Word for the Travel Wise (04/02/06)

Score! Another cool African language to enhance our experience on the diverse continent. This one comes from southern Africa and is spoken in a country that has one of the only three monarchies left in Africa. Know where it is? I mentioned a popular festival called Umhlanga held every August in the area not too long ago. You can check that here if you missed it, but enough guessing games for now.

Today's word is a siSwati word used in Swaziland:

Ninjani - How are you?
Also known as Swati, Swazi, and Seswati; siSiwati is a Bantu language from the Nguni group spoken in Swaziland, Lesotho, Mozambique and South Africa. There are an estimated 1,706,924 speakers across the four countries and is listed as an official language in South Africa and Swaziland only. There are a few sites to visit to assist in learning this African tongue. Start with the Swaziland tourism site. The homepage has a sample dialog including the response to today's word. Young Heroes has their site set up to learn one word a day, but you can refresh as many times as you wish in one day to learn multiple. Lastly, I would search around Amazon more, but this Essential siSwati might be a good start for those really wanting to learn.

Filed under: Learning, Africa, Lesotho, Swaziland