Kichwa: Learning a Bit of This Indigenous Language from Ecuador

Today was the most adventure-packed day out of this trip. We went to the Ecuadorian Amazon jungle in the middle of pouring rain; our guide, José, was a great guy. He taught me a lot of Kichwa, the most popular indigenous native language in Ecuador.

I made a long list of interesting words and basic vocabulary, which I was practicing all day.

Here are some of my favorite common words:

Pagraychuk - thank you

Sacha - Jungle

Ali - Good

I've been interested in the past in learning Kichwa, but this is the first time I got an extended amount of time with a native teacher. I've tried to learn a bit online, but the resources online aren't the best compared to mainstream languages.

Our guide José spoke Kichwa as his mother tongue, but he also spoke perfect Spanish, which isn't always the case for Kichwa speakers.

We are visiting the Amazon rainforest, but I'm from Ecuador's capital, Quito, which is in the Andes mountains. José was telling me about some of the differences between certain words that vary in Kichwa between the jungle and the mountains, and how people often confuse Kichwa for Kechwa, which is from Peru, while Kichwa is from Ecuador.

Kichwa is such a unique language, unlike the other languages I've learned, Kichwa has no influence from Latin and Greek. To be honest, I find it quite similar to constructed languages like Esperanto and Toki Pona, which are auxiliary languages I've studied in the past. However, Kichwa has a super rich culture and traditions attached to it, which makes it very interesting.

I love learning new languages, and the strange nuances of communication. I once read in a linguistics book that Kichwa has some truly strange structures that no other language has, so it's quite unique. I'm always intrigued by how a different language can change the way we put thoughts into meaning.