111 thoughts on “Grab your cossie and your thongs, we’ll head off after brekky.”

  1. I’m Australian and I had to laugh at all of the above. Why do we shorten everything?! American and British slang has also crept in because, really we are all living in a small world. It;s not until you hear slang like this that you realise how different we all are!

  2. I love this!
    My boyfriend (who is from England) and I frequently argue about what to call things and how to pronounce words. My favourites are:
    – ‘Squash’ to me squash is lemon squash, to him it’s the word for cordial
    – ‘Yoghurt’ he says ‘yoggot’
    – ‘Pasta’ he says ‘p-ass-ta’
    – ‘Taco’ vs ‘tacko’
    – The one that annoys me the most is ‘6th’. He says ‘sick-th’ instead of ‘sixth’! Where’s the x?!?!
    Ahhh differences, the spice of life!

    • Oh the English do say room, yoghurt and pasta differently.

      And squash is a vegetable or a sport to me!

  3. and for those of us who grew up North of the Tweed it’s togs for swimmers, a port to take our books to school and we spread peanut paste on toast.

  4. Even the Kiwi to Aussie differences boggle me! I’m always being told by my Aussie friends it’s ‘Doona’ not ‘Duvet’ – I didn’t even know what that was 6 months ago! And thongs are undies to me! One more – I love how Australians say the letter ‘H’!

  5. They say ‘Variety is the spice of life’! I live in south Texas (yes, I know, everyone thinks we talk funny too – Hey Ya’ll!). When I met my first husband I thought he talked funny…”Pahk the cah in the yahd by the gahbage cans,and get me a shahp knife out of the draw”. Where did the ‘r’ go? He was from the East Coast – Massachusetts to be exact.

  6. Ok. In South Australia, swimming costumes are called ‘bathers’, the lunch time meal is called dinner & the evening meal is called tea. A ‘Hens Night’ is called a Doe Show. If you went to a function, it’s also a ‘Show’. A NSW Schooner (a measure of beer) is called a Midi. There is so much more! I grew up in many States of Australia & have chosen to end up in South Australia, I understand the differences we have in our own Country, so it must be really hard for others to understand what on earth we are talking about!

    • Ha ha ha. I loved your little list. A doe show is cute! And if you asked me out to ‘dinner’ I’d totally turn up at night. That’s funny! x

    • Kellie, I’ve been in S.A. for 34 of my 38 years and I have NEVER heard of a “doe show”! It’s ALWAYS been a hen’s night through all of my sister’s marriages over the years. I’ve never called lunch dinner, bathers are bikini’s are swimmers, it doesn’t matter with that one. Functions are not all shows, it depends on the function itself, and while I don’t drink beer we do use schooner. I’ve also lived in Queensland and we had little lunch and big lunch, here it’s recess and lunch.

    • I’ve lived in South Australia my whole life and never ever heard of a Doe Show for a Hen’s Night…??? Also lunch is lunch and dinner is at tea time.

      • Maybe it’s a country town thing. That’s just what we’ve always said here in my 44 years! Nice to know there’s a bit of variety !! I also lived out of the state for a while & I love the different expressions we have just in our little country.

  7. Such an entertaining post! I would definitely not be able to follow those conversations. My boyfriend & I argue about what to call certain things all the time, and we aren’t even from that different of places [I’m from California & he’s from Minnesota, which is basically Canada]. And now we live in NYC & some of the people say some crazy things here! English is very different wherever you go 🙂

  8. I am Canadian. I say “no worries” all the time. I have Australian friends that have shared their speech habits but I think maybe I would find it confusing in everyday speech. The English have always had their different words too (loo, telly, boot ). I don’t think we Canadians think we have speech “isms” but when traveling in the states (USA) I have been told I do.

    • From TV and movies, the only thing I know about Canadians is that they seem to say ‘ay’ after sentences, or something?

      • Canadians say the ‘ou’ sound differently for example out becomes oot, about becomes aboot, house is hoose, mouse is moose (which is strange because how to they say the word moose?)
        After spending time in Canada a couple of years ago, not they many people said ‘eh’ or ‘aye’ after sentences which surprised me because that’s what I was expecting!

        • 🙂 I just love the way Canada-speak creeps into MY speech even though I was raised in Connecticut and served in the Air Force in the American Midwest; we lived in Malone New York for about 20 years. I say oot and aboot, wear a touque instead of a stocking hat (Illinois) in the winter when I’m working on my Snow-Sled (Ski-Doo, Article Cat, etc).

        • I’ve lived on the West Coast of Canada for most of my life and I don’t pronounce it oot or aboot, and can’t say I really hear it in other Canadians. Maybe because I’m use to it. The “eh” thing is over-exagerated, it doesn’t get used nearly as much as people around the world think. I did have a n Australian friend say I told the time funny; for 15 minutes past the hour, we say quarter after, and for 30 minutes past the hour we say one-thirty, two-thirty, ect.

          • I thought the ‘eh’ might be a bit exaggerated. I think one-thirty is normal, but have never heard ‘quarter after’. That’s new!

          • Yes it must be an east coast thing.They must have been from Tarrona (Toronto). We wet ( no spelling mistake) coasters do not ever speak funny. (No eh or aye in my speech). When traveling in the Eastern states I was told I had an accent, a lot of people could not tell where I was from (they think Canada is all snow and polar bears and beavers).

  10. Thanks! Just what I was looking for….I love it when an Aussie client drops his dogs off and tells them I will be back in 4 sleeps. I knew about Bikkie since our Facebook friend is always having one with a cuppa.
    We must sound a little Odd too because our friend often asks us to explain. . .

  11. I live in the southern United States – a region with all kinds of unique expressions and dialects. We say things like “y’all” [“you all” or “you guys”], “fixing to” [“about to”], and “might could” [as in, “Hey y’all, I’m fixing to run to the store, do you need anything? I might could pick up something for lunch on the way home”]!

    I think just about all of your posts include a word or phrase that sounds “foreign” to me, which is part of why I enjoy reading your blog! Even in this post, when you say the TV repair man “had a few troubles” – that’s not something we’d say in the US. We’d say he ran into a few problems or had some difficulties or issues. 🙂

    • When we moved from N IL to GA it amazed me how much was different just in the states. We kept asking where “yonder” was. Like “it’s over yonder” – like an actual place or something!

  12. I think I recognized a bit of what you said because my husband lived in London and has spent so much time in Australia and he uses some of those words/phrases. He also refers to apartments as flats, elevators as lifts and we put petrol in our cars instead of the good old American gas.

  13. I’m american and my mom uses the term “Thongs” for sandals too.
    She used to embarrass me when I was younger, she would always say “Viki don’t forget your thongs!!” and all my friends though she was talking about my underwear. I think it was just a term she used in her childhood.

    • “Thongs” is what we used to call flip flops in the 70’s – 80’s. My daughter, she’s 19, just pointed that out to me because my Mom (her grandmother) said she needed to get her “thongs”, my daughter was confused for a few minutes – LOL!

  15. I love it! I am American – I read quite a few Australian blogs…so this post cleared things up – thanks!

  16. I’m an Aussie living in Canada so I quite often get quizzical looks.
    I have a bad habit of saying “I’m right” or “You’re right” when someone asks me if things are ok. And I mean “Yes, Im ok” but I guess with my accent it confuses a lot of people.
    A lot of our slang words are the same as British ones too. Canadians do say “no worries” but they do have some slang and words that I don’t understand.
    They say ‘toque’ (took as in kook) instead of beanie; ‘cart’ instead of trolley; ‘bathing suit’ instead of cossie/swimmers.
    I also find they use the word ‘vehicle’ a lot more than we do. We would say ‘ I need to borrow a car’ but I often hear them saying vehicle instead. They use the word car but not as often as we do.
    My favourite Canadian word.. ‘skookum’. Im still not really sure what it means lol!

  20. I love this list!
    As an exchange student from Adelaide in the US, I was helping my host family pack the car for a picnic. I asked if I could put “the esky in the boot” – everyone just stopped with no idea what I was talking about, apparently I was trying to put the “cooler in the trunk”!!
    Don’t even get me started on “fanny packs”….!!

  21. awesome…and i just want to know why the minds in the gutter. no worries about the spuds. face value. you were AT a farmer’s market.
    i’mnot austrailian, but oddly some of your terms have crept into my speach: brekkie, even my kids call it that, telly of course, but that has to do with Scottish influence in my youth and no worries…
    thanks for sharing your “language!”
    Cheers!

  22. Fun post.
    I am a Sydney sider who visited Canada and California over Christmas and realised we have sooo many words that we use differently. Oh the funny looks we got asking for certain things. Things like
    Chips are fries.
    A Beanie is a touque.
    Lollies are sweets.
    Lemonade is actually lemony and if you want “lemonade” you have to ask for Sprite…got caught on that one heaps of times.
    Oh and a Latte does not come out of a push button machine…and NO MORE percolated coffee PLEASE!!!
    🙂

  23. I love your list. I hope to visit Australia someday!

    I am a Texan who has lived in seven of our fifty states. I currently live in New Orlean,Louisiana. Our country has a wide variety of differences when it comes to language. It is so interesting to see our differences within each country and then across the world. Language is fascinating.

    The ones that has made me laugh the most is the word for a shoping cart. In some states they are buggies, some call them carts, snd some call them carriages.

  24. Hi, I’m from Malaysia and I am a Malay. Thank you for this post and I really am going to copy all the slang here to add to my vocabulary – if not, at least I can understand what the expats at work are talking about.
    Where I work, it’s pretty much international. I do have a hard time digesting what my international ‘library clients’ are talking about sometimes especially when they come in with their Aussie, Canadian, Texan, Scottish accents or even slangs. As time goes by, I have sort of incorporated most of the jrgons into my daily usage until I wasn’t sure from which countires they belong to. That said, I wonder which English language I should teach my daughter. I started off with British English – very straight and proper; now I end up with ‘rojak’ ( malay term for mismatch ingredients thrown into a bowl for a delicious appertizer) English. Even my spelling is mismatched sometimes.
    Thank you for this post.

    lili

  25. It’s funny how Aussie slang has changed with each generation. There’s the “old” Aussie slang, think Alf Stewart in Home and Away, and then there’s Gen X slang and now Gen Y slang, which seems to border on more American than Aussie.

  26. I LOVE THIS! I said ‘I’ve got the shits!’ to a bunch of girls in New York and they thought I just announced that I had diarrhea. So embarrassing.

  27. Love this! I’m from a little country town. You wear swimmers to the pool Thongs are shoes, the clothing version is a “G-banger’ or… to be crude “floss”. Cordial is a concentrated drink, fizzy drink for ‘soda’. “She’ll be right” means it’s okay. You go to the pub for a schooner. Also, ‘Old man’ isn’t just your father – it can any male who you’re referring too becomes ‘old man’. Eg. “Yeah, old man at the bottle-o said his daughter wore his thongs out to get wood and left them at the door so the mutt chewed them.”

  28. My parents are both intent listeners of radio national in Australia and I think somehow the excellent enunciation rubbed off on my sisters and I, upon moving to country Australia (NSW) we were constantly asked if we were English, only two years at a country boarding school however and I quickly learnt how to speak ‘bogan’

  29. I’m an American married to an Aussie (he grew up in VIC and SA) for 12 years! I knew almost all of these and we’ve had a fun time laughing about them (and the comments)! My husband’s entire family is Australian so I’m pretty well versed in Aussie speak. It’s comical to watch the reactions of others when he says something that us VERY Australian!

    Here are a few others that Americans react to: chook (chicken), chips (fries), bonnet (car hood), boot (trunk), barbecue (grill), crikey, lifts (elevators), flats (apartments), petrol (gas/fuel).

  30. when i lived in canada, i would say “ta” as thank you, and they didnt know what it meant.

    also, it was never “can i go to the toilet” at school, it was “can i go to the bathroom”. toilet must have been too crass.

  31. Hilarious post and comments!! I’m an Aussie who has lived in both Scotland and Canada, and spent a bit of time in Houston, TX, so have heard them all! I’ve been laughed at for saying “I’ll meet ya at the lift (elevator)”, “Let me grab the torch (I’ll go and get the flashlight)” and “I learnt how to drive in a ute (truck)”! It felt so strange for me asking for a Vodka and “Sprite” (instead of lemonade) in North America, but now that’s how I order it back home! English is such a funny language!

  32. When I was in the states a waiter asked if we were ready to order and looked totally confused when I said we were “still umming and Ahhing”. He had no clue what I was telling him.

    Last year in Hawaii I asked someone at the airport if there was somewhere that I could change my daughters nappy and was met with blank looks until I said “you know, her DIAPER!”

    This has always been one of my favourite aspects of travel! You don’t realise how many coloquialisms (sp?) you use until you are OS.

    I also had a client who was american who had no idea what I was saying when I said that something was “chokkas”, even when I extended it to “chokka block” 🙂

    LOVE IT!

  35. In South Africa, we also call swimming costumes “cozzies”. Here are a couple more pearlers:

    Babalaas (‘Bub-ba-lars’) – The hangover from hell, fondly called a “Barbie”. The Babalas is no mythical beast. But look at yourself in the mirror and you’ll wonder as you examine that furry tongue slithering in a mumbling, parched mouth, puffy eyelids scraping bloodshot eyeballs. Comes from the Zulu word ibhabhalazi.

    Bakkie (Like “lucky”) – (Pickup truck in US, “Ute” in Australia) Many people own bakkies in South Africa, particularly in the rural areas. “That bokkie and her ballie parked off on the back of the bakkie.” (That pretty girl and her father sat on the back of the pickup truck)

    Eina (Ay-nah) – (Afrikaans – Ouch) Widely used. You can shout “Eina!” when you see someone get hurt or when you get hurt yourself.

    Howzit – The famous South African greeting. Short for “How is it?” Try and refrain from saying, “It’s fine, thanks”. This will only lead to a funny look. A suitable reply is: “No, fine”, which actually means “Yes, I am fine”. The word “no” is often taken to mean “yes”. A real Afrikaner might reply to a “Howzit”, with this bewildering response: “Ja, well, no fine”. This is merely a more emphatic but long-winded version of “No, fine”. Also ahoy, aweh, yooit, hoesit, yo.

    Isit? (Izzit?) – This conversational word is used widely and in response to just about anything. Derived perhaps from the English way of saying “Is it really?” or the Afrikaans for “Is dit so” Can be used as a questioning “really?”.

    Just now – (In a little bit) Universally used in South Africa, it means that the action will get done “eventually”, but it might mean “never”. If someone says he will do it “just now”, be warned. It might be in 10 minutes, 10 hours or never. “I’ll clean my room just now, Ma.” If someone says “now now”, you’re making progress. It won’t be done immediately, or instantly, but probably less than 10 minutes, barring distractions that relegate it back to “just now”.

    Larny – (Fancy, designer clothes, snob, friend) A number of variations on a word denoting someone who is well-dressed, or designer clothes, or a well-to-do function. Also a Cape Colored meaning “friend” “Hoesit my larnie!” (Hello there my friend!)

    Lekker – (Afrikaans – Nice, pleasant, stoned, fun, lovely, good, pretty) It is used by all language groups to express approval, often to cover up a limited vocab. If you see someone of the opposite sex who is good-looking, you can exclaim: “Lekkerrr!” while drawing out the last syllable. Cars can be lekker. You can have a lekker time. You can feel lekker. Holidays are lekker. It’s lekker when the Springboks win a match. And of course, you can have a lekker boerie on the braai.

    Padkos (‘put-koss’) – (Afrikaans – lit. “road food”) Food to eat on a journey. Padkos is usually a few sarmies (sandwiches), some cooldrinks, chips, fruit and maybe a lekker stukkie biltong. Traditionally tea, home baked bread with meatballs “frikadelle” and cold chicken were packed.

    Skinner – (Afrikaans – “skiner” – Gossip, news) The kind of gossip that goes on behind your back. Can mean news.

    Sorry – Although used as an apology, it is also used as “Excuse me”. South Africans have managed to mutate it further. “Sorry, can I just get past.”

    All from http://www.newfusion.co.za/_mgxroot/page_10791.html

  36. I have a girlfriend from Holland and she always makes me laugh when she gets that puzzled look on her face. A few that I’ve thrown her way is ‘preggos’ (pregnant), ‘kitchen tea’ (bridal shower), ‘tinny’ (tin boat) but she is coming around, lol.

    Oh and us Queenslanders call cossies ‘TOGS’ and Speedos ‘DP’s’ (d..k pointers)

    • traditionally, the kitchen tea and bridal shower are two different things. bridesmaids throw the shower and the maid of honour throws the kitchen tea 🙂

  37. I heard somewhere years ago that the theory why we Aussies shorten words is because we needed to speak faster to stop all the flies getting in our mouths… There some sort of twisted logic to that I suppose, but I always thought that we chop letters out of things because it was so hot that we didn’t want to waste moisture talking. Or we are just being lazy…

    A couple of my faves are –

    Take a squiz (have a look)
    ~Joe Blake (snake)
    ~no wukkas (no worries)
    ~anything that you can put ‘o’ on the end of – Steve-o, Bottle-o, and
    ~Servo (Petrol Station)
    ~how we call people by their opposite – Big Red is actually little and brown haired, Slim Jim is a big bloke etc
    ~Tucker Box (lunch box)

    😀

    Thanks for the chuckle fest Channy!

  38. Im australlian and there are still some slang I havent even figured out…
    I used to have a friend at work that used to say “Just getting on the dog n bone to find out”
    It took me a month for me to figure out she was talking about using the telephone….
    Since when do we have a dog and bone on our ears??

  39. I’m loving this. Since joining photo-a-day challenge, I’ve come in contact with more Aussie friends & phrases. Chooks was a new one for me. Like dead horse, some Americans call soy sauce “bug juice”.
    Love budgie snugglers.
    In terms of men’s underwear, a lot of Americans call jockey briefs “bun huggers”. And if a person isn’t wearing underwear, they are “going commando” (nothing creeps up on them).

    • ‘Going Commando’ was a phrase from the show Friends when Joey was wearing Chandlers pants without underwear. So funny lol

    • I never put two and two together with the ‘going commando’ thing. That’s funny. Nothing does creep up on them!

  40. My best friend used to get into all sorts of trouble when she referred to boys as spunks!
    She was English but lived in Australia from the age of 5-14 then she returned to the UK and went to senior school!

    I love language and identifying the differences between British English and American English then Australian and New Zealand, shall I go on?

    My ex-husband once asked an American air hostess ‘Do you have anything to eat?’ Her reply?
    ‘Sure, would you like a newspaper or a magazine!

    Take care
    Jakix

  41. Thank you for this blog entry! I’m an English teacher in Finland and I hope you don’t mind if I use your text and the comments on my lessons when we talk about the different variations of the English language?

  42. Great post, Channy. 😉 Now, who wants to explain a Tim Tam Slam to all the non-Aussie readers?

      • You definitely should. Make sure to trial them with original, double coat and a few different flavours and include pics for them all. In fact, a post on iconic Aussie food (almost wrote “ironic” but that has its place as well) would be good for your overseas readers. I’d love to hear what their regions are well known for and then we’ll counteract it with Tim Tams, meat pies and beer. Awesome. *lol*

  43. This is awesome.. Other things I know are,
    how ya going? – how are you?
    fortnight – 2 weeks, lots of Americans gmgave no idea!
    pot of gold – is a qld measurement of beer xxxx
    I’m gonna hit the frog n toad – I’m going to leave, get on the road/start driving
    Sunnies – sunglasses
    Footpath – sidewalk
    Snags – sausages
    Chuck a “u-ey” – do a u-turn
    Rubbish – trash
    Cats eyes – reflectors on road
    Holiday – vacation
    Bench – counter top
    Can I have a nurse? (of baby) – gosh the looks I got when I said that!!! They literally thought I wanted to wet nurse their baby or something!! It means Can I have a hold if him/her!
    Grandstand – bleachers
    My shout – pay the bill or pick up the tab
    Lost the plot/ gone bonkers – a bit crazy
    spit the dummy – again, the looks I got!! But simply means lose temper
    fluke – sheer luck
    Give him a ring – call someone on the phone.
    Lift – elevator
    Greenie – tree higher
    Port – suitcase (this is a Qld thing I think!)
    Dollar note – dollar bill
    Pay out on someone/take Mickey out of – tease them
    Checkout chick – cashier

    That’s a few I learnt!! Lol

  44. I’m English and work at Cotton On Kids; someone asked if we had any skivvies????? In the UK a Skivvie is when you get someone to do your dirty work for you. We call Skivvies turtlenecks. I was so confused and embarrassed and had to ask my manager what it was.

    Also when I was at the fish & chip shop the other day I asked the lady for some ketchup; she looked confused, then I asked for red sauce…..still just looked at me…..then my boyfriend asked for me….tomato sauce.

  45. I’m not sure it has been mentioned, but what about having a squiz? Some of our American friends crack up every time we say it.
    Love this post had to have a bit of a giggle with it.

  46. My sister emigrated to Perth from North West England a few years ago now. I’ve visited her a couple of times now and we talk/Skype/text/facebook daily so I’ve picked up a few Aussie sayings from her which drive my friends mad! I habitually say ‘no worries’ & ‘how you going’ (instead of how are you doing). I love going out in Australia & hearing the differences in language, although I was confused as hell in a hotel once when they asked about my doona. I though they were being rude!

    Oh and I think a Bottle-O is the best invention ever. We need them in England! My friends can’t believe the irony of a drive though alcohol shop!

    • Yeah a lot of people think drive through alcohol shops are ironic! But it’s more to do with occupational health and safety for both employees and customers….the companies don’t want people suing if they hurt themselves lugging a slab of 36 cans of beer across a car park.

    • Ha ha ha! Oh actually, it’s quite gross. Let’s stick to calling it tomato sauce instead.

    • it’s rhyming slang! not meant to refer to horse blood, merely the fact that ‘horse’ rhymes with ‘sauce’. same as dog and bone for phone.

  48. Hi Chantelle,
    Today is my 70th birthday and I’ve had a lovely day.
    All my kids and grandkids contacted me and sent wishes.I put jokes on fb about now being officially old.
    Lots of laughing by everybody.
    Hubby took me to the movies and bought tea home for us and Mum.
    This is just a long winded way of telling you that your post and all the comments that have been made has been a fun way for me to finish my day.
    Long live slang and ‘local’ language in all its variations all around the world
    Have a good day
    Barb from Australia

  49. My fav’s these days on the West Coast, U.S. (Seattle) are any terms that truly mean something else but are used instead so you don’t offend anyone or if there are kids in the room. I’ll let you decide what they mean 🙂

    Shut the front door
    Franklin D Roosevelt ( a past president) said very loudly perhaps instead of the more holy persona commonly used (okay, I gave a hint on that one)
    Holy Smokes
    We use a website called urbandictionary.com so that we can understand anything some under 22 says. It also comes in handy when you want more terms that say what you want to say without offending anyone. For example, Ann Curry a beloved morning show host here just got fired. So, now, at work when anyone gets fired or let go, we say, oh, did she/he get Ann Curried? Okay, you get it. Love you Aussies and Kiwis! Wish I had your accent!

  50. Such a great post!
    I live in the Southwestern part of the United States and I say y’all on the regular. My NYC born and bred father, only after years and years of living in the South, finally just realized the usefulness of this contraction.
    Also white watching the Block on youtube, one of the contestants mentioned a “doona?” The hubs and I were confused until the end of the show.
    Doona = Duvet. Ah ha!

  51. haha this post is so cool!
    Being from germany it’s often confusing when you hear/read these idioms and you’re like ‘what are they trying to tell me???’ Your list was so funny, I loved it!

    xoxo Jenni

  52. that “spunk”-comment is silly. yes, that´s a word for something else but if you say “she got spunk” or “She´s spunky” that means that the girl got attitude and nothing else…………..otherwise I wouldn´t have named my blog Spunkyrella.

  53. Don’t forget ‘Joe Blakes’ for snakes and ‘Noahs’ i.e. Noah’s Arks for sharks. My dad loves all these old school Australianisms and still uses them a lot. My grandfathers both loved them and my dad likes using them because he thinks there’s something lovely about the old ‘Strine and it reminds him of his father. I actually ended up doing a whole project on rhyming slang at Uni for cultural studies. It was really interesting to read about it and it was even more crazy to realise that the accent we think is ‘bogan’ now is really how most people spoke in Australia forty years ago. We’ve been oddly gentrified.

  54. Telle – as you know I’ve lived in the USA for the last ten years. I still laugh when I think of my American friend who offered to run to the pharmacy for me because I told her I “had the shits”. It took a bit of explaining for them to understand that I was angry with someone, not under the weather.

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