Tourists meandering along South Africa’s scenic Garden Route should ready their tongues after one of its landmarks was renamed in the local language to start with a click.
Port Elizabeth is to be known as Gqeberha, a Xhosa word for the Baakens River that flows through the coastal city, the government announced in its latest round of name changes to transform the country’s “heritage landscape”.
Of the main click sounds that define Xhosa as the “click language”, the early ‘q’ in Gqeberha signifies a palatal snap of the tongue against the roof of the mouth and drawn down sharply — rather like that of a bottle being uncorked.
The city of one million people was named in 1820 after the late wife of the
