Kosraean love poem
Selnguhn
Lomom ke selnguhn ah
El pa kahs in pupulyuk kato se emet luhk
Tusruk, silaklak met liki wanginla
Pa ingen "Nga lungse kom" safla luk nusum!
→ French poem ←
Kosrae, it story and her
The love poem translated into the language of the Micronesian group of the Eastern Oceanic subgroup of the Austronesian language family, of the island of Kosrae island (Kusaie), the Kosraean (Kosrae, Kusaiean, Kusaie, Lelu-Tafunsak, Malen-Utwe).
Kusaie is spoken by around 6,000 people on the island of Kosrae, as well as in Kolonia, called the Kosrean village, the capital of Ponape Island, which is 300 miles northwest of Kosrae, and in other islands in Micronesia. We can distinguish three dialect variants.
Kosrae (Kusaie, Oualan, Strong) is the easternmost island of the Carolinas archipelago (109km²), and one of the four Federated States of Micronesia.
La Coquille, a French ship, was the first European ship to come into contact with the inhabitants of Kosrae.
On this island which passed under the reign of different countries, many languages were spoken : German, Spanish, Japanese etc.
In the nineteenth century Kosrae, was on the route of the whale-boats which stopped there. Sometimes members of their crews got married there, so today we find some descendants of Russians, French and Americans.
In addition to whalers, like for other islands in Micronesia, Kosrae has seen many "beachcombers" (escapees, deserters, castaways, often English), find refuge there.
At the same time, schools for Marshallese and Gilbertese run by American missionaries were on the island of Kosrae ... so Kusaie was in contact with many languages and a pidgin of English eventually spread there.
A terrible flu epidemic brought by these missionaries decimated the population, killing five out of six people. It will take 50 years for the island to regain its pre-epidemic population.
The kusaiean is her language. Like her, it is Micronesian and shares a good percentage of vocabulary with the languages of the neighboring islands, for example with the Ponapean ... Like her, it is Micronesian and shares all the traits inherited from the origin and long voyages on the ocean ... All these traits then fixed by lazing in the sun, filtered and softened by coconut milks.