Goliath Kilikiting-Thing

All languages have words that are fairly boring,with little precision, having equivalents in almost every language (your standard vanilla and chocolate flavor words): ho-hum vocab fodder that you have to memorize to learn.

However, every language also has amazing words with have precise definitions, words that aren't found in most other languages (your chocolate-fudge-rippled-with-amphetamine-dipped-bacon-bits-enrobed-in-dark-chocolate flavor words).

Gbaya is no exception.  For example, they don't have a general word for "to choose".  They have a word meaning choosing the best out of something but not just something generally meaning "to choose"(chocolate and vanilla).  

They do, like many other African languages, have a special kind of word called "ideophones."  I know when one hears that word "ideophone" for the first time, one might think of phones that should be programmed to administer grave electric shocks to the idiots who are using them while driving.  But ideophones are not that (unfortunately.)

Ideophones are words that evoke an idea in sound, often a vivid impression of certain sensations or sensory perceptions, e.g. sound, movement, color, shape, or action. Ideophones are found in many of the world's languages, though they are relatively uncommon in Western languages.(Wikipedia)

These words usually are usually onomatopoeic and often have very specific situations in which they occur.  In Gbaya they always are all high tones and often have consonants that don't occur in "normal" words (like the very rare "v" sound in Gbaya).

I first really came in contact with these words when Alexis and I were doing a check of 1 Samuel 17 (the famous David and Goliath story).  Now, ideophones don't occur in Hebrew, yet these words are used to match the particular situations in the story.  And the feedback on these words in the Bible translation was that they make the story "better" and "really Gbaya".  Here's just a couple of words used in the story...words to which there is certainly no equivalent in English (at least that I can figure out). 

 I went through each word with Alexis and it was impossible for him to give a Sango or French one-word equivalent.  He described the situations in which they were used and we came up with a definition from there.

Veng- The way in which something separates from something quickly.  Like the way a rock flies out of a sling.  This was used in 17:51 Describing how Goliath’s head came off after David's swipe of his sword.  (Did it come off with a swipe or did he hack it off?....we don't know)

Kilikiting- The state of something big and heavy that has fallen down that does not move anymore.  But it has the connotation of someone looking at this “fallen big thing” and saying mockingly “You’re not so big now!”.  Used in 1 Samuel 17:50 describing Goliath being killed by David.

Tondolo-  The state of something either asleep or dead that doesn’t seem to have any muscle control. Alexis said, "Imagine if you saw someone who is immediately killed by a bullet in the head, how does their body position look after it has fallen?  That's tondolo."  Used to describe the dead bodies of the Philistines on the road from the battlefield to Ekron in 1 Samuel 17:51. 

Degbele-degbele- The movement of fat jiggling or swaying from side to side on someone. Usually referring to a fat belly or a fat backside swaying from side to side when a person is walking slowly.  Pragmatically used to say that someone is fat in sort of a silly and joking way (African cultures aren't sensitive about being fat as Western cultures are).  This was discussed as being used to describe Eli in God's accusation of him not taking the sacrifices seriously but instead just "fattening" himself in 1 Samuel 2:29.  However, this was later abandoned because it was too comical of a word to be used in such a serious situation.  No really, everybody just was dying laughing every time we read it and became weeks long of puns with this word at every opportunity followed by 15 seconds of good laughing.  So.... no go on this one.

These kinds of words are peppered all over the Gbaya New and Old Testament translations.  Because a Bible translation is not a true Bible translation until it sounds like your language.  Or, in our case, it sounds like "real Gbaya."  Like God speaking to you personally where you are.  Because that's what the Bible is.