Lingala dictionary · browse all
bilei
bi-LE-i
food
French: la nourriture
Bilei ezali malamu.
The food is good.
La nourriture est bonne.
Food — and the centre of gravity around which family gathers. "Bilei" is food, the cooked meal that draws everyone in. Around it sit the staples of the Congolese kitchen — fufu, rice, madesu (beans), pondu (cassava leaves), fish from the river. To ask "bilei ezali?" — is there food? — is partly a question and partly the opening to an invitation.
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