Monday, January 11, 2010

Talkin that Shitswa

Once…twice…three times a lady…

Lionel Richie made it across the Atlantic. So did Bob Marley. Assorted early 90s R&B including Bryan McKnight, KC & JoJo, and R Kelly made it. Randy Newman, Elton John accompanied The Pussycat Dolls and Akon across the ocean. Eminem's early work managed the swim. Unfortunately early 90s East Coast hip hop were lost en route, so I have nothing to listen to.

I know this because the barraka (or “bar” to us mulungus) behind my house plays the same songs once...twice…three times an hour all day and all night long. So anyway that explains my newfound hatred for Lionel Richie, and my knowing all the words to Endless Love.

The nadir of my Christmas followed by the zenith of my new years has seen a slowing down of my life. The main obstacle now is that I don’t have a job or any other specific responsibilities, just general ones like “integrate into your community,” “improve your “living situation”, “don’t get malaria”. This has lead to some impressive productivity on my part, including personally constructing a kitchen counter, but mostly it leads to a lot of sitting.

Sitting is nice when followed by a bunch of walking or standing, but when followed only by lying down it can be a killer, so I leave at least twice a day to make sure I don’t slide into a funk. Mostly this involves going to the market and bumbling around, with the general goal of learning Shitswa. Nzo gonzwa Shitswa, nzi zwizwi kwulawula kutsongwani Shitswa. Kahisa nwamuthlwa. I am learning Shitswa. I know how to speak some Shitswa. It is hot today.

This I managed to find out despite the local 18 year old’s insistence that I learn things like “Do you have a girlfriend?”, “you are very beautiful,” “I am in love with you,” and my favorite so far “you will come to my house and cook for me.” I didn’t write this last one down, maybe I should have considering I eat pretty much the same thing every single day. I learn from the skirt-chasing 18 year old, the crazy tomato lady, the guy who sells oil. So many people are so willing to invite you to have a seat and teach you a little of the local dialect. Some do it for laughs (I get laughed at A LOT) but I think most of them do it just because.

Learning Shitswa more than anything has helped me feel like I have a shot at entering into this community. Though Portuguese is spoken in school and by my Italian neighbors, but people in the street speak Shitswa. I feel like if I get up to a level so I can at least understand the gist of small conversations it will be huge. The problem is that Shitswa, being a Bantu language, is traditionally an unwritten language. In the past hundred years Bantu has borrowed the Latin alphabet such that it can be written if need be. But being an unwritten language the rules are uncertain at best.

Portuguese is studied in school, not Shitswa. The only literature in Shitswa is the occasional bible, which in addition to using strange and archaic language (it being the bible and all) it doesn’t exactly make for a very engaging read (it being the bible and all). This is further complicated by the fact that Shitswa is more regional than official. Its uncertain grammatical rules mirror its uncertain regional boundaries. Shangana was the language spoken in Namaacha, where I spent the first three months in training. I was been told that Shangana is so similar to Shitswa that the only real differences are that of pronunciation. But Shangana is several regional dialects away. Ronga is geographically closer but more different from Shitswa than is Shangana. Bitonga is just next door regionally but completely different, I've been told

None of these languages have ever seen governance or control, for hundreds or even thousands of years. I’ve heard that there do exist Shitswa dictionaries, but rest assured no one in my town has ever seen one. The blurriness of the languages is comically illustrated by the theatrical arguments my tutors in the market place will get into over the smallest things, the word “to wash” yesterday featured a lot of screaming and yelling when it was eventually decided that the one person’s word for “to wash” was weird because he was from two towns away, a distance of less than 100 km.

Therefore: one person’s Shitswa can be different from another’s. Only when I start asking exacting questions do conflicts arise. For the most part the people in the market just accept the blurriness of everyone else’s Shitswa. Maybe his is colored by Shangana, maybe hers is different because she grew up on the island off the coast. They just accept the uncertainty and roll with it. It’s all very Mozambican. My cousin Matt would have a heart attack.

It’s been an interesting and sometimes frustrating challenge for me. But it beats sitting.

Now the bar behind my house is playing a techno song that is repeating the line, and this is true: "If I marry you, will you marry me, marry me, my love?" Just more reason to leave the house.

1 comment:

  1. I thought I might be helpful and do some internet hunting for a book on Shitzwa or Bantu languages in general. I did not find as much as you offered and on the CIA country site it lists the following as the languages spoken in Moz... Emakhuwa 26.1%, Xichangana 11.3%, Portuhuese 8.8%, Elomwe 7.6% Cisena 6.8%, Echuwabo 5.8% and always a personal favorite...other Moz languages 32%. Colin, they (and it is the CIA) don't even mention Shitzwa!! Where are you?!
    Love Mom
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