Vimbai

Shona, "have hope and trust"

Pronounced as vim-BYE, this name has a distinctive and memorable sound and a wonderfully uplifting meaning, associated with faith and hope. Predominantly heard in Zimbabwe, but occasionally in South Africa and England too, Vimbai is brought to you today by Nameberry Member, Wandarine:

By pure chance, I came to sit across a girl named Vimbai on a very full bus in Krakow in 2016. I spotted her nametag and loved it immediately, so much that I decided to tell her. She was so sweet about it! She said it means “have faith!” and was so happy that I pronounced it correctly on the first try — she was living in South Africa at the time, where a lot of people struggle with Shona names apparently: She said she’d been called a lot of things before, including Bombay.

It was such a sweet moment between strangers, and I have loved her name and its hopeful, uplifting meaning ever since.