"I believe that South Africa is the most beautiful place on earth. Admittedly, I am biased but when you combine the natural beauty of sunny South Africa with the friendliness and cultural diversity of our people, and the fact that our region is a haven for Africa's most splendid wildlife, then I think that we have been blessed with a truly wonderful land"
- Nelson Mandela
I come from a country with a turbulent past and not so steady future. We are a complicated people with complicated feelings towards our country. South Africa is really a special case when it comes to our different cultures and lifestyles and how it affects our opinions about important local matters. But with all that said and done, I have to share why South Africa is truly one of the most unique places to grow up in. We are unique and vastly different to other cultures because we have so much diversity that we are, ironically, one of a kind. Europe seems an odd place to live, with odd customs and strange traditions that I find perplexing.
Our lekker way of speaking
We have the best slang terminology. Our slang is a mix of languages; from Afrikaans to Zulu and Khoi San and even Portuguese! English comes alive with bright and colourful words that give the language flavour.
Now now - soon, but different to "just now": "Ja ma, I'll do it now now."
Ag - an exclamation: "Ag man, don't be silly"
Babelaas - hangover: "I'm a bit babelaas from last night"
Eina - ouch or sore: "Is your head eina?"
Lekker - cool or good: "I had a lekker holiday"
Braai is better than barbeque
South Africans don't barbeque like the rest of the world. We braai. And we don't braai meat; we braai boerewors and vleis.
It's not ketchup. It's called tomato sauce
And the best tomato sauce is by far South Africa's favourite "All Gold", with its famous 36 tomatoes. I don't know how many of my international friends "correct" me. "Don't you mean ketchup?" No. I mean tomato sauce. What does the word "ketchup" even mean?
The proper school year
School starts in January and ends in December. As how it should be; with reasonable holiday periods in between school terms for kids not to get bored. Summer holidays and school terms are too long in America and Europe. We much prefer our school year.
We don't speak Afrikaans because we're from Africa
Too many times I've been told this while travelling abroad. I shake my head at people's ignorance but, to be fair, I can see where they get the assumption from; yet we all know what happens when we assume! Afrikaans is a dialect language of Dutch with smatterings of other languages that gives it a different feel on the lips compared its mother tongue. It is not Dutch, although it is the daughter language of it. I guess it is an African language in its own right.
We are not just black and white
We are truly a rainbow nation. We are black, white, Indian, Asian and coloured and yet we are all South African! I love it. We all seem to fit into a ticking box. Within each "box", we diverge even further into our own separate cultures. I still forget sometimes that other countries aren't as diverse as ours. We have no one main religion so even on Christmas, you'll find something open.
Christmas in summer
Christmas means sunshine and beaches; holidays and summer rains; shorts and dresses. Two Christmasses now abroad in Europe and I can honestly say that there is nothing better than a Christmas Day lunch in the garden followed by swimming in the pool or spending the day on the beach.
Rooibos tea is more popular than black tea
I grew up drinking rooibos ("red bush" in Afrikaans) since I was a little girl and I remember my family in Poland asking us to send them boxes of it before it became popular abroad. We don't call it red tea though. It is, and forever will be, rooibos.
We play soccer not football
The country is divided on this, depending on who you speak to. Some of us, like me, will call it soccer but many of my friends who follow the English league, will go into heavy debates about how it is not soccer but the age old game of football. It doesn't really matter though because the sport comes second to rugby; our pride and joy.
We raise silkworms as a hobby
As kids, we raise silkworms as pets. I remember how excited we would get each season when it was time to trade and see who had the most silkworms until our parents decided that enough was enough, and we threw our shoe boxes away, which we kept filled with mulberry leaves for the little guys to munch on until they cocooned themselves. When they emerged as pretty little white moths, we would watch in awe as they laid their eggs on the sides of the box and died. I think this was my first lesson in the cycle of life and death.
We have the coolest currency
OK, so the rand isn't particularly strong and if you ask any South African, they'll tell you how much they hate it but even though it's this, that and the next thing, it is still the coolest looking cash I have seen on my travels thus far. I still feel proud when I show my students our coins and notes. I mean, come on, we have animals and the newly added Madiba. Who wants presidents and kings when you can tell how much money you have got by looking at which animal of the Big Five is on the note.
Where are the animals in the rest of the world?
You can pretty much go to any reserve and see zebra, buck and giraffe. Walk into my house during the summer and I guarantee you'll see a rain spider somewhere. We're careful of snakes and let's not get started on the monkeys at the coast. Our bird life is famous and Cape Town is world reknown for whale sightings and cage diving with Great Whites. Visit the Kruger and you'll find our precious Big Five. Where are the animals in Europe? Nothing in Spain and you have to venture into the forests of Poland to maybe catch a glimpse of something wild. My British friends had a debate on whether Scotland even had snakes. I still find this puzzling and kind of funny. How do you grow up not camping in the bush and having to be careful of the hippos and hyenas?
My childhood was pretty epic, with summer vacations at the iconic Vaal Dam, raising silkworms, trying to whistle like the man in the All Gold tomato sauce commercial (thirty sixxxxx), calling our domestic worker Gogo ("granny" in Zulu) as she helped raise me and was part of our family, not understanding that having black friends was newly socially acceptable, and other typical South Africanisms.
We, as a country, might be young and have many problems but one thing I can say and hold true to, is that my country has made me special and I will always be a daughter of Africa.
