Pijin/Pidgin/Pidgeon: The basics

I thought that since it’s my last week, I’d relay a few of the things I’ve learned about the language from taking medical histories from people in Munda. I don’t pretend to be fluent, I don’t even pretend to be able to say more than a few words and even those are probably said very badly – however, a couple of people have asked me to tell them some words so I figured I’d give it a go – most of the words I’ve learned are useful when asking medical questions so you might find some difficult to use in conversation.

Firstly, one thing I should say that the language Pijin is spoken across the country, but in the Western Province (where I am) they mostly speak another language, Roviana, which is completely different and actually unrelated to English. So I know some words in Pijin, but also some in Roviana and I’m not always sure which is which. Another thing, spelling here seems to be entirely phonetic, and they actually don’t seem to care how many are spelled and so the same word may be written differently within the same sentence. For that reason, I have no idea how to spell words so will just try and spell so you can ‘hear’ the words.

Kai-kai – food/eating – e.g you kaikai good?

Sigity – pain (Roviana)

Soa (pron. Sohwah) – pain (Pijin) – can also be ‘pen’

Hillily – burning

Mimi – urine

Toilet – bowel stuff

Ekho – lie down

Pikinini – children

Papopua – home – also ‘ples blong mi’ (see below)

Tumas – too/very much – e.g. thank you tumas – (I thought there were a lot of people named Thomas when I first arrived)

Stacka – lots

Save (pron. Sahveh)  – to know

Baskit – bag

Plastik – plastic bag

Lilbet – little bit

Some grammar:

He/she/it = Hem – (quite useful when doing baby checks - no awkward boy/girl queries)

Mi = Me/I – You don’t use the word I here, it’s always Mi/Me

Fala – used with numbers/plurals – e.g. I want 2 mangoes – Mi likem 2 fala mango

Blong – Possessive (ie belonging to) – e.g. Pikinini blong mi – my children

No – negative – e.g. mi no save – I don’t know

Non-verbal:

Raising eyebrows – means yes – the British doctors found it frustrating when taking histories because it took them weeks to realise that the patients WERE answering their questions.

Finally – after this rather pathetic attempt to explain some words, there’s a much better explanation on the hospital website for anyone who’s interested.