I have a few bugbear mysteries that I need sorting out so for the next while I would like to ask a few stupid questions if that is ok? These are questions the dictionary has not been able to answer for me so if someone could set me straight that would be great.

can someone please explain the difference between go leir and ar fad to me please? I know ar fad is used when referring to time. eg. Bíonn me ag imirt peile t'am ar fad. but when should go leir be used and ar fad be used in different circumstances?

Also liomsa is a bit of a puzzle for me at the moment too. why is this 'a' stuck on the end of liom? Does it mean 'with myself'?

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Caithimíd dul siar chun teacht aniar.

I can help with lhe liom/liomsa now - will have to think a little about the other 2 in order to make sure I don't make matters more confusing!

There is no difference between liom and liomsa - as far as meaning is concerned. But there is a difference of emphasis. Let's say we had a couple of children gathering up stuff in their room and tidying it away into their own presses. Each might be saying, as they picked things up off the floor 'Is liom é sin' (I own that) or 'Is liom é seo' (I own this) or indeed 'Is liom í seo' or 'Is liom í sin' if the item in question was of feminine gender. When picking up a number of bricks or sweets or whatever, they could say 'Is liom iad seo'. All going well and the room is becoming tidier and tidier till one of the children goes to pick up something that the other child feels he himself (she herself) actually owns.
STANDOFF! In reply to the 'Is liom é sin' that was heard, the second child would say (with emphasis) 'Is liomsa é (sin)' to which there would be another 'Is liomsa é' by the other child. You can imagine both pulling out of the object and both saying 'Is liomsa é'. The meaning of what they are saying now is the very same as the meaning of what they were saying at the beginning - but the emphasis is different!

I see no difference in meaning between 'an lá ar fad' and 'an lá go léir' (except that I don't think they use 'go léir' that much, if at all, in the Uster dialect). Native speakers might confirm or refute, pls.

Despite the above, 'ar fad' and 'go léir' are not always interchangeable. Sin scéal eile ar fad (That's a different story altogether) - you can't use 'go léir' in that construction. My initial thoughts are that 'go léir' is limited to a gathering process or speaking of something in its entirety - Bhí na páistí go léir ann. But while 'ar fad' can also be used in such instances, it also has a number of wider meanings (Nach iontach ar fad an teanga í!).

I'm going to stop now as I have probably made a fool of myself enough already. Maybe some native speakers might comment?

go léir is common but maybe not after the word "lá".

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Is fearr Gaeilg na Gaeltaċta ná Gaeilg ar biṫ eile
Agus is í Gaeilg Ġaoṫ Doḃair is binne

Tá sé sin iontach mo chairde. Tuigim sin móron níos fear anois. Is feidir liom fochail núa seo a chlactadh anois. Oh would it not be more right to say 'Sin é scéal eile ar fad'? This are the sort of little gripes I want to sort out in my own head. I don't want to sound as if I am trying to correct YOU. It is just when I see things different to the way I thought it should be it makes me doubt myself

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Caithimíd dul siar chun teacht aniar.

Míniú galánta é seo!


Not a native speaker, but I can confirm that go léir is common enough in Ulster, although it seems to me we use it in a slightly different way to other dialects perhaps. Very often as an added emphasis to uilig, for example: bhí na daoiní uilig go léir ag gabháil síos go dtí an cladach. Phrases like na daoine go léir, and even na daoine ar fad would be less common, I feel. When ar fad means 'completely' or 'entirely' then it's sometimes used like your example above in Ulster too. Oh, and one other thing, ar fad very often means 'still' or 'always' in Ulster, but implies a certain persistence. For example: bhí sé ar fad ag smaointiú ar an teach bheag sin ar rugadh é.

Anyway, these are just impressions - I'm sure someone would be able to provide a more airtight description of how these terms are used in Ulster.

Slán,

Domhnall

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Ultach mé agus Gaeilg Uladh a labhraim go measardha maith!

'Tuigim sin móron níos fear anois' I have just been rereading over what I wrote before and this looks a little wonky to me now. Would - Tuigim sin go mór níos fear anois be a better way to say this? Maybe there is a fancier way to say it but is this still at least technicaly correct?

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Caithimíd dul siar chun teacht aniar.

The 'sa' bit comes historically from 'seo' I think. It's done like this as in traditional Irish, voice emphasis was not done like in English (as in my toy)

Also, when you address someone use the vocative construction 'a chairde'. 'Mo chaide' is just a noun phrase

Do you mean 'tuigim sin níos fearr anois é'?

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__̴ı̴̴̡̡̡ ̡͌l̡̡̡ ̡͌l̡*̡̡ ̴̡ı̴̴̡ ̡̡͡|̲̲̲͡͡͡ ̲▫̲͡ ̲̲̲͡͡π̲̲͡͡ ̲̲͡▫̲̲͡͡ ̲|̡̡̡ ̡ ̴̡ı̴̡̡ ̡͌l̡̡̡̡.___

That's the one! That é in sentences often slips my mind. I am going to concentrate my brain on that this week when yapping to the little one. It often escapes me because in Irish it seems you repeat the subject of the sentence twice in many cases. Like in english the word 'that' is a subject. I am starting to feel that 'that' (sin in this partictular case as opposed to go bfhuil) is only there to clarify the subject in the sentence?

is this the reason why in the sentence I said above : 'Tá sé sin iontach' the é in this case has been replaced with sé instead and is the reason it is said in this way? What I mean is directly translated in English you would think it to be 'Tá sin iontach'. I know that is wrong and Tá sé sin iontach is the right way to say it.

Thanks for pointing that out as these are the little mistakes I am falling into. Please correct me when I make these as often as possible because that is exactly what I want!

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Caithimíd dul siar chun teacht aniar.

Grmma, a Dhomhnaill, a Bhraonaigh, as an eolas sin ar fad. Is maith liom gur thaitin an sampla faoi na páistí leat. Rith sé liom ag an am go bhféadfainn sampla de dhaoine fásta ag troid faoin teanga a úsáid freisin! 'Is liomsa í!' 'Ní hea, is liomsa í!'
Ach bheartaíos fanacht glan ar an gceann sin.

I must say, fair play to you, Luke. You keep digging and digging, keep questioning and questioning. You said yourself that you feel you have made a lot of progress. Ní chuireann sé sin ionadh ar bith orm - I am not one little bit surprised. Your attitude is top class and I look forward to meeting you for a pint or a cup of coffee in a year's time or so to have a fluent conversation as Gaeilge. You are well on your way. Ardfhear!

To refer to your unease about what you wrote, I am going to mention spelling again! I know that we agreed that it is secondary to getting the idiom right and not trying to translate words from English but rather translate meanings. I'm sticking with that. But incorrect spelling can throw people too, especially when two words are spelt similarly with one being substituted for the other. The first thing that struck me about your sentence was:
fear = a man
níos fearr = better
To a learner, it is just an extra letter - and to an English speaker who phone texts a lot, using leter instead of letter or speling instead of spelling is not a big deal. I agree, it's not (even though I don't like it myself I must admit). A native speaker of Irish however will have a different pronunciation for these two words - and pronunciation is one of the basics. Basically, 'arr' sounds longer than 'ar'. Unfortunately I didn't come across 'fearr' being pronounced on that site I mentioned in my last post. But, if you listen to the 3 dialect sound files for each of these, you should get an idea about what I'm on about:
http://breis.focloir.ie/ga/fuaim/fear
http://breis.focloir.ie/ga/fuaim/gearr

You'll find also from listening to this:
http://breis.focloir.ie/ga/fuaim/m%C3%B3r%C3%A1n
that us Munster people are more careful about not getting that Gaelic word mixed up with an English one that looks like it!

Apart from that, I wouldn't be too worried about your sentence to be honest - Personally, I'd be inclined to use 'i bhfad' but that might be just a dialect thing and so, I'm going to make my retreat here now as I too am a learner.

Is mar seo a bheadh sé agamsa:
Tuigim é sin i bhfad níos fearr anois.