Lesson 1
Welcome to Step-by-step Cheespeke! Perhaps you've been listening to the conversation of local Cheesecakes and have wondered what they talk about. Perhaps you're planning on holidaying in an area where the Cheesecake population is very large. Perhaps you're just curious to find out why over 3 million other people have already subscribed to the full version of Step-by-step Cheespeke. Whatever your motives for trying out this fascinating and ever-expanding language, Philonski and all her staff wish you the best of luck.
Lesson 1: present tense, articles, agreement of adjectives, basic vocabulary, a few phrases to get you going.
Cheespeke is a very simple language at its most basic level. There are only three types of verb and no irregulars to memorize. There are those which take an 'o' in the first person singular, those which drop a consonant in the third person plural and those which keep this consonant. It would be useful to have a memorable name for each of these groups, but there isn't one, so tough, you'll just have to remember them. There are five parts to each verb: I, you (referring to both singular and plural), he/she/it, we, they. The personal pronouns are: 'ey', 'te', 'sa', 'os' and 'ilen', although 'ey' is the only pronoun used directly along with a verb, (except in certain circumstances). Have a look at some common verbs to see how they work:
SILENU -- to be -- takes an 'o'
so
ses
sa
sos
silen
SPRENENU -- to say, talk -- drops a consonant
spren
sprenes
sprena
sprenos
sprelen
KANLENU -- to know -- keeps the consonant
kan
kanes
kana
kanos
kanlen
There are no cases as such in Cheespeke, but outside what we can call the "nominative", 'ey' becomes 'me'. This is important to remember when using "dative" verbs, which include YUMENU (to like, please) and DENKLENU (to thank):
YUMENU
o me/te/sa/os/ilen
yum
yumes
yuma
yumos
yulen
DENKLENU
o me/te/sa/os/ilen
denk
denkes
denka
denkos
denklen
Nouns in Cheespeke are of two genders, masculine and feminine. It's easy to see which is which -- those ending in 'a' are feminine, all others are masculine. Adjectives (generally placed before the noun) must agree if they can -- those ending in 'o' should change their ending to 'a' before a feminine noun -- but many adjectives are invariable and take no ending at all. There is only one definite article ('li') and only one indefinite article ('in'), regardless of gender. 'This' and 'that' are both rendered by the same word (explaining why you often see Cheesecakes gesticulating wildly!), which agrees with the noun: 'estro'/'estra'. Plurals are formed by adding 'za' or 'oza' if the noun ends in a consonant. OK, that's enough grammar for now. Here are some simple phrases followed by some vocabulary you should learn.
PHRASES
Li bom sa vay hoot. The tree is very tall.
Ey go o li parc, meza copoza met. I go to the park with my friends.
Shay fes estra socha? What are you doing this evening?
O Peter daka John li bala. John gives Peter the ball.
O John denka Peter. Peter thanks John.
Hepos in vay gardina. Shay precho! We have a big garden. How lovely!
Sprelen shay o ilen yuma te rotop. They say they like your strawberry topping.
Kanes estro Cheesecake met li lotop? Do you know that lemon Cheesecake?
Sa in vay yumi Cheesecake! He is a very tasty Cheesecake!
VOCABULARY
hoot -- tall, high
parc -- park
met -- with
copo -- friend
socha -- evening
bom -- tree
bala -- ball
precho -- lovely
gardina -- garden
vay -- very, big, much
gilenu -- to go, walk
filenu -- to do, make
dakenu -- to give
heplenu -- to have
I'm getting bored now, so I expect you were long ago. That'll do for today.
Oh, have you finished? OK, I'll go away then.
Eh? Hang on! I'm getting into this. Take me to Lesson 2.
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