Round one: Toktok vs Bettseechesch
Toktok (Bislama)
Unable to find IPA
Translation: Speak
Bislama is an English-based creole with around 14 200 speakers. It is spoken in Vanuatu, where it’s the national language and used as a lingua franca to facilitate communication between speakers of the 110 living languages. Bislama emerged in the late 1800s due to the practice of “blackbirding”, aka deceiving or kidnapping Pacific Islanders and taking them to work as indentured labourers on plantations, mainly in Australia and Fiji. Due to everyone speaking different languages, a pidgin emerged that later became a creole. This language was taken to Vanuatu when labourers returned and spread because it could be used as a lingua franca. Most of the vocabulary is English-based with some French, but the grammar is typical of local languages.
Motivation: I literally just think it’s cool. In Bislama there aren’t a lot of specific words because, of course, Vanuatu is the most language dense area in the world so there’s not much room for the native language to be that elaborate, but I thought I’d submit this cute little word anyways because <3
Bettseechesch (Luxembourgish)
[ˈbætˌzeːχeʃ]
Translation: Dandelion (literally it means "bed wetter" because dandelions have a diuretic effect, it's also called Pissblumm, which literally means piss flower)
Luxembourgish is an Indo-European language belonging to the Germanic branch, spoken by half a million people, most of them in Luxembourg. It is part of the Continental West Germanic dialect continuum, but also influenced by French.
Motivation: French, Dutch, German, Italian all have a similar name about pissing the bed for this plant and that's just the ones I'm aware of, I'm sure there's more. It's funny to me that apparently so many people wet their beds after eating dandelions that people decided that that's what this plant should be called lol Plus look at it, it's a bonkers word to look at!
Which is the best word?
Toktok
Bettseechesch
