Is t’wa eystexwes kw’es las lex̲éywa tl’o su lóy kw’es ew hamámts o te sth’óqwi

Is t’wa eystexwes kw’es las lex̲éywa tl’o su lóy kw’es ew hamámts o te sth’óqwi means ‘I guess he liked to go torchlighting, because he was just giving away the fish’.

Audio: Elizabeth Herrling

Structure and Vocabulary

The structure of this phrase is as follows:

• i – an untranslatable auxiliary (‘helper’) verb, related to the meaning ‘here’
• -s – here, marks the presence of a third person (neigher you nor me) subject, in this case the understood ‘it’
• t’wa – maybe, would be, could be (see is tw’a)
• éystexw – to like, to enjoy
• -es – here, marks that a ‘third person’ (the understood subject ‘he’) is the subject.
• kw’es – that, to
• la – an auxiliary (‘helper’) verb, a reduced form of lám –to go
• -s – here, again a form of third person subject agreemtnt
• lex̲éywa – to torchlight
• tl’o su – together, these words mean because (you can also use them separately, but with somewhat different meanings)
• lóy – only
• kw’es – that
• ew…o – just (the two words together mean ‘just’)
• hamámt – giving away (this is the ‘-ing’ or ‘progressive’ form of mámt – to give away)
• te – the
• sth’óqwi – fish