Kinyarwanda survival kit

About this kit

Kinyarwanda is spoken by about 12 million people in Rwanda, where it is the national language. A rare feature in Africa: it is understood by nearly the entire population of the country. With this kit, you have the essentials to greet, ask for directions, eat and handle an emergency in Kigali.

Kinyarwanda is the national language of Rwanda and one of the three official languages of the country alongside French and English. With about 12 million speakers, it has a rare feature in Africa: it is understood by nearly the entire population. This linguistic uniformity has made Rwanda a unique case study on the continent and a favourable ground for cross-community communication.

Kinyarwanda belongs to the wider Bantu family and operates with a system of noun classes: every noun carries a prefix (umu- for humans in the singular, aba- in the plural, iki- or ibi- for things, in- or ama- for other categories) that governs agreement on verbs, adjectives and pronouns. The language is also tonal: word melody can alter meaning. This dual feature makes learning demanding for a French or English speaker, but the regular Latin spelling makes reading easier.

It is very close to Kirundi spoken in Burundi: the two languages are roughly 80% mutually intelligible and form a dialect continuum. Kinyarwanda also shares vocabulary with Kiswahili and, more distantly, with Lingala and Luganda. Rwandan oral literature is rich in proverbs, riddles and royal songs whose transmission was long entrusted to the abiru of the royal court.

This kit gathers the bare essentials to get by in Kigali or in the hills: greeting correctly, asking for directions, eating, handling an emergency and politely saying goodbye. Memorise these expressions before leaving: in Rwanda, Kinyarwanda greetings open every door.