Anyone want to learn Romani?
Well, I'll give a bit of info.
Romani is a Central Zone language of the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European family. It is spoken in Asia, Europe, and the Americas. It is characterized by it's unique inventory of vocabulary, which has words that have originated from Persian, Armenian, Turkish, Byzantine Greek, Georgian, Ossetic, Slavic languages, and well as Hungarian and Romanian.
The dialect her is Kalderash, a member of the Vlax-Romani group of dialects. This dialect is the most spoken by far,having evolved in central Europe, it has since spread throughout the world.
Sounds
Unfortunately for the student and native speaker, Romani has no official or uniform script per se. There have been efforts, but many have been denied. However, one you have gotten a feel for the language, it should be easy to recognize a word, much like seeing facile in italian and then facil in spanish.
a-like the spanish a in padre, similar enough to the a in the english father
â-roughly like the short a in the english hat
ã-the aw sound in english awful
e-like how one pronounces A in ABC, or the ay in okay
ê-like the e in bet
o-like the spanish o or the o in the english home
ô-like the o in english got or not, or the spanish hombre, similar but different than a
u-like the oo in fool or u in flute
û-like the uh in duh, or u in butter
i-like the ee in english seem
î-like the i in english tin or in
y-when used as a vowel, like i
ei-rarely used, but when so, like the ey in hey
ai-like the english word eye
oi-like boy or goyem
ui-hard for most english speakers, like the ouille in ratatouille in french.
b-close to english
ch-close to english
d-close to english
dj-like the j in Jack
f-close to english
g-always hard like in got
h-close to english
j-like in the y in yak or the y in young, but never like in judge. This won't be used though here.
k-close to english
kh-aspirated, meaning like above but with a slight puff of air
l-close to english, closer to the l in glue than lend
ly-hard to put to terms in english. If one uses the consonant in million, or those two ls, it will suffice. Same sound as gl in itallian and ll in Spanish.
m-close to english
n-close to english
ng-when n and g are put together, they are represented as ng. This is one sound, not like in man go, but mang o.
ny-like the ni in onion.
p-close to english
ph-close to english with a puff of air
r-like the spanish r in Pedro. This one is not rolled but is like a tap against the front teeth
rr-like the spanish double r. It is rolled.
s-close to english, never like z or zh
sh-close to english
t-close to english
th-close to english with a puff of air
ts-like the ts in cats
v-soft, but pronouncing it like in love will be good enough
w-like in english witch
x-the kh in hebrew or ch in scottish english or german.
y-like in yeti, close to english
z-close to english
zh-like the s in pleasure or in treasure.
Grammar
The Present Tense
As in Spanish, personal pronouns are not normally used in sentences unless for emphasis or clarity.
For example:
Mangav xabe.
I want (some) food.
Me mangav xabe.
I want food or It is I that wants food.
Another charm of Romani is the lack of infinitive

To conjugate a verb, first you need the stem root
mang-(Verb stem or root)
(me) mangav I want
(tu) manges You want
(wo) mangel He wants
(woi) mangel She wants
(o Rrôm)mangelThe Rom wants
(ame) mangas We want
(tume)mangen You want(plural)
(won) mangen They want
Notice that <en> has two meanings, and usually the subject will be clear from the situation, however, if this is not the case use tume or won.
Practice:
Now, conjugate these verbs:
1)besh- Conjugate in the second person singular
2)lashar- Conjugate in the first person plural
3)phag- Conjugate in the third person singular
Akana mukhav tut le devlesa

-Alex
PS: What did anybody think? If you are interest please say so![/i][/b][/u]