Swahili Made Easy: A Beginner's Complete Course

LESSON 13. THE SWAHILI VERBS

34 SWAHILI MADE EASY LESSON 13 THE SWAHILI VERBS In the infinitive, all Swahili verbs, as we have already said, begin with Ku (i.e. they add the prefix ku to the stem) which correspond, to the English word “ to in “to go, to come, etc…” Here are some of the commonest verbs: kusoma, to read, study kuona, to see kuandika, to write kulala, to sleep, to lie down kupika, to cook kuamka, to wake up, to get up kula, to eat kuenda, (kwenda), to go kunywa,to drink kuja, to come kuwa, to be kurudi, to come back kufika, to arrive kurudisha, to give back kuondoka, to depart kurudia, to repeat kujua, to know kufunga, to shut, close up kutaka, to want, wish kufungua, to open kuelewa, to understand kupenda, to like, to love, kuchoka, to be tired kucheka,to laugh kuvaa, to put on a kuchuma, to pick (flowers,etc.) dress, wear kufanya, to do kujifunza, to learn, study kufundisha, to teach Swahili verbs have four tenses designated by what may be called “tense markers”, namely: PART ONE 35 na, designates the present tense me, expresses the perfect tense li, designates the past tense ta, designates the future tense. This is the way tenses are expressed in the affirmative, as for the negative (tenses see Lesson 17). A sentence contains a subject and a predicate. If the subject is a person, the following personal pronouns are used: ni-, I tu- we u-, you (sing) m- you a-, he, she wa- they To make a Swahili sentence we need: a. the subject prefixes b. the tense marker c. the verb stem, and in the case of monosyllabic verbs, the whole verb. For example, by using the stem soma, “read”, we can join a, b, c, together to get: ninasoma, I read tunasoma, we read unasoma, you read mnasoma, you read anasoma, he/she reads wanasoma, they read This is the present tense. It means, in English, both “I read”and “I am reading”.This becomes very clear in the verb kwenda, “to go”: a. mtoto anakwenda shule kila siku b. mtoto anakwenda shule sasa. 36 SWAHILI MADE EASY These two sentences convey different ideas: (a) says “the child goes to school everyday”, and (b) says “the child is going to school now”. It is now easy to add an object: e.g. Ninasoma kitabu kizuri, “I am reading a nice book” ; unasoma nini? “What are you reading?” etc. The Perfect Tense nimesoma, I have read tumesoma, we have read umesoma, you have read mmesoma, you have read amesoma, he has read wamesoma, they have read The Past Tense nilisoma, I read tulisoma, we read ulisoma, you read mlisoma, you read alisoma, he, she read walisoma, they read The Future Tense nitasoma, I shall read tutasoma, we shall read utasoma, you will read mtasoma, you will read atasoma, he/she will read watasoma, they will wad THE MONOSYLLABIC VERBS These verbs are called monosyllabic because without the prefix tu, they have only one syllable each,e.g.la, ja, fa, nywa, wa.Taking the verb kula, -to eat-, we have: Present Tense ninakula, I eat; I am eating tunakula, we eat; we are eating unakula, you eat; mnakula, you eat; you are eating you are eating anakula , he/she eats; wanakula, they eat; he is eating they are eating PART ONE 37 Perfect Tense nimekula, I have eaten; tumekula, we have eaten umekula, you have eaten; mmekula, you have eaten amekula, he/she, has eaten; wamekula, they have eaten Past Tense nimekula, I ate; tulikula, we ate ulikula, you ate; mlikula, you ate alikuIa, he/she ate walikula, they ate Future Tense nitakula, I shall eat; tutakula, we shall eat utakula, you will eat; mlikula, you will eat atakula, he/she will eat; watakula, they will eat EXERCISE 16 Vocabulary kuchuma, pick, pluck kucheka, to laugh kuona, to see simba, lion sasa, now tembo, elephant baadaye, afterwards twiga, giraffe kujifunza, to learn mbwa, dog kwa bidii, with effort paka, cat kupiga kelele, to shout (for help etc) kueleza, to explain kuelewa, to understand Translate into English: 1. Wageni wamefika; mpishi anapika chakula kingi. 2. Wanawake wanapenda maua; wasichana wanachuma 38 SWAHILI MADE EASY maua sasa. 3. Wagonjwa wamelala; mganga amekwenda kuona simba na tembo. 4. Wezi...