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Leabhar-Clàraidh

Posted: Sun Jul 27, 2014 5:59 pm
by Wilsons-of-Oxford
Tha mi air bàta-survey his an ceann tri seachdainean

Bidh mi ga' feuchainn a sgrìobh innteart leabhar-clàraidh gach latha.

Tha mi ann an Kodiak fathast an-diugh. Bidh sinn ag ullachadh a fàgail san feasgair agus bidh mi trang.

--

An-dè chluich sinn softball leis an co-bàta Rainier. Bha latha math ach bha mise glè glè sgìth. Cha robh cadail agam, bha ach cofaidh annam :).

Tha mi toillichte a bidh air an cuan a rithist.

Im on a survey ship for the next three weeks.
I'll be trying to write a logbook entry each day.

--

I am still in Kodiak today. We'll be preparing to leave in the evening and I will be busy.

Yesterday we played softball with our sister ship Rainier. It was a good day but I was extremely tired. I had no sleep, there was only coffee in me.

I'll be happy to be on the sea again.

Re: Leabhar-Clàraidh

Posted: Sun Jul 27, 2014 7:29 pm
by Seonaidh
Eaux mon creech! Mar a thuirt Sinatra, "Where will I begin?"...
This could take a while...
Tha mi air bàta-survey his an ceann tri seachdainean
Now, faced with that, I thought, "What's this 'his an ceann' business?" So I l00ked at the English: all I can assume is a mispront where you've put "his" - not sure what for though. Anyway, if I wanted to put something like "I'm on a survey ship for the next 3 weeks" into Gaelic, I think "fhad" might feature somewhere ("fad" would do) - something like "Bidh mi air bàta-surbhaidh fhad 3 seachdainean" - or possibly "fhad na h-ath trì seachdainean" if it's not obvious you're starting now.
Bidh mi ga' feuchainn a sgrìobh innteart leabhar-clàraidh gach latha.
The big puzzle here is "innteart": what is it? Anyway, so you'll be trying to keep a diary of events. One thing you should mind is that, when you look up a verb in a Gaelic dictionary, that's exactly what you get - a VERB - which is not often the same as the associated noun-thingies. In English, these "noun-thingies" are things like (let's take the verb "write") writing (present participle), written (past participle) and write (as in such constructs as "I can write" or "I am trying to write"). The point is, just because you find "sgrìobh" in the dictionary doesn't mean you can use "sgrìobh" for all those noun-thingies - it is actually a proper verb: it does NOT mean "to write", it is not an "infinitive", technically, it is the "dependent present", something you'd get after, e.g. "nach" or "gun": "you say [that] you'll write" => "tha thu ag ràdh gun sgrìobh thu". If you want more af a noun-type "write", as in "i'll try to write", the form you need is "sgrìobhadh".

The usual term for a "log-book" (assuming you don't mean a set of trigonometrical tables etc.) is "leabhar-aithris". However, "leabhar-clàraidh" is understandable. Now, you have a couple of things wrong at the start of the sentence - you're trying to write it, but you've got something more like you're trying it (ga feuchainn): you actually need "a' feuchainn" here. Also, the usual way of saying you're trying to do something is to use "feuch ri", so "Bidh mi a' feuchainn ri..."

And then we're usually going to get the infamous "Gaelic inversion": literally, "I'll be trying a diary to write", as it were - so
"Bidh mi a' feuchainn ri leabhar-aithris a sgrìobhadh". Note where there ARE, and ARE NOT, apostrophes in that.

You're in Kodiak - fine. Just mind that it's always "fhathast".

I'm not too comfortable with "ullachadh", but I suppose it'll do. Can't think of a better way of saying "getting ready" at the moment. "In the evening" is obviously "san fheasgair". No doubt you'll be busy.

I lurv the construction "co-bàta" - never heard of it, but it's easily understandable. If I'd coined it, I'd probably be tempted to put "co-bhàta", but still.

Now, what you don't say is stuff like "Bha latha math". Logically, it might look OK - but it actually mean "A good day was" - and I suspect you don't usually say that in English: it begs the question "Was what?" So, what you'd usually do in Gaelic is to say "Bha latha math ann" - literally, "A good day was in it", which is the equivalent to "It was a good day" in English. Being a mite pedantic, you could say "Bha e na latha math" (It was in its good day), but "Bha latha math ann" is what people actually say and is simpler.

As for missing your ZZZs and being hyped up on coffee, it might be better to say something like "Chaill mi mo chadal agus cha robh ach cofaidh annam airson cumail nam dhùisg" or some such.

Tha thu toilichte, indeed! It's usually put "'S toil leam a bhith air bàrr nan tonn a-rithist"

Have fun - and don't forget that all the big brown bears, narwhals and other creatures you might come across are fluent Gaelic speakers and really appreciate it if you try to speak Gaelic with them.

Re: Leabhar-Clàraidh

Posted: Sun Jul 27, 2014 7:44 pm
by Wilsons-of-Oxford
Tapadh leat! 'His' was my autocorrect's attempt at figuring out 'gus' in that context :). Short on time now but I'll come back to the rest.

Re: Leabhar-Clàraidh

Posted: Sun Jul 27, 2014 8:20 pm
by akerbeltz
Bidh mi air bàta-surbhaidh fhad 3 seachdainean
> Bidh mi air bàta-suirbhidh fad 3 seachdainean
Bidh mi a' feuchainn ri leabhar-aithris a sgrìobhadh
No. That means you'll be writing an ENTIRE book every day. Feuchaidh mi ri innteart a sgrìobhadh san leabhar-latha/aithris gach latha or even nì mi oidhirp innteart/rudeigin a sgrìobhadh...
Bidh sinn ag ullachadh a fàgail san feasgair agus bidh mi trang.
>Tha sinn ag ullachadh airson fàgail feasgar agus bidh mi trang.

You can say san fheasgar or air an fheasgar but on the whole, you don't need these preposition when specifying time in Gaelic.
Bha latha math
Well there's more than one way of looking at it. I don't know if you learned any of your Gaelic by ear but if you did, this is not wrong per se, in the sentence bha an latha math (the day was good) the bha gobbles up the a- and the -n is deleted before l- so in spoken Gaelic this can come out as bha latha math.
Tha mi toillichte a bidh air an cuan a rithist.
a bhith air a' chuan (sticking closeish to what you started with). aig muir would be another one. barr nan tonn is a bit over-poetic if you ask me, at least for a log.

Re: Leabhar-Clàraidh

Posted: Tue Jul 29, 2014 7:34 pm
by Wilsons-of-Oxford
Tapadh leibh, a dithis. Chan eil keyboard agam agus bidh mi a' sgrìobadh gu slaodach. Ged a tha mo Ghàidhlig gann, sgrìobhaidh mi an seo gach làtha. Tapadh leibh mise a chuideachadh.

Thanks both of you. I don't have a keyboard at me and I'll be typing slowly. Although my Gaelic's lacking I'll be writing here each day. Thank you for helping me.

DiSathairne 29mh an t-Iuchar

Feasgair chaidh am bhàta a deisealachadh a dhol a-mach. Is breagha a bha an t-sìde, bha gaoth sèimh is cuan còmhnard ann.
Dh'fhàg sinn bhon doca aig coig uairean. Chaidh sinn a-mach trìd Women's Bay agus Woody Island Channel. An sin, Chaidh sinn tuath agus on iar. Nuair a bha mi faire air thoirt bha sinn ann an Kupreanof Strait a' deanamh air Terror Bay. Chunnaic mi beanntaichean àrd is beanntaichean le sneachd orra. Tha Terror Bay fìord cumhang ach domhain. Chan robh cho domhain ris a bha an cairt-iùil ag' radh. Chunnaic sinn eadar-dhealachadh 11 aitheamh.
Chuir sinn bàta a-steach don baigh le puta sèol-mhara agus chaidh iad e a chur a-steach. An deidh sin, sheòl sinn mu chuairt gus an taobh iar na h-eilean.
Chunnaic mi moran muc-mhara agus dòbhran.

Saturday July 29th

This evening we readied the ship to go out. The weather was beautiful with calm winds and flat seas. We left from the dock at 5:00. We went out through Women's Bay and Woody Island Channel. Then, we went north and westerly. When I took watch we were in Kupreanof Strait making for Terror Bay. I saw tall mountains and mountains with snow on them. Terror Bay is a narrow but deep fjord. It was not as deep as the chart said. We saw an 11-fathom difference.
We put a boat into the bay with a tide buoy and they went to install it. After that we sailed around to the west side of the island.
I saw many a whale and otter.

Re: Leabhar-Clàraidh

Posted: Tue Jul 29, 2014 10:42 pm
by Seonaidh
Just a few things (plenty of others...)
Tha Terror Bay fìord cumhang ach domhain
I saw this and thought, "Well, that could be more-or-less OK - if the thing being referred to is 'Terror Bay Fjord'" - but then I looked at the English and discovered it wasn't ("Terror Bay is a narrow but deep fjord"). Also, I was wondering about the Gaelic for "fjord": there's no English word for it, as such features as the deep inlets one finds on the Norwegian coast are largely absent from England. But similar features do occur in Scotlande - particularly in the more Gaelic-speaking parts. Where they are generally referred to as "loch". Or, if you want to be more specific, then maybe "loch-mara". But "fjord" is fine.

So, apart from a dubious "fjord" (actually OK), what's wrong with what you wrote? Two things: one small one - "domhainn" with 2 Ns. And one major one, which is why I mention it. In Gaelic, you cannot use the verb "a bhith" or "bith" as you do the Enlish verb "to be" or "be" - as in such expressions as "X is a Y". FFor that, you either need to use the verb "is" in Gaelic or to use a slightly different construction with "bith". In general, you might use "is" if you're drawing attention to something and the "construction" if it's a more matter-of-fact observation. So, if you wish to stress the fact that the sea loch concerned was a narrow but deep fjord, you might say:-
Is fjord cumhang ach domhainn a th' ann an Terror Bay
- more usual is "'S e fjord..." etc.

On the other hand, if it was just something you mention in passing, you might say:-
Tha Terror Bay na fhjord cumhang ach domhainn
(OK, I'm having a bit of fun with sèimeachadh on "fjord"...) - but the point is the word "na", meaning (literally) "in its", i.e. "Terror Bay is in its narrow but deep sea loch"

Mountains - not quite so fancy - "beanntan".
gus an taobh iar na h-eilean
Probably OK for "towards...", but I might incline towards just "gu". As for the west side of the island, if you want a genitive island, you don't put "an taobh", just "taobh". And, just to totally confuse things, you put "taobh an iar", not "taobh iar" - but note that this "an" derives from "to the", or "dhan", i.e. "the side to the west". Now, "the west side of the island": "taobh an iar an eilein". "Eilean" is gramatically masculine: an t-eilean. So its genitive "the" form is "an", not "na". And, of course, the additional T (an t-eilean) vanishes in prepositional or dative uses (e.g. "at the island" is "aig an eilean" with no additional T). And note also the dieting - I should say "slenderisation" - in the genitive case: eilean > eilein.

Anyway, looks like you;re having a whale (or at least an otter...) of a time!

Re: Leabhar-Clàraidh

Posted: Sat Aug 09, 2014 9:15 am
by Mairead
The English version of "fjord" is "firth". (Came into Middle English from Scots, and into Scots from Old Norse.) It looks to me like the Gaelic for it is "linne", such as Linne Tatha (Firth of Tay), Linne Foirthe (Firth of Forth), Linne Mhoireibh (Moray Firth).

Re: Leabhar-Clàraidh

Posted: Sun Aug 10, 2014 11:11 pm
by Seonaidh
Aidh, tha sin ceart. Indeed, the Icelandic is "fjörður" from ON "fjörðr" or similar, which in most grammatical cases goes to something like "firði", hence "firth" rather than the cognate (but differently-meaning) "ford" - or "fiord" or "forth" for that matter. As for "linne", yes, it's often used for "firth" - but what's called a "firth" in Scotland isn't usually a narrow, steep-sided valley with a patch of sea at the bottom - the Solway Firth, the Firth of Forth, the Firth of Tay, the Pentland Firth - for example. Which is why I though it best to avoid "linne" in this instance.