For all the newbies and pre-arrivals into Australia, I thought it might be a good idea to educate you in the Aussie language. In my experience having lived in Adelaide for 2 years now, the words that seemed amusing to me at first were:

Pokies - no these are not sex shows (my aunt found the signs outside the pubs highly amusing) :bouncing smiles: The South Australians are mad on Pokie Machines - another word for these are fruit machines. Gambling is big over here. Try not to get sucked in. They are computers and the government gets their commission out of them.

Thongs - otherwise known to us as Flip Flops. I've not been able to get used to these yet as they iritate my toe! Both Men and Women Aussies live in them.

Another one was when I was working in an office and a male colleague asked me if I had any durex!! I was taken aback but realised that he must mean something else - yes he did, durex is another word for sellotape.

Any others?

Condoms are known as frangers here - something I didn't know until my kids reached that certain age!



I was always amused by the apple sellers that frequented Tapleys Hill Road many years ago advertising Johnnies at $2.99 a kilo :lol:

And where else could you find a brand of cheese called Coon?

PG I'm still laughing at the sellotape durex thing! :lol:

I bought an aussie dictionary and it is very funny to read. I love the description of possum - A term of endearment as in "You little possum, you", made particularly famous by Dame Edna Everage. Sometimes soft and cuddly. Unfortunately Australian possums are anything but cuddle, having razor sharp claws..........is this true Podgyposum???? :lol:

Sasha :)

Yeah Sahsa possums can be nasty, viscious little critters - think wild cat!

Awww and she seems so nice and friendly on here :P

Sasha :)

Wizzy...i wish you hadnt let the possum (not cat)out of the bag...i'm really the antichrist dressed up as a fat possum just to deceive ...dont say you havent been warned!!!

:sign68: :sign68: :sign68: :sign68: :happy45:

We met some darling little possums in the Barossa the last few days. They take bread and grapes from your fingers and a couple of them you could stroke. These particular ones were pretty friendly!

Elaine

We think we may have a possum in our loft, either that or a very large rat.

It leaves around 11pm and comes back at 6am, makes a load of noise. Wayne tried to video it arriving back the other morning, but didn't see anything.

We can't even see the hole where it gets in and out.

If we get any pictures I'll post them on the photo site.

Not sure what we are going to do when we find out what it is.

Tracey

If it is a possum you can hire a possum trap from the RSPCA at Lonsdale but if you actually catch it you have to release it within 50 metres from where you caught it, as they are a protected native species.


Incidentally the Umpherston Sinkhole in Mount Gambier has friendly possums too. It's a lovely place to visit on a warm summer's evening, but gets a bit crowded with all the possum feeding tourists.

<_<

Anyway..back to the thread :P


it always makes me laugh when the Aussie are referring to a nutter, and remarthat they have kangaroos loose in the top paddock medium 114

Tracey,

We have something like that in our house(loft, roof, whatever ), my wife thought possum, but i thought plastic tub blowing in the wind in back garden.
somthing is certainly banging and crashing though.

Sean

Hi Sean,

Its definately some sort of animal, it has a regular sleeping pattern.

When I first heard it it seemed to run all around the loft as if it was trapped and didin't know what to do. Now it just comes in and settles above my bedroom, still makes loads of noise though.

Our observations will resume at the weekend.

Tracey :ph43r:

http://www.macquariedictionary.com.au

Check this out....pretty much got everything in here

Garf ;)

Wow, yours sound even scarier than our mysterious scratching plastic tub monster, have any of you tried creeping into the loft with a torch?
good luck for the weekend though.

Unfortunately the ceilings are too high, we'd need a pair of ladders to get up to the loft, so for the time being we are just going have to continue with the stakeout :ph43r:

Tracey :unsure:

Back to the thread topic, a few years ago my local corner shop was called Dunnies - I now know is the Aussie slang for toilets! I wonder if that had anything to do with the quality of food they sold....

Yep we have lots of Aussie slang books especially in Big W, I've got one for my father in-laws birthday having a quick look through I saw that to kick a goal is to have sex and there also seems to be lots of slang that I've heard back in the UK too like Kyber pass "arse" and cockney slang. Any one interesting the book it's called Great Aussie Slang bargain at $9.95.

Juls

Here,s a good one,BUM NUTS..? in concept . "My favourite, breakfast is ,Bacon & Bumnuts "... :D , have you guessed yet ;) ...............MM

LMAO ....... EGGS :happy45:

I also found that the Aussies use the word 'HEAPS' in every sentence, really annoying as my kids have just started saying it :68: