Sisyphe wrote:Not gospel truth or anything, but I would say:
M mande li kisa l'gen.* Li di'm gen yon batay ak** yon nèg*** ki kon chache li [akòz de trouble.] (I'm not familiar with this expression in French or Haïtian Créole...) « M pa mechan****, di'l, m vivan ye.
Raymond de L'Étranger par Albert Camus
Fraz sila a fèt di nan Meursault pa vwazen li ki rele Raymond - li gen abitid de batay. Li pa gen'l paske li patikilyeman mechan - se sèlmen grasa anvi li santi vivan. Vi li plen de bagay ki raman (fèt) aksepte nan sosyete.
* It is fine to say this, but it would be code-switching with French technically. 'kisa pwoblem li' is more Créolized.
** 'Ak' also sounds more Créolized - I even use it in French sometimes.
***Nèg=mec
**** the 'se pa ki mwen mechan...' construction is just too French-sounding - I changed it for this reason.
A few more notes:
-Ki is virtually unncessary in most practical situations. I will use it if I am talking to a Francophone who wants to hear Créole but still be able to understand it - with a few modifications, such as the 'ki', it's quite understandable to native French speakers.
-I don't know a rule, but you cannot always use 'youn' for the indefinite article - most of the times actually, it is 'yon' and not 'youn'.
-The passive is very, very rarely used in Haïtian Créole. It sounds awkward to my ears. If you insist on using it, then you must use 'fèt' for it.
This is quite good - how long have you been learning Haïtian Créole?
Your only real errors are in the particles. You do not use t'ap correctly. If you want to convey the French imperfect, use 'kon' 't'ap' is more like 's.o. used to do s.th.', if that makes sense to you. I have mentioned the use of the passive and the corresponding particle above as well. Also as I said before, my revision is not gospel truth. I've grown up in the Diaspora - never been to Haïti in my life. Good luck and hope to see you here soon!
Merci, this was just something I decided to do for fun one night. I'm fluent in French so it's really easy to switch between the two save as you have already noted some significant rules of grammar. I really appreciate the help with the passive voice. I looked everywhere but couldn't find any rules on it, it's quite difficult finding grammar rules on the internet but I figure as long as I have this message board I'll always have somebody to help me.