Promoting cycling in Duhok

This week I have won two small but significant victories for cyclists in Duhok.

Firstly, this gate between Avro City and the Tenahi shops told me bikes were not allowed through the gate. I gently challenged this, and although I was not successful at first, later my appeal reached a manager at Mando Security and he told me that cyclists would be allowed through. He knew me from social media and said that it would be allowed ‘for me and my friends.’

Secondly, I went to the main gate of the University of Duhok and asked for permission to ride through to Avro City, on the basis that it is dangerous to ride along the highway amongst fast-moving cars and into the Avro City front gate. The manager at that front gate said I could tell the other security officials that I was allowed through.

Sadly, the rule of law still does not prevail in ways that it does in many Western countries. It is a lot to do with wasta, or Vitamin Waw as people call it. ‘It’s not what you know, it’s who you know’. Since I have accrued a certain amount of Vitamin Waw after living here on and off since 2010, I’m happy to use any influence I have to help others stand up for their rights. I sometimes tell security guards: “Look I don’t want you to have to phone my wife and say ‘Sorry your husband got squashed by a 2-tonne truck because I wouldn’t let him cycle safely through the quiet roads of the university'”.

I would like to see more progress establishing a system whereby responsible cyclists can take the short cut through UoD – it is a great way for the huge population who live in Avro to get through to Masike and on the city centre. Likewise, it is a key route for people who want to cycle from central Duhok to Avro and Secondly, I went to the main gate of the University of Duhok and asked for permission to ride through to Avro City, on the basis that it is dangerous to ride along the highway amongst fast-moving cars and into the Avro City front gate. The manager at that front gate said I could tell the other security officials that I was allowed through. I would like to see more progress establishing a system whereby responsible cyclists can take the short cut through UoD – it is a great way for the huge population who live in Avro to get through to Masike and on the city centre. Likewise, it is a key route for people who want to cycle from central Duhok to Avro, four universities, Family Mall and Tenahi neighbourhood as well as four universities and Family Mall.

Another way to make our point is to mention my friend Dr Azad, a widely respected lecturer in the Physical Education Dept at UoD. He has done a lot to promote cycling. So there are people within the university who are very in favour of cycling.

It’s worth considering why there are these rules and it is surely partly because bikes are largely used by kids just messing about. Avro City Security don’t want neighbourhood kids goofing around on their bikes at a classy apartment complex like this. And to a point, this is a valid concern. But if we wear cycle helmets and have lights and high vis clothing at night we show that we are using the roads considerately.

There are various reasons why I promote cycling and try to challenge the laws and customs which stand in the way of bikes being more widely used in Kurdistan.

1. Christians are commanded to defend the poor, and the poor will be greatly helped if they can get around town without shelling out large sums for taxis each month.
2. Cycling is good exercise. Christians care for people’s bodies, not just their souls.
3. Guzzling petrol when it is sometimes quicker to go by bike is poor stewardship of the resources God has given us. Better stewardship of wealth is a critical issue for the wellbeing of Kurdistan.
4. Though sometimes people go over the top on this, it is good to reduce air pollution.
5. Riding by bike rather than in an expensive car signposts Jesus Christ, who chose a donkey as his mode of transport into Jerusalem, not a war horse.
   
   As an endnote, I think we all have seen good things in our passport countries that we are proud of, and it’s good if we can judiciously and humbly share those insights in the countries we serve in as guests. I’ve lived for many years in Oxford, UK, and have recently seen huge changes to the infrastructure of the city to enable a large proportion of the city get around by bike. Hence my optimism that things can change in Duhok!

The Origins of the Kurds

The account in the Sharafnama (Kurdish: شەرەفنامە Şerefname, “The Book of Honor”), from 1597. For those studying Kurdish identity, it is a very important legend; it is Sharafkhan’s adaptation of the legend of Kaveh in the Persian epic the Shahnama.

After the death of the great Persian king Jamshid, the tyrant Zahhak usurped the throne and established a reign of terror. Besides being cruel by natural inclination, he suffered from a strange disease that made him even more of an oppressor. Two snakes grew out of his shoulders and caused him severe pain, which could only be alleviated by feeding the snakes human brains each day. So every day Zahhak had two young persons killed and their brains fed to the snakes. 

The man charged with slaughtering the two young people taken to the palace each day took pity on them and thought up a ruse. He killed only one person a day, replacing the other by a sheep and mixing the two brains. One young person’s life was thus saved every day; he was told to leave the country and to stay hidden in distant inaccessible mountains. 

The young persons thus saved gradually came to constitute a large community; they married among themselves and brought forth offspring. These people were named Kurds. Because during many years they evaded other human company and stayed away from the towns, they developed a language of their own. In the forests and the mountains they built houses and tilled the soil. Some of them came to own property and flocks, and spread themselves over the steppes and deserts. 

——————————————–

From the Sharafnama, a history of the Kurdish tribes, written by the Kurdish emir Sharaf Khan Bidlisi, 1597

This translation is taken from Susan Meiselas: Kurdistan: In the Shadow of History. Since there appears to be no published English translation of the Sharafnama, it is not clear where this excerpt is sourced from.

It is striking that the hero in this legend does not seem to be named, though Kurds call him Kawa, a Kurdish form of the Persian name Kaveh.

A Dictionary of Duhoki Kurdish

Maybe we’ll call this DDK for short. There are many Kurdish dictionaries out there. My aim is to add some key terms that have not been adequately covered in other Kurdish dictionaries. Although I am a huge advocate for the Kurdish Wiktionary, the rules of Wikipedia and its cousin sites discount most original research. This has meant that we need a new medium in which to publish original research into the Kurdish language and especially the variant of Northern Kurdish spoken in the Duhok Province.

English-Kurdish

English term	Kurdish Term(s) & Comments
adoption	A common term is xudankirina zarokan. More precise would be wergirtina zarokan. Longer but also accurate is xudan li zarokan derketin; a strange phrase to Anglophones, but lit. it means ‘to appear as guardian (xudan) to children’. Tebennî kirin is very widely understood and used, but is a loan from Arabic. It is doubtful how much edapşin kirin is used in Behdini, but it is somewhat used in Duhok; Wikiferheng has not to date provided any sources for this English loan word, and it does sound somewhat clumsy: why not edapt kirin? (the noun part gets doubled up, first in the English -ion, then in the Kurdish kirin, but loan words do strange things and one mustn’t be pedantic). As for the verb form to adopt, BHD in Galatians 4:5 uses kirin zarokên xwe (or there, kurrên xwe). The noun form is a little more difficult: note Romans 9:4 where adoption -Gk huiothesia– is rendered mafên kurrên Xudê- the rights of (being?) the children of God. Where we need to think some more is when we say something like ‘today we’re discussing the issue of adoption’. What will become the shorthand term for this vital ethical practice? In English obviously we take a general verb ‘to adopt’ – we adopt others’ clothes, mannerisms etc – and make it refer particularly to the adoption of children. A kurdiya petî noun form has perhaps not yet gained currency, so for myself, when I want a placeholder word I use tebennî kirin or edapşin kirin depending on who I’m speaking to.
boarding school	A term for this is not widely known. But boarding at university is a familiar provision. A dormitory is known as a qism. So boarding school is best called qotabxane li gel qismî
carer	sad that this word is not in WF at all! peristgar is sometimes used for a nurse, but how can the sense of carer be communicated? Maybe harîkar.
the character of God	This is a difficult term to render in Kurdish. FR suggests saloxetên Xudê; a friend from Dêrik suggests şexsiyeta Xudê; both are loan words from Arabic. Karaktera Xudê has in its favour inherent familiarity points for those schooled in either English or Turkish (Tanrının karakteri) – the phrase is commonplace in English theological discourse. Those with a unitarian worldview will likely be uncomfortable with many of the options we could choose, especially perhaps the kesayetî of God, because to their mind he is not a person as we are persons, whereas the Judaeo-Christian doctrine of God is that we are persons because we are made in the image of the personal God and we do not think it inappropriate to use the same word of humans as we use of God. However, since kes can mean ‘guy’ – do you see that kes over there?, etc – maybe it might have an irreverent ring to it in describing God’s nature. Other options that are yet to be tested are xisleta Xudê, xusûsiyeta Xudê, xûya Xudê, or taybetmendiya Xudê. Purists may prefer these words since, although some words like taybetmendî do have roots in Arabic, they may sound more authentically Kurdish.
conquest	This word is important in Biblical Studies because of the Conquest of Canaan under Joshua. The best word I can find is dagîrkirin, which is a generally negative term meaning invasion. Girtina Kena’anê might be more neutral. Conquest is fairly neutral in English; it’s mildly positive but not as gung-ho as ‘liberation’. Interestingly, no entry has been made on WF for ‘conquest’ as of 06.2021.
crutch	gult or gulte. This doesn’t seem to be very widely known in Behdini.
earphone (cf headphones)	êrpod (ji inglîzî Airpod); hetfon bêwayr.
exile	This is a key term in the Bible. derbiderkirin is the noun form. WF lists other options: biyanistan, xerîbî, xurbet, sirgûn. Sirgûn seems to be little known in Behdini. BHD uses raguhastin. Note that veguhastin means transportation, but raguhastin has the sense of forcible deportation. My sense is that Matt 1:17 wisely opted for raguhastin rather than derbiderkirin; maybe that is the more recognised term for the Kurdish experience of exile, for example in 1975, when Mulla Mustafa and many others were exiled to Iran.
headphones	hetfon هەتفۆن. semaeyên guhî. (see semae)
just a matter of time	meseleka demiya, meseleka wextiya. It’s just a matter of time before there is a war over water in the Middle East.
mission	raspardin; erk also works but is less precise
modified Arabic script	elfabeya erebî ya guherandî. This is often referred to as Kurdish script, as opposed to Latin script. This is a more accurate designation of this script- also called the Perso-Arabic script.
nutrient	This has proved a difficult word to translate into Kurdish. ITS suggests tuxum, although that word seems to also mean seed, so how we communicate the importance of eating food full of nutrients, I don’t know
nutritious	Probably best just to say healthy food, ie xwarinên sehî.
own goal	xediî (ẍediî) (غەدعی), (ji erebî خدعة)
pain in the neck / butt etc	zikdirînik (cf zikêş). Lit a tearer of the stomach; cf ‘thorn in my side’
relational	As in ‘we need to develop a more relational culture in our workplace’. Difficult to translate into Kurdish; têkildarî works best. (peywendîdar tends to mean he has friends in high places; wasta) See task-oriented
seashell	Still not entered on Wiktionary (Jan 2022), but sedef or sedefa deryayê seems right.
shark	qirş (an Arabic word)
symbolism	hêmayetî; sîmbolîzm is the preferred term (ZA).
task-oriented	(as opposed to people-oriented) task is erk; but this dichotomy can be expressed as kiriyarî and kesî

Kurdish-English

Kurdish term	English
cejna bûn	Commonly used in Duhok for birthday. rojbûn, îdmîlad, roja jidayîkbûn, roja ku lê hatine dinyayê. Not sure if it should be one word or two.
çem bê çeqel nabê	There is no waterfront without a jackal. I suggest these near equivalent proverbs in English: the grass is always greener on the other side, all that glitters is not gold. Difficulties editing this on WF. A Kurmanji form would be çem bê çeqel tune.
fesil bûn?	to be fired
qupiya kirin	To cheat in exams. Syn: ẍişe kirin, which refers to cheating more generally. Qupiya is a loan word from Sorani and doesn’t seem to be etymologically related to English ‘copy’; but for learning vocab it’s a happy coincidence!
semae	microphone, speaker. This seems confusing to us, but context usually determines the meaning. If people are pushed they would say for microphone semaeya laqîte and for speaker semaeya dengî
Destnexoş	Irksome, wearisome, unbearable; used of a task that is difficult, time-consuming or irritating. Lit. ‘unpleasant to the hand’. Interestingly, it is used in Matt 23:4 to describe the Pharisees’ heavy loads that are hard to carry
serbarî	Despite.
teknefer	alone; single-handed. We used this in GBP to describe how David killed Goliath ‘singlehandedly’
tirs û birs	lit fear and hunger. Somewhat parallel to ‘in dire straits’; ‘up the creek without a paddle’ etc

KEY: ITS= Ismail Taha Shahin from Simel; a respected lexicographer in the Duhok Province.

ZA=Zinar Adnan, a schoolteacher, translator and writer in Duhok.

Bold: means that the entry should be imported into Wikiferheng in some form.

Bold:Underlined Entry has been added to Wikiferheng.

“Dead yet Speaketh”

How RC is remembered today

82 years ago today, RC died at a hospital in Mosul after being shot in his family home in Duhok.

His ministry in the 1920s and 30s received both praise and strong opposition. His legacy is also a sensitive one. I shall refer to him just by initials for that reason.

Thankfully, recently, at outline of his life has appeared on English Wikipedia. In this article I have the modest goal of simply surveying his legacy and how different people perceive the man.

1. His house is sometimes regarded as the oldest house in Duhok. It was built in around 1930. They call it his qesr, which means palace. It must have been something of a qesr in his day, though I think it was more functionally well-thought-through than palatial.
2. Some remember admiringly his great feat of bringing spring water into Duhok. Indeed a kind man at his house took the time to point out from his roof the now dried-up spring in the valley to the east from where water was piped to his vicinity.
3. He was actually a Californian, but many think he was British. This is understandable given that there were many officials of the British Protectorate working in Iraq up to independence in 1932.
4. Some think he worked for the American or British government. He was in fact a Presbyterian missionary, working under the auspices of the United Mission to Mesopotamia (UMM) but locals do not well understand the concept of the separation of church and state.
5. It is partly from a long Kurdish folk song that many know RC’s story (note, he is referred to as Kemberlan/کەمبەرلان, a slight corruption of his surname) . The name of the folk singer escapes me and I have now lost the mp3 of this dengbêj telling his story at great length and with a screechy melody that sits uneasily in the Western ear.
6. People say the killer also shot his dog as he fled out of the house. He did shoot the servant Musa, and the C family did have a dog- I’ve seen photos- but this story may come from the song since it’s not mentioned in his wife’s letter or any other reports. Anyone else able to verify either way?
7. In about 2019 a cafe was opened in Duhok called, if I remember rightly, Kafê Kemberlan. The worker at the cafe told me they used his name because he is a famous figure from Duhok’s past, rather than out of any great appreciation of his labours in evangelising the town. Because the building was demolished, the cafe had to go. But I was glad to visit once. Interestingly, they displayed a framed photo of the man who killed RC alongside many other notable figures. But there was no intention to salute this man, who was later executed for subsequent murder or murders. I asked why they did not have a photo of RC, and he replied that they didn’t have one. It was a curious omission in the charming folkloric decor, and it spoke to me of how inaccessible to the local people a basic knowledge of the man still is.
8. Locals often still talk about RC. There was a long newspaper article about his house in early 2019 I think and a Facebook article was written in March 2020 in Kurdish, with grainy photos of both him and his killer.
9. I have heard about a documentary being made about him by someone related to the killer.
10. One older man I talked to a while ago said that RC got what he deserved, because he was leading people away from the majority faith. This attitude is fairly rare. However, many people know the official line on apostasy and those who aid it. So for them to commend RC or publicly defend him is to challenge the historic view that he was doing a very bad thing in making disciples of Christ.
11. I can personally relate that his legacy has spread far and wide. I used to tell workers at a kebab house in Oxford, UK about Jesus Christ and one young man from Duhok who gave me pushback for my message told me simply to go find out about Kemberlan. He felt tied not just ideologically but by ties of blood to the man who had ‘stopped RC [literally] in his tracks’. I had never heard of him, but later I understood who he was referring to in that greasy joint just off the Cowley Road!
12. Moving to Christian appraisals of his work, the most significant published appraisal of his work is to be found in a book called Ethnic Realities and the Church, now available on Kindle. RC’s resourcefulness and courage is saluted and the key elements of his life and work are covered there.
13. He is also mentioned in an important Missiology PhD thesis. In this survey of Western Protestant mission in the Middle East, he is described as a ‘maverick’, though in admiring tones. Though the analysis is short, it does helpfully set RC in his context, one in which the ‘preach and convert’ model was being widely challenged by a more liberal approach to mission which concentrated on medical and educational work to the detriment of gospel preaching and making disciples.
14. After his death, fellow-students of his raised money which was set aside for Bible translation. Fifty years later, the door opened for that money to be used.
15. RC’s determination to avoid some of the missionary trends of his day is seen in what is I think his only published work, a short missiological portrait of the Kurds. Note that the link on Wikipedia suggests that you must pay to view the article. Given that copyright expired in 2018 (70 years after his death), this link can legitimately be used to read the piece: a stirring call to hope for the conversion of the Kurds such that they will take their place as people of influence within the Middle East. At the end, he lays hope for their salvation not on schools and hospitals, and many modern gospel workers who emphasise the sovereign power of God working through the word sown in weakness will salute him at this point:

“approaches” and “methods” will never
save them; here, as in all things, our confidence must
be in Him who said, “Other sheep I have, which are not
of this fold; them also must I bring, and there shall be
one fold, one shepherd.”

One Small Site for a Kurd, one Giant Leap for Kurdistan

Could you be the person who goes down in history as the William Caxton of Kurdistan?  Do you remember, William Caxton is reckoned to be the man who introduced the printing press to England, and as a printer became the first retailer of printed books in England.  I believe a transliteration tool would be a huge technological-educational leap

forward for Kurds and Kurdish culture worldwide.

Why is this needed? Most Kurds can only properly read and write in their language in one script, either the Latin script or the Arabic script.  And foreigners, even those who sweat away learning the Arabic script, will generally always be able to read Kurdish in Latin script many times faster.

چاوانی باشی؟ ———-> Çawan î baş î? (The standard greeting How are you, are you well?)

But some people, myself included, are constantly transforming one script into another to meet the needs of the varied readership you might have in presentations and transnational Facebook groups, for example.  Kurdish Wikipedia would be a good example where it is probably increasingly getting used, but many people would be hindered from reading it because they can’t read, or can’t read at all well, the Kurmanji site in Latin script or the Sorani site in modified Arabic script (sometimes called the ‘Kurdish’ script).

It is true, there are tools that do this 90% accurately; Chawg and Lexilogos, for example, the former marginally better than the latter it seems.  And Kurmanji Wikipedia itself allows you to switch between scripts, though, again, erratically.  So my question in this blog post is: is there a volunteer, or even a professional IT engineer, who could blaze a trail and design an online tool that does this with near 100% accuracy?

There is no way to get ‘technology to do it all for you’.  If you’re not familiar with the scripts, ‘و’ in Arabic script is transliterated to either ‌u or w: you just have to know the word and then decide whether it’s the ‘u’ sound or the ‘w’ sound.

My input into this conversation is as follows:

• What is needed is a word-bank which contains every word in every possible inflection, listed with its correct transcription from one alphabet to the other.  This is where our language consultancy has a lot of experience.  Whenever we edit dictionary pages on ku.wiktionary.org we enter a word in both scripts.  So, the data is there: see for example this dictionary page where a giraffe is spelt in Arabic script midway down the page.  Many pages on Kurdish Wiktionary have only pages in one script, so we would need a bot to roughly transliterate them and insert a flag asking the reader to correct the transcription if it is flawed.
• furthermore, many more words need to be created so as to cover plurals and different tenses and cases.  Some of that has already been automated.  See, for example, the box containing all verb conjugations of the Kudish word for ‘put’.  But in Wiktionary many of these word-forms have not yet been given pages of their own, defining a word as e.g. “second-person singular past perfect of the verb ‘to put'”.  So, that’s another big project.
• another question is whether that data within ku.wiktionary.org can easily be mined and placed at the disposal of a machine transliteration tool.
• if it can, it would want to be set up such that the user can submit their corrections to the site’s draft transliteration.  That way, a lot of creases will be ironed out for future users.

That would be a fine tool for all those who read and write seriously in Kurdish.  30 million people worldwide could stand to benefit.  But I’ll leave you with a final example of how fiddly this procedure is:

• One of the most tedious tasks when transliterating Kurdish from Arabic to Latin script is the fact that Arabic script has no capitals.  To be sure, پاریس would obviously be Paris not paris.  But the real fine tuning would come when it has to be decided whether ئازاد (azad) is an adjective meaning free or capital-A Azad, a boy’s name.

 

 

How easy is it to self-publish on Kindle & Google Play?

I have been wondering how to fund our dictionary work this year.  I feel a burden not to fundraise in quite the same way as we have in the last two years.  It would be great to see more funding coming from Kurds and people actually working with Kurds.

For the last year or so I have been collecting Kurdish words and phrases under the title ‘You Know More Kurdish than You Think’.  I could probably quite easily write up my copious notes (written and mental) into a booklet that I would sell to anyone interested in the Kurds, their language and culture.

If I sold 1,000 copies of a booklet and charged people the price of one Kurdish language lesson (c$10), I could raise $10,000, which would go a long way towards paying our editor who is doing such amazing work on the Kurdish Wiktionary.  Even if I only sold 100 copies, it would still be worth it.

(We might sell more if we sold it for $5 each or even the $3 that apps usually sell for, but that’s a separate issue)

Anyway, before deciding on this, I need to know:

1. how easy it is to self-publish on Kindle
2. any details on how much of a cut Amazon get from your sale price.
3. If it is possible to add audio to the text.  The nature of this text is that it would be best read out.
4. An app might be better- that seems to be the way publishing is going, that some people buy books from Google Play these days.  That might deal with the need for a multi-media publication.

   Please post any comments here- I looked into this a while ago and it was difficult to get clear guidance.

   In brief, here’s what the booklet/ app would be about:

   You Know More Kurdish Than You Think
   One of the best ways to ENJOY speaking Kurdish is to use all those English words that they’ve kidnapped and dressed up in Kurdish pantaloons. For example, when Kurds say someone is a ‘sînema’, they mean he’s ‘a real character’, a joker.  A ‘joker’, on the other hand, is the Kurdish word for a ‘jack-of-all-trades’- or a universal remote control, while we’re at it…

   If you want to buy denim jeans, you know that word already- you’re looking for a pair of ‘kowboy’. (Parents are told in all seriousness that the school uniform for boys is ‘kowboy’)  If on the other hand, you’re watching a Western with Kurdish friends, although John Wayne may be wearing a pair of kowboy, he is not a ‘kowboy’, but rather a ‘tîksas’, even if he’s actually riding through Arizona.
   So, jeans, you see, are not especially trendy: if you want to look the part, make sure you have the minimalist facial hair known as a ‘SIM-kart’- that finger-nail sized patch under the lower-lip.  Actually, that’s no longer the ‘modelle’ now.

   Oh, and while you watch the ‘filum’, make sure you order some ‘kentekî’ with some ‘fînger’ (=finger chips) followed perhaps by some ice cream in a ‘biskwît’, which has evolved from the traditional European biscuit into something more conical.

   And finally, it’s time to say Goodbye.  But Kurds say Hallo when they mean Goodbye.  Clearly the Beatles were advocating for the Kurdish community as they sang in their Sgt Pepper suits back in 1967 ‘I don’t know why you say Goodbye I say Hello’…

 

“They took our houses, they took our women, but they can never take our memories”

NGO workers often struggle to befriend the Yezidis they minister to in Kurdistan.  But one key to developing the relationship is for project workers to take a real interest in the villages people have come from.

If we talk about education and current affairs, these folk will likely feel belittled about all they don’t know; if we lower ourselves to ask them about their villages, they will maybe realise they actually were quite expert in the history, geography and economy of their village.

The first step is adding to Wikipedia a full list of the villages of Sinjar.  English Wikipedia lists the main settlements, but ku.wikipedia.org is the site where a full alphabetic listing of villages is being kept.  Ask a Sinjari friend the name of their village or hamlet, and if it’s not on the list, you can add it! Wikipedia is a great way to help disempowered people and put their village on the map.  They can be empowered in a small but significant way by being the geographers and historians of their own village.

I have opened a webpage called Sinjar Stories.  Anyone can click the edit icon and add their notes.  Just remember this short URL tinyURL.com/sinjarstories and start recording any interesting info.  This is a source that can be cited when a Wikipedia page is written for a village.

I have also just discovered the excellent multi-layered mapping at Wikimapia.  Click on Categories and you can choose to view villages, schools or ‘interesting places’ for example: another great way to while away the hours profitably while drinking tea with Shingalis.

 

 

Training Course for Wiktionarians?

Related to the previous post is this question: how can I provide training for my staff that will make them more effective lexicographers?

For example, we are doing a feasibility study on launching a Sorani-dialect Wiktionary that would be a cousin site to the ku.wiktionary.org site.

The two dialects are quite similar, but you cannot lump them together and just have one monolingual Kurdish dictionary.  Either you define a giraffe in Kurmanji or you define it in Sorani.  The answer is having two separate wiktionaries.  (In fact, a stub already exists for Sorani: ckb.wiktionary.org, but noone seems to have added data to it yet)

But much of the data would be shared.  Only slight changes to the page below would be needed, and Bob’s Your Uncle you have a Sorani dictionary entry for the word giraffe.

But how exactly does one acquire the skills to do that sort of data export-import?

And we’d like to be able to adapt and improve the actual apparatus and navigation of the Wiktionary itself.  Any insight anybody?

 

Techie Help Needed with Wiki work

Lexicography – The art of writing dictionaries – has always been 99% Perspiration and 1% Inspiration.  But the ground has shifted massively in recent decades.  Now much of the sweat can be absorbed by computers.

I wanted to put this request out to techie-minded friends of our work: can anyone find a way for us to automatise the hyperlinking of words?

Let me explain: in Wiktionary, and Wikipedia too, a term can be further explored by hopping to a page for that particular word.  This is a crucial advantage in online dictionaries: if you don’t understand a word within a definition of a word, just click on it and you will get redirected to that word itself.

But the Kurdish Wiktionary often imports data from printed dictionaries – and these definitions do not contain hyperlinks.

Consider an example from the English Wiktionary:

———————————————–

step ladder (plural step ladders)

A ladder with steps or treads instead of rungs that is hinged in the middle…
———————————————–

If you were curious as to what a rung was, just click on ‘rung’ and you’ll be able to see.

If you cleck the edit icon, you will see that the code for this entry reads as follows:

# A [[ladder]] with [[step]]s or [[tread]]s instead of [[rung]]s.

You will notice that the word ‘rungs’ is not hyperlinked, but rather ‘rung’, because the headword to look up is rung not rungs.  So a dictionary editor has to take care what exactly he hyperlinks.  And it’s a judgment call as to which of the words he hyperlinks, because it is clearly not useful to hyperlink common words like ‘a’, ‘with’ or ‘of’.

But my basic question here is: how can we automate a lot of this work?  Can we at least set up a short-cut so that all we have to do is highlight a word and press something like Alt-H in order to hyperlink it: ie insert square brackets round it?

I know that you can choose between visual editing and source editing.  The former does automate some of the tasks, but we have found that once you know the code fairly well it’s quicker to do it using the source code.  But tailor-made shortcuts would be a godsend.

Please enter comments if you have any ideas.

A Classic Kurdish Poem

Now translated into English.

Few expats give time to reading Kurdish poetry, and yet it is vital to understanding the way Kurdish people think.  And although few Kurds pick up and read books of poetry, many of them are impacted by the poetry that is set to music, this poem The Bride of the Kurds being a good example.

Here is my translation of it.  If you would like to study the poem more closely, download my translation, and you will find there an introduction and extensive translation notes at the end.  This really is a preprepared Kurdish lesson, designed  for anyone who wants to understand the Kurdish mind better, and to empathise with their sufferings and dashed hopes.

Bwîka Kurdan           / The Bride of the Kurds           Translation © Jeremy Fowler 2015

Apologies for the poor formatting.  I have removed the endnotes from this edition, but the superscriptions remain; it all comes out neatly if you download it from Dropbox. 

1.	Ey felek bo te dinalim, bo çî nêrgiz çirmisîn?	O universe, I am crying for you, why have the narcissi faded?
2.	Ew çima bextê me, hoye[i] her bê dost û bê kes în?	Why is this our lot, that we are friendless and forlorn?
3.	Qet[ii] dê hêt ew roja me divêt, kehniya warî bizêt?	Is it true that a day will come, so that the springs[iii] of the motherland will flow?
4.	Jê[iv] vexûn desta bi hilînîn,[v] jê vexûn çend me bivêt?	Will we drink with raised hands, will we drink to our hearts’ content?
5.	Agirê sar û vemirî, çav me lê ye geş bibit.	The cold and quenched fire, our eyes are on it, for it to roar into flame.[vi]
6.	Ew buhara têhnê kuştî, hêvîdar im xoş[vii] bibit.	This parched spring,[viii] I hope it will be pleasant.
7.	Kurdno, rabin bibînin berxekê jar[ix] û ze’îf	O Kurds, arise and look at the impoverished and weak lamb
8.	Dane ber pal û kêşana, xencerek dijwar li dîf.	Subjected to push and pull,[x] with a threatening dagger at the ready.
9.	Ew werîsê tê alandî her ji hiriya berxî ye	That rope is spun[xi] from the lamb’s own wool
10.	Pê dikêşin serbirînê bû werîsê nuxî[xii] ye.	They pull it to its beheading, and with that rope it falls.
11.	Mezina ji mêje gotine dujminê serê[xiii] xo kew.	The elders said long ago, that the partridge is the enemy against itself…
12.	Dar bi darî têt birînê, destikê bivirî dar e, lew.	Wood is chopped by wood… the handle of the axe is wooden, do you catch my drift?[xiv]
13.	Nê[xv] me nalîne ji bivirî, sed hizar cara hewar.	Surely we are crying because of the axe, a hundred thousand times crying for help.
14.	Em bi wî bivirî ketîne, hind nesax û birîndar.	We have fallen by this axe, some ill and some injured.
15.	Nê me nalîne ji mêje bû hetavek ruhn û geş.	Surely we have been crying for a long time, for clear and strong sunshine.
16.	Dawetî rabin semayê, pûç bikin berperên reş	The dancers will arise for the dance, they will destroy those dark chapters.[xvi] * future or imperative?
17.	Evro kanî li min wê rojê pir ji xoşî[xvii] û renge reng?	Today, where is that day I long for, full of good cheer and colour?[xviii]
18.	Vebiguhêzin[xix] bûka Kurdan, ew torîna şox û şeng.	*Let us Receive the Bride of the Kurds! that gracious girl[xx] attractive and bright.
19.	Kanê kew bo çî naxwînin? kanê warê gul gulî?	Where are the partridges? Why are they not reciting? Where is the land of blooming flowers?[xxi]
20.	Lê[xxii] diçerînin gurk û rûvî boş[xxiii] e lê mar û kûlî	In this land wolves and foxes are grazing, and there’s snakes and locusts[xxiv] everywhere. / *  In this land wolves are grazing and foxes run riot[xxv], and  there’s snakes and locusts[xxvi] everywhere.
21.	Kanê mizgefta me, tê da sed nivêj rojê kirîn?	Where is our mosque, within it a hundred ritual prayers?[xxvii]
22.	Kanê dargîza, tê da şîn[xxviii] gûze, terr me jê kirîn?	Where is the walnut tree inside it,[xxix] with ripe walnuts, fresh and tender[xxx], that we picked?
23.	Kanê robarê pir bizav, kanê pêlên hêviyê?	Where is the rushing river, where are the waves of hope?
24.	Kanê bêrî, ka şivan? Geş bikin Kurdîniyê!	Where is the milkmaid, where is the shepherd? Stoke the fires of our Kurdishness![xxxi]
25.	Ka gelavêja[xxxii] me dîtî, wextekê zêrîn bijar?	Where is Sirius that we saw,[xxxiii] a time of choice gold?
26.	Lew me gotê: hinde êdî her dê mînit ew bihar	That is why we said that from now on it will endure forever, that Spring.[xxxiv]
27.	Baxçeyê vîna nemayî; kê we kir[xxxv] kavil bibit?	The lost garden of love; who made it into a ruin?[xxxvi]
28.	Torîna bextê me, evro kê we kir zîz û sil bibit?	The gracious girl of our fortune, on this day who made her stroppy and sullen?[xxxvii]
29.	Evro kanê li min wê rojê pir ji xoşî û renge reng?	Today, where is that day I long for,[xxxviii] full of good cheer and colour?[xxxix]
30.	Vebiguhêzin bûka Kurdan ew torîna şox û şeng.	Receive the Bride of the Kurds! , that gracious girl attractive and bright.
31.	Da bibînin kiç û lawan mil bi mil bêne şahiyê,	* Linking before or after? So that we will see[xl] the daughters and sons, shoulder to shoulder coming to the celebration,
32.	Bişikînin kul û êşan ber hetava sahiyê	(Imperative?*) Smash[xli] the hurt and pain, beneath a cloudless sky
33.	Da bihelînim ji Kurdan ala ser çiyayên pir ji xwîn	So that I (I or we*) will raise the flag of the Kurds,[xlii] on the mountains full of blood
34.	Da hawar kem ji dilê sotî “Her bijît Serbest û Jîn”	So that I cry for help from a burnt heart, “Long live Freedom and Life!”
35.	Ne guneh û ne şerm e jî, ger[xliii] me jî ala hebit	Neither sin nor shame if there is a flag for us;
36.	Ne umêdek kûr[xliv] û dûr e, bawerî bi sala hebit	Not a hope that remains deep and far, I believe within a year
37.	Dê ji kiluxên wan şehîdan sitînekê bilind vedim	I shall, with the skulls of the * / those martyrs, set up a tall pillar,
38.	Pê vekim alayê Kurdan, da bigehit tava germ	Make it the flag of the Kurds, so that it reaches the warm sun
39.	Bêjime[xlv] xelkê vê cîhanê, navê Kurda jî heye!	I say to the people of this world, the name ‘Kurds’ also exists!
40.	Kî dişêt navê me têk dit hindî ku rêber heye?	Who can * our name, [xlvi]
41.	Evro kanê li min wê rojê pir ji xweşî û renge reng?	Today, where is that day, full of good cheer and colour?
42.	Vebiguhêzin bûka Kurdan ew torîna şox û şeng	Receive the Bride of the Kurds! that gracious girl attractive and bright.
43.	Bigirnijînin beçke şêran, ew helal û ew rihan	Smile O lion cubs, those[xlvii] wild flowers[xlviii] and rosemary.
44.	Piz û zarokên şehîdan ew kulîlkên çi nezan	The flocks* and children of the martyrs, those flowers*, how innocent[xlix]
45.	Bêne[l] hêzkê li nav çinaran, xefk û davên xo vedin	May there be a swing between the sycamore trees;[li] free yourself  from the trap and snare![lii]
46.	Kêl û vêlan biçiklînin,[liii] bêjin “Êk du xu veden”	Set up the stone skittles!  “Move over- it’s my turn!”[liv]
47.	Bêjine şalûl û tivîrkan, werine hêlînên berê	Say to the singing bird and tweeting bird, come to your nests of old
48.	Werine ser gulb û çeqên xo, bixwînin vê berperê,	Come to your flowers[lv] and branches, recite[lvi] this new chapter,
49.	Berpera jîna[lvii] me ya nû, ew jiyana dûr ji jan,	The chronicle* of our new life, this life far from agony,
50.	Dûr ji saliskî û rûmetî: serferazî bû şiyan.[lviii]	Far from flattery and vainglory, free to live out our potential.
51.	Kotirîn û dad in ji dadê bû Xudê dadê nekin.	Pigeons/doves* [lix], do not * for God.
52.	Ehremen[lx] evroke pûç bû. Sed tilîlî[lxi] bo[lxii] vedin!	Ahriman today, may he be destroyed.  Sound out one hundred ululations!