I’ll Be With You Now in South Africa Doesn’t Mean Right Now

Hello there. You have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is John from Orlando. How are you?

Hi, John. Doing well. What’s going on in Orlando?

Well, I was enjoying a wonderful flight on the second longest flight in the world back in 1996. We were leaving Miami for Cape Town, South Africa. And it was a very exciting time for my wife and I to go visit some friends who were in the State Department.

So we’re on our way to go to Cape Town. And by the time we landed out in the international airport, we had this wonderful arrival into the southern tip of the continent of Africa. So we land out, we get out of the airplane, we walk into the terminal building, and now we have to exchange money, U.S. money, for Krugerrands.

And, you know, we go up to, just like in any airport, we walk up to the booth. And the gentleman was waiting on a person in front of us. When he completed that transaction, we sort of step up like you would expect in a queue. And he says, I’ll be with you now. Put his head down and started counting some money and, you know, sort of doing his busy work behind the glass, you know, with a little hole in it like a bank teller.

And my wife and I looked at each other, kind of did a double take, and then we took the social cue that he actually meant just wait a minute. And so that was just an odd interaction, one of our very first moments in another country where they had this colloquial saying, I’ll be with you now. So I didn’t know the roots of it.

And the follow-on as we went and finally met with our friends, and they said not only is that a saying that just means wait just a minute, but if they tell you I’ll be with you now now, that’s actually like a slight that they will just take their sweet time getting back to you with whatever it is you’re asking or inquiring about. So I didn’t know the origins of I’ll be with you now.

Yeah, it’s pretty complicated, and it’s shared with some of the other English-speaking countries, just not with North America. We had an email from a listener named David Cannon, who is South African, a number of years ago, who had this great email. And I wanted to share some of this that he says.

He was talking about now is a definite commitment to get it done as soon as they’re finished with what they’re currently busy with, which sounds like what you were talking about. The difference between right now and just now is also something that they honor, and we maybe don’t quite really see the difference here in North America.

Right now is this moment, and just now is soon, but not at this very moment. And then now now is definitely urgent. Now-now comes actually not from English, but from Afrikaans. So it’s nunu in that language. It just means now-now. It’s the typical reduplication where you take a word and for emphasis, you say it twice. And it maybe means a more specific case of the word, a more specific instance of the word.

But you were saying that now-now in that case meant the opposite?

Opposite, yeah. That’s what it seemed to us.

Oh, really? You know, explaining it to our friends. So, you know, I actually sort of cued it up with something like in the South where they say, well, bless your heart. Or I’ll be with you presently. I’ll be with you now, now. It’s kind of like a silly person, you know, I’ll take my sweet time. I don’t know.

It was just sort of the context of the moment really is decisive in terms of how the meaning gets given. Because it doesn’t really conform to what I learned from people who’ve lived in South Africa or the South African dictionaries. Are all very clear, at least as far as they’re concerned, that now now means absolutely now. It means right away.

Yeah. Yeah. Very interesting. Yeah. So it was so fun. And then the years since, we’ve just enjoyed adding that into our lexicon. And people who listen to my wife and I interact sometimes will say that to each other, you know, sort of jokingly, like, hey, I’m a little busy. And I’ll be with you now. So we’ve borrowed it and have a lot of fun with it.

John, this is wonderful. Thank you so much for calling.

All right, take care. Great. Bye-bye. Have a good day.

You too. All right, bye-bye.

In Caribbean English, they say now for now. So this would be Belize and Jamaica and a few other places. And it’s basically the same as right now, means right away, but now for now.

Oh, they say the phrase now for now?

Now for now as a Pat set expression.

Oh, and that means right away?

Right away, yeah. I’m going to do this now for now?

Now for now, yeah. Interesting, right?

Oh, yeah. Give us a call, 877-929-9673, or send your questions and stories about language to words@waywordradio.org.