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| Telling "vanakkam" with this posture is very common among Tamil people. |
kálai vanakkam - morning greeting
madhiya vanakkam - afternoon greeting
málai vanakkam - evening greeting
iravu vanakkam - night greeting
You can also add the word iniya (literally, sweet) before all of the greetings above to make it sound more pleasing.
Telling who and how someone is
'I am' is nán and 'I am not' is nán illa. Notice that the be-verb 'am' is omitted in Tamil. It does not mean that it has no be-verbs. Grammatically speaking, be-verbs are avoided when telling who someone or what something is. Naturally, Tamil needs be-verbs while explaining how someone or something is. I explain this phenomenon later in this post. Just for now, practise the following sentences.
nán Guhan I am Guhan
nán oru ásiriyan I am a teacher
nán Valli I am Valli
nán oru ásiriyai I am a teacher
As clearly seen, oru is the indefinite article 'a'. Tamil has no definite article 'the'; instead, andha (literally that) is used. Notice that Guhan is a male. So, he says that he is a teacher using masculine form, ásiriyan. Valli is a female and hence, she uses feminine form, ásiriyai. In Tamil, most of the common nouns have -an suffix for masculine and -ai suffix for feminine. This distinction is also found in English; for example: actor and actress.
Telling how someone is, requires be-verb in Tamil. irukkén is used for 'am'. So, nán irukkén means 'I am'. To explain how you are, simply add irukkén at the end of the sentence. Read out the following sentences for practice.
nán sandhósamá irukkén I am happy
nán oyaramá irukkén I am tall
If you add -á prefix to a noun, it becomes an adjective in Tamil. In this case, sandhósam is happiness and oyaram is height. To negate the above sentence, just replace irukkén with illa (no).
nán Guhan illa I am not Guhan
nán oru ásiriyan illa I am not a teacher
nán sandhósamá illa I am not happy
nán oyaramá illa I am not tall
My and mine
The word ennóda means both my and mine.
ennóda pér Guhan My name is Guhan
ennóda vídu romba perusu My house is very big
Asking simple questions
Asking Yes/No type question is very easy in Tamil. You can simply append -á to nouns and -vá to adjectives in a sentence to convert it as a question. Carefully read out the following example sentences to get get a clear idea.
nán Guhan I am Guhan
nán Guhaná? Am I Guhan?
nán sandhósamá irukkén I am happy
nán sandhósamává irukkén? Am I happy?
You can also add enna (what) before the noun or adjective which is under question. It will not affect the meaning, anyway. So both, nán Guhaná? and nán enna Guhaná? mean the same.
You
Let us now learn how to begin a real conversation in Tamil. We need nínga 'you' and the verb irukkínga 'are' while we directly refer the listener (In grammatical jargon, second person).
nínga Guhaná? Are you Guhan?
nínga oru tíchará? Are you a teacher?
Well, let us pause here and consider the second sentence. It contains a word which sounds like English. Yes, tíchar came from the English word 'teacher'. Tamil people casually use English words in their everyday speech. This form of speech is often refered to as 'Tanglish'. Tanglish also contains words from other languages like Sanskrit, Hindi, Urdu, Telugu and Portuguese. The word sandhósam is actually a Telugu word which in turn rooted from Sanskrit. The Tamil equivalent of the word sandhósam is magizhtchi which is now used only in classical form of Tamil.
Okay. Let us continue learning the word 'you'. Let us try to use irukkínga 'are' along with nínga 'you' in the example sentences.
nínga sandhósamá irukkínga You are happy
nínga oyaramá irukkínga You are tall
What will you do if you have to negate the above sentences? The answer is easy. Simply replace irukkínga with illa.
nínga sandhósamá illa You are not happy
nínga oyaramá illa You are not tall
Asking more questions
Until now, you know enna 'what' turns a sentence into a question. But now, we are going to see its second meaning - 'what?'. Similarly, endha means 'which?', epdi means 'how?' and yáru means 'who?'.
ennóda vélai enna? What is job?
nán epdi irukkén? How am I?
ennóda péná endha kalar? Which color is my pen?
nínga yáru? Who are you?
nán Guhan I am Guhan
Valli yáru? Who is Valli?
Valli oru ásiriyai Valli is a teacher
Dialog
Guhan kálai vanakkam! epdi irukkínga, Valli?
Valli kálai vanakkam! nán nalla irukkén, nandri. Sivá yáru?
Guhan Sivá ennóda mánavan.
Valli Sivá nalla paiyaná?
Guhan ámá, Sivá nalla paiyan.
Guhan Good morning! How are you, Valli?
Valli Good morning! I'm fine, thanks. Who is Siva?
Guhan Siva is my student.
Valli Is Siva a good boy?
Guhan Yes, Siva is a good boy.
Vocabulary Listing
ámá yes
ásiriyai fem. teacher
ásiriyan mas. teacher
endha which
ennóda my, mine
epdi how
illa no
iniya sweet
iravu night
irukkén am
irukkínga (you) are
kalar color
kálai morning
madhiyam afternoon
magizhtchi happiness
málai evening
mánavan student
nalla good
nallá fine
nandri thanks
nán I
nínga you
oru a
oyaram height
paiyan boy
perusu big
péna pen
romba very
sandhósam happiness
tíchar teacher
vanakkam greetings
vélai job, work
vídu house
yáru who
