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Post by shorty on Jan 21, 2012 15:38:02 GMT 12
A zac was a threepence, your groppy mocker was your best outfit (or your No 3s) and fong was booze as in getting fonged up, i.e getting boozed. Buckshee came from the arabic baksheesh which is an Egyptian term meaning free.
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Post by ngatimozart on Jan 21, 2012 16:42:09 GMT 12
I went to primary school in the 60's and was taught by nuns. The nuns taught us to pronounce our h's differently and woebetide any of us if we mispronounced them. It got painful very quickly. Another thing that I've commented on previously on another thread is the venacular in the Forces. We all had our own lingo or slang and accent. I was bought in Gore (rolled me r's real good) and after a year in the RNZAF my old man complained about me saying eh at the end of every sentence and sounding a bit like a Maori. That was in 1975. When I was in the pussers the accent was more pronounced and all the ratings basically spoke with what I would call an east coast Maori accent. In my time in uniform we swore a lot and when I was home on leave, or in polite company, I did have to be very watchful of my f's and c 's. A word that my dad and his cohorts used a lot was cobber (same as mate), which you very rarely hear now. Another thing that is regional is, a crib is what Southlanders and Otagoites call a bach & a peter is flagon of beer. So I wonder if cobber was a lower half of the South Island term as well. Another comment, more about the written language. When I was doing my BA at Canterbury during the 1990s, the academic staff were complaining about the younger students lack of basic written language skills such as spelling, structure and even the use of the apostrophe. Like I said I was taught by nuns and was very frequently introduced to the strap or the yard rule but by the time I left school I could read, write and count. Definitely showing my age now.
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Post by ngatimozart on Jan 21, 2012 16:52:52 GMT 12
An ad endum. This is not a strange question, maybe a little different for this forum but it is a very interesting one and the discussion so far has been very informative.
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Post by shorty on Jan 21, 2012 17:37:19 GMT 12
Cobber and peter (and flagon) were used in Auckland too and I always thought that crib was a south island term and bach was the north island equivalent. (not batch as some real estate people call it), it's short for bachelor accomodation, the sort you and your cobber would stay in. There was (is), not sure after the quakes, a youth gym in Christchurch with the name of Crichton Cobbers.
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Post by Luther Moore on Jan 21, 2012 18:06:53 GMT 12
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Post by Dave Homewood on Jan 21, 2012 19:16:41 GMT 12
Cobber is still often heard among the kiwi WWII veterans I talk with, and some younger folk still use it. it was used universally in New Zealand and Australia in years gone by and of course it is where Edgar Kain got his nickname, NZ's first WWII fighter ace.
I too have heard the term bach used all over the North Island but never crib up here unless used by wayward mainlanders; when I lived in Christchurch they called them cribs. Now cribs seem to be where gangsta rappers and their bitches and hoes live if TV is to be believed so I much prefer a bach. And it seems these days bachs and cribs are more commonly called "holiday homes".
Shorty's mention of bach being short for bachelor accommodation reminded me that a lot of old folk use the old term 'whare' for a single man's bush hut or farm hut, which often had a roof, door and small fireplace and little else. Lots of mill men and farm workers lived in these one room huts fashioned from rough wood and corregated iron materials and even canvas in some cases. You still see the occasional whare on roadside farms, derelict and charming, which travelling the country. However, unlike the Maori word for house, whare, in this instance it is not pronounced as "forrey" as we have come to accept in modern Maori language. A bush hut whare was always pronounced "worree". No doubt it derived from the Maori term though the design and purpose is different and I like the fact the name is pronouced distinctly differently.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Jan 21, 2012 19:31:58 GMT 12
I found this page: ees.net.nz/tools/kiwislang.htmA lot of those are universal words outside of the USA's bad's spelling zone, but I have never heard of "Berm -- grass strip at side of road" - I call that a verge
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Post by baronbeeza on Jan 21, 2012 19:38:13 GMT 12
Berm is common in the UK I think Dave. I know it is the verge here but from my travels berm may be a little more in use. I didn't check the list..... Midsommer Murder is about to start.
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Post by shorty on Jan 21, 2012 20:13:46 GMT 12
Berm is in pretty common useage where it means the area between the road and the footpath whereas verge doesn't have to have a footpath forming one side. The accomodation huts towed behind traction engines were also called whares. I think they are using "holiday homes" as it sounds more expensive! Bachs were commonly of cheap "rustic'" construction and furnished with second hand cast offs, these days they are being replaced by mansions costing more than a house in town! Building regulations are killing off those that are left.
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Post by mumbles on Jan 21, 2012 21:26:36 GMT 12
I found this page: ees.net.nz/tools/kiwislang.htmA lot of those are universal words outside of the USA's bad's spelling zone, but I have never heard of "Berm -- grass strip at side of road" - I call that a verge Anything with a kerb between a road and a house I have always called a berm. Anything without a kerb with gravel or grass at the roadside I have always called a verge. There is also Luncheon/Belgian as another thing referred to differently between North and South islands respectively (luncheon meat).
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Post by mumbles on Jan 21, 2012 21:31:57 GMT 12
I think they are using "holiday homes" as it sounds more expensive! Bachs were commonly of cheap "rustic'" construction and furnished with second hand cast offs, There are still a few of those on the lakefront in Taupo a few mintues walk from the centre of town. The land alone must be worth megabucks.
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Post by Luther Moore on Jan 22, 2012 13:19:46 GMT 12
Remember the bad old days when TVNZ used to censor out swear words from movies, so you ended upo with a blank gap that broke the verisimmilitude and ruined the film? Nowadays they even use the bad language on the news! I agree with Sam entirely. i'll be t the pioneers who lived in the bush probably swore more than we did, and with good reason. The swear words we all hear everyday are not new, they go back centuries and were all invented for a purpose. The famous F-word was invented by an act of Parliament, as an abbreviation for Fornicate Under Consent of the King, after the population had dropped dramatically in Britain folowing some plague or war. I learned that at school!(Inside the classroom from a teacher, so it's probably wrong) There is another question, what swear words have been invented in the last seventy years?or what swear words have been around for hundreds of years?
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Post by Dave Homewood on Jan 22, 2012 13:49:58 GMT 12
The last 70 years, probably none.
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Post by hairy on Jan 22, 2012 15:20:18 GMT 12
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Post by ngatimozart on Jan 22, 2012 16:28:23 GMT 12
Don't know if any new swear words have been invented in last 70 years but I am sure the context that they are used in has changed.
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Post by Luther Moore on Jan 22, 2012 17:22:28 GMT 12
C*nt was used 1800's a lot.
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