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On the
Origin of Names
By Kola Tubosun
What does the word
“simian” and the name “Simeon” have in common, besides a
similar pronunciation? You guessed it – nothing at all,
unless Simeon lives in the cage in a zoo or on a display
plinth in a museum of extinct apes. If I were named Simeon,
I would be very sad indeed if anyone were to laugh out loud
every time they mentioned my name, especially if the person
is a native speaker of English.
I remember my Kenya days, reclining
under the mango trees on the grass lawns around the Margaret
Thatcher Library on the campus of Moi University, Eldoret,
discussing words and languages. All of us were guys, men, so
the topic inevitably led to the risqué. All I wanted really
was a chance to gather knowledge about the Kiswahili
language to add to my vocabulary, and until then, everything
was going smoothly. I would come out in the morning, lay on
the grass while my informant, Ng’ash, a photographer (whose
name also rhymed with nyash) did
his work and dealt with my endless list of questions at the
same time. After going through a list of over four hundred
words in Kiswahili with him and his other equally
fascinating and mischievous co-photographers in that spot of
the campus, I found that ngozi meant
“skin”, pole
pole meant
the same as pele
pele (go
gently), kiboko meant
“buffalo” whose skin is used to make what we calledkoboko (the
whip), Mungu meant “God” and jana meant
the same as àná (Yoruba
for “yesterday”), among many other amazing similarities. I
also found out that kuma meant
“vagina”, and that motomeant
“hot”. The joke Ng’ash liked to make was that the first time
a Kenyan found himself in Japan, he could not get his mind
off the fact that the institution he was enrolled in was
called theKumamoto
University. Kuma in
Japanese is a popular name for children, meaning “bear”.
And so in Washington DC in December, I
found myself on a dinner table with half a dozen Tanzanians
who dared me to prove to them how much of Swahili I spoke. I
did, starting with the everyday ordinary words. But they
kept egging me on and I told them that I had actually learnt
the private words first while I was in Kenya, and that I
still remembered them even though I found a dinner table the
least appropriate place to discuss such things. They would
have none of it so I said, “I know that mbooro is
for penis. Do you believe me now? I know that one for
females but the point is proven, no?” The boys looked
surprised, and the girls kept giggling mischievously, now
resolved not to let me off until I gave voice to their body
parts as well. It was an embarrassing almost awkward moment.
But I did, and then shared the joke about the Japanese
University. What else I found out afterwards was how easier
to mention the word for privates in another person’s
language. When asked to tell them what they were in my
language, I could only tell them the word for penis. For
vagina, I referred them to the Nigerian women in the hall,
and as I correctly guessed, none of them took up the
challenge to ask.
What I also learnt at the table was
that the Nigerian name “Uche” in Tanzanian Swahili also
meant the same as kuma,
and that every time they heard the Nigerian name while
watching a soccer game, they were giggling aloud not for the
style of his dribble or the grace of his feet. Since I found
out in Kenya in 2005 that Titi means breasts (as in matiti in
Swahili), and “titties” in American English, I’ve always
wondered what my name means in all the languages of the
world if there was a way I could go on and find out. In
American English, it means “a dark carbonated drink with a
secret formula bottled in cans and bottles.” Not bad. What
does it mean in Chinese, Malay, Emai, Nepali, Farsi, Akan,
Ikaan, Uwu or Arabic? Maybe I should ask Reham about the
Arabic part. I hope the meaning would not be too x-rated for
her to tell me. I also remember one of my class sessions
last semester when we were discussing colours. I had written
the Yoruba ways of expressing colour on the board, and it
included pupa for
“red”, bulu for
“blue”, funfun for
“white” and dudu for
“black” among many others. By the end of the class, I was
told by the students why of all the colours we learnt that
day, they would most likely remember dudu for
a longer time to come. In American English (slangs), the
word doo-doo refers
to excreta, they said. Talking with my Swahili friend
recently about these, she told me that dudu in
Swahili also means “a large insect”, in addition to being
the word now used to refer to the HIV/AIDS virus. Very
nice. So now, although eniyan means
“person” in Yoruba, all of a sudden, I am never going to
refer to myself as an eniyan
dudu ever
again! Not in America, and definitely not in Kenya.
Top of page
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In this issue
Issue #2 Index
Diabetes Diagnosis Saved My Life
On the Origin of Names
Poetry: For the Love of Flight
RSPB Volunteers wanted
Swale cervical screening tests
Why the iPad is King
Poetry: Poems from Blue Hyacinths
Contributors
Derrick W. Meadows
Jennie Wakuche
Kola Tubosun
Lola Shoneyin
Olu Oguibe
R. Elkin, C. Evans & J. Mellor
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