An Idiot´s Guide to Eating, Praying and Loving

Eat, Pray Love 

Level: Intermediate

Hello fellow Idiots! 

Does this sound familiar... I´m an idiot in my own language and an even bigger idiot in my second language! If, like me, you´ve ever felt like a complete idiot talking in a foreign language then what you need is a guide. ´But where can I find a guide to English for idiots?´you cry. I really don´t know the answer to that one but what I suggest is the following, the world is full of guidebooks for other things you could learn or improve and a lot of them are written in English! Learning how to make Origami swans and therefore learning the word swan and origami is killing two birds with one stone. Not literally, this is an idiom, and like many idioms is actually impossible but should that put us off? In the following article, the author will take you through his personal journey into the Portugese guidebooks that taught him how to eat, how to pray and how to love, translating back into English their recipes, instructions and advice so that you can begin eating, praying and loving in English. 

This way you idiot!

A personal Erlebnis:

What you can´t you must,
What you must you can!

I was walking through a book shop in Brazil when, dizzy with hunger, I walked straight into a bookcase full of self-help books. In the collision, one fell into my hands. It was entitled ´´Desperte o gigante interior´´(Awaken the giant within) by Anthony Robbins. Opening the book randomly I read the quote ´´em que forma eu devo viver o hoje a fim do criar o amanha com o qual estou compremetido´´  (how am I going to live today in order to create the tomorrow I´m commited to?) 

Suddenly, two mega realisations for the price of one dawned on me. Firstly, that Brazilian people needed guidebooks as much as us and if I could find one to awaken my giant within then I could surely find one for any old bullshit. Secondly, that the tomorrow I´m commited to is speaking better Portugese and that today I needed to live in Portugese right now.  ´I am hungry´ I thought. ´No,´ I corrected myself. ´Eu tenho fome (I am hungry)´ So what was I gonna do about it?

EAT: 

Ah, 200 Recipes of Appetising Curries, what am I going to eat today? Aha, Vindaloo! 

Since moving to Brazil 2 years ago, I´ve yet to find a decent curry house and I think a vindaloo, typically the hottest curry on an Indian menu back in Britain, would likely melt the tongue out of a brazilian head. I was surprised when I found this recipe for a vindaloo in my Portugese curry book. This is the basic recipe for a Goan Chicken Vindaloo, I´ve added my own twist. 

Goan Chicken Vindaloo: Serves 4, Cooking time - 2hrs

Ingredients:

For the paste:
2 teaspoonfuls of cumin
2 teaspoonfuls of red pepper seeds (or half a pack for the authentic Raiders of the Lost Ark feel)
6 cloves of garlic
1 cinnamon stick
Cardamom pods 
a pinch of salt and pepper
Red wine vinegar (2 or 3 shot glasses worth)

For the curry:
Sunflower Oil
1 huge onion
Chicken breast fillets (about 600g)
2 dessert spoonfuls of garam masala curry powder (a difficult ingredient to find in Brazil but not impossible! Check your specialist food shops in posh parts of town)
1 400g tin of tomatoes
3 dessert spoonfuls of Tomato puree
4 big potatos (skinned and cut into smallish chunks)
Chicken stock 

And, of course, Rice!

How to make: 

Start by making your paste: garlic, cumin, pepper, cinnamon, vinegar, and the cardamom pods. You don´t need a blender, just give it all a good whisk with a fork. Then dice the chicken fillets and add to the mix, stirring it up. Voila, you´ve now seasoned your meat and you can leave it to marinate for 24 hours or get straight on with the next part. 

the yellow rice might be achieved
by adding saffron or photoshopping
it in after. 

Get a big non-stick wok or frying pan. Pour in the sunflower oil and fry the chopped onion for a few minutes.  Then add the marinated chicken and the garam masala powder, stirring it up. After approximately 3 minutes, add the potatos, tomato puree, tinned tomatos and the chicken stock. Bring it to boil for a moment, then turn it down to simmer for 1hr30! At this point you can put your feet up, do a crossword, sip some wine, but it´s better to check on it now and again and give it a bit of a stir. 

With half an hour to go, get back on your feet and start making the rice. Hey Presto! It´s done. Serve to the music of Ravi Shankar and with a cold bottle of lovely bubbly Kingfisher or Cobra beer. Pukka!*

*Pukka is hindi for genuine or superior. It´s used by cockneys and Jamie Oliver to express their delight with the food they´re eating. 

The benefits of cooking in English can be exemplified by the madeline eaten at the beginning of the novel ´A Search for Lost Time´. French author Proust dunked a biscuit in tea and remembered 3200pages of material! Blowing your mouth off with an ultrahot vindaloo could provide the synaesthetic stimulus to remember all the new words above!



PRAY:

´We got to Pray just to make it Today´ Wise words from MC Hammer, the rapper who wowed the world in the early nineties before hanging up his baggy trousers for a life of preaching the wiki-wiki-word! Praying is a spiritual wish, a holy begging, to the forces beyond to help our football team win, our lives to change, money to roll in, the world to be at peace. Usually when we pray, we have to do something with our hands too. Whether it´s rubbing our prayer beads, pinching imaginary nipples in buddhist lotus poses or freeze-framed clapping in christianity. Usually we have to humble ourselves before the maker or makers by kneeling or lying flat on our bellies. In the past we´d offer up sacrafices too. 

from the film The Wicker Man (1973)

Before Christianity, Celtic paganism was the religion of the British Isles. Do you remember Merlin from the tales of King Arthur? He was a pagan wizard or druid and his beliefs are pretty much the ancient Celtic ones. Looking up xamanismo.com.br, I´ve found a prayer for the pagan festival of Beltane I´d like to share with you. It seems to me much more fun than grovelling to a  God or Gods and you only have to do it once a year.

Beltane in a nutshell: Nowadays Beltane is a celebration of human sensuality but to the ancient Celts it was a day to focus the fertilization of the Earth. It´s the opposite day to Samhain (31st October) and was traditionally held on the 1st of May. In the southern hemisphere, it´s held on the 31st of October. Beltane means Bright Fire and as the male and female energies intermingle, allegorised by certain rituals, the pagans pray to the God Bellenos for energy and light to aid the earth´s fertilisation. 

Pagan lessons on the Summer Isles

How to celebrate Beltane: First and most importantly, you need a May Pole. This is the great phallic symbol of Beltane. Around this you sing and dance in couples, wrapping the pole in the coloured ribbons (red and white) attached to its top. If you can´t organise an authentic May Pole then you may use a telephone pole or street lamp. The best male dancer and the prettiest female dancer are then chosen to be king and queen of the festivities. 

Second you need to make a totem like the Wicker Man pictured, to burn as an offering. Fire is an important part of Beltane, and you can leap over burning totems, incense sticks, candles or churrascos to absorb some of this energy. Be careful not to use loose or flammable clothing or you´ll absorb too much fire energy. In the Summer Isles, north of Scotland, they used to sacrafice nosey and pious Christians at sunset but for your Beltane why not eat an abundance of fresh fruit and decorate yourself with flowers.

Burn the Christian!

A prayer for Beltane from the book Bruxeria para Iniciantes (Witchcraft for beginners)

Earth, fire, wind, water, heart (repeat 10 times, spinning on one leg, one eye closed)
Mother Earth, get it on, Mother Earth, get it on,
Mother Earth, get it on. Don´t be shy, get it on tonight.
Everything´s going to be all right. 
Lord of Fire, you got the milk and honey, 
Sow your wild oats, Cast your seed into the wind
Get it on tonight.
With your powers magnified
In the earth´s mantle on the moon tide
Get it on, tonight - blood sugar sex magic
Earth, fire, wind, water, heart (repeat 10 times)

So Gaia and Fire are in the mood, vindaloo is coursing through your veins and your digestive track, ´What could be hotter?´ I hear you ask....



LOVE: 

Sting - tantric sex practitioner

Or Sex by definition is all around us so why not embrace it as a means to practice your English. Perhaps you´ve already slept with a native speaker? Perhaps you have as a life goal the wish to make love to a famous native speaker? Where sex is communication, a basic flaw in your grammatical construction, wrong intonation or a wrong word choice can have explosive consequences. Example, if your English lover asks to be spanked, slapping them full on the face would be the wrong thing to do. Spanking is to smack someone lightly but punitively on the bottom. In the heat of passion, don´t ask for your partner to do it more difficult when you mean harder, and if they ask you for harder, don´t test them on their algebra. I´ll always remember in a packed class discussing friendship, an Italian student telling me how he´d fisted his friend. He meant punched and if he´d learnt the dirty English meaning of to fist from the Gay Kama Sutra, then he´d have avoided this embarrassment. A shelf full of dirty books in foreign language editions from the Lover´s Guide to Cosmopolitan magazine to Lady Chatterley´s Lover and Fifty Shades of Grey can take pride of place on the top shelf of any learner´s bookcase because they are instantly camouflaged by their foreigness. No brown paper bags are necessary.

Tantric love-making in English adapted from the book ´´O Guia Completa de Sexo Tantrico´´

1. Time and synchronicity: Synchronise watches with your partner. Check your diaries and book at least one day of tantric sex. You need to synch your sex drives so that you want to have sex as soon as you wake up in the morning.

2. Explore each other: You don´t need a compass and torches for this, just a lot of olive oil and a loving touch. The woman begins by messaging the man. As women take longer to reach stimulation peak or orgasm height, they should massage their man for about 70% longer than being massaged themselves.

3. Don´t rush: This is all about the journey not the destination. You must learn to enjoy the experience with out pressuring each other for the outcome. A man needs to learn to enjoy being touched without jizzing prematurely, hence their need for longer massaging.

4. Different sensations: Use your nails, hair and silk cloth to stimulate the senses. Hot candle wax over the scrotum or ice cubes up the butthole will cause sensory shockwaves.

5. Reverse the roles: Using circular strokes, massage your woman. One hand should work each corresponding body part: the shoulder and arse, the back and the abdomen, the belly and the holiest of holies. 

Tantric Position for the Advanced Practitioner

6.Inhale and exhale: If you´ve got this far without breathing then you´re likely feeling very dizzy. I cannot emphasise enough the importance of breathing throughout the whole process from step 1 to step 10. Inhale. Exhale. 

7.Look at each other: Turn off the television, put down that book (even if it´s this guide), you need to look each other in the eyes. This is key to tantricity. Before having sex, spend some time looking at a candle flame to train the eye, then look at each other slowly at first and then more quickly.

Tantric Underwear

8.Create loving rituals: Lingerie, a thong, leiderhosen, a nice perfume or a potent aftershave that you use only when having a tantric episode. Share a bath together or clean the house in the nude. All surfaces of the love making environment should be dust and germ free. Surround your bedding with symbols of the elements, a leaf for the air, a flower for the earth, a beer for water and a candle for fire. 

9.Understand tantric philosophy: Sorry to disappoint you but this is not all about your genitals. Tantric sex is about affection. The idea behind tantric practice is to become aware of your own being, to expand your consciousness and welcome intimacy into your life. 

10. Find a serious tantric master: There are many classes and workshops you can join but make sure you choose a professional to guide you. Touch is an essential part of these classes but intercourse is not. A sure sign that you´ve joined the wrong ´class´ is if you´re asked to drop your house keys into a big glass jar. 

Christmas Special

Level - Intermediate/ Upper-Intermediate

5 Golden Traditions

A time to Get Stuffed

Christmas Eve: On Christmas Eve, we leave a mince-pie and a glass of sherry on the mantelpiece of the fireplace. These are presents for Santa Claus who is allowed to drink and drive at Christmas and tresspass on private property. We sometimes leave a carrot out for the reindeer too but this always seems frugal as one carrot will hardly feed 9 reindeer who undoubtedly burn up a considerable amount of energy flying across the whole world in one night. We put up our stockings and go to bed and try really hard, sometimes impossibly, to sleep. 

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dicken´s
as seen from the periscope
of Captain Nemo´s Submarine

Christmas Dinner: It´s Christmas time and there´s no reason to be afraid... unless, of course, you are a turkey. A big, juicy turkey is the traditional cooked bird for Christmas Day dinner. They are roasted and served with stuffing, roast potatos, parsnips and carrots and yorkshire pudding (savoury). In my family, we have Christmas dinner at 3pm after opening half our Christmas presents. We usually have a soup for starters and a christmas pudding (sweet) for dessert. The worst Christmas Dinner ever had was at Bob Cratchit´s house in London 1842, where a small rat was served with pepper for several children. The best Christmas Dinner ever was at Bob Cratchit´s house in London 1843, where a huge turkey was served twice as big as a child suffering from a consumptive disease.

original crackers actually contained fairies
whose bones would crack in the pulling

Crackers: Just before dessert we pull crackers. Inside the crackers are our crowns, jokes and small packets of screws. The crowns are the same size as they were when we were children but nowadays they fit our heads. We tell each other jokes like ´What do you call five bottles of lemonade? A Pop Group´ and we all groan. We leave the screws out for the elves to take back to their magic sweatshop. 

The Radio Times: Every year this weekly television and radio guide brings out a Christmas Edition. For the first couple of days of December we used to spend our time meticulously planning the programmes and films we would watch, avoiding turkeys (or bad films). In the old days we only had 5 channels to choose from but nowadays, with DVDs and Digital television, the Radio Times is no longer as relevant. We use it instead to swat mischevious elves. 

In the Korean horror film Mistletoe Monster,
a young clerk becomes a plant and uses his powers
to snog many an attractive co-worker

Mistletoe: Mistletoe is a small plant that we hang from the ceiling and if you stand under it someone will attempt to snog you. Personally, I´ve never had much luck with mistletoe, I once wore a mistletoe hat to a Christmas Office Party with a sort of crane-like misteltoe dangling device but it malfunctioned and I was attacked by an owl. It was my first and last Christmas Party at an aviary. Actually, mistletoe is far from romantic, it´s actually a parasitic plant and it´s name comes from the German for Dung Branch or Shit Branch. 

Christmas Glossary:

mince-pies torta de frutas

sherry xerez

mantelpiece cornija

fireplace lareira

reindeer rena

stocking meia 

turkey peru, fracasso

roast assado

christmas pudding pudim de natal

crackers explosivos de natal

mistletoe visco

TASK: 

A) HE-MAN and SHE-RA CHRISTMAS SPECIAL

I know that´s you He-Man

Watch the story of how Christmas came to Eternia in the He-Man She-Ra Christmas Special on Youtube and answer the following quesions! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xh4kIiH3Sm8
See ANSWERS PAGE to check your answers. 

QUESTIONS: 

Just Chilling

1. Why are the Eternians decorating?

2. What are Prince Adam and Man-at-Arms building?

3.What does Two Bad mistake the Sky Spy for?

4. When He-Man is captured by Skeletor´s Force Belts, She Ra comes to the rescue a) late as always, b) ahead of schedule or c) Just in time

5. What colours are She-Ra´s horse´s rings?

6. Complete Orko´s spell ´Little children up and away______________________________´

7. What were Miguel and Alicia doing when they got lost in the snow?

8. What does Orko leave behind beside the Launch Pad?

9. What is the following: 1220006610528500179181079133581834574144720847?

But I don´t want to feel good!

10. What two stories do the children tell Orko?

11. Match the insults with the recipient:

INSULTS:

a)Bone Brain                                                                                        

b)Miserable Excuse for a Villain

c)Metal Mouth/ Bucket of Bolts

d) Dratted Dog

RECIPIENT:

i) Relay

ii) Skeletor

iii) Hordak

iv) Monstroids

12) What people live in the Fright Zone?

13)What adjectives do the kids use to describe Skeletor?

14)Name 2 things that Skeletor does for fun?

15) What does Relay do that wakes Skeletor up?

16) What does Santa give the 2 children?

B) WRITING A THANK YOU LETTER

Imagine your long lost English speaking relative has sent you a present. Choose one of the following items and write an extended letter of gratitude including information about why you like or don´t like the present, how you spent Christmas and any peronal news you´d like to share. 

Giver: Long Lost Fritz                       Present: A Nazi flag

Giver: Cousin He-Man                      Present: A flying belt

Giver: Long lost Colonel Fawcett       Present: A Map to the Lost City of Z

Giver: Long lost Ash                          Present: The Necronomicon or Book of Blood

Giver: Long lost Willy Wonka            Present: A Chocolate factory

Giver: Long lost Aunty Pauper           Present: A bag of coal and an orange peel

I bequeath you a chocolate factory

English - the Holistic path

Level: Upper-Intermediate/Advanced

English- the Holistic Path

´As we near the End of the Mayan Calendar, it is important that we pause to reflect on our development as English Speaking Beings. We are all born with an innate abitlity to speak English, but so few of us do because so few us realise that learning English is a spiritual journey. A spiritual journey from a state of unknowing to knowing.´ A quote from Guru Lentil phd., writer of the book ´Seven Spiritual Steps to English´

Countdown to English

Some of us were born in English speaking countries because karmically we´d earned this privilege in past lives. I, for one, remembered in a sensory deprivation tank, that I was once a Zulu chieftain who learnt English  from the explorer Doctor Livingstone. Native Portugese speakers and those of other languages in general need to learn English to raise their consciousness in both the material world (university, business, the entertainment industry) and the spiritual. The paths are not seperate, they are holistic, they are one and the same. If I were to say to you that an athlete in the supreme physical condition of his life would never reach the top of his game if psychologically he was full of self-doubt and insecurity, you would not argue because the world recognises that psychological preparation is key to sporting accomplishment. Would you then argue that one could learn English without working on the spiritual through meditation, mantra and crystal healing? No, you would not. And if you did, you would be a fool. 

Early attempts to write in English

Language is what seperates us humans from our fellow planetary beings. Language evolved from the caves of hunter gatherers to be the laws and poetry of the great ancient civilisations. The Mayans, Egyptians and the Phoenicians though seperated by thousands of miles and years shared one common goal - the reinvention of English. In the beginning, according to the Bible, there was one common language, then came Babylon and English would lie dormant for what Krishna calls Kali Yuga the present age, a time of spiritual dissolution.

the human mind originally
intended to be English

But the new age is dawning, it begins officially where the Mayan Calendar ends. During this time cosmic waves will be oscillating at what scientists are calling ´a very´ high frequency, and it is not unlikely that interdimensional portals will be opening to allow the Godhead in for a limited time only. What does that mean? It means that open minds and open hearts will receive the grammar from the Godhead, phrasal verb particles will meld with your atomic structures and the English person within us all will grow and bloom like a lotus flower. But how do we prepare for this change of consciousness? Listen. Listen to the answer within you. You already know the answer. Listen again. Did you hear it? No. Well, okay, here are some other ways to spiritually prepare for English the Second Coming. I have taken this information from the guide book to the School of Englightened English as a Second Language, the adepts of which recommend these spiRITUALS become as part of your daily routine as brushing your material teeth or taking your material dog for a walk through the material world. 

Mantras and Positive affirmations: 

´The way you think, the way you eat, can influence your life by 30 to 50 years´ Deepak Chopra, Indian Ayurvedic Physician

An affirmation is a positive statement. NLP scientists and CIA counter terrorist agents the world over swear by the power of repeated affirmations in changing states of consciousness. 

Repeat the following every morning before breakfast:

All interwoven events that have brought me to this moment have occurred and are now in the past. I permit myself to relax, release, and allow my life in the English language to unfold with grace, freedom, and love.

´I am an English Person´

Allow complete healing of my Englishness within. All the English I have already learnt is present within me and I allow more English to enter my Spirit, releasing any negativity about the learning process.

And then repeat ten times:

I`_____________(your name) am an English person and I speak perfect English. 

You can say this staring at your third eye in the mirror or focusing on the nearest available idol. 

Meditation: 

chakras

What do Richard Gere, Gillian Anderson and Moby all have in common? They have all achieved greatness through the practice of meditation. Meditation in the words of the Buddha is choosing the path to wisdom. It is about getting in touch with your higher self, your English self in the space between words. Spending some time alone each day sitting in a dark room in the lotus position with an English grammar book under your Mulahdara or Root Chakra will dramatically effect your English. You may not see the results in a day´s time, a month´s time maybe even in a year´s time but one day you will be in a state of natural wonderment. The risk of unguided meditation is that it often leads to narcolepsy and apathy, in severe cases you can become severed from your astral body. 

The experts recommend a mixing of unguided with guided meditation. I recommend the website http://www.fragrantheart.com/cms/free-audio-meditations 

for their wonderful free meditations. You can for instance do a 20 minute meditation to meet your Guardian Angel. See this week´s TASK!

´Life itself is a meditation´ Raul Julia,
Gomez in the Addams Familyi

Crystal Healing:

We are all made of stardust, and crystals are our oldest relatives, apart from gas. It is dangerous on a material level to expose oneself to gas, our astral bodies love the stuff but unfortunately it easily overcomes our material bodies. Crystals, however, allow us to tap into the energy grid round our bodies. Used in the right way with expert help to align the chakras, they are perfectly safe. In ancient Chinese medicine, Emeralds were used to stimulate memory and ease fatigue. As an English teacher working in London, I would place Emeralds at the corner of every classroom often preferring them to potted plants. When I realised that this didn´t work, I would throw these pebbles at the students if they fell asleep, lost concentration or rested their elbows on the table. The result was astonishing. Suddenly I had their full attention and they hung on every word  I  said as if their lives depended on it. 

A teaspoon of british granite every day
leads to a 2.2 per cent increase in Englishness. 

GLOSSARY: 

New age vocab

Guru

Adept Perito

Astral body corpo astral 

Third Eye terceiro olho

Spirit Espírito

Healing Cura

Holistic holística

                                                                      Affirmation afirmação

TASK: THE FOREST - A GUIDED MEDITATION FOR PAIRS

You are going to take your partner on a guided meditation and vise versa:

Student A: 

Read the following to your partner and note down their responses.

Close your eyes and relax. Are you relaxed? Good. Imagine you are walking in a forest. What do you see? What can you hear? Describe your surroundings. How do you feel?

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

In the forest you see a path. What kind of path is it? Describe the path. Where does it go? 

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

You follow the path. Walking along you suddenly see a wild animal in the middle of the path. What kind of animal is it? What size is it and what is it doing? How do you get passed the animal?

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Further along the path you see a bunch of keys. How many keys are there? Describe the keys. Do you pick them up?

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

At the end of the path you come to a wall. Describe the wall. How do you get passed it? What is on the other side of the wall?

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Open your eyes. 

Student B: 

Read the following to your partner and note down their responses.

Close your eyes and relax. Are you relaxed? Good. Relax some more. Harder. Relax harder. Keep relaxing, relax. RELAX! You are now relaxed and you will listen to me or else. 

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

You wake up in a mud swamp. You are surrounded by ugly plants and weird creatures. What do you see? Smell? Hear? Feel? 

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

I don´t believe you. You don´t feel anything, do you? You´re a heartless individual, cold, cold hearted bastard. Wait! What´s that noise? Coming from deep in the dark forest. You start to run? What the hell is chasing you? 

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

You run down a path. Keep running. Run faster, goddammit. It´s gaining on you. You see a light up ahead. A house. Describe the house. 

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

In your desperation to escape you imagined the house would be better than it actually is. Actually the house looks worse, much worse than you ever dared imagine. Imagine how bad that is. Describe the house of your nightmares.

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Keep running you fool! The thing is behind you. You go into the house. You go into hell itself. Someone´s inside there waiting for you. Who are they? And what do they do to you???

________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Now how do you feel? Don´t worry it was only a dream, it´s over now. Open your eyes.

(at this point wear a scary mask and scream very loudly in the face of Student A)

London Slang from Past to Present

Level - Upper Intermediate/ Advanced

Welcome to your first lesson! Every week I´ll be posting an article and a challenge that hopefully will entertain and train your English, Entertrain you if you will! These lessons usually contain bad language and subject matter that is only suitable for adult learners. 

Brixton, London - Electric Avenue

´Them creps are nang, blad!´ What do you think that means?
A. Those pancakes are horrible, Bread
B. Those trainers are cool, friend.
C. That stuff belongs to my grandmother, Brad

I won´t tell you which option is correct just yet. But who speaks like this? Did someone spill a drink on Stephen Hawking´s voice box? Nope. This is the slang (gíria) of young London today. This is Jafaican.

Jafaican (fake Jamaican) is a multicultural dialect emerging in London´s inner city where the traditional cockney accent is being replaced by a mixture of ethnic influences. Accents from West Africa, Jamaica, Bangladesh, India and South America are all part of the mix.

the Bow Bells

The traditional cockney was born within the sound of the Bow Bells (the bells of the Church of St Mary-le-Bow), an area of about 5 or 6 square miles in the East End of London where the working class lived. Cockneys have their own culture and dialect, they also have their own king. The Pearly King. He is dressed in pearls from head to foot. Since the 1950s the Cockneys have been moving to the suburbs and to the county of Essex, where they have another king called David Beckham aka Golden Balls who lives in Beckingham Palace. They are now called Towies (The Only Way Is Essex) and they like nothing better than to dance round their handbags and wear fake tan.

Some people, especially teachers, complain about the new Jafaican  dialect, but like it or hate it, it is a very real part of modern London life and it is very useful to know some of the key words in both Cockney and Jafaican.

Cockney gangster in The Long Good Friday

Cockney Glossary:

Rhyming slang –                 China (plate) = Mate = Friend

                                               Apple and Pears = Stairs escadaria

                                               Dog and Bone = Telephone

                                               Battlecruiser = Boozer = Pub

                                               Trouble and Strife = Wife Esposa

                                               Adam and Eve it = Believe it acreditar

Pronunciation tip –          

Drop your hs e.g. ´Ave you any ´oney, ´Arold? = Have you any honey, Harold?

                                              

Dizzee Rascal

Jafaican Glossary:

                                               Creps = trainers tennis

                                               Yard = Home Casa

                                               Blad/ Bredren/ Bruv = Mate = Friend

                                               Yute = Kid

                                               Safe = Hello

                                               Ends = Neighbourhood Bairro

                                               Sket = Girl of easy virtue Piranha

                                               Low Batties = Trousers

                                               Batty boy = Gay

                                               Nang = Cool

                                               Sick = Good

                                               Baddaman = Really good

                                               Deep = Horrible

                                               Allow it = Leave or forget it

                                               Nuff = Really

                                               Fit/Buff = Attractive

                                               Begging = Talking nonsense falando asneira

                                               Jamming = Hanging around passar tempo

                                               Chat = contradict negar

                                               Bare = a lot, very

                                               Flex it = show off exibir-se

Grammar tip –                  Was replaces Were in the past simple e.g. we was jamming. we were jamming.  

                                        Innit replaces all question tags e.g. you´d like an ice cream, innit? 

                                         You´d like an ice cream, wouldn´t you?

So, can you translate ´Them creps are nang, blad´? That´s right the correct answer was B!

A)Watch Ali-G on religion and answer the following questions: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wrKslUpB8Y Answers on Answer Page!

 1.Check yourself before you what?

2.God is like an overhyped what?

3.Ali G´s mate Dave has what?

4. Who is the MacDaddy of the Christian faith?

5.What does Ali G think is a coincidence

6.Where might Jesus have been born?

7.What did Ali G´s girlfriend Julie once ask him to do?

8. How many years has the catholic priest been celibate?

9.What does Ali find hypocritical?

10.What was the nun at Ricky C´s birthday called?

  

B)Write a letter to your Jafaican pen pal telling them about your life and your routine! Post them on the comments page!