Learning Pashto

There is a scene in David Sedaris's book "Me Talk Pretty One Day" where he describes learning French (by the way if you have not read that book, stop reading this blog, run to the bookstore, purchase it, read it, stop rolling on the floor laughing, and then come back to the blog). In the book, Sedaris describes the stages of learning a language; one in particular is called "the Angry Baby stage," in which nouns are shouted and objects pointed at "Food!" "Juice" "Ashtray." I am in a different situation having decided to use the Rosetta Stone software to learn Pashto - the language spoken in southern Afghanistan. If you have never used the Rosetta Stone method I shall describe it for you. Rather like that stern Carmelite nun who taught math in junior high, the Rosetta Stoners believe in tough love. They eschew things like translation and dictionaries, believing that one should learn a language like a baby - by associating words with objects. So the first several lessons resemble closely David Sedaris's experience but with objects seemingly randomly selected. I learned the words for car, fish, airplane, fruit cocktail, and child. No sentences, no verbs. As I progress I get to learn more complex, but equally useless phrases like: "the boy jumps," and "woman dancing." No real sentences yet, no greetings, not even "the boy jumps out of an airplane with fruit cocktail," though I think I could suss that one out.

At some point in the lessons I am waiting for the "aha' moment where I will begin to put pronouns, nouns and verbs together in practical phrases. My other source of Pashto language skills is the handbook the Forces gives everyone deploying here. And where the Rosetta Stone language is abstract and obscure, the handbook is brutally practical and probably not meant for someone like me working in a headquarters. So while I can say " Show me your ID card!" "Don't move" and "Flat on the ground," none of these phrases are conducive to a healthy office working environment, unless you work in government.

And so as I try to find a way to work the following exchange into casual conversation:
"Is that a white cat"
"No, that is not a white cat, that is a black cat"
I continue to slog through the Rosetta Stone lessons. Wish me luck.