Comments on: Learn some South African slang – greet a South African today

By: LieweHeksie1024

LieweHeksie1024 — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 20:56:24 +0000

Hallo, hoezit ?

Hoe het dit vandag met jou gegaan ?

I say this all the time

By: ONX

ONX — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 17:55:21 +0000

i like the exclamation yessirs!! (jesus!)
and the affirmative es vaar (true that!!)
i only know these very short ones,sumbudy please help me construct a sentence in afrikaans.oh!! and then i know es nee reg (its not good)
es reg (its/is good)

HATS OFF FOR ME!!!!

By: Sue Pitt

Sue Pitt — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 08:30:03 +0000

As ex-South Africans (20 years gone) it is amazing how easily we understand these exchanges still. Here are some other examples:
‘Jislaaik!’ Exclamation of surprise/pain, also ‘eina!’ Then there is one of my favourites: ‘Ja-nee’ which translated from Afrikaans is ‘Yes-No’ – usually used as a filler, a pause in conversation, and has no real meaning.
An interesting phrase is ‘ Ja, well, no fine’ – another almost no meaning filler, said I think in consideration of something eg.
Person 1 : ” Shall I pick you up then?”
Person 2: ” Ja, well, no fine – catch you later.”

By: VallyP

VallyP — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 19:16:26 +0000

I also like the combination English/Afrikaans expressions that are commonly used, like:
“Let’s pay and ry” – meaning pay and go (‘Ry’ being Afrikaans for drive)
“finish and klaar” – really finished (‘klaar’ means finished)
There are others, but I don’t know how to spell some of them as I’ve only ever used them in speech in SA.

By: VallyP

VallyP — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 19:07:37 +0000

‘takkies’ is the South African word for trainers and ‘plakkies’ is used for flip flops and a ‘bakkie’ is a pick up truck. ‘Muti’ is medicine (from Zulu) and a ‘fundhi’ (not sure of the spelling here) is someone who’s a bit of an expert in something.

By: mizenglish

mizenglish — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 02:47:31 +0000

‘bru’ is a popular one i heard exchanged between men in Cape Town. I think it’s short for ‘brother’ perhaps. The word ‘lekker’ and ‘dangas/dungus’ were pretty recurrent in speech too. Not sure they’re considered slang though.