By far my favorite Indonesian expression so far, "belum" is constantly used in conversation to respond to any inquiry in a positive (or face-saving) light. Usually delivered lightly with a smile, it means "not yet."
Is your team winning? Belum.
Do you have children?
Belum.
Have you visited Surabaya?
Belum.
Do you like spicy food?
Belum.
Are you a doctor?
Belum.
Do you know X? Can you Y?
Belum.
My examples do not really showcase the word properly - I would have liked to take some more authentic dialogue sampling (but I haven't...belum!). This tiny word is more like an expression, and it betrays the optimism of
the people I have met here. "No" not being an acceptable answer, everyone
lives in the hopeful anticipation of what can still be realized.
It reminds me of high frequency words in other languages that don't quite work in English. Može byť in Slovak (it may be). Genau in German (exactly). Con razón in Spanish (with reason). And so on. When you live between linguistic worlds, you feel those linguistic gaps more palpably as you ache to express something precisely with an English phrase that has as much zing.
I like the sound of it and suspect that belum will be a favorite that carries over into my other lives. My linguistic and cultural quests are far from over here, but I think that the belum perspective will provide this moving-target journey through thousands of islands with some fun perspective along the way.
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2 comments:
I love this short article. You are a very good language-observer! Hugs!
Ja som hrozna! I forgot može byť. Thank you for the reminder. I also love that you can still make your keyboard make all the appropriate diacritical marks in many languages, and the idea of carrying linguistic ... truths from one cultural life into others. I think that's something that resonates with anyone who's lived for an extended period in another culture. And of course I am continually impressed by how much of different languages your brain retains. Neuveritelne! :)
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