While wetin dey happen?' means 'What is going on?' I Sabi This is the pidgin form of the verb 'to be'.įor example, ‘You too dey tear head!’ means ‘you are too quarrelsome or short-tempered.’ This could mean 'go', 'leave', or 'get out!' This means 'Traffic Jam.’ You will hear people say things like ‘Go slow hold me as I dey com.' It means ‘On my way here, I was help up in a traffic jam.’ Comot If you're shopping you might say ‘I no get basket of tomatoes for house.’ This means, ‘I don’t have a basket of tomatoes at home.’ Go Slow ‘I no get anytin to tell you’ means, 'I have nothing to say to you' or 'I have no words.' It means ‘Please, come and join me.’ I no get You could say, 'Abeg come chop food' which is an invitation to a meal. You can use the suffix '–solutely' from the word 'absolutely' to create 'Gbamsolutely', which is used in more sophisticated circles. This is a response that means 'exactly or precisely.' Response: ‘E burn small, but notin spoil.’ Meaning ‘Yes, it did but not enough to ruin it’ but if he simply says ‘Notin spoil’ it means ‘All is well, the meal is intact.’ Gbam! You: ‘Di food burn?’ or ‘notin spoil abi?’ meaning ‘ did the meal burn?’ If for instance you were in the kitchen, cooking with a friend, then you both step out for a bit and realise that the meal is burning, then one person runs off to check, you might have this conversation: It means: ‘This is how meat is fried, right?’ Someone could answer saying ‘na so’, meaning ‘yes’ or even say ‘ern-ern, na so?’ if they are not sure of the answer. This means 'It is so' or 'I concur/ is that so?įor instance, you could ask: ‘No so dem dey fry meat, abi? It means: 'The shade of green on this bag is lemon green, right?’ Na so/Na so? Sometimes we switch it with ‘e be like magic.’ Abi?įor example, if you're shopping for lemons you might say: ‘Dis bag na lemon green e be, abi?’ 'di way wey di car tumble ern, e be like film!’ meaning ‘the way the car tumbled was just like in the movies, or incredible.’
#Png pidgin english phrases movie
This phrase is used to express incredulity, especially when reporting a scenario, movie or circumstance.įor instance, a person reporting an accident that happened quickly could say: It means, ‘Are you sure of what you are saying? This doesn’t seem true.’ E be like film
The situation or topic is either suspicious or untrue.įor instance, one could say: ‘You sure of dis tin wey you dey talk so? Dis matter get k-leg.’ You can also say 'Dis food sweet no be small.' K-leg This phrase means 'This meal is delicious'. When you hear, 'You don chop up?' the speaker means 'You are prospering or have put on some weight.' Dis food sweet well, well To show that you are extremely hungry, you can say: So 'I wan Chop' or 'I dey H' means 'I want to eat' or 'I am hungry.' Unlike the English word, 'chop' which implies that something is being sliced or hacked in pidgin it means 'food'. This is pidgin for 'How are you?' With friends, you can also say: It doesn't threaten any linguistic or cultural heritage, but rather binds us. Our safe place is Nigerian Pidgin: our common language. This can make speakers of other languages uncomfortable. Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba languages are our national languages because they are spoken by the majority. Consequently, my siblings also learned languages and married speakers of other languages. My father also moved our family around by working in different states, until he settled in Abuja when I was born. My aunties married and introduced new languages into the family.
This exposed them to different linguistic environments now they speak between three and six languages.
My maternal grandfather, Sergeant Afa, was a soldier whose family of 11 moved from barrack to barrack. It is the one language that binds us all. Just remember to add a little bit of pidgin to yours and you will be fine. If you are visiting Nigeria, don't be daunted by the 520 languages in our repertoire. Tok is derived from the English word talk and Pisin from pidgin.Author Mimi Werna has put together her 20 favourite phrases in Nigerian Pidgin. Tok Pisin is a creole language and is the most widely spoken in Papua New Guinea with between one and two million exposed to it as a first language.
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