Thursday Thirteen #5: 13 Ways to Say "I Love You"

Thirteen Ways to say "I Love You"

13. Hawaiian – Aloha wau ia ‘oe

Did you know: The “Hawaiian Alphabet” consists of only 12 letters: 5 vowels (a, e, i, o, u) and 7 consonants (h, k, l, m, n, p, w)?

12. Japanese – Anata wa, dai suki desu

Did you know: Japanese is a syllabic language that uses “inflection” in addition to spelling to indicate meaning. It’s one of the hardest languages to acquire, some say, because one word, for example “ma,” might mean mother in one inflection and something quite pofane in another. Inflections are a form of pronunciation emphasizing the sound low, med, or high. Sound complicated?

11. Norwegian – Jeg eisker deg

Did you know: The Norwegian alphabet consists of 29 letters, the first 26 or which are the same as the alphabet used in English. The three last letters are Æ, Ø and Å. In addition to the 29 official letters, there are several diacritical signs in use (somewhat more in Nynorsk than Bokmål): à ä ç é è ê ñ ó ò ô ü. The diactritical signs are not compulsory, but may alter the meaning of the word dramatically, e.g.: for (for), fór (have gone), fòr (meadow) and fôr (animals food).

10. Swahili – Naku panda

Did you know: Swahili is a combination of African tribal languages, Arabic and Portuguese.

9. Spanish – Te quiero / Te amo / Yo amor tu

Did you know: New Mexico has Spanish as an official language?

8. German – Ich liebe Dich

Did you know: In German all nouns are capitalized?

7. Finnish – Mina rakastan sinua

Did you know: Unlike "sexist" languages such as English, Finnish provides the gender-neutral word hän, which translates as "he or she".

6. Dutch – Ik hou van jou

Did you know: The original meaning of ezel, the name seventeenth-century Dutch artists gave to the three-legged stand we know today as an easel was named for the Dutch for "donkey" because, like a donkey, it too carried a burden.

5. Arabic – Ana Ahebak / Ana Bahibak

Did you know: Arabic is one of six official languages used at the United Nations.

4. Hebrew – Ani ohevet ota

Did you know: Hebrew is a straight-forward phonetic language, which means that there is only one way to spell a particular word.

3. French – Je t’aime / Je t’adore

Did you know: Ma petite chou-chou is an endearment in French that translates into "My little cabbage". Something like "pumpkin" in English, do you suppose?

2. Indonesian – Saya cinta padamu

Did you know: The name Indonesia derives from the Latin Indus, meaning "India", and the Greek nesos, meaning "island".

1. Afrikaans – Ek is lief vir jou

Did you know: Afrikaans originated from the 17th century Dutch language and Afrikaans and Dutch are largely mutually intelligible.