Bondye se yon bon Dye

I love Kreyol. I speak it every day. I often go days without hearing or speaking English. Sometimes I forget English because I speak it so much. There are many reasons that I love this language. One of the biggest reasons is that it allows me to form and grow relationships with so many that I wouldn’t be able to if I didn’t speak kreyol. I look back and can’t imagine not being able to communicate with people who I now consider to be some of my closest family and friends. I love that sometimes I dream in a language I didn’t grow up speaking. And, of course, I love making jokes in kreyol, particularly when it’s a play on words. It is such a beautiful language with interesting phrases and I have learned so much while learning the language, things way deeper than just a 2nd language.

Kreyol often lends itself to shortening words or phrases, contractions and such are very common. For example: “Bondye” means “God”, but you can also simply say “Dye” for God. This is one of my favorite, if not my absolute favorite, example of kreyol playing on words. Because both “Bondye” and “Dye” can mean “God”, you can say “Bondye se yon bon Dye” which means “God is a good God”. If you do not know or understand, you think someone is simply saying God is a God. But it’s so much deeper. God is a good God, Bondye se yon bon Dye.

This is something that I of course already knew, but I feel like it hits harder for me in kreyol. And I have certainly been learning more and more that God is a good God. His timing, His will, it is good. Everything He made is good. His plan is good. These are “common sense” things but so easy to forget. Each and every day I need to remind myself of these things, I need to remind myself that He is good. That everything surronding Him is good, everything He does and makes is good. And (shockingly enough) His plan and timing is ALWAYS better than mine.

But in kreyol, it’s so simple to say, so simple to remember. I don’t have to say “Bondye se yon bon Dye” every time I want to remind myself that “God is a good God”. I can simply say “God”, “Bondye”. “Bondye” meaning “God”, but ” bon Dye” meaning “good God”. What a great, simple reminder.

I’m thankful for kreyol, for the fun I have learning it, for the laughs that comes from joking around in kreyol, for the relationships that I have been able to have because of kreyol, for the reminder the God is a good God. I am thankful that Bondye se yon bon Dye.