We have been in Arguria (tertulia) with Ketxus Ponce to talk about the rich collection he has achieved (very) in the porón he has made, as the Hondarribitarra has closed (endured) the challenge for many years. By the way, as you've seen, we've learned many words from the people with it. With examples taken from a talk about the Basque people by the Hondarribitarra writer Fernando Artola “Bordari”, Hondarribia magazine began to publish words and their meanings in the late 1980s. The exercise interested Ponce and a friend, and they decided to listen carefully to the language around him. “Once I heard it, I began to hear many special words that would otherwise go unnoticed, in any area: in the gathering of neighbors, in the poteo of the street, in the songs of Txomin Artola, asking the adults about this and that… The sources were many and I wrote everything in the notebook. When what I was doing was disseminated, a dozen countrymen began to propose words and phrases to me by mail, verbally… Also the writer ‘Bizargorri’ Jesús Mari Mendizabal, who was my professor of Euskera, did the same exercise when he came to live in Hondarribia; I passed his list and added it to my own. Little by little I realized that I was collecting a great treasure.”

And to share the treasure, he created a Facebook page around 2009. All the material that accumulates is the way to record; “I have over 800 words, but this is infinite.” And at the same time, it has over 1,620 Facebook followers, who help you shape and perfect the popular vocabulary. The name of the page is Honddarbi, as it contains several variants to designate the people themselves: “Hondarribia and Honddarbi are the most common, I use them both, depending on the context. Some people do not like Honddarbi, because at the time the Iraqis used it to insult the Hondarribitarras, but if the people have taken their name, it seems to me that the debate is sterile. Even calling us bikinis was an insult long ago, and today many Hondarribitarras say it is Viking, proud.”

Sometimes the Facebook page is more active, other times it sleeps, depending on how long the Ketxus Ponce himself can devote to it. He is now eager and has just posted more words on the social network, which were heard in the webpage conversations Ahotsak.eus. Write the word, accompanies a photograph and a definition next to it, as well as some phrase to contextualize the word. People leave comments, that in their house the word has another pronunciation, that they use it in such expressions, that they have heard it in a different sense… “The other day I posted a trace (a rake), and a Facebook colleague answered me no, which is a rake. From them I have learned the importance of pointing to the source to know who, where, in what context… has used the word heard or read. Now I write the source next to the word, and that gives credibility to what was received, if it cannot seem like I invented it.”

Of course, Facebook followers also make proposals. The most recent are wood (to express constant rain, rain) and the faked (drowning). Ponce tells us that in addition to adding new words to the Internet, he recovers those that have already been put up long ago, and that the result is interesting because around that same word comes contact with other people.

Linking, in the way of fishermen

Ponce says that Hondarribia is a rich dictionary. Inside the village, different expressions and words were used between baserritarras or fishermen (Portuguese, baserritarras and kaletarras are the three historical communities of the people). It is likely that, in any case, the vocabulary related to the sea and fishing will be the most fruitful of this coastal town. They have many words to name the different types of waves (long wave baga, wave hook that breaks in the middle of the sea, aroia gotti, aroia betti to express the fluctuations of the tide, trap…). The announcements also testify to this. To bind, for example, tap; pull the stick; use pelajikua (if you are trying with everyone); dial the sonar (if you notice that you are willing to do it in girls/boys); give the sword (the orca is foamy, and the expression is used to express that it scares the others)… If we do it in appearance, alpha (ugly) fish; berber (nice); talk

Fishing has been machined and modified, many utensils have disappeared and over the years many words have been lost to name them. Similarly in the case of time: Ponce has detected five or six types of wind and five or six other types of rain, given the great dependence fishermen have on time. “They were attentive to the Moon, to the color of the morning and night, to the wind… and they had the way to name all that; today the skipper consults the weather forecast and knows whether or not he can go out to the sea. Our language is conditioned by the ways of life and customs of each era.”

What is the language of our time? “If they previously shaped many expressions with a vocabulary taken from the sea, they are now different sources and references. As a consequence of globalization, for example, we will hear ‘words’ in the streets of Hondarribia, or the influence of Castilian is great in the current jargon (ze guai).” However, popular language is noted in the decline: “My perception is that in many other localities, boys and girls retain many particularities of the Basque country, but that in Hondarribia, in general, the unified Basque country has prevailed, more than in other places”.

“Euskera apaised”, or the Kaletarra language vs academic

Ketxus Ponce works amateur, but her collection can be a good starting point for anyone who wants to conduct a deeper linguistic study on Hondarribia’s language. In this sense, Zuckerberg said he would like to publish material in a book in a popular way, as would the dynamics that Facebook carries. “It seems to me that sometimes academic clothing moves the linguistics of the people away. The language of the street clashes with the language that academics ‘command’. As I heard from a compatriot, the Basque is a stateless man. It is still seen in the movies, while in Spanish it is used to register the street, in Basque it is often used a very technical language”.

We have been asked whether it would not be interesting to create an initiative such as the words of Honddarbi that recognizes the entire Basque Country, to compare and share the words and phrases used in each people to call the same thing. To the extent that it is useful to increase knowledge, it would be welcome, Ponce has responded to us. He added that in other localities there are similar projects and, although they were thought to be words used only in Hondarribia, then he realized that in other places they use the same word, although they were geographically distant. In coastal villages, for example, they have many common words related to the fishing trade.

“The glass was glued and made with the ponies”

Before finishing the colloquium, we asked Ponce for more examples of Basque from Hondarribia. Some are: to insult, peeled (avaro, avaro), cut (weak, weak, deficient), short (small man, fat), fragile (lazy woman). Among the most commonly used, the chaqueton (broken or tired, depending on the context), the kape (head flush), the maxine (wild word to designate any instrument, would be the maxine-bike with legs), -kaká (a lot of money, hot poop, a lot of money, a lot of heat), the chafo (free), andare (leave), the billboard (travihucha) “This potato is more expensive than a dog”), txotx (novice sailor), susa (heated)… Related to the world of the farmhouse, early chickens (young woman), shorten the cows (bring to the snack), eia (cowshed), txantxa (wire brush to clean pigs)… Attached to the verbs, -keteginketnugu, joan Atxamarta (trasto), xarpota (screw), sludge (to express a heavy and confusing atmosphere; “dirty people, yesterday in the tavern”), pichindor (begitxindorra), kanttala (corner, canton), ponpoiuana (chiste), axexatu (xaxatu), bolari (pikutara), not coins (french). And in your village, how do you say…?

Along with the photo above, on the ‘Words of Honddarbi’ page reads: TTIRRITTA. Cricket. “Kri kri kri kri.. soon ttugu ttirrittak kantan”.