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- "Ingawaje alilala alisikia"
"Ingawaje alilala alisikia"
Translation:Although he slept she heard
18 Comments
1163
The English sentence sounds strange. It's unusual for "hear" to be used without a complement unless the complement is understood (e.g. "Did you know that X?" "I heard."). Is the meaning something like "Although he was sleeping, he heard (that)"?
It is a simple mistake. I guess the writers meant that "Although she slept, she heard."
My best guess: "Although he/she slept, he/she heard (was able to hear - what was happening/we spoke)."
"Although he slept he could hear." -
is the gist of the Swahili (as too of at least one other Bantu language): the shortcoming here, as elsewhere in this course, is in the translation.
That's to say: the Swahili sentence is correct (with he --- he , or she --- she; not he --- she, she --- he), and the English ought to be as above.
Using the above Swahili sentence as an example, a comma might help distinguish clauses, thereby making sentences more intelligible.
Yes but the software doesn't seem to understand commas. It doesn't care if you put punctuation or not
the -ka- tense is the consecutive, so in consecutive actions (usually when telling a story) - and in that case "ingawa" wouldn't make sense either.
As Gazelle1596 explained, that wouldn't make sense. It would be like saying "Although she slept and then she heard".
-ka- connects equally ranked actions/states, so if you used akasikia, the sentence is unfinished because you haven't finished the "although" clause.
- 10
It makes no logical sense in the English translation. Is it supposed to mean 'Although she/he(typo error in the above example), slept she/he had (already) heard?'
No, that would have been "amesikia" and then wouldn't make logical sense either.
It does not accept "although he slept he heard", which at least would make some sense.
If the content creators really did intend a he / she difference in the two clauses, they should have used a pair of words like (baba, mama). I would have written, "Ingawa baba alikuwa amelala, mama alisikia." ~ Although Dad was asleep, Mom heard (the noise). As they stand, I have some doubts about both the Swahili sentence and the English translation.
