A Vaalie, a Capetonian and a Zulu

A Vaalie, a Capetonian and a Zulu were driving along one day in a car …

But wait, before I continue I need to make a quick detour, to explain myself. That’s the price of living in the new South Africa, I guess. I have to make sure that no one is inadvertently “disadvantaged” by this piece. I love the Afrikaans language. Not enough to actually learn to speak it mind you, but as an offhand sort of subject, I find it very fascinating. I’m also not unaware of the fact that this admission is not politically correct. “Hawu, a black guy saying he likes Afrikaans? Clearly he’s an agent of the former oppressive regime!” But thankfully, I’m not in the business of being politically correct. Besides, aren’t we all supposed to be reconciled and rainbow-nationed? Almost every single movie of the new South Africa ends with the massive kasie mama passionately embracing the Boer oom. That’s the South Africa I live in. Mandela’s Mzansi. We passionately stifle each other across the colour line. Back to the story.

I was travelling along with the two Afrikaans ous, making them say funny things in die taal for my amusement. Things went well, till I tried a Victor Matfield impersonation. The Vaalie was livid. “Nee man, you can’t say ‘ek‘ like that! Gautengers don’t say ‘ek‘ like that!” Oh. Askies, man.

As it turns out, there’s a difference between Cape and Gauteng Afrikaans. For one thing, Vaalies (indeed, Gautengers, Vrystaaters and everyone else behind the Boerewors Curtain) do not say “ek” like they’re from Mitchells Plain. Your Blou Boel says “ack”. That was my mistake. I somehow managed to make Victor Matfield sound like Pieter de Villiers. And Vaalies don’t say “ma en pa”. They say “maw en paw”. Or so I was told.

Personally, I prefer Gauteng Afrikaans, if only because of the way certain Capetonians pronounce Paarl. That throaty, gargling “R” sound. Very off-putting.

Then the Capetonian, perhaps feeling a bit left out of things, started telling me these awful Afrikaans jokes. I can’t remember any of them (my brain does that with bad jokes), but I do remember that they all rhymed. All his jokes rhymed. As if that weren’t impressive enough, he wasn’t even speaking vintage Afrikaans. It was a gut-wrenching hodgepodge of broken English and Afrikaans. But still, the sentences rhymed! Determined to find out whether this was a common phenomenon, I emailed the handful of Afrikaners that I know. I got mixed responses, but here are some of the better examples of what I call Afrikaans rhyming slang.

“Hoe linker hoe flinker, hoe regter hoe slegter” was probably favoured by your Boer granny. Apparently this little tongue twister was what you said when your hand twitched or your eye flickered. A left-hand twitch meant that you’d be losing some ront and a right-hand flicker meant you’d be gaining some. I’m sure you’ve also heard of a “bietjie wyn vir die pyn”. Want to serenade your loved one? Try “My heart is in pyn, want jy is so fyn!”

Like I said, I like the Afrikaans language. Maybe it’s because I really enjoy pap en wors. Or the sound of Wikus van der Merwe’s accent. Perhaps the reason is that the thought of a Zulu liking Afrikaans will really mess with Eugene Terre’Blanche’s head.