Q&A: Sounding Smart

I want to use these next 4 or 5 blog entries to answer some common questions we’ve received and to clarify a few confusing details about where we are and what we’re doing. This first focuses on the Swazi language.

Question: Is it siSwati or Swahili you’re speaking in Swaziland, and what’s the language like?

We’re learning siSwati, not Swahili. Swahili is typically spoken in Kenya and many places north of us, but no Swazis speak (or would even understand) Swahili. siSwati is in the Bantu language group and is similar to Zulu and its regional variants, which is widely spoken in Southern Africa. They’re so similar in fact that learning one means you can pretty well understand both. Zulu has more types of clicks than siSwati, which primarily uses just a few (or at least variants of a few, depending on which letter follows the click). This fact makes it easy for us to distinguish spoken Zulu: it’s more click-heavy. Anyway, Swazis speak siSwati, not Swahili. That’s a lot of S’s to keep straight, I know, but doing so will provide you with two more S’s: sounding smart.

Question: can you guys make those click sounds yet? What other sounds are different or difficult?

Yes, we can in fact now properly pronounce the clicks in siSwati and don’t have too much trouble saying the words that include them. But it’s taken a great deal of practice and when reading or using an unfamiliar word it still sometimes trips us up. To try it, just place the middle of your tongue on the roof of your mouth (or place the front of your tongue directly behind your front teeth, depending upon usage), and create a kind of suction that, when you force your tongue down and away from your mouth’s roof, makes a click sound. To say “no” in siSwati, which is spelled cha the “ch” is a version of this click: you pronounce the hard C sound at the same time that you make the above-described click. Then you follow it with an a (pronounced “ah”). The hard part is making the click and the C-sound at the same time, but it is possible—the far back of the tongue makes the hard-C while the middle/front of the tongue makes the click.

There are also a lot of sounds that linguists call “lateral fricatives,” which sound a bit like soft, slurred Z’s, and resemble a buzzing hum in the mouth. HL and DL are the most common such sounds in siSwati, as in the town name Nhlangano or the word kudla (to eat) or kudlala (to play). The DL sound has more of the Z sound whereas HL is more breathy and S-like. Some non-siSwati speakers pronounce the HL just like the English “Shl,” which gets them in the same phonetic ballpark I suppose… but it still sounds pretty funny: “I’m going to Shlangano today after our meeting” is just enough off-kilter to be hilarious. Anyway, what’s fairly easy about siSwati for us English speakers is that it uses the same alphabetic letters, and most of those letters represent familiar sounds.

Question: are you fluent siSwati speakers yet?

As of the end of 2008 we are by no means fluent siSwati speakers. Not even close. English is commonly spoken here (in fact Swazi schools use English to teach all subjects and English is the official language of governmental business/operations) so we can usually get by just fine. But in the rural areas, community meetings, and on many individual homesteads, English is rarely used or understood—and that’s where our language training comes in. siSwati is a beautiful, sing-songy sounding language, and some of the grammar/conjugation rules actually enhance the alliteration and rhymes within phrases. We like it—but it’s still hard for us to speak or understand it. We are at the beginner-intermediate level, and we’ve hired a tutor to help our continued language learning; a local high school girl who comes over every week or so for one or two hours. She’s great—in fact her first name is Patience. I’m not speaking figuratively, and that’s not what her name translates into, that’s really her name: Patience. Having a tutor named Patience is like having a dentist named Gentle. It’s reassuring.

Question: can you teach me a few things to say in siSwati?

Here are a few siSwati phrases, sayings, and figures of speech for you to practice and impress (or utterly confuse) your friends. K’s sound like English G’s, C’s are clicks and HL’s /DL’s are fricatives, as described above.

Angisati siSwati – I do not know siSwati
Kulungile — it’s okay/alright
Ngiyabonga kakhulu – I thank you very much
Wemukelekile -- You are welcome
Ngicela emaswidi? – may I please have some candy?
Uyangiphatamisa – you are bothering me.
Ngipuma eMelika futsi kitsi kukaSeattle – I am from America and my family home is at Seattle.
We like to walk in/on the mountain– sitsandza kuhamba ensambeni
Umfati wami (or: Umkami) – my wife
Indvodzami – my husband
Uyasebenta kakhulu engadzeni namuhla, make! – you are working very hard in the garden today, mother!
Akamuhle lilanga liphuma – she is as beautiful as the sun.
Akamubi wehlula emanti – he/she is so ugly that even daily facial lotions can’t change him/her.
Angihambisani nalentfo – I am not of the same opinion.
Indendende – it’s a long lousy and boring speech.
Kuba munyu kwetibunu – to be tired of sitting on your butt for a long time in the same place Yincane nayitekwako – It’s a big long story that cannot be described.
Kandlula wafa -- there is no food to offer you; we have nothing.
Mehlo madzala – long time no see [“mehlo” is eyes].
Muhle sengatsi akayi ngaphandle – she’s so beautiful that you’d think she doesn’t use the toilet.
Kulola matinyo – to wait impatiently to eat promised meat.
Lizizi – describes a person who likes meat a lot
Okumhlophe! – all the best; best wishes!

And this last one you might already recognize from reading this blog:

Hambani kahle, bamngani bami -- goodbye/go well, my friends.