The language

Sranantongo: 54 words you hear in Paramaribo

Sranantongo is the creole language of Suriname and the lingua franca of Paramaribo: Dutch is the official language, but this is what you hear on the street and at the market. Below are 54 words, with pronunciation, how they are really used, and where outsiders go wrong.

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Greetings

fa waka fa WA-ka: how goes it. The standard greeting: fa is how, waka is to walk or to go. You say it to anyone you know even slightly, from a neighbour to a market seller. The usual reply is "bun" or "ala sani bun", all good. Slightly more formal is "fa yu tan", how are you keeping. In the Netherlands fawaka as one word has become the best-known Sranan phrase, including among people with no Surinamese background. It is not about walking and it is not a question about your health. It is the social opener, and a short "bun" is a complete answer. Delivering a full report is the mistake visitors make.
grantangi gran-TAN-gie: great thanks. Tangi is thanks, gran is great, so grantangi is thank you very much. A short "tangi" also works, exactly like a quick thanks. Grantangi is warmer and comes out when someone has genuinely done something for you: at a funeral, in a speech, or to the woman who just gave you her recipe. It is one of the words almost any visitor can use straight away without sounding odd.
san de san DEE: what is there. More informal than fa waka and more between peers: san is what, de is to be there. It works exactly like "what is up". The standard reply is "noti", nothing, even when there is plenty going on. You hear it more from younger speakers than from older ones. Do not use it with someone much older or with an official behind a counter. There you use fa waka or plain Dutch. Sranan has register like any other language.

Everyday

bigi BIE-gie: big. Bigi is big, from English big, and it is often not about size at all. Bigi sma is an adult or elder, respectfully. Bigi yari is a milestone birthday. Bigi prisiri is a big celebration. Someone who puts on airs is said to be doing bigi.
bun boen: good. Bun is good, as adjective, as adverb and as agreement. It is the standard answer to fa waka and it closes countless set phrases: waka bun, sribi bun, luku bun. On its own it also means fine, agreed. "Ala sani bun" is everything is good.
dri drie: three. Dri is three. The numerals are one of the places where you clearly hear where Sranantongo came from: wan, tu, dri, fo, feifi, siksi, seibi, aiti, neigi, tin. They sit close to English and Dutch at once, which makes counting easy for a Dutch- or English-speaking visitor. At the market people rarely count in Sranan and almost always in Dutch, with prices in SRD. The numerals are good to know, but the haggling happens in Dutch.
kon kon: to come. Kon is to come, from English come, and it is one of the first verbs you pick up because it sits inside every invitation: kon dya (come here), kon nyan (come and eat), kon na mi oso (come to my house). In compounds it also carries the sense of becoming.
krosi KRO-sie: clothes. Krosi is clothing, from English clothes. Wasi krosi is doing the laundry. The word touches the most visible piece of culture in Suriname: the koto with the angisa, the folded headscarf of Creole dress, and the pangi, the wrapped cloth of the Maroons. Both are sold at the market and both carry their own rules about when they are worn. An angisa is not simply a headscarf: the way it is folded can carry a message. Buy one by all means, but do not assume you wear it the way someone who grew up with it does.
luku LOE-koe: to look. Luku is to look, from English look. The form you hear most is "luku bun", literally look well, meaning watch out or be careful. It is also used as a warning without immediate danger, closer to mind how you go. "Luku bun" is not a compliment about how something looks. It is a warning.
ogri O-grie: bad, evil. Ogri is bad, mean or nasty, and as a noun harm or evil. The word is generally linked to English ugly, but the sense shifted from ugly to bad. Ogri-ai, literally bad eye, is the evil eye: the idea that envy can do damage, a belief that is widely held in Suriname. Ogri does not mean ugly, despite the resemblance. Calling someone ogri is about their behaviour.
safu SA-foe: soft. Safu is soft: of voice, of texture, of character. Doubled to "safu safu" it means gently, carefully, slowly. It is the counterpart of tranga, and applied to food it means cooked through to soft, which for cassava and plantain is a judgement of quality.
sribi SRIE-bie: to sleep, sleep. Sribi is to sleep and sleep itself, from English sleep. "Mi abi sribi" is I am sleepy, with the same have-construction as with hunger. "Sribi bun" is sleep well. Anyone sleeping in a hammock in the interior hears the word put to use straight away.
taki TA-kie: to talk, to say. Taki is to talk and to say, from English talk. It sits inside taki tori, catching up. Grammatically taki does something extra: it introduces reported speech, roughly like "that". "A taki dati a no man kon" is he said that he could not come. The doubling "taki taki" as a name for the language is not Sranan but a nickname imposed from outside, and it sounds belittling. Say Sranantongo or Sranan.
tranga TRAN-ga: strong, hard. Tranga is strong, hard, firm, and figuratively stubborn. Tranga yesi, literally strong ears, means disobedient and is what parents say to children who do not listen. A person who has endured a lot is called tranga, and that is a compliment. Tranga yesi is not about hearing. It is the reverse of what the literal translation suggests: ears too strong to listen.
tu toe: two; too. Tu is two, and it is also the word for "too", placed after what it attaches to: "mi tu" is me too. The double function comes from English, where two and too sound alike, and Sranantongo collapsed them into one form.
waka WA-ka: to walk, to go. Waka is to walk and by extension to go, to travel, to proceed. That is why fa waka means how are things. As a farewell you say "waka bun", literally walk well, which amounts to travel safely or all the best. For a walk through town, waka is also simply the literal word.
wan wan: one; a, an. Wan is the numeral one and at the same time the indefinite article a. "Wan oso" is therefore usually just a house, not one house. The definite article is a in the singular and den in the plural: a oso is the house, den oso are the houses. Wan also sits in wan tron (once) and wan sma (someone). Beginners hear an emphatic "one" in every wan. Usually it is just "a", and emphasis comes from tone or from an extra word.
watra WA-tra: water. Watra is water in every sense: drinking water, rain, the river. Sei is side, so the waterside is watrasei in Sranan. Watra appears in many compounds, from a jug of water to the names of creeks and places. Tap water in Paramaribo is generally considered drinkable, though many visitors stick to bottled water.

Food and drink

alesi a-LEE-sie: rice. Alesi is rice, the staple of the Surinamese kitchen, and the word is generally linked to Portuguese arroz. Rice is also agriculture in Suriname: the Nickerie district is the country’s rice region. At the market, alongside ordinary rice, you will find hei gron alesi, upland rice, sold by Maroon traders.
angri AN-grie: hunger. Angri is hunger, from English hungry, and you have it: "mi abi angri". The word is also used more broadly for a strong craving. For people in the diaspora, angri often attaches to one specific dish that never tastes quite the same in the Netherlands. The construction is "mi abi angri", I have hunger, not "mi angri". The second sounds like an unfinished sentence.
dyogo DJO-go: large bottle of beer. The dyogo is the one-litre bottle of Parbo Bier, and with that the unit in which beer is drunk in Suriname. You order one for the table, it arrives ice cold in a cooler sleeve, and small glasses come with it so everyone drinks before it warms up. The sharing is the entire reason the format exists. A dyogo is not meant for one person. Drinking it alone from a big glass misses the point: the small glasses exist so it stays cold and so it gets shared.
fisi FIE-sie: fish. Fisi is fish, from English fish. Suriname eats sea fish as well as river and swamp fish, and you hear the difference at the market: the freshwater names often come from Sranan or from Indigenous languages. Bakkeljauw, salted and dried fish, is a category of its own and turns up in dishes such as heri heri.
meti MEE-tie: meat. Meti is meat in general, from English meat, and also animal. Moksi meti is mixed meat, usually chicken with pork and smoked meat together. In the interior meti also covers game, and there it is worth asking which animal is on the plate before you order.
moksi MOK-sie: mixed, to mix. Moksi means mixed. It is not a dish, it is the word you put in front of one: moksi alesi is mixed rice, moksi meti is mixed meats (usually chicken, pork and smoked meat together). Outside the kitchen it works the same way: moksi patu is a pot with everything in it, and a mixed crowd can be described as moksi. That mixing is exactly why the word lands so well in Suriname. The common mistake is treating moksi as the name of a dish and ordering "a moksi". That is like ordering "a mixed". The dish is moksi alesi, mixed rice, and every family makes it differently.
nyan njan: to eat. Nyan is the verb to eat, and doubled to nyanyan it is the food itself. The word is related to the nyam found in other Atlantic creoles such as Jamaican; the precise West African source is disputed. "Kon nyan" is the standard invitation at the table, and in Suriname it is not a politeness but an expectation. Do not decline out of politeness. Turning down "kon nyan" reads as standoffish in Suriname; accepting a small plate is the right answer, even if you have just eaten.
sopi SO-pie: liquor, strong drink. Sopi is strong drink, in practice usually rum. Suriname has its own rum tradition, with Borgoe as the best-known brand, and rum is part of oso dresi as well: herbs are steeped in it. In Afro-Surinamese ritual settings sopi is poured out, a splash on the ground for the ancestors, before anyone drinks. If someone tips a splash onto the ground before pouring, that is not spillage. Say nothing about it and wait.
trefu TREE-foe: food taboo. A trefu is a food that one particular person must not eat. It is personal or inherited through the family line, it is connected to winti, and eating your trefu makes you ill. The word reached Sranan through Dutch treife from Yiddish and Hebrew, a second trace of Jewish history in the language, though the practice itself is Afro-Surinamese. Which animal or dish is involved differs by person and by family. A trefu is not an allergy, a diet or a preference, and it is not a general prohibition: the same dish that is trefu for one person is eaten happily by the next. If you are serving food to Surinamese guests, ask not only about allergies but whether anyone has a trefu.

People

bakra BA-kra: white person, European. Bakra means a white person, in Suriname usually specifically a Dutch person. Bakra kondre is the Netherlands. The word is commonly linked to Efik mbakara and is related to the buckra or backra found in other Caribbean languages. In colonial times it meant the white master, and that history is still in it: in everyday use bakra is descriptive and neutral, but with the right tone it can also be an accusation. As a visitor you may hear the word without it being an insult; it is simply describing you. Using it about other people yourself is a different matter: it belongs to the speakers, not to the visitor, and its force depends entirely on who says it.
boi boi: boy. Boi is a boy or young man, and also a form of address between men, roughly like "mate". Standing alone at the start of a sentence, "boi" works as an exclamation of surprise or emphasis, close to "oh man". Do not use it to an older man. That does not read as friendly but as disrespectful, and the historical weight of "boy" addressed to Black men makes it a particularly poor choice from a visitor.
man man: man; to be able. Man is a man, but it is also an auxiliary verb meaning can or to be able. "Mi man" is I can, "mi no man" is I cannot. In practice you hear the second sense more than the first, and "mi no man moro" (I cannot take any more) is one of the most-used sentences in the language, covering everything from exhaustion to being charmed. "Mi no man" means I cannot, not I am not a man. That is the classic confusion for anyone who knows the word only as a noun.
mati MA-tie: friend, mate. In everyday use mati is simply friend or mate, and that is how you will hear it most. The word also carries a specific meaning in Afro-Surinamese history: mati wroko, mati work, names intimate relationships between women in Creole Surinamese communities, a tradition documented at length in the anthropological work of Gloria Wekker. That usage has not disappeared, and for many people it is not a curiosity but part of their own family history. Do not run ahead with the second meaning. In conversation mati almost always just means friend, and the mati wroko sense is one you raise only if the other person raises it first.
pikin pie-KIEN: small, child. Pikin is both small and child. "Wan pikin sani" is a small thing, "a pikin" is the child. The word is generally traced to Portuguese pequeno and appears in related forms across other Atlantic creoles. It shows up everywhere in compounds: uma pikin is a girl, man pikin a boy, and "pikin moro" means a little more. English has a related word that has been used as a racist slur. In Sranantongo pikin carries none of that: it is an ordinary, everyday word for small and for child. Do not conflate the two.
sma sma (één lettergreep): someone, person. Sma is person or people, generally traced back to English somebody. It is the word for talking about people without naming them: "den sma" are the people, "wan bun sma" is a good person. Bigi sma is literally a big person and means an adult or an elder, with respect built in. In younger speech "mi sma" means my girlfriend or my partner. Bigi sma is not about body size. Calling someone bigi sma is a compliment about age and standing, not a remark about their build.
uma OE-ma: woman. Uma is the neutral word for woman and traces back to English woman. It also works as a gender marker in compounds: uma pikin is a girl, against man pikin for a boy. With an animal you mark the sex the same way.
wenke WEN-ke: girl, young woman. Wenke is a girl or young woman, the counterpart of boi. It is informal and tone decides everything: from an aunt it is affectionate, from a strange man in the street it is not. For an adult woman, uma is the neutral word. Do not confuse wenke with wenkri, which means shop (from Dutch winkel). The two sound close and that produces the standard slip.

Home and neighbourhood

birti BIR-tie: neighbourhood, vicinity. Birti comes from Dutch buurt and means both the neighbourhood and the vicinity of something: "na mi birti" is near me. In Paramaribo the birti is a real social unit, with its own shop, its own warung and neighbours who know who is at home. Blauwgrond is the first birti many visitors learn by name, because of the food.
dorosei DO-ro-sei: the outside, outdoors. Doro is door, sei is side, so dorosei is outside. The word does more work in Suriname than its Dutch equivalent, because a large part of life happens outdoors: eating, washing, talking, waiting for it to cool down. "Na dorosei" is outside, against "na ini", inside.
dyari DJA-rie: yard, garden. The dyari is the yard around the house, and in Suriname it is the most important space of the household. Cooking happens there over charcoal, the washing hangs there, people sit there in the evening and guests are received there, often before they are received indoors. Visit someone at home in Paramaribo and you will spend most of the time in the dyari rather than the living room. Do not translate it as garden in the ornamental sense. A dyari is a working space: sand or grass, fruit trees, a pot on the fire, plastic chairs.
oso O-so: house, home. Oso is house and home at once, and it is one of the most productive words in the language. Oso dresi is home remedy, herbal medicine. Dede oso is the house of mourning, where people sit through the nights after a death. Wroko oso is a workshop. The word rarely refers to the building alone; it refers to the household inside it. Oso is not the same as an address. "Na oso" means at home, with the family, and an invitation of "kon na mi oso" is about the yard and the people, not a tour of the building.

Culture and belief

dede DE-de: dead, death. Dede is dead, both as a state and as an event. The word you meet most often is dede oso, literally death house: the nights when family and neighbours gather at the home of the deceased to keep watch, with coffee, songs, stories and games until morning. Afro-Surinamese families also observe aiti dei, the eighth day after the death, with its own gathering. Mourning in Suriname is collective and lasts longer than a single ceremony. A dede oso is not a party, even though there is laughter and there are games. That is the point: the family is being kept company. Go only if you are invited, dress properly, and do not photograph.
dresi DRE-sie: medicine, to treat. Dresi is medicine and also the verb to treat or to dress; it goes back to English to dress, as in dressing a wound. Its best-known use is oso dresi, literally house medicine: the herbal medicine passed down in families, often steeped in strong drink. At the Vreedzaammarkt beside the Central Market, Maroon women sell exactly that, alongside plant oils such as krapa and neem. To the sellers, oso dresi is not folklore but a trade in things that work. Do not treat it as a souvenir, and ask what a preparation does before buying; some are strong and not meant for people who do not know what they are handling. Photography at the Vreedzaammarkt is unwelcome.
gado GA-do: god. Gado is God, and the word works in church and in everyday speech. Sranantongo has a long written church tradition: the Moravian Brethren were using the language for preaching and Bible translation as early as the nineteenth century, which is part of how Sranan came to be written down at all. "Mi Gado" is an everyday exclamation and need not be meant religiously. Gado is not automatically the Christian God. In a winti context it refers to the creator god, and many Surinamese move between both frames without difficulty.
kaseri ka-SEE-rie: ritually clean, kosher. Kaseri comes from Hebrew kasher, kosher, and entered Sranantongo through Suriname’s Portuguese-Jewish community. Its meaning broadened: kaseri is ritually clean or pure in a general sense, and the word is used in winti contexts for what is clean and in order. It is one of the clearest traces that Suriname’s Jewish history left in the everyday language. In Sranantongo kaseri does not mean that something meets Jewish dietary law. That an Afro-Surinamese ritual word comes from Hebrew says something about how entangled Suriname’s communities have been, not that the practices are the same.
konfriyari kon-frie-JA-rie: birthday. Birthday, also as friyari. In Suriname it is not an hour on the sofa but an open house: people drop in when it suits them, food is ready, and the birthday person stays home all day. You congratulate with "fristeri", from Dutch feliciteren. A bigi yari is a milestone birthday, for which a hall gets hired and the whole network turns up. The Dutch habit of congratulating everyone in the room is not strange in Suriname, but the timing is: there is no start time and no closing time. Arrive at two, find it still full at eight, and nothing has gone wrong.
odo O-do: proverb. An odo is a proverb. Sranantongo has hundreds of them and they are still in use: in a speech, in a sermon, or simply to end an argument. Odo are vivid, usually featuring animals or the forest, and many are about patience, gossip and the consequences of your own behaviour. They are collected in the Sranan dictionaries and in separate anthologies. We deliberately do not print a list of odo here. The wording varies by family and by source, and a proverb quoted wrongly is worse than no proverb. Ask someone who grew up with them.
Sranantongo SRA-nan-TON-go: Suriname tongue. Sranan is Suriname, tongo is tongue, and Sranantongo is the name of the language itself. It is a creole language with a largely English-derived vocabulary plus Dutch, Portuguese and West African elements, formed on the plantations. It is not the official language (that is Dutch) but it is the lingua franca: the language in which communities that share no other language understand each other in Paramaribo. Speakers usually just say Sranan. Do not call it "Taki Taki". That name was applied from outside and sounds belittling to many speakers, as though it were not a real language. It has its own grammar, an official spelling and a written literature. Nor is it "broken Dutch": most of the vocabulary is English in origin.
winti WIN-tie: wind. Winti is the Afro-Surinamese religion: a coherent body of West African belief as it continued in Suriname, with a creator god, the ancestors, and a set of winti, spirits tied to domains of nature. The word literally means wind and names both the religion and an individual spirit. Under colonial law the practice was a criminal offence; the ban was only lifted in 1971. For many Surinamese today winti is simply part of life, sometimes alongside church or mosque. Winti is not folklore, not superstition and not voodoo. It is a living religion with its own priests, songs and rules, and people who practise it are not necessarily outside the church either. Guidebooks that present it as exotic spectacle have it wrong. Ceremonies are not an attraction: you go if you are invited, and you do not photograph them.

Expressions

brasa BRA-sa: embrace, to embrace. A brasa is an embrace, and brasa is also the verb. The word goes back to Portuguese (abraço, abraçar), one of the languages present in the earliest phase of Sranantongo. As a sign-off at the end of a message or a conversation, "brasa" is entirely normal, including in writing. It also turns up regularly in the names of Surinamese-Dutch cultural initiatives, where it stands for embrace and connection.
faya FA-ja: fire, hot. Faya is fire and anything hot: the sun, a pan, pepper. Figuratively it is heat in the sense of intensity or trouble. Its best-known use is faya lobi, literally fiery love, the Surinamese name for the bright red Ixora coccinea that grows in yards all over the country and is treated as a floral emblem of Suriname. You will see the plant in Paramaribo more than any other flowering shrub. In Dutch street slang faya has drifted to mean awkward or unpleasant ("that is faya"). That sense grew up in the Netherlands, not in the Sranantongo spoken in Paramaribo. Do not use it in Suriname to mean that something is a bummer.
mi gudu mie GOE-doe: my treasure, my riches. Gudu is wealth, possessions, something precious. Mi gudu is therefore literally my treasure, and it is one of the warmest forms of address the language has. Parents say it to children, partners to each other, and a grandmother says it to everyone. For many people in the diaspora this is the phrase that comes back first when they think of their grandparents. It is intimate. Used with a stranger it can land as over-familiar, roughly like a stranger calling you "sweetheart".
no span no SPAN: do not tense up. Take it easy, do not worry, it will be fine. Span comes from being tense. This is young, urban usage: you hear it in Paramaribo and even more in the Dutch cities, where it spread through Surinamese-Dutch youth. It is not old Sranan and it is not in the classic dictionaries, but it is one of the most-used expressions today. Saying "no span" to someone in their seventies reads as cheeky. It belongs among friends and peers.
prisiri prie-SIE-rie: pleasure, joy. Prisiri is pleasure, and used adjectivally it is enjoyable or cheerful. The word sits at the centre of anything being celebrated: birthdays, Owruyari on 31 December, a party in the yard. "Bigi prisiri" is a great time. Where switi is about the quality of a thing, prisiri is about the mood of the people.
switi SWIE-tie: sweet, tasty. Switi means tasty or lovely, and it goes far beyond food. A party is switi, music is switi, an afternoon with family is switi. It is one of the most-used words of approval in Sranantongo and every generation says it. "Switi Sranan" is the affectionate name for the country itself, heard most often from people who no longer live there. Switi here does not mean "sugary". A hot, spicy roti is also switi. Sweetness as a taste is normally clear from context rather than from the word.
tori TO-rie: story. Tori is story, news and matter all at once. "San na a tori" is what is going on. Taki tori is catching up, and that is an activity in its own right: hours in the yard exchanging tori. A tori can also be a problem ("a de wan tori", it is a whole thing) or fuss ("no meki tori", do not make an issue of it). Surinamese Dutch simply kept the word. Tori is not necessarily a made-up story. The news on the radio is also tori. Translating it as "little story" makes it smaller than it is.

Frequently asked questions

What is Sranantongo?

Sranantongo is the creole language of Suriname and the lingua franca of Paramaribo. Its vocabulary is largely English-derived, with Dutch, Portuguese and West African influences. Dutch is the official language, but on the street, at the market and at home Sranantongo is understood by nearly everyone, whatever else they speak.

How many languages are spoken in Suriname?

More than twenty. Alongside Dutch as the official language and Sranantongo as the lingua franca there are Sarnami, Surinamese Javanese, the Maroon languages (including Saramaccan and Aukan), Chinese languages and Indigenous languages such as Karina and Lokono.

Do I need to learn Sranantongo to travel to Suriname?

No. Dutch or English will get you everywhere in Paramaribo. But a handful of words changes something: fa waka as a greeting, or switi as a compliment on the food in a warung, almost always gets a response. These 54 words are chosen for exactly that.

What does switi mean?

Switi literally means sweet, but in Suriname it stretches to anything good, tasty or enjoyable. Switi is also the first half of our own name, Switi Tours.

The language lives on the street

On the Paramaribo food tour you hear these words where they belong: at the market, in the warung, at the stall. Your guide translates as you go.

See the food tour

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