You remember that song, don’t you? It’s the one where Mr. Ritchie puts on his Jafakin accent and dances in the streets. The question is: what are the people at the end saying and in what language? I’m guessing it’s Hatian Creole but I don’t know for sure.
Hey! Jumbo jumbo!
I always figured it was jambo, which is Swahili for “hello.”
I’d say, from an extensive time-wasting search of online Swahili translations, that it’s Swahili as well.
Tombo si dese de moya - I found meanings for tombo (“quail”), si (“is not”), and moya (actually moyo, “heart, courage, feeling”). I can’t find anything for the middle stuff but I don’t know exactly how it’s divided up, either. It could be de se de or dese de or de sede or desede, none of which comes up on the translator form. And I could be completely spelling the sounds wrong and THAT’S why it’s not coming up. But the fact that most of that phrase translates into Swahili seems to indicate that it’s all Swahili.
Good thing I don’t guess languages for a living. Thanks guys-- especially you jay, going that extra mile that I didn’t even think about going.
(Chant)
[ Lyrics found at www.mp3lyrics.org/fRI ]
Tom bo li de say de moi ya
Yeah, Jambo Jumbo
Way to parti’ o we goin’
Oh, jambali
Tom bo li de say de moi ya
Yeah, JUMBO JUMBO!
Does this “translation” help?
The words aren’t in any language other than Richie-speak. Several of the individual words have meanings in various languages – the common example is of course “jambo” being “hello” in Swahili – and with my relative paltry language education I can pick out several others: “li” is used in Italian, “de” in Spanish, “moi” in French, “say” and “ya” in English (and I’m sure those are used in other languages as well, including African ones…). But Richie has long-since confirmed he just made stuff up. Here’s a recent citation: Five surprising facts about Richie’s classic ‘All Night Long’