Lauren: Ya.

I've only ever heard the word ya used to mean "enough." So imagine my surprise when I say "thank you" to a stewardess on our LAN flight and she responds with "that's enough." Or I've heard it used to say that something just happened. Ya fui al mercado -- I just went to the market.

In Chile though, there are three different uses of ya (basically it means just about anything). This whole new use of this word was absolutely fascinating to me. There are a lot of language quirks here; a lot of indigenous words used from the Mapuche and Quechua. More on that to come.

The Acknowledgement: The primary use of ya is simply OK, or "sure thing".

"Thank you for the coffee."

"Ya."

In this context ya just means, I acknowledge that you've spoken and there's really nothing else to say here, except well ya. There's really no English equivalent that comes to mind here.

The Excited Affirmation: Ya here can be used to mean "Yes! Let's do this!"

"Do you want to go to that play tonight?"

"Ya!"

The That's Enough: You wouldn't use this without a basta at the end. This is like, I've had enough of this. Ya basta -- No more of this.

The ya is also used to say that something just happened, but I have yet to hear it used in that context.

-- Lauren