1.B.3 Exercises A wealth of information is presented in these notes, but it is not at all necessary to learn all this or the Sanskrit technical terms: indeed, it is preferable NOT to learn them. The practical way to become familiar with the basics of Sanskrit is through practice: all the theory that is provided is simply so that the practice may be intelligent, and lead to understanding. With this aim in mind, at the end of each lesson a few simple exercises are presented. (a) Practise sounding the sixteen matrka in their correct order, and writing them in Roman script. (b) Practise writing and recognizing the first six vowels in devanagarT. (c) Look up the verb 'stand' in a good English dictionary and observe its wide range of meanings. (d) Translate the following sentences into English: 1. tisthasi vadami ca 4. tisthami vadati ca 2. tisthati vadasi ca 5. vadasi tisthami ca 3. vadami tisthasi ca 6. tisthami vadami ca (e) Translate the following sentences into Sanskrit: 1. He stands and I speak 4. You speak and he stands 2. You stand and he speaks 5. I stand and he speaks 3. You speak and I stand 6. I speak and you stand 1.B.4 Flash Cards The next sheet has the flash cards for the first six vowels. Cut these out and start using them. Flash cards for the rest of the alphabet will be provided at appropriate places in the course. It would be useful to keep the flash cards in a box (for example a cigarette box): there will be a total of forty-nine cards for the alphabet, and a further ten for the numerals.
