Please help me understand a simple Persian sentence

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Khayyam
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Please help me understand a simple Persian sentence

Postby Khayyam » Wed Nov 09, 2022 1:58 am

From a dual-language children's book I'm reading;

English: The shark plays tag with the fish.

Persian: کوسهماهی دارد با بقیه ماهیها، قایمباشک بازی میکند.

Google Translate says قایمباشک means hide and seek, not tag. What's the deal? Do they use the same word for both games in Persian? That seems unlikely, considering the games are quite different. Also, it looks like this is a compound word, but I can't see where to break it into its component parts. Google says قایمبا means missing, which would make sense, but شک means doubt or skepticism, which doesn't make sense.

Edited multiple times because the right-to-left switch confuses Google Translate (and me) every single time. I'm just going to give up on putting the period at the correct end of the Persian sentence.
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Lycopersicon
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Re: Please help me understand a simple Persian sentence

Postby Lycopersicon » Wed Nov 09, 2022 1:38 pm

It means hide and seek.

کوسه‌ماهی دارد با بقیهٔ ماهی‌ها قایِم‌باشَکْ بازی می‌کند.



You can use shift + spacebar to insert a half-space in compound words (this is called نیم‌ فاصله in Persian).
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Odair
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Re: Please help me understand a simple Persian sentence

Postby Odair » Wed Nov 09, 2022 9:06 pm

Bashak is a child-word apparently made of the verb bash and the -ak diminutive suffix (like in pesarak = little boy), and is unrelated to the verb shakk (doubt).

a good read:
https://fa.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D9%82%D8 ... 8%B4%DA%A9
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Khayyam
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Re: Please help me understand a simple Persian sentence

Postby Khayyam » Thu Nov 10, 2022 1:23 am

You two are my Persian-learning heroes. Thanks so much.
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Das Leben ist ein langer, roter Fluss
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