I’ve got a long way to go in learning Amharic, but I’m getting pretty dang good at one of the most important components—the greeting. Its not like English or Spanish (the only two samples I personally have to choose from), where there’s just a variety of hellos and goodbyes and how are you’s for each time of the day. No, no, no. The Amharic greeting
can go on for 5 minutes. Then stop for a minute. And then come back for another few minutes of round two.
It can go like this:
X: Hello
Y: Hello
X: How are you?
Y: Hello
X: Are you fine?
Y: How is everything?
X: I am fine, thanks be to God
Y: Thanks be to God
X: How are you?
Y: Very fine, thanks be to God
Y: How is your family?
X: Everything is fine
X: Hello
Y: Hello
X: How are you?
Y: How are you?
X: I am fine, thanks be to God
Y: What new do you speak?
X: I speak nothing new
Y: Hello
X: Hello
And so on. You get the point. Once this process is mastered, or at least learned, then you can start to sound like you actually know what’s going on. The problem is, the person you’re talking to thinks you know what’s going on. And they keep talking and you (actually, I) get confused.
As the Ethiopian saying goes: “slowly but surely, an egg, with legs, will walk.” Chew on that.
