Common mistakes in Malay 3

The third installment of 'Common mistakes in Malay' will be my focus in this post.

Here are four more errors in the Malay usage.
1. Duplicating compound words (kata majmuk).
Examples:
a) Pelajar diminta membawa alat tulis - alat tulis sendiri. [wrong]
Pelajar diminta membawa alat-alat tulis sendiri. [correct]
[Students are asked to bring their own statinery.]

b) Wakil rakyat-wakil rakyat berada di Parlimen sekarang. [wrong]
Wakil-wakli rakyat berada di Parlimen sekarang. [correct]
[The people's representatives are in Parliament now.]

2. Duplicating nouns and adjectives together in a sentence.
Examples:
a) Anak-anak Encik Lim pandai-pandai. [wrong]
Anak Encik Lim pandai-pandai. [correct]
Anak-anak Encik Lim pandai. [correct]
[All the sons of Mr Lim are clever.]

b) Penghuni-penghuni di kondominium di sana kaya-kaya. [wrong]
Penghuni di kondominium di sana kaya-kaya. [correct
Penghuni-penghuni di kondominium di sana kaya. [correct]
[All residents in the condominium there are rich.]

3 Duplicating the nouns after words denoting plurality.
Examples:
a) Persatuan pengguna-pengguna itu melindungi hak konsumer. [wrong]
Persatun pengguna itu melindungi hak konsumer. [correct]
[The consumers' association protects the right of consumers.]

b) Lelaki itu mengumpulkan daun-daun kering lalu memerunnya. [wrong]
Lelaki itu mengumpulkan daun kering lalu memerunnya. [correct]
[The man gathered dry leaves and burnt them.]

4 Duplicating nouns after 'antara'.
a) Kerjasama antara negara-negara jiran amat penting demi kebaikan bersama. [wrong]
Kerjasama antara negara jiran amat penting demi kebaikan bersama. [correct]
[Co-operation between neighbouring countries is vital for their common good.]

b) Pertandingan badminton antara kelas-kelas akan diadakan pada hujung minggu ini. [wrong]
Pertandingan badminton antara kelas akan diadakan pada hujung minggu ini. [correct]
[Inter-class badminton competition will be held this weekend.]

So much for four more of the common errors in the Malay usage for today.

Please be a man

In this post, I intend to discuss the words that should be behind 'Please be'.

If you want to know what words should follow 'Please be', you must realise that it is the same as the ones that go after am, is, are, was, were, will be, and so on. In other words, what goes after a verb-to-be.

They are nouns, adjectives, ing-verbs, and past participles.
Here are some examples:
a) I am a man. [noun (a man) is behind 'am']

b) She was smart when she was small. [adjective (smart) is after 'was']

c) They were returning home when it rained. [returning (ing-verb) follows 'were']

d) It will be written on the board. [written (past participle) is behind 'will be']

Hence you can have nouns, adjectives, ing-verbs and past participles after 'Please be'.
Look at the examples given below:
a) Please be a man and fight him. [noun (a man) stays behind 'be']

b) Please be punctual when you come for the meeting. [adjective (smart) is after 'be'.]

c) Please be moving as we don't time to idle any minute.[ing verb (moving) is behind 'be']

d) Please be informed that the meeting will be postponed to a date to be fixed later.[informed (past participle)follows 'be']

Common Mistakes in Malay 2

I will continue with common errors in Malay in this post.

1 Using penjodoh bilangan with abstract nouns.
Examples:
a) Dia mengemukakan dua buah cadangan dalam mesyuarat itu. [wrong]
Dia mengemukakan dua cadangan dalam mesyuarat itu. [correct]
[He put forward two suggestions in the meeting.]

b) Ketiga-tiga buah pendapat amat bernas. [wrong]
Ketiga-tiga pendapatnya amat bernas. [correct]
[All his three opinions are solid.]

2 Using 'pada' after affix 'ber_kan'.
Examples:
a) Dengan berdasarkan pada maklumat yang dikumpulkannya, dia membuat kesimpulan ini. [wrong]
Dengan berdasarkan maklumat yang dikumpulkannya, dia membaut kesimpulan ini. [correct]
[Based on the information he had collected, he formed the said conclusion.]

b) Dengan berpandukan pada peta itu, dia berjaya mencari tempat itu. [wrong]
Dengan berpandukan peta itu, dia berjaya mencari tempat itu. [correct]
[Guided by the map, he succeeded in finding the place.]

3 Leaving pendodoh bilangan when they are required to be grammatically correct.
Examples:
a) Dia membeli dua buku di kedai itu. [wrong]
Dia membeli dua buah buku di kedai itu. [correct]

b) Kedua-dua pelajar itu dihukum oleh guru disiplin. [wrong]
Kedua-dua orang pelajar itu dihukum oleh guru disiplin. [correct]
[Both students were punished by the disciplinary master.]

4 Errors in passive voice for first and second personal pronouns.
Examples:
a) Buku ini pernah dibaca oleh saya. [wrong]
Buku ini pernah saya baca. [correct]
[I have read this book before.]

b) Ibu bapamu harus dihormati oleh kamu. [wrong]
Ibu bapamu harus kamu hormati. [correct]
[You should respect your parents.]

So much for second instalment of common errors in Malay usage for today.

Common mistakes in Malay 1

As we learn by imitation, we tend to make mistakes when the one we imitate do so. This is true in languages, and Malay is no exception.

Let us look at a few common errors in Malay.

1 Leaving prefix meN (me, mem, men, meng, meny, menge)in transitive verbs in statements.
Examples:
a) Saya terima sepucuk surat daripada sahabat penaku. [wrong]
Saya menerima sepucuk surat daripada sahabat penaku. [correct]
[I received a letter from my pen-pal.]

b) Dia gunakan tangan kiri semasa menulis sesuatu.[wrong]
Dia menggunakan tangan kiri semasa menulis sesuatu. [correct]
[He uses his left tangan when he writes.]

2 Leaving kata sendi nama (prepositions) when they must be present.
Examples:
a) Kanak-kanak suka gula-gula. [wrong]
Kanak-kanak suka akan gula-gula. [correct]
[Children like sweets.]

b) Aminah sangat sayang anak tunggalnya. [wrong]
Aminah sangat sayang akan anak tunggalnya.[correct]
Aminah sangat sayang kepada anak tunggalnya. [correct]
[Aminah loves her only child very much.]

c) Saya tidak tahu namanya. [wrong]
Saya tidak tahu akan namanya. [correct]
[I do not know his name.]

d) Dia lupa alamat baru kawannya. [wrong]
Dia lupa akan alamat baru kawannya. [correct]
[He forgot the new address of his friend.]

3 Using kata sendi nama 'di' for time when 'pada' should be used.
Examples:
a) Rumah Minah didatangi kawan-kawannya di Hari Raya Aidilfitri. [wrong]
Rumah Minah didatangi kawan-kawannya pada Hari Raya Aidiltri. [correct]
[Minah's house was visited by her friends on Hari Raya Aidiltri (the Muslim's New Year after fasting for a month.]

b) Johari banyak menerima hadiah di hari jadinya. [wrong]
Johari banyak menerima hadiah pada hari jadinya. [correct]
[Johari received a lot of presents on his birthday.]

4 Using 'dalam' in front of concrete objects with space in them.
Examples:
a) Dompet saya tertinggal dalam teksi itu. [wrong]
Dompet saya tertinggal di dalam teksi itu. [correct]
[My wallet was left in the taxi.]

b) Banyak dokumen yang penting disimpannya dalam laci itu. [wrong]
Banyak dokumen yang penting disimpannya di dalam laci itu. [correct]
[He kept many important documents in the drawer.]

c) Adik saya masih belajar dalam perpustakaan itu. [wrong]
Adik saya masih belajar di dalam perpustakaan itu. [correct]
[My brother is still doing his studies in the library.]

So much for today's post. I shall discuss more common mistakes in Malay in my future posts.

Floating on Sungai Salang

When I was small, I used to play on the beach, picking seashells and chasing waves. My father was very strict and he told me not to swim in the sea. Believe it or not, I followed his advice. That explained why I did not how to swim although I lived near the sea. It was in the teachers' college that I joined the swimming club and learnt how to float. This training really helped me when I was teaching in Jerantut, Pahang because I used to go to Sungai Salang (I can't remember the correct name, anyway) with my colleagues. There I enjoyed floating more that swimming because my breast stroke was hopeless as I could not propel myself to go forward. I had to contend myself with my dog swim, that is, paddling with both hands to move forward.

Making sentences to fetch good marks in Malay

In this post, I would like to show readers how a sentence should be constructed in Malay so as to get full marks.

If you are given an idiom, say 'anak emas' which means the apple of one's eye and you construct a sentence such as 'Aminah ialah anak emas keluarganya.' you will not get full marks because I may not know what you mean if I do not know the meaning of 'anak emas'. However, if you elaborate further to give a clue as to what it means, you will get full marks. For example you can improve on the above sentence by writing 'Aminah ialah anak emas keluarganya kerana ibu bapanya sangat sayang kepadanya.' [Aminah is the apple of her parents' eyes because they love her very much.' The following is a picture of how marks are awarded for the above two sentences.

Aminah ialah anak emas keluarganya. [1/2 mark or 0 mark]
Aminah ialah anak emas keluarganya kerana ibu bapanya sangat sayang kepadanya.[1 mark]

Let us take another example. If you are given an idiom 'tak kering gusi' to make a sentence with, you will be awarded marks according to how well you construct your sentence to convey the actual meaning of 'tak kering gusi'. Now I am not going to give you the meaning of this idiom. Can you understand its meaning in the following sentence?

Kami pun tak kering gusi apabila melihat telatahnya.[0 mark]

I am sure you can't make head of tail of the above sentence. However, if you elaborate on it, the picture will be different. Let us look at the improved sentence below:

Kami tak kering gusi apabila melihat telatahnya kerana gerak-gerinya memang lucu. [We could not help laughing when we saw him because he acted comically.] [1 mark]

By the way, 'tak kering gusi' means 'in stitches' or 'can't help laughing' or 'laughing continuously'.

Here is a very difficult idiom to make a sentence with. The idiom is 'dua kali lima'. To construct this sentence, you have to do it in a conversational style.

Compare the marks given for the two sentences below:

1 Kamu berdua memang dua kali lima sahaja. [0 marks] (Assuming we do not know what 'dua kali lima' means]

2 'Kamu suka mengatakan bahawa Hashim malas orangnya tetapi pada pendapat saya, kamu berdua memang dua kali lima sahaja kerana kamu pun malas juga," kata Ali kepada Abu. [1 mark]
The above sentence means 'You like to say that Hashim is lazy but to me both of you can be termed 'the pot calling the kettle black' because you are lazy, too.' said Ali to Abu.

The idiom 'dua kali lima' means 'two people whose characters are the same, usually bad ones.

So much for sentence-making in Malay for this post.

Who is whom?

The confusion between who and whom often occurs in my students' written assignments. Hence I will deal with their difference in this post, hoping to be of help to other leaners of the English language.

The relative pronoun 'who' refers to the subject in front of it. These are some examples of how to use 'who' as a relative pronoun.
a) She is the girl who often helps me when I am in difficulty. ['who' here refers to 'the girl', the subject in front of it.]

b) Those who win who get their prizes in cash. ['who' in this sentence refers to 'those', the subject in front of it.]

c) The man who cheated my neighbour is still in town. ['who' in this case refers to 'The man', the subject in front of it.]

As for the relative pronoun 'whom', it is just the objective case of 'who'. In other words, it refers to the object instead of the subject. Let us look at a few examples to see how 'whom' is correctly used.
a) He was the man to whom I gave my application letter. ['whom' here refers to the object 'the man'. The sentence comes from two sentences, that is, 'He was the man.' and 'I gave my application to the man.']

b) She was the girl with whom I travelled from Perlis to Johor Bahru. ['whom' here refers to the object 'the girl'. Here again, the sentence comes from two sentences, that is, 'She wsa the girl.' and 'I travelled with the girl from Perlis to Johor Bahru.']

c) He was the officer from whom I obtained this information. ['whom' here refers to the object 'the officer'. The two sentences that are combined to form the above sentence are 'He was the officer.' and 'I obtained this information from the officer.]

So much for the different usage of 'who' and 'whom'

How to express the same sentence differently

In writing, we do not want our readers to get bored after reading our works. To avoid this from happening, we have to vary the way we write our sentences. We should not stick to one sentence pattern. Hence, it is worth experimenting with various ways of expressing the same intended meaning in a sentence. I shall elaborate this point with a few examples.
Sentence 1: We had a picnic near the beach.
We can express this sentence in two more ways, that is:
a) We went for a picnic by the beach.
b) We were picnicking on the beach.

Sentence 2: The boy looked very thin.
This sentence can be rendered in other ways such as:
a) The boy was a bag of bones.
b) How skinny the boy was!
c) The boy had a skeletal look.

Sentence 3: Occasionally, we were scolded by our parents when we were up to our mischief.
You can express the above sentence differently as:
a) Sometimes, our parents told us off when we were naughty.
b) Once in a while, we got a telling-off by our parents for being mischievous.
c) For our mischief, at times we were reprimanded by our parents.
d) Our parents sometimes told us off when we were mischievous.

Sentence 3: His comic look triggered off our laughing machine for quite some time.
A few sentences of the same meaning can be made out of the above sentence.
a) We could not help laugh when we looked his funny face.
b) His comic face had us in stitches.
c) We laughed incessantly because of his funny look.

You can try our hand at making sentences with almost the same intended meaning. With practice, you can surely coin unique sentences in your writing.

How to win a free laptop

Sometimes we like to get something free of charge. In this post, I will tell readers how to get a laptop free of charge. This laptop is to be given away by Dell. The model is Dell Inspiron 14. It is powered by a Intel Core 2 P7450 processor. With 3GB’s of DDR2 800mHz ram and a 250 G Hard disk, it is sufficient for normal use. If you want to copy disks or files to disks this laptop also comes with a DVD burner.

To find out how to win this laptop, go to the following url for details.

http://sizlopedia.in/2010/03/win-a-new-dell-inspiron-14-intel-core-2-duo-t6600-by-tweeting-or-commenting-in-sizlopedia-giveaway/

So much for give-away for this post.

Speaking the language one learns

As I was trilingually educated, I was taught three languages when I was in school. Mandarin is my mother tongue while English and Malay are the two extra languages which I learnt besides Mandarin.

I find that one has to speak the languages to be able to master the language. From my personal experience, I had a lot of chances speaking Mandarin but I was only able to speak English and Malay during language classes for both languages. Hence, I joined the English Literary and Debating Society and Malay Society to have more chances of speaking the languages. I used to take part in Elocution contests in English and Malay.

When I was with the English and Debating Society, I enjoy the impromptu Speech activities organised by the society. We were given a topic on the spot and were asked to speak after five minutes. It was through such sessions that one realised the need to have the appropriate vocabulary to express well.

After graduating from a teachers' college, I was posted to Pahang where I spoke the three languages daily. There was one Mandarin teacher who spoke Mandarin most of the time and I talked to him using this language. Most of the colleagues were Malays and I got the chance to speak to them in Malay. As for outstation teachers, they were mostly English-educated and I conversed with them in English. Besides, I was teaching Integrated Science in English and Malay at that time.

Hence I believe strongly that one has to speak the language one learns to be able to master it better.