Learn Mayan

When I first visited the Yucatan peninsula in the early 1980s, I was warned that not many people spoke English, so I should be prepared to rely on pigeon Spanish and well-honed charade skills. Unfortunately, I found that the reality was actually worse: if you got away from the hotel desk and waiters, many Yucatecans actually spoke Mayan as their first language and knew only a little street-Spanish. As I ventured outside of tourist areas, I found that most people in small to medium-ish pueblos had at best picked up steet-Spanish when they were 14-17 years old, and that usually happened only if they had lived in a bigger city. People raised only on their family milpa (the classic Maya family corn plot, hacked out ofthe jungle) or in the pueblitos might not know much Spanish at all.

This is still often true, particularly with construction and cleaning workers who daily commute into Merida and Progreso. I’ve found many of our Mayan-speaking acquaintances actively avoid talking with obvious foreigners, because they’ve only had frustrating past experiences trying to mesh their embarrassingly weak street-Spanish with our even cruder NOB Spanish (NOB = North of the Border). As a result, these friends retreat into their shells when in the Big City, and they tend to only exchange brief glances and occasional shy smiles with NOB folks and white-skinned Yucatecans. Is it time to reach across this unnecessary divide?

Want to bridge the gap? Learn a few basic Mayan phrases.

Here’s a dandy Yucatan Living article on the basic pronunciations of Mayan with some additional background information and a little vocabulary that offers a good start: Mayan for Ts’ulo’ob.

The next step? Add the sorts of things we all enjoy talking about:
How are you? Where are you from? What’s your name? Do you have children?

Let’s just jump into the deep end! Mayan speakers absolutely love it when goofy-gringos attempt to speak Mayan. You may find that they initially don’t understand you at all, because they’ve never heard Mayan coming out of a light-skinned person’s mouth, and it’s just too foreign to be believed.

Let’s start with some greetings, followed by a reply:

Bix a beel?	Beesh-uh-bell	Formal: How are you?
General Reply: Ma’alob	Mah ah-low(b)	I’m good!
General Reply: Ma’alobi	Mah ah-low-bee	I’m Very good!
Bax ka’wali?	Bah-sch kah wah-lee	Informal: How are you?
Specific Reply: Mix ba	Meesh bah	I’m good.
Bix anikech?	Beesh ahneekehsh
General Reply: Uts	Ooots
General Reply: Utsil	Oootseal	I’m very good!

Hmmmm… how can “I’m good” be said three different ways? And why is that (b) in parenthesis?

For starters, the Mayan Language is very different from English, and many, many times there are no one-for-one, word-by-word translations between the two languages, so it’s best to learn Mayan as concepts and phrases rather than rigid translations.

For example, Mayan nouns change their endings to include information about that noun:

Did you notice how the endings of "na’" changed to described which type of mother was used?

How about that “b”? The “b” in parenthesis implies that you don’t actually say the be “b” at the end of a Mayan word – kind of like the “h” in herb, but if there are other letters after the ending “b”, then you voice the “b”: ma’alob = mah ah-loh, while ma’alobi’ = mah ah-loh-bee.

What other ways will people also often reply to those “Howdy!” greetings above? They will likely also include a “and how are you?”

• Modern Mayan
• Cancun Mayan
• Classic Maya
• Temple Maya