Only about 1 percent of the population of East Africa owns a "kompyuta." This is what a computer is called in Kiswahili.
Internet cafes are quickly spreading across the country but in order to benefit from this technology you need to know English. In East Africa, computer programs are sold in English only.
UNESCO estimates about 90 percent of the world's approximately 6,000 languages are not available on the Internet.
But in Africa there is change in the air. The search engine Google now offers an interface in Kiswahili. By the middle of the year, Microsoft plans to introduce Windows and Office versions in the same language.
Kiswahili is spoken by about 100 million people in six countries, making it worth the effort. "We want to give more people in Africa access to computers," says Patrick Opiyo, Project Manager at Microsoft in Nairobi.
The history of Kiswahili goes back to the times when Arabic seamen traded with the Bantu population. Since the upper classes in the former British colonies continued to speak English, Kiswahili modernized only slowly.
For many terms in the world of compu-ters, no separate Kiswahili word has established itself, as yet.
"You can see that clearly with the word kompyuta, a term derived from the English, of course," says Opiyo. "Today, some people prefer to say tarakilishi instead, a word which comes from Kiswahili for `calculate.'"
Translating the [computer] mouse was not a problem: Kiswahili also uses the name for the animal.
In order to translate the approximately 3,000 office software terms, Microsoft has employed linguists from Uganda to Zanzibar.
People were encouraged to make suggestions for translations through the Internet.
Microsoft adopted this method from its competitor Linux, which writes whole programs with the help of volunteers. "When a new term is translated into a native language, the language stays alive," Opiyo says.
Opiyo would like like to take Africanization a step further. "I could imagine incorporating local sounds, as well, so that when a new e-mail arrives, you don't hear the sound of a bell but the beat of an African drum."
It starts out as a heartwarming clip. A young girl, clearly delighted to be in Tokyo, beams as she makes a peace sign to the camera. Seconds later, she is shoved to the ground from behind by a woman wearing a surgical mask. The assailant doesn’t skip a beat, striding out of shot of the clip filmed by the girl’s mother. This was no accidental clash of shoulders in a crowded place, but one of the most visible examples of a spate of butsukari otoko — “bumping man” — shoving incidents in Japan that experts attribute to a combination of gender
The race for New Taipei City mayor is being keenly watched, and now with the nomination of former deputy mayor of Taipei Hammer Lee (李四川) as the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) candidate, the battle lines are drawn. All polling data on the tight race mentioned in this column is from the March 12 Formosa poll. On Christmas Day 2010, Taipei County merged into one mega-metropolis of four million people, making it the nation’s largest city. The same day, the winner of the mayoral race, Eric Chu (朱立倫) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), took office and insisted on the current
When my friend invited me to take a tour of a wooden house hand-built by a Pingtung County resident, my curiosity was instantly piqued and I readily agreed to join him. If it was built by a single person, it would surely be quite small. If it was made of wood, it would surely be cramped, dingy and mildewy. If it was designed by an amateur, it would surely be irregular in shape, perhaps cobbled together from whatever material was easily available. I was wrong on all counts. As we drove up to the house in Fangliao Township (枋寮鄉), I was surprised
March 16 to March 22 Hidden for decades behind junk-filled metal shacks, trees and overgrowth, a small domed structure bearing a Buddhist swastika resurfaced last June in a Taichung alley. It was soon identified as a remnant of the 122-year-old Gokokuzan Taichuu-ji (Taichung Temple, 護國山台中寺), which was thought to have been demolished in the 1980s. In addition, a stone stele dedicated to monk Hoshu Ono, who served as abbot from 1914 to 1930, was discovered in the detritus. The temple was established in 1903 as the local center for the Soto school
RSS