Feit van die dag!

So, if you can't tell by the title, today's fact is about language. South Africa's constitution recognizes and guarantees equal status to 11 different languages! As Southafrica.info proudly proclaims, South Africa is not called the rainbow nation for nothing. Luckily, English is the most commonly spoken language in official and commercial public life. However, it is only the sixth most common spoken home language.
According to the 2001 census, IsiZulu is the the mother tongue of about 24% of the South African population. It is the language of South Africa's largest ethnic group, the Zulu people. It is an extremely regional language, spoken predominantly in the Gauteng province (which is where Johannesburg is located, and where I will be arriving). I wanted to make the title of this blog entry in IsiZulu, but Google Translate didn't offer that as an option. So it is in Afrikaans, which is the homelanguage in about 13% of the population. You can go use google translate to figure out what it says! And if, like me, you don't know anything about the language of Afrikaans, here is some info: It developed in South Africa from 17th century Dutch dialects. Apparently it is fairly close to the Dutch language, although it is easier for Dutch-speakers to understand Afrikaans than the other way around.


There are quite a few other African languages listed, but luckily most South Africans are multi-lingual and most speak English. This is good news, because I don't think I would have been able to buy 11 different travel phrase books. Just in case, I looked up which languages are predominant in the Free State Province, which is where Parys and the Dell Cheetah Centre is located. Apparently the predominant languages are Sesotho and Afrikaans. Dit behoort 'n avontuur wees!
On a side note, my bud just told me that both IsiZulu and Sesotho are both languages that include click consonants. She (may or may not be) a linguistics major, so she knows her stuff! I can't wait to hear these languages!


Okay, on to cheetahs! I decided to stick with the whole language thing, so it's a fact about cheetah sounds. Cheetahs can't roar. They can purr, hiss, growl, whine, and call to each other with chirping birdlike sounds. Because it can purr but not roar, the cheetah is not considered a "true" big cat. But its purr is really loud!