in the past two weeks that I figured that it was about time for me to write a little bit of a lesson for everyone back home!
Greetings in Kyrgyz are a major part of the culture. It is polite and appropriate to greet people you see as you go about the village, in ways particular to the age and gender of the person to whom you are speaking. The most common form that I use is салом алеикум (salom aleikum), which you may recognize from other countries that have large Muslim populations. This greeting is used between men only.
Another greeting we use frequently is саламатсызбы (salamatsyzby, where the y makes a sort of “uh sound between an i and a u), which literally means “are you healthy.” The proper response to that is саламатчылык (salamatchylyk). I use this to greet women around age and older, and women use this to greet anyone around their age or older.
The third frequent greeting is easier, салам (salam), which means “peace,” and is an informal greeting that I use with people younger than me, mostly kids, and with friends. The rule of thumb we use is that if someone is more than two years older than you, that you must use the formal greeting.
We then ask, “how are you,” which is кандайсыз (kandaisyz). The proper response is жакшы, рахмат (jakshy, rakhmat), which means “I am well, thank you.” Often we ask the same question, or а сизчи? (a sizchi?), meaning “and you?”
It’s a quick and easy exchange, and goes somewhat like this:
Me: саламатсызбы!
Villager: саламатчылык!
Me: кандайсыз?
Villager: жакшы, рахмат, кандайсыз?
Me: мен жакшы, рахмат.
As you probably noticed, cyrillic is the alphabet used here, but it’s not too different when you use it regularly. The pronunciation isn’t too bad – the challenge is that there are nine vowel letters in Kyrgyz, а, ы, о, у, э, е, и, ө, and ү, not counting the dipthong vowels used in many Russian words (ё, ю, and я), and as you might imagine, several of those sounds aren’t used in English.
Oh, and there’s vowel harmony. Next week. On Monday Bazaar.