igama lami lesiZulu

Igami lami lesiZulu nguNtshebe. My Zulu name is Ntshebe. This translates, literally, as "long beard" or "person with long beard." Which means that native Zulu speakers immediately find me ridiculous, and that they almost never forget my name. For example, every morning when I walk into the kitchen for breakfast and every afternoon when I return from class, the housekeeper stops what she's doing, smiles a big smile, and shouts out (more about me than at me) "Ntshebe omkhulu!"

It does help a little bit that I'm not the only one with a ridiculous Zulu name: on our first morning in Durban, the waitress in the hotel asked for our Zulu names, and I replied, "Ngibizwa 'Ntshebe'" (I am called "Ntshebe"), while one of my colleagues explained that he as of yet did not have a Zulu name. She thought for a second, asked if it would be okay if she gave him a Zulu name, and when he replied affirmatively she said, "UnguSidudla" (You are Sidudla). He's a big guy, and while Sidudla translates literally as "powerfully built person," it's probably more like calling somebody "Thickness." And then there's Masondosondo ("Wheels Wheels"), who uses a wheelchair. So needless to say it's a ridiculous sight when Long Beard, Thickness, and Wheels are traveling in a pack.

Speaking of names, and of our housekeeper, we had forgotten (or just not heard, or heard and just not comprehended) our housekeeper's name and were feeling bad about that, so we asked one of our professors about the best way to go about apologizing and asking her to tell us again. But she explained to us that it's actually no big deal to forget somebody's name in Zulu culture, and that on the contrary it's possible to go a long time without ever asking or knowing someone's name. This is because kinship terms are far more important in Zulu culture, and so it's far more common to call somebody Mama or Baba or mfowethu (our brother) or dadewethu (our sister). So her suggestion was just to go on saying, "Sawubona, Mama" (Hello, Mama, lit. "We see you, Mama") and then say, one day, "Konje, lithini igama lakho?" -- "By the way, what's your name?" Of course if she had a name like Ntshebe or Sidudla, we wouldn't have run into this problem in the first place.