Translation help wanted

David Robertson ddr11 at COLUMBIA.EDU
Wed May 11 19:10:26 UTC 2005


Anyone have suggestions on translating this sentence?

The setting is a marathon lesson in Chinuk Wawa shorthand being given to a
large group of adults at Kamloops Reserve until late at night.

"Vironika chako sik tomtom wik kata nanich kopa ayu til iaka ac kopa lait."

On my first look at it, I got a meaning like "Veronica got upset (Vironika
chako sik tomtom), she couldn't see [metaphorically] (wik kata nanich
kopa) that her sister was very tired (ayu til iaka ac) from the [low]
light (kopa lait)."

It should be pretty clear why I'm not satisfied with this interpretation.

Your suggestions are solicited.

The above passage comes from Kamloops Wawa #112 (January 1894), page 5.

--Dave R.

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