It is not every African thing that must have an English name -By Azuka Onwuka

Azuka Onwuka

Ịgba nkwụ is ịgba nkwụ, not “wine carrying.” “Wine carrying” is crude English that makes no meaning and has no class.

Suya is suya. It needs no English name.

Banga is banga. That name is fantastic.

Starch as the name of a meal is scary. Can someone beg our Warri people to give a sweet local name to that food?

Ofe nsala is ofe nsala, not white soup. The colour of that soup is not white or anything close to white. The expression “white soup” makes the soup scary. Nsala makes it exotic.

Edikaikong is edikaikong, not vegetable soup. Efo riro is efo riro, not vegetable soup. When called edikaikong and efo riro, these delicacies sound romantic and mouth-watering.

Ofe akwụ is ofe akwụ, not palm nut soup. Palm nut soup is not appetising.

Nkwụ enu is nkwụ enu, not “up wine” (Gosh! Who coined that awful expression that is a grammatical blunder?) If you don’t want to call it nkwụ enu or ngwọ, call each of the two variants palm wine.

Ụkwa is ụkwa, not breadfruit. Breadfruit is an different.

Ogbanje/abiku is ogbanje/abiku.

Ọmụgwọ is ọmụgwọ.

Agbada is simply agbada.

This was how names like pizza, samosa, saké, kimono, sari, kaiser, kaizen became global words.