Aussie Insults

I have a book, "Great Aussie Insults" compiled by Bill Wannan.

So funny, I have to share some of them with you. Where needed, I will translate:

"May all your chooks turn into emus and kick your dunny over." [chooks: chickens, dunny: outhouse]

"He couldn't knock the skin off a rice pudding."

"The typical daily newspaper wants boiling down to the size of a sheet of notepaper and then frying with disinfecting fluid and cayenne pepper to make it wholesome and refreshing." [oh so true!]

"There are only two classes of person in New South Wales. Those who have been convicted, and those who ought to have been." [Australia is notoriously founded by British convicts. Each of the seven states take jibes at each other.]

On the Australian accent from an article in The Australian in 1978:

"The broad Australian accent is not a lovesome thing, I grant you. At its worst, it is reminiscent of a dehydrated crow uttering its last statement on life from the bough of a dead tree in the middle of a claypan at the peak of a seven-year drought."

[The term "larrikin" came into use in the 1870s in Victoria and New South Wales, to denote a street hooligan or tough. Today it is simply an endearment for a bloke who is a jokester.]

NED THE LARRIKIN
A blossom of blackness indeed--
of satan a sinister fruit!
Far better the centipede's seed--
the spawn of the adder or newt!
Than terror of talon or fang
this imp of the alleys is worse:
His speech is poisonous slang--
his phrases are colored with curse.

An old "bush ballad:"
Fair Australia, Oh what a dump.
All you get to eat is crocodile's rump,
Bandicoot's brains and catfish pie,
Let me go home again before I die!

From the Sydney "Bulletin," Australian Sassiety:
"Australian 'sassiety' is a hollow, heartless bedizened swarm of sycopantic snobs and snobbesses."

On Deeming the Murderer:
The dastard demoniac, dubbed Deeming, deserves the doom of a degrading dog's death for diabolical deeds, if demonstrated without doubt that he is the doer.

On Women:
I'd sooner talk to a man than a woman any day. Ten minutes exhausts them.

The Sex Problem Again:
[Written in 1907, the last line is not what contemporaries would think; the term refers to a rooster.]
Some men want to be considered gods in their own homes; you'll generally find that sort of men very small potatoes outside; if they weren't they wouldn't bother so much about being cocks on their own little dunghills.

School-yard song:
Boys are strong
Like King-Kong.
Girls are weak,
Chuck 'em in the creek.

On Marriage:
Oh! Betting and Beer are the basis
of the only respectable life.
Much better to go to the races
Than moulder at home with the wife.

To a Food Waiter:
"What will you have?" said the waiter,
reflectively picking his nose.
"I'll have two boiled eggs you bastard,
you can't put your finger in those."
[Bastard is a common word here, sometimes even denoting affection. It is not necessarily considered a "swear" word as in America. In fact, I have been surprised to discover that several words Americans consider offensive are commonplace here, and no one bats an eyelid.]

And to leave you with one more thought, translation follows...oh, and keep in mind that the national anthem on this continent is entitled "Advance Australia Fair."

Advance Australia:
Wowsers, whingers, ratbags, narks,
Silvertails, galahs and sharks,
Knockers, larrikins, and chromos,
Bengal lancers, bludgers, homos,
Botts and polers, spielers, lairs,
Advance Australia--you are theirs!

translated in order: "wet blanket, whiner, ratbags, tattletale (gossip, troublemaker), pest, silly mindless bird, and sharks, pessimist, larrikin, paintsniffer, English army person, lazy user person, homosexual, botts and polers (don't know) teller of tales, flashy sleazy dressing person...Australia, you are theirs!"



For a laugh, go to http://www.koalanet.com.au/ for Australian slang. Pretty entertaining, and it has been helpful to me to learn the lingo.