The Xhosa language

I though you might like to know about the local language. The local tribe are called the Xhosa, it is a very big tribe with many millions people, similar in stature to the Zulus. Nelson Mandela is a Xhosa and was actually born and brought up close to here. If you were wondering how to pronounce Xhosa it's harder than you might think, the Xh is actually a click, a bit like the noise people make when they want a horse to go faster. To make things harder there are 3 different clicks to get your tongue around, ‘c’ is a bit like making a ‘tut’ and and ‘q’ is like the sound of a cork popping. The Guiness Book of Records even lists a Xhosa phrase as the most difficult tongue twister in the world, it includes the work for windpipe which is 'uquoquoquo'. As you can imagine I’m having all sorts of fun and games trying to incorporate this into my daily speech but at least people seem to appreciate it if you just give it a try. Not surprisingly I have to work with an interpreter all the time at the moment and probably will have to for the whole year. If you are accepted by people here they like to give you a Xhosa name, I’m hoping mine will have a click in it that I can show off when I get home.

Just a note on the strike, it is supposed to get worse tomorrow with the unions calling for a complete shut-down of the country. We have been promised a skeleton of staff for the hospital which I hope we will get. Understandably the nurses have been quite scared as working nurses in larger central hospitals have been physically abused but other strikers. Fingers crossed then…