A Proper Job - local dialect

Here's a quickie - prompted by the consumption of this very nice beer in the UK (if you can find it, try it!) 

The phrase 'proper job' comes from the West Country (the SW region of England). It means 'very good' or 'job well done'. And it's not used like this more nationally. 

Examples: 

You "I got an A in my exam!". Local: "Proper job!"

Local finishes a pint of good lager, smacks their lips and says "Proper job!". 

Bye.

 

Brass Monkeys!

I'm in London at the end of January. And today it is "brass monkeys". 

In fact, you might also say it could "freeze the balls* off a brass monkey". (Which is a bit more vulgar.)

In the UK and US, we use these phrases colloquially to describe exceptionally cold weather.

This usage apparently started in 19th century America. Nobody really knows the reason for the animal mention. But it seems likely that it referred to small brass monkey statuettes of the time (often from Japan). Which were solid metal, and thus fairly impervious. Only very extreme weather temperatures would affect these inanimate simians! 

Earlier phrases referred to freezing the whiskers, nose or tail off a brass monkey. The slightly less elegant 'balls' was added in the 20th century!

It seems that a popular, and convoluted, theory of the brass monkey being a tray to store a ship's cannonballs has been debunked by experts as well, balls. 

Anyway, brass monkeys is one of English's many strange colloquialisms. And if you hear it when visiting the UK or US, at least you now know what it means ;) 

* Balls is UK/US slang for testicles! 


Also on this blog:

What is "Going For A Cheeky Nando's"? 

More British English Slang

More informal British English

Biscuits and some issues with US & UK English

Nerd Corner: the Outrageous Sudoku Shocker

Well it seems in Japan, people rarely call or know sudoku as sudoku (数独). They know it more commonly as nanpure (nam-poo-ray) which is a portmanteau of the English 'Number Place'. Whaaat?

But yes, I was reliably informed by Japanese friends, after 'nanpure' was listed as the Japanese for sudoku in a recent textbook. 

This seemed particularly odd to me - outside Japan we all know sudoku as a Japanese puzzle, with a Japanese name. And yet that's not the case actually in Japan?? 

Pretty much. Which set me off on a bit of delving. 

There seem to be two (maybe interlinked) reasons for this mysterious reversal. 

1. The puzzle is not necessarily, entirely, Japanese. There have been a whole bunch of similar number puzzles historically, and worldwide. And in the 20th century the (relatively obscure?) American puzzle, Number Place, made its way to Japan. It was popular, got modified, named sudoku, and later on, re-exported to the West ...where it was a huge hit and generally known as 'Japanese'. But in Japan - unlike the West - the original Number Place moniker still had resonance.

2. This one is anecdotal from another Japanese friend, but makes pretty good sense: the term 'sudoku' was actually copyrighted, in Japan, by a certain Japanese publisher. As a result, other publications could use the same puzzle concept, but they had to call it something else. And nanpure seems to have been the most ready option. Overseas, however, where there was no breach of copyright, all puzzles were presented as 'sudoku'.

Anyway, hope that's provided a little Thursday interest. Time for coffee (with no puzzles) for me. 

- Sudoku itself is a Japanese portmanteau for 数字は独身に限る (suuji wa dokushin ni kagiru) roughly 'keep the digits single'. As you might have guessed, portmanteau words from many languages are popular in Japanese! 

- Nanpure ナンプレ is written in a different script, katakana - reserved for borrowed foreign words.

What is "Going For A Cheeky Nando's"?

Blowing.The.Lid. *Unfeasible Shock* Yep, 'Cheeky Nando's' doesn't mean anything! This phrase became used a few years ago, in the UK, to confuse (US) foreigners who couldn't understand 'cheeky', and then for young Brits to create really long, non-sensical explanations for it. The whole process is an urban joke! (Not invented by the restaurant). Cheeky in British slang could imply 'local, fun, a bit naughty'. If anything here, it refers to the local 'naughtiness' of inventing bogus explanations of the slang to foreigners. Which, though it was a phenomenon at the time, and has doubtless spawned many inventive and creative outpourings, is also rather dumb and irritating. 

No!

(Yes)

The best option with this phrase is to ignore it - or enjoy the amusement of listening to the young Brits' complex, serious, joke responses to you if you ask what it means. (It just means eating a meal in Nando's chicken restaurant, ultimately.) 

The whole joke has (hopefully) gone out of fashion now. Though it was so popular at one point that many neutral people have since nicknamed the dining chain 'Cheeky Nando's'.

Hope that's cleared that up!  

Feeling oddly hungry now... 

Note to English learners: 'blowing the lid' on something means exposing it. (As if you are removing the lid on jar, to show what is really inside.) It usually refers to something bad or criminal, which needs to be exposed!

I'm OK. (What does that mean?)

Over coffee recently, a Chinese friend asked me: "Do you want cake with that?". To which I replied "I'm OK".

"That means you want cake, or you don't want cake?"

Fair point.

It means I don't want cake.

"I'm OK" in this context is a softer way of expressing no. I guess the root meaning is "I'm OK just as I am now" (so I don't need anything extra). I could also say something like: "Do you want another coffee, or are you OK?" - meaning, do you want extra coffee, or are you OK as you are now.

It is one of the many not-always-obvious colloquialisms in British English. Perfectly straightforward to other British English speakers. But not to somebody else trying to figure it out with logic! 

Borrowed Words - England, Japan & France

I had coffee with a Japanese friend yesterday who asked me about a Katakana word, 'janru'. 

As you might know (and I've talked about it on this blog) Japanese has an extensive vocabulary of foreign words, spelled / pronounced in a phonetically Japanese way. And there is a special Japanese alphabet - Katakana - with which to write them. 

Janru (ジャンル) in Japanese apparently means 'type' or 'category'. My friend knew it was foreign, because it's written in Katakana. But which foreign language.. more of a mystery. Many Katakana words are from English, but by no means all. 'Pan' (パン - bread) for example, is from Portuguese - as are quite a number of words, due to historical dealings with that country. 

He wondered if janru was French or English. And in fact, I think he is right on both counts. In British English, we use 'genre' (pron: jon-rer) to mean a type or category. But the word is French. Japanese is not the only language to borrow! 

We use a lot of modern French words in modern English. Of course, one of the many ancient influences on the English language is French - not least from being conquered by them (and for centuries it seems boundaries between, and rule of, the two countries were much more 'fluid' and disputed than they are today!) Most of these French words were absorbed into English many hundreds of years ago, and they've become corrupted over time. So we can't even recognise them as 'French' any more. They are now English! (Often if an English word is pronounced unlike its spelling, it came from original French!)

But aside from this, we have just appropriated convenient French words and their meanings for everyday modern English. 'Genre' is one of them. And we have many more!

Here are some others,  with very rudimentary attempts to help with pronunciation... ^^

- RSVP
Meaning: please reply. It is an acronym for Répondez, S'il Vous Plaît.

- Chauffeur
Meaning: driver.

- Déjà vu (dayjah vu) 
Meaning: literally 'already seen' - the inexplicable feeling that what you are experiencing has happened before.

- Chic (sheek) 
Meaning: stylish.

- A la Carte
Meaning: literally, by the menu. We use it to mean choosing individual dishes from the menu.

- Au Fait (oh fay) 
Meaning: knowledgeable of, familiar with. Example: "Sarah is au fait with HTML coding". (She's not an expert, but she's proficient at it!) 

- Enfant Terrible (ohnfohn ter-eeble) 
Meaning: literally 'terrible child'. But it refers to a person who is shocking or unconventional - and often used as a slight compliment in creative circles. "He is the enfant terrible of fashion design!" implies he is shocking but maybe brilliant.

- Entrepreneur
Meaning: a person who sets up and runs ventures.

- Gaffe
Meaning: a blunder. To make a gaffe is to stupidly say something badly inappropriate. 

- Clique (cleek)  
Meaning: a closed group. 'Cliquey' is not a very positive thing in the UK. 

- Gauche (goh-sh)  
Meaning: literally in French it means 'left' (which perhaps implies a clumsy left hand?) It is a word applied to socially inexperienced or clumsy people. Often young people trying too hard! "Oh dear, that new Chris guy is a bit gauche!"

- Omelette
Meaning: an omelette! (The Americans often prefer to spell it omelet)

- Au de Toilette (oh de twahl-ette) 
Meaning: literally, 'washtime water'. But it refers to perfumes, as most of us know! It means the slightly more watered (and more affordable!) version of a fragrance. 


Incidentally, due to the long term success of these industries in France, global terms using French increase a lot if you work with sectors such as fashion, art, music, food, wine, perfumes and other luxury goods! 

Jean Paul Gaultier was an 'enfant terrible' of fashion design!     

Also, does France borrow modern English words too?? (Or even historically, did the language exchange go both ways??) OR are there Japanese words out there (besides perhaps Manga and Anime) which have been adopted into the day-to-day of other cultures? If you know, please do add in comments!


Photo credit: Style Gibberish


Also on this blog: 

Semen everywhere! (And the cat oven explained)

A Few Strange British English Pronunciations

 

 

More British English Slang

Following a few recent conversations, and an amusing (if you're British) competition ad made by a bank in Singapore, here are three English words which have common, old slang meanings outside of their regular ones! 

1. Curtains
Regular meaning: fabric things which cover your windows (we don't use the term 'drapes' in the UK)
Slang meaning: the end, usually death or the act of dying. As in the end of the show, when the curtains come down. I think this is mostly old London slang. It's often a slightly joking term and it is not offensive in daily chat, but should not be used in any kind of serious situation!

Example: "It'll be curtains for the goldfish if it keeps on trying to jump out of the tank!"

2. Toss
Regular meaning: to throw something
Slang meaning: to masturbate. The term is applied to males and can have variations such as 'tosser' (a man who tosses - ie an idiotic or unpleasant person), 'tosspot' (a ridiculous or unpleasant person). Tosser is the same as 'wanker' (with the same meaning) and both are quite common in colloquial British English! (Both are insults)

Example: "Urgh, my new boss is being a total tosser!"  

3. Tart
Regular meanings: a small pie; an acidic or sour taste
Slang meaning: a slut or prostitute. Traditionally applied to women, today it can be used of either gender to imply they sleep around a lot (this is an insult!) This is very old slang, and quite well known worldwide, I think.

Examples: 
"Don't go out with Eric, he's a complete tart!"
"Shall I buy these shoes?" - "No, they look a bit tarty." 

The banking ad.

English proverbs: Red Sky at Night..

In the UK we have an old saying which goes: 

Red sky at night, shepherd's delight
Red sky at morning, shepherd's warning.

This means that if there's a pink/red sunset, the next day will be fine. But if there's a pink sunrise, there will be rain. It tends to be true. If you're an outdoorsy shepherd or farmer, this matters. Apparently this saying is even in the bible. We have quite a lot of weather prediction proverbs in the West.

I don't know if this is the same in nearly 365-regular-climate SE Asia! Red sky at night holds true here, but in the sunny tropics there are a lot of red sunsets! Here's tonight's :) 

Word(s) of the Day: 下毛毛雨 (xià máo máo yǔ)

Language: mandarin Chinese
Meaning: 'hairy rain' - ie light, feathery rain or drizzle! 
  

Photo credit: Teresa Chipperfield

Semen everywhere! (And the cat oven explained)

Not my photo. This logo would have been most helpful!

On a recent trip to Bali, Indonesia, I was surprised to see endless billboards advertising semen. Several different kinds, it seems. It's popular stuff! One poster even added 'bagusnya!' which means 'it's good!'. Hmm..

I speak some Indonesian, and the word 'semen' is not a part of the language that I know of. So what's going on here? 

In fact it IS an English word. Sort of. Take English pronunciation out of it and re-think. You could also pronounce this word as se-mehn. Which is exactly what it is: cement! Spelled in the way an Indonesian would say it. (Incidentally 'c' in Indonesian is pronounced 'ch'.) 

In East Asian languages, it's common to use words from other languages, and re-spell them in a way that's locally compatible. Usually this is for words for modern imported items or concepts. Or sometimes these words appear in the language from past colonial influences. Japan, in fact - which has never been colonised by anyone - has one of the richest vocabularies of foreign words. They even have an entire separate alphabet for them (Katakana). In some languages, they have their own indigenous words too, and you can pick which one to use.

Here are some common examples:

Japanese
Teburu (テーブル) = table
Takushi (タクシー) = taxi
Basu (バス) = bus
Miruku (ミルク) = milk
Biru (ビール) = beer
Kurisumasu (クリスマス) = Christmas 

Malay
Fesyen = fashion
Imigresen = immigration
Bas = bus
Teksi = taxi 
Bir = beer

Indonesian
Imigrasi = immigration
Taksi = taxi  
Komputer = computer
Doktor = doctor
Sepatu = shoe (from Portuguese I think, 'sepatos') 

I'm now trying to think of some British English words like this. We have plenty of words adopted from other  languages - pyjamas, juggernaut, jodhpurs are all from India, for example.. and we have a whole bunch of French and Gaelic going on in there too. With the French words we seem to keep the original spelling but pronounce them locally (we say Paris not 'Paree' like the French do, and 'beecham' not beauchamp). I don't speak any Indian dialects, and I think the script is different, so can't say if we spell these in an 'English' way or not. If you know, or can think of any other examples, do post in the Comments below!


PS Full translation of the billboard above: Three Wheel Cement - Sturdy & Trustworthy. (It's Good!)

PPS I also saw a large sign for a premises labelled 'Body Work & Cat Oven' - good lord! In fact 'cat' is Indonesian for paint I think, so suspect (hope!) this place was vehicle related. Meow.

Biscuits and some issues with US & UK English

OK, we all know the classic British English / US English clangers: 

Pants UK = elasticated underwear 
Pants US = trousers
Rubber UK = eraser you have in your pencil-case at school
Rubber US = condom
Pissed UK = drunk
Pissed US = angry (in UK we say 'pissed off' for this)

But there's more. I have a friend from Chicago and we recently went out here in Singapore. No Chinese dialects to contend with, second language grapplings that me and my Asian friends have.. and yet we had conversations like this:

She: I went to IKEA and I bought this comforter.. 
Me: What's a comforter?
She: You know, like a padded blanket thing you have for the bed
Me: Oh, you mean a duvet !
She: What's a duvet? 

Also (in Chicago at least) you can go tailgating as a student. In the UK this means you're possibly creeping along, illegally following someone's car. To my friend it meant taking vehicles, crates of beer and getting drunk in the car-park before watching a big football / baseball game.

And I also discovered that Americans have biscuits. We all know that they call real biscuits 'cookies'. But biscuits exist too.. and they're not 'biscuits' but basically crumbly, savoury scones, which you have with gravy! I joined her and her friends at a US restaurant, and I tried one. Here it is! (Underneath the bacon)

Ah

Today in Singapore I was given this. It shows that Coke is smartly localising its personalised cans. But also it got me wondering what 'ah' means before a noun in SG. Another one I've seen said 'ah kong'. And there is a popular local movie here called 'Ah Boys to Men'. What is 'ah'? 

A local friend informed me it has no real meaning, but signifies an affectionate way of referring to the person. (FYI in Singapore you will commonly find local dialects mixed together, with Malay, with English, anything goes really!) Ah kong means grandpa. And this 'ah' is mainly from the Chinese Hokkien dialect (though it seems there are Cantonese and other 'ahs' as well!)

Funnily enough, in Northern England we also use 'our' to refer affectionately to family members and close friends, usually preceding actual names - our Sarah, our Gary etc. (ie 'belonging to us'.)

In Singapore, I've also heard the Hokkien terms 'ah beng' and 'ah lian' which refer to gangsterish, badly dressed young males and females respectively. I can only guess these are also seen affectionately?

Word of the Day: tiga suku

OK, words of the day..

Language: Malay
Meaning: literally 'three quarters'. In use: (referring to a person) 'a bit crazy or simple', 'not quite all there'. In other words, there's a quarter missing somewhere. it can be used jokingly, or more directly. 

Pronunciation: teegah sookuh

Compare English phrases 'a pepperoni short of a pizza'; 'not playing with a full deck'. These phrases are slightly affectionate / joking.

^_^

A Few Strange British English Pronunciations

I have said this before, but since I started making friends from language exchange, I realise how difficult British English is to learn! As a native speaker, I knew that a few things were strange, but this doesn't begin to compare with the confusion that anomalies cause for learners trying to make logical sense of a second language. English is riddled with seemingly random daily pronunciations (finger v ginger, plough v tough, hanger v ranger..) but British English in particular has some real clangers (I've listed some below).

The explanation to all this weirdness is largely our history, which has been encrusted with invasions and visitations from Romans, Anglo-Saxons, Normans and others, all of whom brought their own bits to the language, including pronunciations. And then we have our own Celtic and other language influences from Scotland, Wales and Ireland. A lot of the most startling British English peculiarities arise from those culprits the Normans, whose French language contributions have become corrupted with time.

Lieutenant = leftenant. 'Lieu' is French, and in old French, it could also be pronounced 'liev' or 'luef'. This word is pronounced as the more logical 'lootenant' in American English. 

Featherstonehaugh = fanshaw. It's an English surname. I have no idea why it is pronounced this way!

Magdalen or Magdalene = maudlin, when it refers to the colleges at Oxford and Cambridge Universities. It might be a nickname, or because English pronunciation often dropped the 'g' during the Middle Ages, when the colleges were founded (French language influence again). Old institutions in the UK are famous for holding on to ancient and traditional things as part of their brand and culture. This includes names.

Caius = keys. Yep, another college at Cambridge University. The full name is Gonville and Caius College. And the weird pronunciation follows the surname of one of its founders. 

Worcester, Leicester, Bicester = wooster, lester, bister respectively. These are names of British towns. -chester, -caster and -cester are all old names for a settlement - it seems originally from the Roman Latin (castra = encampment) but then adopted and changed a bit by the later Saxons. Apparently, much later during the 1700s, the middle syllable just got lost due to fashion or lazy usage! 

Beauchamp = beecham. It's normally connected to place names (eg Beauchamp Place in London) Beauchamp is a French word again, pronounced roughly 'bowsharm' (apologies, French readers!) Beecham is a corruption of this. Incidentally, many of these peculiarly pronounced French place and personal names are associated with the upper classes and aristocracy (who presumably also like to hold on to ancient things as part of their brand!)

St John = sinjun, when it is a given name. (I used to have a friend called St John and the joke greeting was always 'Is the cat on fire, or is that you, Singe-in?') I couldn't find a definitive reason for the strange sound, but it seems a corrupted old French pronunciation is likely. The regular 'Saint John' is still the more normal way to pronounce this in other instances, though. e.g St John's Ambulance.

Berwick = berrick. It's a place name, and 'berrick' is the most common pronunciation, particularly for Northern and Scottish places. It comes from the Scottish Gaelic Bearaig. There are a few Berwicks around the UK, and it seems there can be some regional variations for the ones in the South. But 'berrick' is pretty safe. 'Berrick' Street Market, is a famous landmark down South in London !

Mainwearing is another English surname deriving from Anglo-Norman (French) :)

Tattoos and Lost in Translation

Remember the Western celebrity trend for having tattoos done using Chinese and Japanese characters (also Thai, Sanskrit and other languages)? Britney, P!nk, Angelina, the Spice Girls' Mel C all have them. And I noticed some years ago that this trend was catching on around London as well. Why not, it looks cool, right?

Cool, until a friend from Beijing  pointed out to me with some amusement, that the girl at the table next to us had a tattoo on her arm which meant 'Ladies Toilet'.

And this is the thing. I have a very rudimentary grasp of written Chinese and Japanese, but even EYE know you can't translate things literally. How you combine characters matters! Every modern language has nuance and colloquialisms, and in fact the whole way of thinking behind Japanese and Chinese language systems is completely different from Western languages and thinking. So you can't just pick up a dictionary and translate things word for word. You need to know how the language works to convey the meaning ...and also how these characters might be read in the modern context. It's like my Japanese friends who keep saying 'I will meet you around the backside'. This makes perfect sense, logically - it is the back, side of the building. But in everyday British English backside only has one real meaning: somebody's posterior! 

And the same for this poor girl's tattoo.  女 is a Chinese character meaning 'woman' or 'female'. But in everyday Chinese - and you see this here in Singapore too - it is the sign for Ladies Toilets!

There has also been controversy over some celebrity tattoos - which look great but have no or confusing meaning in the Asian language they're supposed to represent. Tattoos are kind of a permanent thing. And you would think that (especially if you're a wealthy celebrity) it would be worth getting a proper translator on board before actually committing to the design! 

Meanwhile, I welcome any input from Japanese or Chinese speakers as to whether Mel C's tattoo (below) really means 'Girl Power' - or not! 

The Welsh Language

This week, I mentioned to some Asian friends in Singapore that part of my ancestry is Welsh, and that my Grandmother spoke some of the language. One friend asked "What does it sound like? Can people who speak British English understand it?" I guess he was thinking - not unreasonably - that Welsh was a dialect or variation of English.

In fact Welsh has absolutely no similarity to English at all, and it sounds completely alien to us! Because the roots of the Welsh language are completely different from English. Welsh, or Cymraeg, is a Celtic language. It is an old language, derived from Common Brittonic, which was the indigenous language of many of the peoples of Britain since the Iron Age, before English arrived and started replacing it in around the 5th Century.

(English is actually a Germanic language, which arrived with the Anglo Saxons and other settlers from that region. During earlier Roman Britain it seems Celtic languages were still used alongside Latin.)

Even within Welsh itself there are dialects, and also apparently polite and colloquial forms of speech. Many of the UK's ancient languages have been dying out, but since the late 20th century, the Welsh have made a concerted attempt to preserve their traditional language. All schools in Wales now teach Welsh as a compulsory subject, and about 20% are Welsh-speaking schools. Today apparently around 15% of the population of Wales is well versed in the language (speaking, reading and writing). There have also been for several decades in the UK, Welsh language television channels. (I remember these from childhood, even though we didn't live in Wales!) 

SO, in answer to my Asian friend's question, this is what Welsh sounds like (serious topics, but the subtitles show how different it is from English):
 

Incidentally (trivia) the longest place name in Britain is Welsh:
Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch
(Apparently the name translates as "The church of St. Mary in the hollow of white hazel trees near the rapid whirlpool by St. Tysilio's of the red cave".)

More informal British English

1. Spud
Spud means a potato. It's an informal, quite affectionate noun (potatoes in all their forms: mashed, as chips, roasted, boiled, baked.. have a very special place in British culture!)

Example: 
Mum: "How many spuds do you want with your lunch?"
Child: "Two please."

It also forms the brand name of a chain of baked potato fast-food restaurants in the UK, known as Spud-u-like!

Roast spuds

2. Knackered
Means 'exceptionally tired'. That's pretty much its meaning today, although a few decades ago it used to mean 'exceptionally tired after of a lot of sex', so was used less freely! Even now the word is mostly used amongst friends, family or close colleagues. The term actually derives from an older verb referring to slaughter of animals that were too old to be of use any more (ie old and tired). :/

Examples: 
- "I am completely knackered!"
- "The hill climb was really knackering.."

3. Dawdle
This is a verb meaning to delay or move slowly, wasting time, instead of reaching your target. It's an old word, and slightly old-fashioned now. It is not rude. 

Examples: 
"Hurry up, we can't dawdle around here!" 
"Rachel is always dawdling, it drives me nuts!"
 

Some more British English terms

So, following a conversation with Japanese friends tonight, these are all informal, quite frequently heard, British English terms for a man, or a 'guy'. They are not offensive.


1. Chap


Example: "He's a nice chap." (He's a nice guy / man)
If anything 'chap' is possibly slightly upper-class, informal language.


2. Bloke


Example: "He's a good bloke." (He's a nice guy / man)
'Bloke' is universal across all classes.


3. Geezer
This is much more of a Cockney London term. It means man, but it can also imply a man who is a bit dodgy, or (modern) a bit cool.


Example:"A bunch of geezers." (A group of men. Possibly Cockney men!)




[Apologies for Blogger's ridiculous auto-layout, again - hope the above is all legible!]

Word of the Day: だんご虫 (dangomushi)

That's this little guy:

In Japanese, he is '虫' mushi = bug, with だんご dango, which is a small rice ball/cake (often eaten on a stick). Because basically, if you disturb him, he curls up to into a little ball. Such a cute name!

Dangomushi

Dango!

In British English he's called a 'woodlouse' (plural 'woodlice'). Louse = a kind of bug, and he likes to live in old wood such as tree stumps or logs stored for the fire. He looks kinda prehistoric, but he's harmless and only about 1cm long. :)

Bug photos courtesy Greenlegs7 and Matt Cole Photography

Weird English phrases continued

Here's some more British English which I find is not used overseas! The first two were new even to an American friend.

1. Gammy
This is a slightly old fashioned term. It's an adjective meaning 'not working properly, damaged'. I've only heard it used to refer to human limbs, but it might have other uses! After a recent fight injury, I used this: "Hold on, I can't walk so fast with my gammy leg!"

2. Self-flage (self-flaj)
Short for self-flagellation, something very religious Christian monks used to do to punish themselves (for sins). Now we use it a bit jokingly; self-flage is definitely informal language, and to be honest I've never seen it written down so I'm not sure of the spelling! It means to do something, voluntarily or not, which is harmful, difficult or annoying to ourselves.

Example:
"I can't believe she went back to him, that's a bit self-flage." or
"I'm going to spend the weekend in the office working on X - total self-flage!"

3. Urchin
This is another old-fashioned term. It refers traditionally to a mischievous small child, often a poor one or 'street kid'. Most of the kids in Oliver the musical would be considered urchins. Sometimes also called street urchins. We don't use it very much in modern English.

In old fashioned English, urchin also meant 'hedgehog' - hence the name for another spiny creature, the sea urchin.


For more odd UK English...
A couple more strange 'English' terms
Four more weird English phrases
Three weird English phrases