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Friday June 18, 2004

Beyond alef, bet and chet, it’s all Greek to me

by dan pine

I hold my siddur, reading the Hebrew as ploddingly as a preschooler slogging through “The Pokey Little Puppy.” Some words and phrases I manage well. But mostly the text slides by me like a hockey puck on thin ice.

Even after years of familiarity with the alef-bet, my Hebrew language skills remain frustratingly fossilized. I know only the same 50 words I memorized ages ago, and I’m still apt to confuse vet with khaf, hay with chet.

Still, even standing outside the gates of Hebrew fluency as I do, it’s hard to miss the beauty of the language. I love its alternately rough and lambskin-smooth texture. I love its amazing root system, which generates countless vocabulary possibilities out of modest three-letter morphemes. I love the fiery look of the Hebrew letters, as if each had just been smelted by some divine ironworker.

But because I taught myself all the Hebrew I know, I’m stuck in beginnersville.

It’s a very familiar place. I’ve always loved to dabble in languages. French, Spanish, German, Russian — I’ve flirted with them all, though only with Spanish have I come close to a proper romance. But with Hebrew, the living language of my people, somehow I barely shook hands.

Maybe because it’s hard. Hebrew is so linguistically different from the European languages I studied in high school. Half of English vocabulary comes from French, but other than “amen” and “hallelujah,” I can’t think of too many English words borrowed from the Hebrew. You start from scratch when you take up this language.

Also, unless you spend time in Israel, or seek out the local Israeli ex-pat community to practice with (neither of which I ever did), it’s nearly impossible to cross over to fluency.

I did have fun cramming a few weeks in advance of my trip to Israel last fall. I checked out a few “teach yourself Hebrew” tapes from the Albany library, bought a couple of primers, then hit the books.

I did really well, too. I totally mastered the Hebrew for, “I want to eat something now … Is the restaurant here? … My Hebrew is not good. … Where is the restaurant? Thank you, but I don’t want to drink beer at the hotel now. … Do you want to drink beer in the restaurant?” and lots more.

My crash course actually helped enormously while I was in Israel. Nothing brings a tourist closer to natives than speaking a few words in their language. Even saying, “Todah rabah (thanks a lot)” to waiters and bus drivers made me feel I belonged there, that Israel was my country too. Being able to say “hello,” “how are you,” “please,” “thank you” and “goodbye” in Hebrew provided just enough electricity to light up my casual encounters with Israelis.

Predictably, within weeks of coming home, I forgot much of what I had learned. Most likely the Hebrew words and phrases are parked somewhere in my cerebral cortex, but I’m not sure I can find the valet ticket.

Obviously, if I would just enroll in a class at Berkeley’s Lehrhaus Judaica or any of my local synagogues’ adult ed Hebrew classes, I could do some catching up. Maybe even become conversant within a year or two. It’s all about priorities.

Like so many other fanciful goals of mine –– learning to play that Mozart sonata on the piano, rafting down the Amazon River, losing 15 pounds –– I suspect mastering Hebrew is something I will never do.

Rather than lament it, though, I find myself enjoying the limited Hebrew skills I do have. Poring over a passage of Torah, painstakingly trying to pronounce the words and occasionally comprehending the meaning of a phrase or two is a source of pleasure, if not exactly pride.

Besides, most of the Hebrew words I do know are good ones: shamayim (heaven), emet (truth), olam (world), kadosh (holy), chai (life), shir (song), brachah (blessing) are some of my favorites. For some reason, I also know microgal (microwave) and nikoy yavesh (dry cleaning) too; mundane, yes, but even those have a certain lilt to them.

So I think I’ll stick with my 50 Hebrew terms, hoard them like a less-than-mint condition coin collection and content myself with my smattering. I may not be able to speak to Israelis, but the Hebrew words I do know definitely speak to me.

Dan Pine lives and kvetches in Albany. He can be reached at dan@jweekly.com.

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