BellaOnline Forums Travel and Culture African Culture Wearing a Khanga

I try to look at the searches done on my site every week or so. Someone did a search on "someone wearing a khanga". I didn't have any pictures, so I took out one of my khangas and had my daughter model it.

Here's the first picture:


Most East African women are seen wearing khangas over their skirts in this manner. The khanga keeps the dust and dirt of their nicer clothes.

Here's the same khanga being worn in a different manner:



My daughter has a t-shirt on underneath, but generally your wouldn't have that on. I've never seen a woman wear a khanga like this - this may be done in the privacy of her own home, perhaps. I did see this in a guide on khangas in a Nairobi bookstore. I wish I had bought the book...

One last picture of the African proverb on the back of the khanga:



To learn more about khangas, you can read my article What is a Khanga?

Nice, we went to Tanzania and brought back many of these,

Wow those are gorgeous! Is that the same general thing as they call a sarong in the Indian area? I have two now and love them. They are so versatile!

YES, it is very similar to a sarong. Actually the only differences I can really think of is that sarongs usually have fringe on the edges (and khangas don't) and a khanga is unique because of the swahili sayings, or proverbs that are on them. But other than that a khanga can be tied just like a sarong. I use my khangas for EVERYTHING!!! heheh, if you ever need any ideas or tips for tying your sarongs just let me know, I'm getting quite good with mine! Here are some more pics... One of my favorite uses is a couch cover because as you will see in the picture I have a very fuzzy cat!! It also makes a great headwrap when I am too lazy to mess with my hair. That other picture is me and my husband at The Wailers concert last weekend.

Those are all such great pictures. I love my sarongs and wouldn't mind adding a khanga to my wardrobe.

Jambo!
I brought a beautiful purple, black and white khanga back from Kenya and have worn it tied over one shoulder over a black turtleneck and slacks. Very dramatic!
I also like to use it as a window covering to keep the sun out of the kitchen in summer. (I don't have regular curtains or drapes.)
I was interested to read that the lettering on it is a proverb. Can anyone translate it for me?
Hata nikitenda wema binadamu siwema yao nimaovu.
Thanks!

I found an online Swahili dictionary for you

Hata - even
nikitenda - are actions
wema - good
binadamu - people
siwema - not good
yao - their
nimaovu - are evil

OK so what does it mean? Is it dangerous wearing something that says something you don't know about?

Even if they do good things, if a person is not good their actions are evil?

Thanks, Lisa. Translations are so difficult when we don't know anything about word positions, etc. in a language. And proverbs are particularly hard because they often use idioms that only make sense to someone who grew up with the language.
I will choose to think it means that even bad people can do good things, until someone who speaks Swahili tells me otherwise.

I'm sure Jeanne can ask one of her contacts and get the actual meaning!

It just amazes me that I've searched Google for quite a while and can't find that phrase *anywhere*. There are a lot of sites with Swahili proverbs and yours is mysterious!

I can get my daughter's uncle to translate that phrase for me.

Here is what I've come up with...

Hata - Until (let's use 'Even' - makes more sense)
nikitenda - If I do good (ni = I, ki = if, tenda = to do good)
wema - goodness
binadamu - a human being
siwema - not goodness (si = not, wema = good)
yao - their
nimaovu - I (something) wicked (ni = I, ma = this is the tense I can't figure out, ovu = to be wicked)

I've got a lot of guesses on this, but I can't quite put it together...


This is what I get between my two Swahili dictionaries. Swahili doesn't read straight through. Pronouns and nouns moderate each other in an odd order.

I'm thinking siwema yao is "Their not goodness" or "Their evilness" but I could be way off on that.

This might be something like "If I do good things, humans are good. If I do bad things, they are bad." Seems simplistic. Let's see what Uncle Steve has to say... LOL My Swahili is very rusty now that I haven't really spoken it for 15 years.

Or maybe something like "Even if a good human does good, their not goodness (evil deeds) ... I am wicked" something like that? Maybe?

I'm probably WAY off on this. I should have been in bed about an hour ago. LOL

I've sent this to Uncle Steve... hehehe We'll see what he says.