Languages in Grandfather's Story Cloth.

I am holding in my hands an advanced copy of Grandfather's Story Cloth by Linda Gerdner and Sarah Langford and illustrated by Stuart Loughridge. Shen's newest book features text written in both English and Hmong. Though I had helped with the English, the Hmong language is a complete mystery to me. Since the translations are side by side, I enjoyed guessing which words meant what in Hmong. For example, "Yawg" means "Grandfather." "Niam" means "Mother." And "Chersheng" (the name of the little boy) means "Chersheng."

I've always been fascinated with languages, especially how different sounds are interpreted by the Romanized alphabet. I'm sure there are many sounds in the Hmong language that do not exist in English. What's interesting to me are the different combination of consonants. How does one pronounce "txhawj" (worry)? Or "nws" (he)?