a Bantu language spoken in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, (the country formerly known as Zaire), Lingala is extremely simplistic, having only 3 tenses, past, present, and future. In fact, the language is so simple that there is no word for Thank You. Instead, as happens in most cases with Lingala, the corresponding French word is simply mangled into the sentense. Lingala uses "melesi" for "thank you".
Lingala is primarily a military language, made popular under the regime of Mobutu Sese Seko, who ruled Zaire for many years. The language is excellent for giving commands and for anything in the imperitive tense (YOU! GO! THERE! NOW!), but I recommend something like French for anything more intimate.
In the west of DR Congo, Lingala and French are the languages of business. In the east of DR Congo, Lingala is replaced by Swahili as the dominant Bantu language.