Jambo!

If people know any Swahili at all, they will know Jambo, for "Hello". Getting ready for a trip, I am leafing through my phrase book to see what I can add to that.

The few times that I have visited East Africa I learned enough of the language to say hello, thank you, and "I don't speak Swahili" - as well as a few other phrases, but much has been forgotten. I started with a language CD from Pimsleur language courses, in addition to the little phrase book. The Pinsleur lessons are actually quite proper - telling you that the language is properly called Kiswakili, meaning the language of the Swahili people. It also teaches that the proper greeting is Hujambo, which is roughly, oddly enough, "Is everything unwell?" and the proper response is in the negative - Sijambo, for "Everything is not unwell", which has a certain ring to it. In practice, I suspect that only Pimsleur and language studies students ay places like Yale make the effort to be proper.

It is an interesting language: originally the language of the coastal fisherman, it actually spread further when early missionaries and soon Germany and other colonial powers wanted a language that could be used universally, to avoid dealing with the many tribal dialects. It incorporates some elements of Arabic from early traders, and later German, Portuguese, English and French from colonial influence. The obvious additions were, not surprisingly, for things that were not previously part of the culture: looking through my phrasebook, I find beer/bia, book/kitabu (from Arabic kitab), bank/benki, antibiotics/antibiotiki or car/motokaa. Oddly, the word for baggage claim is mizigo, so it's been around for a while?

It is one of those languages, like Hawaiian, where everything is pronounced as you see it - the written alphabet had been Arabic, but is now, thankfully, Roman. There are quite a few words that begin with a soft, humming "n" or "m" sound and pronunciation is helped if you remember that the accent is (almost) always on the next-to-last syllable: BEN-ki / antibio-TI-ki / mo-TO-kaa. When I hear "motokaa" I can't help but remember Mr. Toad in The Wind in the Willows, and his obsession with the vehicle.

A few years ago, I visited Uganda and Rwanda on a trip to hike and see mountain gorillas. Naturally, before the trip I studied up on my Swahili because it is spoken there and I wanted to make an effort and show a little respect. So, I was a bit surprised when I received a decidedly cool reception in Uganda the first couple of times that I used it. Turns out that the language is primarily used by the military as a common language for communication between different tribal groups. This is how I learned that the military is not well respected by most of the Uganda peoples. English was a much better choice for me to use. In Tanzania, English and Swahili are the two official languages.

I am intrigued whenever I come across Swahili in movies, which is admittedly not very often.

Highly entertaining to hear John Wayne use it often (and accurately, I think) in Hatari!, which means "Danger!". I saw that movie again last week and I loved it - it is so improper on all levels that I can't help but like it as a period piece from 1960-something. Wayne and his crew capture wild game for zoos - driving jeeps like teenagers through herds of giraffe or buffalo, generally ignore their black staff, show pretty simplistic views of the women in their lives, smoke nonstop, and drink 'til they pass out. The clincher is the nice Henry Mancini soundtrack with all of this.

I also recently saw Nowhere in Africa which is the sympathetic story of a family of Jewish refugees trying to make it in 1930's Kenya. The dialog was a natural mix of English, German, and Swahili - with subtitles for two out of three of the languages. Watching it, I discovered that I may know more Swahili than German. A worthwhile movie if you haven't seen it.

A couple of years ago I had the pleasure of coming across one of my favorite phrases in a movie that includes an European explorer (maybe Stanley?) chasing off a lion by shouting "Toka". My little phrase book lists toka as meaning "Go away", or better yet "Piss off!", if used with expression towards an unwanted advance. It has become a private drinking toast used by certain family members - and sounds quite festive in that context.

From earlier trips to the region I remember a couple of phrases that we quickly picked up:
Twende! = Let's go!, group leader Michael says this a lot
Maji moto = hot water, if you brought your own coffee or tea
Asante (sana) = thank you (very much), always helpful
But, I think my favorite phrase is a very sweet, poetic, way of saying good night: Lala salama, literally: sleep safely.

TUSKER

A safari wouldn't be complete without Tusker, and I'm looking forward to sampling some soon. It is a really good East African beer and it has a wonderful logo, but it's only one of many quality African beers. The continent has many homegrown breweries; one of the few good legacies of colonial rule. When Germany, England, Belgium and others brought their brewing technology with them to support colonial tastes, Africans picked up the lager habit soon after. "In the bush", one of the common African background sounds is the distinctive call of the ring-necked dove and mothers always tell their children that he says "work-hard-er, work-hard-er", but may people swear he calls "drink-la-ger". 

Maybe ten years ago, Tusker was actually at the forefront of the African international beer wars when they worked to get a large South African brewer thrown out of Kenya, where Tusker is brewed. They worked a hard fought advertising campaign appealing to Kenyan nationalism and eventually managed to get SABMiller to withdraw from Kenya. Today, Kenya remains proud of the Tusker slogan “My Country, My Beer”.  I think that slogan dates back to the origin of the brand in 1922. The Tusker name has an interesting genesis - the story is that one of the founders of the brewery was killed by an elephant in a hunting "accident" shortly after the company started, and their first beer was named to honor him.

In truth, we will be in Tanzania, and SABMiller dominates the beer market here, with Safari, Kilimanjaro, Balimi, and Ndovu Beer, (which means roughly “Tusker” in Swahili). Although the Serengeti plain extends into Kenya, it is almost always associated with Tanzania but Serengeti Beer is actually brewed in Kenya, perhaps just to irritate the Tanzanians, and SABMiller. In any case, all beer brewed in Africa is guaranteed to have wonderful names and memorable labels.

Flags and Tanzania

At the end of the month I am off to the Serengeti so I started reading up on the flag of Tanzania. I think the current flag is pretty straightforward, but I managed to get sidetracked into Google and became interested in other flags that contribute to tell a long story of regional history.

The area is rich in resources, so travelers and merchants from the Persian Gulf and Western India had visited the East African coast since early in the first millennium AD, and the area was generally under Islamic Arab control for much of the time. It's easy to forget that there was a lot going on in the world before the Europeans got involved, but that didn't last long.


Vasco da Gama (remember him?) then visited the region on his first voyage in 1498 and began a period of Portuguese control that lasted until the mid 1800's. The region didn't merit its own flag, but the flag of King Manuel I of Portugal flew during the time of the Vasco da Gama's voyages.

In 1885, Germany moved in and established the trading colony of German East Africa which flew a flag that depicted a slightly skewed version of the Southern Cross while still looking totally northern and Germanic, from 1885 until 1919.

With Germany’s defeat in World War I, control of the region transferred to the British and the new state of Tanganyika, which had a pretty cool flag in the vein of other British colonies, but with an African twist.

The region gained independence from Great Britian, but  prior to today’s Tanzania, the nation of Tanganyika adopted a new flag from 1961 until 1964.

While all this was going on, the offshore islands of Zanzibar and Pemba were ruled by a sultan. Originally under rule from Oman, and later locally ruled. From 1896 until 1963 the flag of the Sultanate of Zanzibar was about as simple as can be.

Upon gaining independence through revolution in 1963, Zanzibar briefly adopted a new flag, based on the island’s Afro-Shirazi Party banner.

Then, in 1964, the independent country of Tanzania was created from the merging of Tanganyika and Zanzibar. The new flag, in use today, adopted the elements of their separate flags, but struck a diagonal to create a flag that attempted not to show dominance of one over the other.
The green is symbolic of the fertile lands of Tanzania, while yellow is for the country's mineral deposits, and blue is for the waters of Tanzania, including the Indian Ocean. The black in the center represents the people of Tanzania. Nicely done.

However... There is a bit more to the story. Zanzibar, which maintains a degree self-governance, decided they were not entirely happy with things as they were, and in 2005 the island adopted a separate flag. I understand that it's their flag and they are happy to have their own, but what's up with this?