O-no-ma-to-pe

As an avider reader of dictionaries, and a speaker of Afrikaans, it was inevitable that I stumble upon the Japanese idea of onomatopoeia within my first month.

Afrikaans is choc-full of onamatopoeia, but in a sense that the words mimic the sounds of the action. Words like "plons" and "klap" and "hop" are fun to say, and are extremely descriptive. You could paint a mental picture with verbs.

Japanese has a wealth of double-glance words. In the end, they don't mean anything to me because they are all just repetitions, but they are still fun to say, although they do not paint any mental pictures in my bilingual (soon to be semi-tri-lingual) mind.

Some of the words are:
tabi-tabi (often, many times, frequently)
waza-waza (especially, on purpose)
zoku-zoku (in succession)
pera-pera (fluently)
pin-pin (lively)
suya-suya (quietly, gently)
don-don (one after another, bang, beat, rapidly, on and on)

Last night at the short-notice dinner party (which turned out to be a party worth writing home about), the first dish was a small bowl of juicy looking snails (called baigai). Imagine my delight when I asked them how to eat it, and my neighbour took a toothpick and said "kuru-kuru".. and I knew that she meant "turn it round and round". Small joys everywhere.