Hard in Zulu

Divorce is hard, but money cushions the pain. 

McKenzie Scott and her husband Jeff Bezos divorced. 

Hard is lukhuni  in Zulu.

Lu-khu-ni. You say the  first part like look, the second like cook and the last like neat.

In the olden days in a land called Kwa-Zulu, mothers, aunts, married sisters and grandmothers warned girls that: u-lu-khu-ni u-mendo (marriage is hard).

You think your marriage is hard because he did not say I love you when you parted at the train station? Women those days were marrying men who had 3 or four wives and the last wife, was not necessarily the last.  

Climate change. It’s very hard to take, also very scary. Climate change is hard because we see nature’s anger after centuries of abuse: COVID-19, birds dying from oil spills, whales running away from home to die on the beach, the 2004 tsunami, floods, heatwave and fires bent on destroying whole states and provinces.

Things are hard for clothing factories in U.S. England and France because fashion designers manufacture all that high fashion in China and other countries, where labour is not in dollars, pounds and euros.

ZULU	ENGLISH
I-COVID-19 ilukhuni.	Covid-19 is hard.
Ukuguga ku-lukhuni.	Old age is hard.
Umendo ulukhuni.	Marriage is hard.
Le-nyama ilukhuni.	This meat is hard.
Ukudilizwa ku-lukhuni.	Being laid off/retrenched is hard.
Kulukhuni ukufelwa umama.	It’s hard when your mother dies.
Kulukhuni ukufelwa ingane.	Losing a baby is hard.
Kulukhuni e-Merika.	It’s hard in America.
Kulukhuni e-Haiti.	It’s hard in Haiti.
Kulukhuni e-South Africa.	It’s hard in South Africa.
Kulukhuni e-Gaza.	It’s hard in Gaza.

TRY IT: Using your country say, ‘Kulukhuni e………………

This is another ‘written podcast” by Nonqaba waka Msimang.