Pronunciation in Malawi

In Chichewa, the language spoken in Malawi, it is no crime to exchange an ‘l’ for an ‘r’. So whenever there is an ‘l’ you can also say ‘r’ and vice versa. Hence, many Malawians can’t hear the difference between an ‘l’ and an ‘r’, which becomes a problem when they speak English. It is always about a 50/50 chance that they get it right. A ‘frying pan’ easily becomes a ‘flying pan’, a ‘blight right’ is a ‘bright light’, and ‘Amalura’ is ‘Amarula’. Even with their own names they sometimes change them – even in writing. I for instance have a Jaqureen in my class (who sometimes is Jacqueline) and a Calorine.

When I was visiting the cathedral on Likoma Island I was in one of the rooms and my guide said

“so this is where they have the romance.”

“What do you mean by ‘they have romance in here’?”

“Here they have romance and in the other room they have high mass?”

You guessed it: it wasn’t ‘romance’ but ‘low mass’. Over the weekend the actor that I was so impressed of in Blantyre stayed with us in our house. He has a project with Zipatso Academy where he has some workshops with the students from time to time. He told me that a famous politician once said the following on the radio: “The presidents erection is very important for us women. His erection is going to push us forward …”

Another thing is that Malawians when speaking English often add an –y to almost every word the say: “Andy theny I wenty to the lakey”. This is only a problem when the word with the –y ending also exists and has a different meaning. For instance in Chichewa the numbers 8 and 80 are the same: eighty.