Frankly, I'm not even sure if that's all correct...Here's the translation:
Hi, all! How's it going? Everything's cool here; we are still studying the Latvian language in our classes at the university, and we also have a new friend Laima who helps us study Latvian.
It's been a little while since we've rapped at y'all; sorry about that. Life has been scooting right along here in Rīga. We are both taking Latvian lessons at Latvijas Universitāte (UL), which has been an interesting experience. We have the same teacher, Inta, but we are in different classes. Sarah's class is a beginning one; she has classmates from Denmark, Sri Lanka, Sweden, America and India, none of whom have much experience with Latvian. They've been studying how to tell time, basic pronouns, things in the classroom, where you're from, etc. My (Galen's) class, on the other hand, is MURDER! They stuck me in the highest level even though I requested an intermediate one, and I may have to bump down. Knife to the ego! All the students in my class speak fluently and are basically there to work on augmenting that fluency. There's an architect from Los Angeles who's married to Latvian woman and who is living here indefinitely; a woman from Spain (here with Opus Dei) who's been living in Latvia for 2 years; and a psychologist from Switzerland and doctor from Sri Lanka, both of whom have lived in Latvia for 6 years. So I'm in way over my head! We do a lot of reading and working on complicated verb forms. Let me tell you about Latvian verbs...
There are three types of verbs, called Conjugations I, II and III. Each conjugation is divided into reflexive and non-reflexive forms. Except Conjugation I, which has several (five, I think) sub-classes, each divided into reflexive and non-reflexive forms, with massive irregularities. Each of these has a past, present and future tense, then you've got participles and alternate forms which I don't even have a word for in English, then there are huge amounts of prefixes which change the meaning of the verb. For example, "lasīt" means "to read" and "izlasīt" means "to read in its entirety." So in the past tense "Es lasīju grāmatu" means "I was reading the book" or "I read the book but didn't finish it" but "Es izlasīju grāmatu" means "I read the book and finished it." Then you've got "slēgt" which means "to close." Compare that with "aizslēgt" which means "to lock" and "atslēgt" which means "to unlock." The verbs are even worse than the nouns! Nouns are divided into six declensions (three masculine, two feminine, one weird feminine), with each declension having a singular and plural form, and each form having five case alternations (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative and locative). Needless to say, we feel like we totally suck.
I've also been teaching Spanish at UL, which has been a really rewarding experience. I have 6 students in my class, all of whom are reasonably proficient. I have dedicated most of the class so far to working on verb forms; there are several they hadn't learned and several more to go. We do a lot of conversing, and Sarah comes to almost all the classes to talk with the students or partner up with someone for an activity if there's an odd number of people on a particular day. I've really been enjoying it; we talk mostly about our daily lives and the differences between Latin American language and culture vs. that of Spain. Most of the Spanish speakers here are Iberian (obviously), so some of the vocabulary is foreign to them. I think it's good for them to get a feel for the different varieties. It's somewhat strange to teach Spanish to Latvian speakers; I can't always translate a word that they don't understand, so I have to explain it completely in Spanish, give an English word which they may or may not know, or look up the word in English and give them the Latvian translation. However, the Spanish -> English -> Latvian translation eats up a little too much time, so I usually just explain it in Spanish or charades until they get it. They're great students; we sing a lot!
Cell phone etiquette during class is a little different here...just go ahead an answer it...in class. Just leave to have your conversation...or don't. In fact, the teacher's phone once rang in Sarah's class, and the teacher answered it and walked out into the hall.
We also have a friend! Finally! I feel like the new kid that finally hung out with someone from class on the playground. This girl's name is Laima; she's the daughter of a professor at UL. She is interested in learning Spanish (even though she already speaks Latvian, Russian, English and German), so she and Sarah and I meet several times a week and practice speaking Latvian and Spanish. It's a lot of fun to have pizza or coffee and chat as best we can in Latvian.
Other than that, we have been glued to CNN/the internet watching the election. We are so excited for Obama, and the few Latvians we've asked feel the same. It's strange; they know who our candidates are and what day the US election is. Do you know the president of Latvia's name? It's Valdis Zatlers - he's a doctor. We actually saw his motorcade tonight...his sedan (maybe a Pontiac?) and two cop cars. On the other end of the protection spectrum is the US embassy, which has a pointy 10-foot fence, cameras, armed guards, two security stations before the front door...and a big-screen TV.
Well, I guess there's not much more to report. We're gorging ourselves on pastries (seriously, they are the best we've ever had) and watching the temperature and numbers of hours of daylight slide slowly downwards. Hope everyone's well, and keep in touch! We miss you guys!
Basse Kungs un Kundze
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