Triomf; The Tower of Babel Re-Titled (Avec Subtitles)

Producer Lyndon Plante brings forward an intriguing point:

"Triomf the movie is now being made with South African, Zimbabwean, French, British, Mozambiquan and American input (that I am aware of)."

It makes us wonder: How many languages do all of us speak? An obvious list would include Afrikaans, English (in its South African, Zimbabwean, American and perhaps even British variants), French, Portuguese, Spanish... and then we up in Jo'burg-sur-la-Seine would love to know if Triomf has anybody aboard fluent in Zulu or Xhosa or Swazi or... well or any of SA's eleven official languages. And what is it like to live in a land not merely official languages, but eleven of 'em.

(As Americans, we consider it our patriotic duty to discourage any speaking of Spanish whatsoever, worldwide, lest our mother tongue be corrupted and we find ourselves, say, at a rodeo out on the chaparral twirling our lariats high atop our cayuses and discover our burritos have been adulterated with too much guacamole and salsa, forcing us to vamoose across la frontera to, peut-être, Quebec.)

In any case, we welcome the day when the Tower of Babel, much like Sophiatown, is officially renamed "Triomf." (And then back again. With an official ceremony. In eleven languages. And then a big braii afterwards. And maybe some dancing.)

Boere Music, Afrikaans... and Paris

Those of us in the Paris, France, region of South Africa will have to be forgiven our ignorance. Especially when it comes to matters like discussions of Boere Music, or Boeremusiek, or whatever it's called (we speak a very curious Afrikaans argot in this arrondissement).

And because our Afrikaans is so lacking, up here in Johannesburg's northernmost suburbs, we worry sometimes. We worry that we're missing nuances, or that we're not currently right in the thick of what's left of the argument over Bok van Blerk and "De La Rey." (Even if that discussion seems a little overwrought to our Southern South African comrades, we here in Paris love to sit around Les Deux Magots and discuss the finer details.)

But in our effort to inform ourselves, we came across a pretty extraordinary piece of work by Andries ''Roof'' Bezuidenhout, on SA's own LitNet Vryepoort. It's a lively, lengthy article that makes a tremendous effort at putting "De La Rey" and conteporary music in Afrikaans in context. We need that up here in Paris, frankly.

So we're adding a link to this article in here, in hopes of stimulating a small and civilized but lively discussion. And note that it even has footnotes, which means it must be good. (We Parisian philosophes love a laundry list's worth of footnotes. It makes us feel — how do you say it in Afrikaans? — tres existentialiste?