Before I start I must admit that I have friends and family living in Australia. And they’re not all former convicts.

They have assured me the local inhabitants in down-under can speak and understand perfectly intelligible English.

Even so, my Aussie mates have suggested on the old dog-and-bone that I smooth the way for future cruise ship passengers who may struggle with Aussie vernacular when they meet it head on during a stopover.

G’day

First off, in the Sydney region you may find yourself scratching your head at the following words (suggested meanings attached f.y.i.):

bogie (a swimming pool, not something you extract from your nose on deck to the consternation of the crew)
bombora (the current over a submerged reef…if you see one of these from the side of your ship I suggest you head for the lifeboat)
dingo (native dog, not a board game)
gibber (a rock or stone, not what you do when confronted with your ship’s bar bill)
wombat (a marsupial the size of a small pig…it usually lives in a burrow and is nocturnal…rather like the ship’s drunk).

Useful expressions

Are you awake, Sheila? (Australian sexual foreplay, handy for those moments when you find yourself in a cabin with a bedroom partner you met over dinner during the cruise)

Get stuck into somebody (no relation to the above, it actually means to argue strongly or berate somebody…such as the steward who’s turned up with your bar bill. Sometimes used by the husband/wife who’s wandered in wondering what the hell you are doing with his/her other half)

Feel like a shag on a rock (deserted, forlorn…handy if you get shipwrecked in the Pacific and wash up on a desert island. Can also be used as a chat-up line)

Live on the smell of an oily rag (living frugally…often used by the ship’s crew, poor devils)

Swing the billy (put the kettle on with the intention of making a nice cuppa tea…in your cabin, after the shag)

Flash as a rat with a gold tooth (wealthy passengers who consider themselves a cut above the rest of the hoi-polloi)

Were you born in a bloody tent? (aimed at anyone who tends to leave a cabin or any other door open during a gale – can be aimed at the person who’s just left your bed and heading back to their cabin)

Ankle biter or rug-rat (a child…best avoided on a cruise unless it’s yours and only then if it has escaped its manacles and climbed out of the hold)

As useless as a glass door on a dunny (stuff you shouldn’t waste time and money on – and bring home from your cruise to Australia…may also be used as a description of your lack of sexual prowess if you’ve had too much to drink to do the dirty deed)

Wouldn’t shout if a shark bit her (a stingy person who never buys a round of drinks on an Australian ship)

Like a stunned mullet (refers to a person who is suffering from complete inertia or bewilderment…such as the Scrooge who is suddenly stuck with paying the bar bill for the Captain’s table).

By the way, if some Aussie says, ‘Give us a captain’ they probably want to look (Captain Cook) at the Noah’s Ark (shark) eating the ship’s babbler (babbling brook, cook) who has just fallen over the side of the ship.

Catch you later, cobber.

James Leavey

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