[tlhIngan Hol] Klingon Word of the Day: taQ

[Steven Boozer]

> Klingon Word of the Day for Thursday, July 07, 2016
> 
> Klingon word: taQ
> Part of speech: verb
> Definition: be weird

  taQ tlhIngan wo' 
  The Klingon empire is weird. KGT

(KGT 194):  There is a story, perhaps apocryphal, of a non-Klingon actor who attempted to play the lead in the original Klingon version of Shakespeare's Hamlet but was shouted off the stage when he began the famous soliloquy by saying, {taQ pagh taQbe'} ("To be weird or not to be weird"), rather than the correct {taH pagh taHbe'} ("To be or not to be"; literally, "[one] continues or [one] does not continue"). 

SEE ALSO:
jum 			be odd (v)
Huj 			be strange (v)
le' 			be special, be exceptional (v)
motlhbe' 		be unusual (v)

Cf. the idiom {cha'maH cha' joQDu'}:
 
(KGT 126-27):  Klingons have 23 ribs ({joQDu'}). The idiom {cha'maH cha' joQDu'} (twenty-two ribs), leaving one rib out, is used to indicate that something is missing or not quite right, especially when it is difficult or impossible to explain the problem. It can be used in varied circumstances. For example, referring to a situation, one might say {naDev cha'maH cha' joQDu' tu'lu'} ("There are twenty-two ribs here")--that is, there is something out of the ordinary going on, even if no one can say exactly what. Referring to a person, one could say {cha'maH cha' joQDu' ghaj qama'} ("The prisoner has twenty-two ribs"), suggesting that the prisoner is somehow a bit strange.


--
Voragh
tlhIngan ghantoH pIn'a'
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons