K'nyom mok bpi srok Amerik.

Before I came to Cambodia, I was told that the Khmer language, not being tonal like the other SE Asian languages, was fairly easy to pronounce. That's a big, fat lie. Its easy to pronounce the same way its easy to understand Superstring theory. In place of tones, there are umpteen vowels (more than 30 I am told), which my dictionary correctly states are "notoriously difficult to romanize", along with consonants that are aspirated and non-aspirated (whatever that may mean) or even swallowed, and a host of words with impossible 1- syllable sounds like "ngup" "bpram" "dtou" "ch'ngañ" and "tlay". Go ahead, give em a try, especially "ngup".

Despite the sound barriers, I have jumped right into Khmer lessons and am busy chopping the language to bits. Once a week I have a lesson with a couple other PEPY interns. Our teacher Rany, a young woman of about 25, is very kind, but proceeds at a furious pace. The method goes something like this: Rany introduces a new phrase, I try in vain to reproduce the sound, so she says it 3 more times, I write some letters that might or might not come close to representing the words, then say it again, she compliments my pronunciation though obviously wrong, and finally she says it the correct way again. Proceed to next phrase.

I also found another tutor, Sokkhy, who has agreed to give me an additional 2 lessons per week. I've made a bit more progress with her because the lessons are one-on-one. Also, she is a bit more honest about my horrendous pronunciation, and doesn't let me move on until I've come reasonably close. The content of our lessons has been quite varied so far. I've learned some basics like my name, age, and marital status of course, but also some rather useless things like "One kilo of rambutans costs 2000 riels." and "I would like to buy a man sarong for wearing." However, Sokkhy is incredibly patient and today I learned some more helpful phrases such as "I'm sorry", "I like banana", and "I want to eat amok." (In this case, amok being a traditional Khmer food rather than a mad murderous frenzy).

On the flip, the grammar and structure of the language is straightforward and not so different from English. Perhaps the most brilliant feature is that the verbs have no tense whatsoever. I ate, I eat, and I will eat are all the same: K'nyom nyam. I am fairly sure there is no conjugation either, though the verbs may change with respect to whom you are talking. For example, there are completely different verbs for "to eat", depending on if you are talking to a child, someone of the same social status, an elder, or the king. In fact, yesterday I was told there are no less than 8 words for "to eat".

Seriously though, even as I struggle with the pronunciation, I am enjoying learning a completely new tongue. We have a couple Cambodia staff who are encouraging my efforts--always asking what I learned in the most recent lesson. They got a huge kick out of my "I would like to buy a man sarong" expression and offered to take me to the market. So, I have no idea how far I will get with the language, but it will most certainly be a fun and humorous process.