On this strip of land squatted by Cádiz, one is almost always a foreigner. An extranjero. The word is difficult to pronounce for those who do not speak the language, with its jota (j) separated by only one vowel from the rolled /r/. A jota, a letter all spat out of Spanish, which we learn to pronounce from early school, so much so that speaking as if we would scratch our throat is not innate.
Gua-chis-nai / What's your name?
In this city where people live in the open air, swept by the winds and the palms of the trees, the inhabitants have become accustomed to catching words on the fly, as they hear them.
Thus was born the word " guachisnai" - pronounced "gouachinaïe", synonymous with the word "extranjero": a "casera" word, typical of Gaditan speech, not to be found in Spanish dictionaries.
The story goes that the word is derived from the question "What's your name?", from the days when English merchants landing in the Bay of Cadiz would inquire about the names of the local lads. "What's your name?" / "Comment t'appelles-tu? A primary question, classic of all odysseys, which, heard, triturated and spat out by Gaditan ears and mouths, would have ended in "guachisnai".
Gua-chis-nai / What's-your-name: In France, some of our poets have put red bonnets on the dictionary. Gaditans, on the other hand, disguise words from head to toe. To mock ("bromar") others, but also to laugh at themselves and what they think they hear. A popular, carnivalesque laugh, typical of the grotesque that the Spanish call "le gracioso". It's a grotesque that dissociates and recomposes, a bit like sticking a fake moustache on a word after it's been made up.
