| |
|
|
|
|
Use control to stop Background Music |
- If a donkey kicks you and you kick back, you are both
donkeys. (Gambia)
- An adult squatting sees farther than a child on top of
tree. (Gambia)
- A fly that has no one to advice it, follows the corpse
into the grave. (Gambia)
- Giant silk cotton trees grow out of very tiny seeds.
(Gambia)
- However black a cow is, the milk is always white.
(Gambia)
- The disobedient fowl obeys in a pot of soup (Benin -
Nigeria).
- The crocodile does not die under the water so that we
can call the monkey to celebrate its funeral (Akan).
- When two elephants fight it is the grass that suffers
(Uganda).
- The frog does not jump in the daytime without reason
(Nigeria).
- One goat cannot carry another goat's tail (Nigeria).
- The family is like the forest, if you are outside it is
dense, if you are inside you see that each tree has its own
position (Akan).
- It is the woman whose child has been eaten by a witch
who best knows the evils of witchcraft (Nigeria).
- The hunter does not rub himself in oil and lie by the
fire to sleep (Nigeria).
- The hunter in pursuit of an elephant does not stop to
throw stones at birds (Uganda).
- If all seeds that fall were to grow, then no one could
follow the path under the trees (Akan).
- Even the mightest eagle comes down to the tree tops to
rest (Uganda).
- A tiger does not have to proclaim its tigri-tude (Wole
Soyinka - Nigeria)
- Before you ask a man for clothes, look at the clothes
that he is wearing (Yoruba, Nigeria)
- As long as there are lice in the seams of the garment
there must be bloodstains on the fingernails (Yoruba,
Nigeria)
- If a blind man says lets throw stones, be assured that
he has stepped on one (Hausa, Nigeria)
- Until lions have their own historians, tales of the hunt
shall always glorify the hunter (Igbo, Nigeria)
- When you are eating with the devil, you must use a long
spoon (Igbo, Nigeria)
- The fowl digs out the blade that kills it (Somali)
- Although the snake does not fly it has caught the bird
whose home is in the sky (Akan)
- One should never rub bottoms with a porcupine (Akan)
- Fowls will not spare a cockroach that falls in their
mist (Akan)
- You do not need a big stick to break a cock's head (Akan)
- Marriage is like a groundnut, you have to crack them to
see what is inside (Akan)
- The rain wets the leopard's spots but does not wash them
off (Akan)
- If crocodiles eat their own eggs what would they do to
the flesh of a frog (Nigeria)
- A man does not wander far from where his corn is
roasting (Nigeria)
- Rat no dey born rabbit (Nigeria)
- When man pikin dey piss, him dey hold something for
hand. Woman wey try-am, go piss for her hand (Palmwine
Drinkards, Nigeria)
- Those who get to the river early drink the cleanest
water (Kenya)
- Hurry hurry has no blessings (Kenya)
- A person changing his clothing always hides while
changing (Kenya)
- A donkey always says thank you with a kick (Kenya)
- Nobody gathers firewood to roast a thin goat (Kenya)
- Having a good discussion is like having riches (Kenya)
- Many births mean many burials (Kenya)
- The important things are left in the locker (Kenya)
- A boy isn't sent to collect the honey (Kenya)
- If you don't wish to have rags for clothes, don't play
with a dog (Nigeria)
- No sane person sharpens his machete to cut a banana tree
(Nigeria)
- If a monkey is amongst dogs, why won't it start barking?
(Nigeria)
- An elephant's tasks are never too heavy for it
(Zimbabwe)
- It is the soil that knows that the mouse's baby is ill
(Zimbabwe)
- A man who doesn't know his or her family is like a lion
wounded while trying to make a kill for lunch (B. Audifferen)
- If you can walk, you can dance; If you can talk, you can
sing
- Greed loses what it has gained
- The house-roof fights with the rain, but he who is
sheltered ignores it. (Wolof)
- To love the king is not bad, but a king who loves you is
better. (Wolof)
- Allah does not destroy the men whom one hates. (Wolof)
- If nothing touches the palm-leaves they do not rustle.
(Oji, Ashanti)
- He is a fool whose sheep runs away twice. (Oji, Ashanti)
- The man who has bread to eat does not appreciate the
severity of a famine. (Yoruba)
- Because friendship is pleasant, we partake of our
friend's entertainment; not because we have not enough to
eat in our own house. (Yoruba)
- When your neighbor's horse falls into a pit, you should
not rejoice at it, for your own child may fall into it too.
(Yoruba)
- The pot-lid is always badly off: the pot gets all the
sweet, the lid nothing but steam. (Yoruba)
- His opinions are like water in the bottom of a canoe,
going from side to side. (Efik)
- You lament not the dead, but lament the trouble of
making a grave; the way of the ghost is longer than the
grave. (Efik)
- For no man could be blessed without the acceptance of
his own head. (Yoruba)
- If you don't sell your head, no one will buy it.
(Yoruba)
- The bell rings loudest in your own home. (Yoruba)
- No one can uproot the tree which God has planted.
(Yoruba)
- Where you will sit when you are old shows where you
stood in youth. (Yoruba)
- Nobody knows the mysteries which lie at the bottom of
the ocean. (Yoruba)
- If we stand tall it is because we stand on the backs of
those who came before us. (Yoruba)
- When you stand with the blessings of your mother and
God, it matters not who stands against you. (Yoruba)
- After we fry the fat, we see what is left. (Yoruba)
- When the door is closed, you must learn to slide across
the crack of the sill. (Yoruba)
- You must be willing to die in order to live. (Yoruba)
- What you give you get, ten times over. (Yoruba)
- Stretch your hands as far as they reach, grab all you
can grab. (Yoruba)
- If you are on a road to nowhere, find another road.
(Ashanti)
- You must act as if it is impossible to fail. (Ashanti)
- Do not follow the path. Go where there is no path to
begin the trail. (Ashanti)
- The ruin of a nation begins in the home of its people.
(Ashanti)
- Do not let what you cannot do tear from your hands what
you can. (Ashanti)
- True power comes through cooperation and silence.
(Ashanti)
- Force against force equals more force. (Ashanti)
- Two men in a burning house must not stop to argue.
(Ashanti)
- One falsehood spoils a thousand truths. (Ashanti)
- The one who asks questions doesn't lose his way. (Akan)
- You must eat an elephant one bite at a time. (Twi)
- It is a fool whose own tomatoes are sold to him. (Akan)
- You must live within your sacred truth. (Hausa)
- Strategy is better than strength. (Hausa)
- When elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers.
(Kikuyu)
- A child who is to be successful is not to be reared
exclusively on a bed of down. (Akan)
- Treat your guest as a guest for two days; on the third
day, give him a hoe! (Swahili)
- Wisdom is not like money to be tied up and hidden. (Akan)
- The friend of a fool is a fool. The friend of a wise
person is another wise person. (The Husia)
- You cannot pick up a pebble with one finger. (Malawi)
- Two hippopotamuses cannot share the same hole. (Cote
d'Ivoire)
- One bean does not make a whole meal. (Morocco)
- An axe does not cut down a tree by itself. (Burkina
Faso)
- The tortoise is friends with the snail: those with
shells keep their shells close together. (Benin)
- People helping one another can bring an elephant into
the house. (Rwanda)
- When you wake up in the morning you see the other
person’s butt.
- Nobody mourns an unnoticed death. (Burundi)
- The river may is wide, but it can crossed. (Cote
d'Ivoire).
- He who eats well speaks well or it is a question of
insanity. (Yoruba)
- No matter how long a log may float in the water, it will
never become a crocodile. (Gambia)
- The blacksmith in one village becomes a blacksmith's
apprentice in another (Ghana)
- If a child's hands are clean, he can eat with elders
(Gambia)
- A child who denies their mother a night's sleep will
also remain awake (Gambia)
|
