This past
Easter weekend, since my school thought it’d be an excellent idea to have
classes on Good Friday, I was sadly confined to solitude on campus—as the
homeland is just a wee bit too far for a weekend rendezvous.
Lucky for me,
one of my dear Canadian friends drove a whopping seven hours to come and pay me
a visit (some dedication eh?)
Anyways, as we
were walking around the very empty campus, (because everyone left for ‘Jers),
he turned to me and said, “oh man this
place is a ghost town eh?”
After hearing
this, I paused and thought wow, I totally forgot Canadian’s say weird things—all
the time.
Before I get
to the infamous Canadian ‘eh’ I thought I should first fill you in on some of
the more popular Canadian jargon…(some of this may be more prevalent among
university students, so bear with me as I jot down some of the wacky terms)
Beauty: another
term for great, awesome, cool
“Aw man, did you see
that? That was a beauty play!”
Muck: to go at
something with great intensity
“I’m starving! Let’s
go muck some ‘za’”
translation: I
am terribly hungry. We should grab some pizza and eat it with great enthusiasm”
Snip: to shoot,
to snag, to see, (often a sports related term…frequently used in hockey)
“Blake had a sweet
goal today, snipped it top cheddar from the blue line”
translation: “Blake
scored a stupendous goal from the blue line today, the puck went in the top
corner of the net”
No Worries: phrase
meaning, don’t worry about it, it isn’t a problem etc.
“You can’t grab a
coffee right now? No worries then, ill c’ya ‘round.”
Translation: That is not a problem that you are
unable to have a cup of coffee with me at the moment, I shall see you at a more
convenient time
Pardon Me?: a
phrase used when something is unclear or
misunderstood
“Pardon Me? What did
ya say?”
Washroom: this one in particular I get made fun of for saying ALL the time but I personally think that this one makes more sense then saying “bathroom” because you “wash” your hands in a washroom but you don’t “bathe” in a bathroom
“Pardon me, but would
you be able to tell me where the washroom is?”
Grade 1, Grade 2,
Grade 11 etc. :used to describe a grade in school, (instead of 1st,
2nd, 3rd grade)—I had to memorize “freshman, sophomore,
junior, senior” before coming to school here!
“This one time in grade 11…”
translation: “this one time in junior year”
Wheelin’: in the
process of courting someone, trying to “pick someone up”
“He’s been wheelin’
that bid’ for the past week”
translation: “he
has been trying to court the young lady for the past week”
Other terms include: hundy,
bittie, buck, celly, chate, dangles, flow, pound, micky, dealin….and the list
goes on.
As the weekend continued, I came
to the realization that even though my friend was clearly speaking what appeared to be English…if I wasn’t born
in Canada, I would have zero clue as to what he was talking about. And oh…the
amount of times this boy said the infamous ‘eh’
“That movie was great eh?”
“Oh man, it’s cold out eh?”
“Kelly, you’re like the most
awesome person ever eh?” (didn’t actually say that…but I’m certain he was
thinking it)
After he left, I was left in
quite the pickle as I realized that I hadn’t really learned any “American” vocabulary.
I mean all I could think of was “sorry I’m not sorry” and “sucks to suck”.
I guess I still have the rest of
the semester to compile a final list of all of the phrases I have learned and
teach them to my Canadian friends. But, considering that I have 4 weeks left of
school and most of them have less than two weeks, they can definitely tell me
that it “sucks to suck.”
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