I am describing the writing systems in current usage in the world. For each
writing system, I give a choice of a dozen sample words in one or more of
the languages using that writing system.
As I invite my readers to try and "decipher" these samples, I would like
them to find out words which would be *intelligible* to them.
For each language, I chose either native words which are internationally
well-known (e.g. Arabic "hashish", Hebrew "kasher", Japanese "sayonara",
Russian "sovyet", etc.), or foreign loanwords taken from Italian (the
language in which the essay is written) or other widespread Western
languages (e.g., I have several samples of "restaurant", "hôtel",
"spaghetti", "pizza", "ticket", "computer", etc.).
For most languages I my personal collection of dictionaries was enough for
the task, but I am at odds finding anything for the languages mentioned in
the subject...
So, anyone having a dictionary, phrase book, or working knowledge of Yi (aka
Lolo: the modern syllabic script), Cree (or other languages written in Cree
script), Lao, Sinhala, Tamil or Telugu, would you be so kind to look up for
me about *twelve* words, written in native script?
It would be ideal to have these words encoded in Unicode (UTF-8, or
whatever), together with transcription and translation. But it is fine to
have any kind of encoding, or even a picture of PDF.
If you have difficulty finding international words in that certain language,
it is fine to have proper names of places (it would be great to have
"Italy", "Europe", or the name of the countries or regions where the
language is spoken, or of their capital cities), or names of famous people
(especially names of gods, prophets or saints connected with the local
religion, or names of people famous in that people's history or myth).
If you are not sure as what would be "intelligible" for me and my readers
(and you wish to have a good laugh at my expense!) you can send me the words
without any transcription and translation, and I will tell you what my guess
is. In the worst case, I will even accept unintelligible words, as far as
they are provided of sense.
Thank you in advance for any help! I will *REALLY* appreciate it.