Keboletseng Sophy

What is in a name? All names have meanings and when a child is born, the name given has a special meaning or memory to the parents naming the child. Keboletseng or as she introduced herself to me as Sophy, has been our charlady here at eKayaMedia for about a month now since Jane was moved up to Human Resources. She is pleasant to be around and is does an excellent job in keeping our offices clean.

I love words and meanings to names but struggle to pronounce them properly and usually murder people's name in my feeble attempt to use them. Keboletseng would normally introduce herself either as Sophy or Maki which is her nickname. Keboletseng is a Tswana mid-sentence name which means "...why did I speak..." In other words it is a word that comes out of a sentence and cannot stand alone other than if it is used as a person's name.

As for Maki, all I can get from an internet search is that Maki is either a Finnish or Japanese name or as Noma is quoted "it is not our fault that the Bantu education didn't allow us to put our names onto Google". Maki is most likely a shortened name similar to how Noma is shortened from Nomangaliso. By the way Nomangaliso means "Miracle" as her parents were expecting a boy and they were blessed with a daughter instead. For those who want to know, my name means "Holy", wow although I am far from holy, it would be good to know that you lived up to your name.

Mama Sophy is Keboletseng's Anglicised name for us English speaking South Africans. It is a good name as Sophy is derived from Sophia which means "Wisdom". And of course my first Vespa was called Sophia.