Zulu Lesson Touch

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RCMP officer touching her boots.

Touch is thinta in Zulu. Babies are big on touching. They touch your face while they are on the bottle. Probably checking if it’s not artificial intelligence feeding them. One guy online said women don’t touch men accidentally on the arm. They like you.

Thi-nta. You say the first part like tea, the last one like fantastic. We live in a touch world. Phone and computers have touch screens. Shopping malls have touch screen directories: for banks touch here, for shoe stores touch here, for handbags touch here etc.  

What is lacking is human touch. Very soon, the U.S. will ban it, like Tik Tok. The world is extremely complicated. We don’t touch anymore. Men cannot touch women at work to remove something in the hair or clothing, for fear of sexual harassment. We stopped hugging and shaking hands in 2020, the year of COVID-19. We still don’t, in case the devious virus is still lurking somewhere.

There’s a Zulu proverb about touching the snake on the tail (wathinta inyoka emsileni) which means provoking a dangerous person like a bully, drug lord or a former boxing champ.

ENGLISH

ZULU

They are always touching each other.

Bahlale be-thintana.

Don’t touch me (lovers’ fight).

Musa ukungi-thinta.

Don’t touch the fire (teaching kids).

Musa uku-thinta umlilo.

Don’t touch anything (shopping with kids).

Ninga thinti lutho.

Bob touched Kim first.

U-Bob uthinte u-Kim kuqala.

Prince Harry touches his wife a lot.

Prince Harry uthinta umkakhe kakhulu.

I’ll touch you by phone.

Ngizoku-thinta ngocingo.

By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.

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