Written by Afendi Muteki
Part Two
The
youth of Dire Dawa have interesting skills. Among them, what attracts me most
is their language skill. From the youth
of Dire Dawa, you will rarely see a boy who can’t speak three languages; Afan
Oromoo, Amharic and Somali. As Arabic is still servin as the commercial
language of the city, many of the youth of Dire Dawa also learn to speak it.
The boys who were brought up in the Konnel area of Magala district easily
communicate in Harari language as though they were the native speakers. The
youth whose livelihood is associated with the railway transportation can be
assumed to understand French if not they speak it fluently.
 |
| Dire Dawa in 2007, photo by Dire Tube (www.diretube.com) |
Being
multi-lingual is a gift of the Almighty God. It helps one to share his feeling
with others easily. It has a remedy during hardships and it can be a source of fantasy.
Furthermore, a mult-lingual person can easily get high audience. Social
chatting in friends circle will become more amusing when the friends in the
circle are multi-lingual. The youth of
Dire Dawa highly match the descriptions I put here. If you go to Dire Dawa and
visit your friend in his barcaa “Jama’aa” (club), or if you stop at a café in
“Kazira” and meet by chance some youth of Dire Dawa passing a coffee time
there, then you would be highly amazed in their language skill and may say “I
wish I were born in Dire Dawa”.
The
youth of Dire Dawa are very active; as they fastly adapted to new technology
and easily create new working techniques, they have also created their
city-wide colloquial languages. For example, they speak Afan Oromo and Amharic
in unique accents. Let me paraphrase this .
Basically
the Afan Oromo spoken in the city is the Harar Oromo dialect. And in this
dialect, you will say “argeetin jira” for “I have seen it”. But the youth of
Dire Dawa say “agareetin jira” which is slightly different. If you want to say
“he passed” in Afaan Oromoo, you will say “dabre”, but the youth of Dire Dawa
say “dabare”. In Afaan Oromo, you will say “ana qofa” for “only me”; but in
Dire Dawa accent, you will say “ana qullii”. And in Afaan Oromoo, you will say
“kijibaa” for “liar”, but the youth of Dire Dawa say “Farada”. This unique accent doesn’t extend out of Dire
Dawa to the towns situated in the highlands of Harerghe. (Some parts of Haramaya
and Harar may be regarded as two exceptions; I observed that some of the youth
of these towns also share the accent of Dire Dawa to some extent).
The
colloquial language in Dire Dawa also contains many words that are created by
the youth. As I introduced you at the beginning of my essay, “qashti” was
created by them. Words like “abustoo” (“alright), “xuxxuruq” (talkative) and
“labjaa” (“cheating in sells” or the cheater himself) are also attributed to
them. On the other hand, the youth of Dire Dawa, altered the meaning of many of
the existing words and made them parts of the spoken language. For example, the
word “jiidhaa” (wet) is made to mean “foolish”; “daaraa” (ash) was altered to
“miserable”, “ulaa” (honey collector) was made to mean “deceptive” or “cheater”
and “bonbaa” (water pipe) was altered to “a big liar”.
The
spoken language of the city is also featured by a frequent reoccurrence of some
Arabic words. For example, Arabic words like “faduuli” (the one that enters to
others’ personal affair), “iyyala suuq” (gangster), and “fattala” (rumour disseminator)
are highly used in the speech of Dire Dawa youth.
The
last but equally important items that have a great part in the spoken language
of Dire Dawa are the idiomatic expressions and proverbs which are created
periodically and added to speech of the people. For example, “hattuu salaattu”
(a thief that prays) is an idiom created by Dire Dawa youth, and it has an
approximate meaning with the English idiom “wolf in the lambs skin”. “Hisaaba
finiinaa” (a boiling price) is said when a person interested to by certain
product is asked to pay a high price that he didn’t expect. From a proverbs
created by the youth of Dire Dawa, the one that goes “khabajaan kuntaala abban
qumxatti deebisa” (meaning “dignity worths a quintal but the owner may
exchange it for an ounce”) is very famous and it clearly shows the exalted
stage of their creative mind.
One
should note that the words, idioms and proverbs created by Dire Dawa youth are
now also used by the residents of the other towns of Harerghe. However, no
urban dweller in the other towns of Harerghe resemble the youth of Dire Dawa
when he speaks. For example, I, the native of Galamso, can’t resemble in my
speech the Dire Dawa youth in anyway; even though I use the created words like
“qashti” and “labjaa”, I don’t say “agareetin jira” or “faradaa” as the youth
of Dire Dawa. (By the way, we those who are born in Harerghe use this
clear-cutting sign as a formula to differentiate those who falsely claim a
birth in Dire Dawa from those who were truly the natives of the city).
***** ***** *****
I
have described for you Dire Dawa in short. Before I summarize my essay, let me
take you the “La Gare” quarter of the city and show you the language usage
associated with railway transportation.
Trains
are called according to their service and their comfortability. “Otoray” is the
main passengers’ train. It can be taken as the highgway public bus of the train
catagory; however, it is very different from public bus for it has three
classes which accommodate passengers according to the payment they can afford.
Class one is the luxury class. People who paid for this class may sit on highly
comfortable seats or they may sleep on a sofa while they are on travel. People
in the second class will get seats individually, but there are no sofas here.
The third one is the most busy and densely occupied class; seats are available
to those who have gotten in to the train early, and the rest will travel
standing on the floor of the train. Suffocation, troubles in breathing, and
highl heat are the usual phenomena the travellers in this class would have to
struggle.
“Dede”
is another kind of passengers train. It is different from “Otoray” in the
number of the carts it has; “Otoray” has many carts than “Dede”. Because of
this, there may not be class difference on “Dede”; it may host only second
class travellers, or all of the carts may be of third class.
Another
kind of passengers train is called “Hasan Jog”. However, for a reason I
couldn’t know until now, its journey is confined to Dire Dawa-Djibouti line
only. Is it because the locomotive can’t resist travelling long distance in the
high temprature? It may be, but the youth of “Laga Gare” may tell us the true reason
behind this.
Except
infants, all passengers that use the rail transportation should pay a
travelling fee. The fee is called “Noolii” and it is paid before entering to
the train. The passenger who paid “Noolii” would receive a receipt which he
must have in his hand until his final destination. When the controller of the
train service asked him for the receipt while on travel, he must show it. If
the passenger is unable to show the receipt, then the controller of the train
would consider him a cheater and fine him. This controller, who usually dresses
a unique uniform, is called “Shaftraan”.
People
who can’t afford the payments, and usually on-travel thieves, relay on another
kind of train called “Falto”. This is a freight carrier train that brings loads
from the port of Djibouti and takes the export items there. Those who don’t pay
“Noolii” preferred it only for there is no “Shaftraan” here. However, people
onboard wouldn’t enter to the carts of the train by any means; the internal
sections of the carts are places where freight is put.
The
travellers that use “Falto” usually sit on the roofs and the left and right
sides of the carts. It is considered illegal to travel in this way. If anyone wants
to make advantage of travelling by “Falto” in this illegal manner, he must
learn the art of the open air travellers of “Falto”. This art is called
“Harfa”. The “Harfa” includes getting onboard when the train starts its
movement from rail station, sitting on the roof and sides of the train carefully,
keeping body balance onboard and when the train passes curves, searching for
sitting places in the other carts if the whole of the sides and the roof of one
cart is occupied, and getting off the train carefully before it stopped at the
next station. A person that doesn’t observe these “Harfaa” skills may encounter
a big danger, he may die as well. If a man dies in this condition, it is said
“Nyam tahe” (meaning “He is eaten”).
***** ***** *****
This
is Dire Dawa in my sight. I hope others will tell us more about the city. I
too, will try to study it again and write other essays.
Afendi
Muteki
March
25/2013
Harar
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