KAMA WASIKILIZA SANA UTAWEZA KUSIKIA KIFARU KUFANYA KELELE!

I CADGED from me old dad some years ago, as an Item of Interest, a small book, first printed 1936, this edition (14th) 1958, entitled, "Up-country Swahili", (Jinkin's knows where my pops got it from and WHY for that matter). The author, in his intro, says: "To the ordinary up-country native, Swahili is a foreign language, of which he possesses only a very limited knowledge. This book aims at teaching, in a simple way, just that degree of Swahili that is understood and talked by the average intelligent up-country native."

It's laid out in such a manner of the classic language learning style, i.e. sections of grammar and vocabulary followed by translation excercises.

This is where the funny part starts. Again, like traditional language learning, it's pure translation. Lists of separate "useful" phrases with no apparent connection between them. So what phrases can be useful for the "settler, miner, businessman, or wife" (read, "oppressive, tyranical, domineering colonizer"), in colonial East Africa in the 30s to 50s?

Washenzi weusi. - The savages are black.
Ninakupiga. - I am hitting you.
Safisha viatu yangu mara moja! - Clean my boots at once!
Mimi naogopa nyoka, funga milango. - I am afraid of snakes, fasten the door.
Huyu mchawi, ona chura katika kifuko yake! - That man is a witch-doctor, see the frog in his pocket! (I JEST NOT LADIES AND GENTS!)
BOY! tengeneza bafu yangu, na hapana kutia maji ya moto tele sawasawa ulifanya jana, napenda moto, lakini hapana moto sana. - BOY! Get my bath ready, and don't put in as much hot water as you did yesterday, I like it hot, but not too hot.
Mpishi anapiga muchawi. - The cook is beating the witch-doctor.
Napiga mulevi na miti. - I am hitting the drunkard with a stick. (PLEASE! I AM NOT JOKING!)
Choo inajaa ya kiroboto. - The latrine is full of fleas. (NO! PLEASE ENOUGH! ENOUGH!)

Perhaps more later?

A plot thicker than Mad Thick McThick, winner of last year's Mr. Thick competition (yes I know, plagiarised from Black Adder), what 'mI talking about? Charles Palliser's "The Quincunx". I'm now reading it for the THIRD time (minimum necessary), to use another of Edmund 's phrases: the plot twists and turns like a twisty turny thing. The BASIC story is thus:

John Melamphy / Huffam / Clothier and his mother are victims of devious scheming involving several families and an Estate. The scheming involves a codicil which, according to who holds it, and the state of the last heir (John), i.e. dead or alive, determines the definitive owners of the estate.

Smelly Pre-Victorian London is where John and his mother find themselves, manipulated from all sides as EVERYONE involved around them seems to be firstly their friend with offers of help then it turns out that they have different motives and in fact are deadly enemies.

This book EVERYONE must read, at least 3 times like I said, give it a year or so between readings. Read and make notes, who is who, who does what, and you'll begin to discover and understand lots of other clues and sub-plots that the author slips in.

riverrun, past Eve and Adam's, from swerve of shore to bend of bay, brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to Howth Castle and Environs.


PORTO ALEGRE has slipped gently into Summer with the normal cyclic weather of warm, to hot, to intense blacksmith forge to mutha of a rain storm, to cooling down and starting over. When I say "warm" that is relative, I'm talking 30c plus.
Today we're on a cooling down period, it's actually cooled from about 39c yesterday to 33c today! Don't think it's going to get much lower.

Normal for Summer, EVERYONE'S gone to the beach, except me. Can't afford it and haven't got a place to go anyway since my divorce. As a consequence of everyone having gone to the beach, I've got very little work during the week (= very little dosh) and I find myself at home trying to write, mostly failing and spending hours on internet crap, or reading. At the moment, and for the second time, I'm reading "The Quincunx" by Charles Palliser. This book is probably the best Charles Dickens book ever written, not by Charles Dickens. Palliser out Dickenses Dickens, er, I think, so to speak. "A literary classic...blah blah", just so. "Literary classic" usually means you have to read it two or three times to understand it. With JJ's "Ulysses" make that perhaps, four or five times, and with his "Finegan's", forget about reading it, just have it on your bookshelf to appear intellectual. Or try drinking 12 pints of Guinness THEN reading it, it works and everything makes complete sense.

End here. Us then. Finn, again! Take. Bussoftlhee, mememormee! Till thousendsthee. Lps. The keys to. Given! A way a lone a last a loved a long the

BLWYDDYN NEWYDD DDA

First post of the year this. Porto Alegre is baking, my apartment is baking. The only solution is drink large quatities of iced FBAs.

LAST NIGHT. I opted to be alone. Towards midnight sleep was impossible of course because of the Brazilians' love for fireworks. I drifted in and out but the partying went on 'till the wee hours so I got up later, around 10am.

I'm puting together a blog about Porto Alegre for travellers, visit it here. If anyone's travelling through or if you're a newcomer to live here a while, you'll find stuff about what to do, where to go on a Sunday morning. How to avoid getting ripped off when when dring beers, and lots of other stuff. It's an informal thing with my own points of view, I add bits and pieces almost every day so it's increasing a lot.