Language Skills while voyaging

[rotrax]

As a true London Cockney, born within the sound of the church bells of St. Mary le Bow at the end of the Strand near Cheapside in the City of London I like the ever evolving Rhyming Slang.


On occasion though I am beaten and have no idea what is being said.


For example, some years ago I asked the Workshop Foreman " Where is George? "


The answer got me trying hard to work out the reply.


" 'Ees gorn dahn the rubber wiv the bubble. "


Translated, it goes like this :-


" He has gone to the pub with the Greek. "


Cockney rhyming slang has 'rubber dub dub' shortened to the first word for pub and 'bubble and squeak' for Greek, also shortened to the first word. Our diesel technician was Takis, a talented injector and pump mechanic from the Greek part of Cyprus.


A Cockney might give you a banknote saying as he did so " Stick that in yer sky! "


The meaning is clear to a rhyming slang speaker - put that in your pocket. Sky rocket = pocket.


If you plan to visit london, take a crash course...............

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by dannc

For us, it took less than two weeks before we could start understanding SOME of the language. I was starting to be able to parse the language and understand a bit here and there. Twas really remarkable.

Yeah, I hate dubbing, just subtitle what is being said.

We watch a fair amount of British and Irish TV and we have to turn on the subtitles for the wife to understand what is being said...

Our last trip to Ireland we had no real problem understanding people, until one day we were on a bus in Dublin, and a group in front of us were talking. I could barely understand them, which was partly because of the noise of the bus, but they really had a different accent that was throwing me off.

I used to work with a guy from Liverpool, UK. Took a month or so for me to understand a word he was saying. He supposedly was speaking English.

Later,
Dan

He is , it’s you that isn’t !!!

[goboatingnow]

English is a very easy language to learn badly but be comprehensible. This is unfortunately not true of other languages in the main , hence watching TV is as useful.

[rotrax]

It is an unfortunate truth that the USA and the UK are two countries separated by a common language...................

[flightlead404]

Originally Posted by rotrax

As a true London Cockney, born within the sound of the church bells of St. Mary le Bow at the end of the Strand near Cheapside in the City of London I like the ever evolving Rhyming Slang.


On occasion though I am beaten and have no idea what is being said.


For example, some years ago I asked the Workshop Foreman " Where is George? "


The answer got me trying hard to work out the reply.


" 'Ees gorn dahn the rubber wiv the bubble. "


Translated, it goes like this :-


" He has gone to the pub with the Greek. "


Cockney rhyming slang has 'rubber dub dub' shortened to the first word for pub and 'bubble and squeak' for Greek, also shortened to the first word. Our diesel technician was Takis, a talented injector and pump mechanic from the Greek part of Cyprus.


A Cockney might give you a banknote saying as he did so " Stick that in yer sky! "


The meaning is clear to a rhyming slang speaker - put that in your pocket. Sky rocket = pocket.


If you plan to visit london, take a crash course...............

I love that there are ATMs that let select "Cockney" as a language choice, and will dispense a Pony or a Monkey.

[MicHughV]

Well, when you arrive in South Africa, you will quickly discover that many languages are spoken there and most South Africans are fluent in several.
It's not uncommon for a South African to switch languages in mid-stream, as another language may better describe or explain what the talker wants to convey.
For one South African speaking to another, this is usually not a problem, but for a tourist or yachtie arriving there, a conversation may leave you hanging in mid-air...going wtf did he just say ?.
South African " english" is replete with words, expressions, nuances, slang, etc that come from another language.
You'll hear " howsit, you must come scope out out my bakkie" meaning " hello, you must come and see my truck"..
or" aieesh, that's a lekker bakkie"...meaning, " wow, that's a nice truck"..
These are perfectly acceptable " english" words...for a South African...

[Buzzman]

But you must remember to pork yer bakkie in the grudge.


Or park your car in the garage.

[MicHughV]

ah yes...."english"....coming to America for the first time, I thought my "english" would be perfectly understood...but that was not the case...

English " open the bonnet and hand me that spanner please, so I can remove the tappet cover, please".....
America " open the hood and hand me that wrench so I can remove the valve cover, puh-lease"....

[valhalla360]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

English is a very easy language to learn badly but be comprehensible. This is unfortunately not true of other languages in the main , hence watching TV is as useful.

That's a vague enough statement, it can be true of most any language.

I'm biased being a native english speaker but I muddle along very poorly in several languages and generally get my point across...but every non-native speaker I know who has learned english suggests it's very difficult if you want to go past simple greetings and asking where the bathroom is.

[MicHughV]

the problem with english is that it is not a phonetic language....

ugh....
trough
through
plough....

all these words pronounce the "ugh" differently..

many languages place the verb at the end of a sentence.
instead of " the boy kicked the ball"....it is " the boy, the ball, kicked".....

English was not my mother language...learning it...and learning it well...was not easy...
I "read" the book...the color" red"...etc..etc..etc...very confusing for a non-english speaker to come to grips with english...Worcestershire sauce....the English call this "wooster" sauce....the rest of the world calls it " Wur-chester-sire" sauce...

[dannc]

Originally Posted by MicHughV

...
I "read" the book...the color" red"...etc..etc..etc...very confusing for a non-english speaker to come to grips with english...Worcestershire sauce....the English call this "wooster" sauce....the rest of the world calls it " Wur-chester-sire" sauce...

I shared an office for many years with a non native English speaker. He is the most educated person I have every known, with five or so Bachelor and Master degrees and could have had a couple more Masters if he took a few more classes. Wicked smart guy and great guy to work with.

Every once in awhile he would show up at the office with a question about English. Most of the time, his question would make you wonder how anyone ever learns to speak English but especially as a second language. Things a native speaker just knows, but if you think about it, makes no sense.

Like moor, more and Moore

• I would like MORE of that gruel, please sir.
• Lets go MOOR the boat.
• Lets go for a walk on the MOOR.
• He is a Moor and his last name is MOORE.

The MOOR named MOORE, asked for MORE gruel for breakfast, went to MOOR his boat, before taking a walk on the MOOR.



Later,
Dan

[Buzzman]

The only problem with that is that, apart from 'more', the other usages are all pronounced the same.

And in the UK, I think, even 'more' can be pronounced 'moore'. As in Thomas More.

On a previous comment about the 'ough' sound: the 'trough' can be EITHER pronounced 'troff' OR 'trow' (rhyming with the bow of the boat).

It's apparently an English lower class derivation that somehow made its way to Tasmania where several of my two-headed relatives use it regularly. The large sink usually found in laundries is called a 'trough' (trow). I call it a 'sink'. A basin is the much smaller hand-washing water receptacle found in the bathroom, privy, dunny, john.

And if you think 'pony' and 'monkey' are odd names for money (apparently derived from Colonial India where rupee notes of 25 and 500 denominations carried images of those animals, and were reverse-converted into pounds sterling when soldiers arrived back in the UK from their tour of duty in India), you oughta try understanding Aussie currency.

Australia, home of everything that can kill you quickly, even named one of its notes after the 'grey nurse' shark - the original issuing of the AU$100 note, which was grey in colour, but swiftly changed to a greenish hue, after it was realised the 'grey nurse' could be photocopied fairly accurately. [This also pre-dated the plastic notes, when all notes were still on paper].

We also have the 'trey' (threepence, pre-decimal) and the 'zac' which was 5 pence, but also carried over onto the decimal age 5c. Since the removal of the old copper 1c and 2c pieces from circulation, this has also received the carry over nickname of 'shrapnel' (originally applied to the 'coppers' - 1c and 2c coins) which is also a generic term for all loose change, as in, when counting out a fistful of coins to pay for some small item: "I've got a pocket full of shrapnel I need to get rid of".

Ten cents is a 'bob', borrowed from Cockney, and so 20c is 'two bob'. A 50c piece is a fid or fiddy, which is either an adaptation of the Cockney 'fiddly did' or an adaptation from US gangsta slang.

One dollar (coin) is a 'buck', $2 dollar coin 'two bucks' (very original), and $5 note a 'fiver', but also in some circles a 'purple meanie' due to its lavender colour.
The $10 note is called a 'tenner', but also a 'bluey' due to its bluish colour, or even a 'blue note' riffing off the jazz era.

[Oddly, bluey is also the slang term for a redhead, and the abbreviation for the quintessential Australian dog breed, the Blue Heeler Cattle Dog].
The $20 note is known as a 'lobster', or 'lobbie', due to its pinkish-orange colour.

The $50 note is a 'pineapple' due to it's yellowish-greenish colour, like an unripe pineapple. As previously, the old grey $100 dollar note was the 'grey nurse', but its dark green successor is simply the greenback or C-note.

Perhaps more originally, the oddest Australian currency was that created during the coin-impoverished era of early governor, Lachlan Macquarie. who had the armorer punch out the centre of Spanish dollars (pieces of eight) and re-stamp them as 5 shillings (the outer ring) and 15 pence (the inner circular coin). They became known as the 'holey dollar' and the 'dump', the former of which is, today, the logo of Macquarie Bank, one of Australia's most successful merchant and trading banks, known locally and colloquially as 'the millionaire factory' as it seems to produce millionaires at a rate faster than any other bank. It's CEO, Shemarah Wikmanayake, is the highest paid executive in Australia I believe, or very close to it.

And for the record, Aussies also pronounce 'Worcestershire sauce' as Wooster-shuh, just like the Poms do. And Pom, originally 'POHM' for Prisoner Of His Majesty, allegedly the designation of arriving convicts in the early colonial years. So an Aussie resident, originally East Londoner, might have been heard to remark, on sighting a ship coming into Sydney harbour: "Ere comes a nuvver loader bleedin' Poms".

For many years, Australia's most popular vehicle, the GMH Holden Commodore was known as the 'dunny door', the ubiquitous outback 'dunny' being the local designation for the outhouse, or shithouse, or shouse, or kybo (pron ky-bo, rhyming with sky blow), apparently alluding to Kybo brand coffee cans that were used to hold lye or some other dry chemical sprinkled on the 'doings' before one left the outhouse, a US derivative that may have travelled here with diggers after WWI or earlier with US gold miners flocking here for our gold rush.

And while we're on Aussie (and it's ozzee, not ossee) slang terms, lets look at the various glasses in which one might be served alcohol, especially beer.
These vary from state to state around the country. The near ubiquitous 'schooner' is, in NSW, a 15oz/425ml glass, and a 'middy' it's junior at 10oz/250ml, while a 'pint' is, oddly, not actually a pint, being only 500ml/20 oz, not the 16oz one might otherwise expect of a pint, or the 600ml that the 'pint' was converted to in the 1966 decimal conversion.

It used to be a local joke that you could spot a 'foreigner' (i.e. someone from out of town) because they'd use the wrong name for the different-sized glasses. So woe betide the Sydney-sider who arrived at the bar of a Brisbane Hotel and attempted to order a 'middy' when he should have ordered a 'pot'. Or the Adelaide resident, on holiday in Sydney, who wondered why he was getting so drunk ordering 'schooners' as he normally did 'back home', without realising that the Adelaide 'schooner' is equivalent only to the much smaller NSW 'middy', while it's NSW schooner counterpart is 15oz/425ml to the middy's 10oz/285ml. Even more amusing is the indignation of the New South Welshman, served the 'schooner' he requested in an Adelaide hotel, complaining that all he was served was a 'middy' and not a 'schooner'.
Many rolled eyes and chuckles all round.
And woe betide the barman anywhere who left a large head on the beer, instead of filling it almost to the brim: "Wosser marra, mate? Tide garn out..?? 'Ow bout yer topper up, eh?"

In fact, in the Eighties, when smaller breweries began popping up, WA's Redback Brewery's wheat beer, which has a notoriously large and firm 'head', was required to provide drinkers with a special, taller glass, featuring a marked 'plimsoll line' so drinkers could see they were not being 'gypped' (or short-changed), itself a slang term brought back by WWI 'diggers' who had been ripped off by smart-arse 'WOGs' aka 'Egyptian street traders' ('gypos) aka 'wily oriental gentlemen' (WOG).

But while drinking his beer, he might choose to partake of a sandwich, or 'sanger', which might contain pressed meat known as bologna, boloney, polony, fritz or devon, depending which State you are in.

Another often confusing snack is the deep-fried, battered, potato slice, known in most of the country as a 'potato scallop', but in other parts as a potato cake, while fast-food 'restaurants' (borrowing from their American origins) refer to their somewhat similar product as a 'hash brown'. The Swiss know them as a rostie, the Irish as potato cakes while the Scots prefer 'tattie scones'.

And while the Scots are said to have invented the deep-fried Mars Bar (apparently, Glaswegians will fry anything) it is the Aussies to whom we owe the 'Tim Tam straw'. The Tim Tam is a chocolate coated, cream filled biscuit made by the Australian Arnotts bakery, a packet of which was famously handed by our PM Scott Morrison to UK PM Boris Johnson at a recent meeting, after SM learned that BJ had a fondness for them.

The trick, with the Tim Tam straw, is to carefully bite off both ends of a biscuit - just the chocolate skin - to expose the inner biscuit layers. Then, biting on one end, simultaneously dunk the other end in a cup of hot liquid, like tea or coffee, and suck, hard. Very, very quickly, you then inhale/suck/swallow the now totally sodden Tim Tam.
The trick is to do so without making a god-awful mess down the front of your shirt, and a fist pump is earned for completing the task without any 'spillage'.
Be warned, it's tricky and requires practice....


Language, eh..???

Allegedly, it's for communicating, clearly... Clearly there's some ways to go...

[rotrax]

I remember a bit from the second Barry McKenzie film, written by Barry Humphris.


Col the Frog, an Aussie living in Paris is bemoaning the fact his girlfriend has left him. Barry Mac asks if he was really keen on her.


" Keen Bazza, cos I was keen! I wooda dragged me bare arse over 200 yards of broken beer bottles just to hear her piss in an old jam tin......."


You dont get literature like that everyday!

[Buzzman]

You need to look for videos of Austraian 'comedian' Rodney Rude on YT....

He once claimed he got drunk and fell asleep next to a woman who was SO ugly when he awoke he had to chew his own arm off to avoid waking her.

He also claimed he was so desperate for a root (sex) that he'd f**k a black snake with a festered arse........as long as someone held its head....

[You need to know that the red-bellied black snake is one of the most poisonous of Australias many poisonous snakes....]

He was, shall we say, 'creative' with the idiom and the language. And had a maniacal 'stage cackle'. Very eighties.... and very non-PC...

And if you have never heard his skit about the head.....that is, a head with no arms and no legs....it begins as do so many great jokes, with "This head rolls into a bar, see, and asks the barman for a drink....."

No spoliers, go look for it yourself. I promise you it's worth it.

[rotrax]

The following incident is true, happened in 1972.
I used to turn out for the Abingdon RFC 1st VX, playing number 9.
A near neighbour fancied a game of rugby and asked to come along on training night.
Just so you know, in those days Rugby players trained on beer and fags.
He was an Ulsterman called Hampton ######, an uncommon name and a well known rhyming slang word. Hampton Wick - a place near Hampton Court Palace - =prick.
We entered the changing room and booted up. The club captain joined us.
" 'Oo's yer mate? " he asked. Before I could reply, my neighbour, very well versed in fending off comment quickly said:-


" My names Hampton - and I've heard all the bloody jokes! "