But she wouldn’t repeat the show for Will. Instead, she climbed onto my office chair and ordered me to turn her around and around - "točit" she said. Each time we passed the keyboard, I tried to add another word to the list of Czech words she does use regularly around the simpletons who are her parents. Most are standard Czech words, but a few are what I call children’s Czech, or simply colloquial Czech that C’s picked up from our babysitters.
She hasn’t surpassed us yet (only a matter of time), but she has added to our Czech vocabulary. Who knew heiss (hejs?)had wiggled its way into Czech?!
Our toddler primer, or words C employs
| točit - turn houpi - swing dolu - down nahoru - up ovečka - little sheep prasátko - pig pes - dog kočička - kitty cat slon - elephant panenka - doll balónek - little balloon boty - shoes nohy - leg čepice - hat t'api t'api - walk | pojd‘sem - come here nejde - not working není - isn‘t hači - sit down haji - lie down čurat - pee bobek - little pellet, poop tak - so to - it tam - there tady - here ne - no prosim - please děkuju - thank you ahoj - hello/goodbye | heiss - hot ham - food papat - to eat vejce - egg kaše - gruel ;-) mlíko - milk sušenka - cookie bonbon - sweet spinkat - to sleep plakat - to cry holčička - little girl pán - man mimi - little baby písek - sand pá pá - bye bye |
Warning: some of these spellings are probably off, as no dictionary I've found includes haji, let alone tapi tapi. If anyone has better spelling suggestions, please send them in, I'll mail you a postcard as thanks!
Update: haji is from hajat, and t'api t'api from t'apat (also perhaps tlapat?). They can both be found in Lingea Lexicon - if you know what you're looking for.
Filed under: Czech words toddler_tales
5 comments:
Thanks Dana, I've updated my list with your corrected spellings! What is funny to me about the way that C has learned to speak Czech is that she uses a mix of diminutives and normal Czech slang. So she says mlíko rather than mlíčko, and boty rather than botičky, but then does call pigs prasátko and sheep ovečka.
I asked a few people about heiss (probably spelled hejs?) and they told me it is common slang in Moravia and heard on occasion around kids in Prague, often to indicate something is dangerously hot, maybe because it just sounds more serious!
My email is juliaprague at yahoo by the way, and you have completely earned a postcard for your help!
What a great list! I'm sure you already know that kaše also means mashed potatoes. I suspect it means all sorts of mushy food.
Exactly, mush. But Caroline uses it to mean her morning cereal which is something surprisingly like cream of wheat.
I bet hejs is a teenagery thing. Ask your niece about platfuss (sp?) too. It's a word I hear sometimes too which just seems funny in Czech!
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