Learning Runyankole

I've spent a good part of this week starting to explore the mysteries of Runyankole. I NEED to learn this language. Except in official meetings and when someone is speaking directly to me, all the talk (and lots of laughter) is in Runyankole so I feel like I'm missing so much of life here. Also, most people in the village speak no English so even to get my basic needs met I need the language. I have bought what I think are the only Runyankole grammar and phrase books and have a tutor in the village for Monday-Wednesday and a tutor in Mbarara for Friday-Sunday. Some of the things I learned this week: Most educated people don't read and write Runyankole. Despite spending their whole lives speaking it, they were taught in school only to read and write English, (This is changing and there is now some curriculum in Runyankole literacy) which I think explains some of the incredible variation in speech (some people say... and some people say..; also lots of variation in spelling). According to my grammar book, Runyankole is an 'agglutinative' language. It starts with root words and adds on prefixes, infixes (new to me- it's when you stick the extra part in the middle of the word) and suffixes. All the words in the sentence tend to agree with subject but there are 13 different classes of subjects and the agreement for adjectives, objects, etc. are each different so all very confusing. This is to say nothing of modified verbs and their tenses. I am learning more about parts of sentences than I ever learned for English. But, I think because of never studying Runyankole themselves, no one was able to explain to me why a word that meant the same was different in different contexts. The grammar book was written in 1957 and is a bit dated. Some of the phrases I'm meant to memorize are, "The smith forges spears", and "How fine the cows are!". I'm passing on the first, have committed the second to memory. I've been asked (by Americans) what the language sounds like. (Try to tell someone what English sounds like!) Here goes- There are lots of syllables and, because of the agreement of words and probably just because, there is repetition of syllables- e.g.'please to meet you' is "nashemererwa okukushanga". R's are rolled. There's a lot of "ch" sounds though it's written 'ki' and 'ky'. Most people speak very fast and, in sentences, connecting vowels are dropped. A lot of friendly chats are loud and sound urgent and there tends to be lots of laughter. There's about 6 ways each of saying 'ehhhhh' and 'hmmmm', ranging from 'ok' to 'are you kidding?' to 'how great!' to 'how terrible!'. Runyankole is a tonal language though I don't even know enough to understand when it makes a difference. I learned last night that to say noon, you say six. (1 o'clock is 7 o'clock and vice versa). No one could explain why but my trusty grammar book says time is counted from dawn so there's daytime hours- time from 6 am- and night time hours- time from 6pm. Since this is the equator, it's conveniently consistent! I have been ready to give up (it seems so impossible) but last night someone repeated word for word (a very short conversation) an interchange I had had with a shop keeper a week ago and told me how enthusiastic the shop keeper was about my attempts; and I can now pick out some words in conversation. Putting together the meanings of sentences will have to wait!