Those, I think, have transitioned to the common American English lexicon. I didn’t grow up knowing any Jewish people, but words like putz, schmuck, schlep, spiel, shtick were reasonably known. Probably can add chutzpah in there, too, and if you were a curious sort, you might ask what those opening words of the Lavergne and Shirley tune meant (the meaning of those, schlemiel and schlemazel I didn’t learn until college, though.) What we didn’t know necessarily was that words like putz and schmuck are also words meaning “penis.” Feh is a good one that I sometimes use that I picked up later in life.
I should’ve clarified - khala is shorthand for khala jeera, which is black cumin. So, yeah, jeera = cumin. Khala jeera tastes a little different and is skinnier than typical cumin seeds. It could be a more northern way to say it since I think it’s used more often in north Indian cooking rather than south. Looking at Dr. Google, it does have a few alternate words depending upon where you are. Also, I’m a decent cook but a lazy speaker.
Or not
I was only aware of the British slang and if someone ended a comment with KWIM, I’d wonder why they were insulting me.
I pepper my speech with a lot of Brit slang; well, mostly curse words. I’m also another one to use a lot of Yiddish terms and it’s fun to see it rub off on my gentile co-workers. I’ve got everyone saying “schlep”, and “schmutz” and everyone’s favorite, “schmuck” .
OK, I am familiar with the word kala as “black” as in kala namak, “black salt,” and I’m pretty sure I have some kala jeera lying around somewhere in this house (I’m not Indian, but I do spend a lot of time in the South Asian community and have learned my herb and spice vocabulary pretty well, as I also love to cook. And hing is so much nicer a word than “asafetida.” And haldi rings better than “turmeric.”)
I remember when we were little our family exclusively used the Polish “dupa” for butt or rear end. We’re not Polish, I don’t know where that came from.
I’m big on the concept of mitzvah–Doing something good for another person simply because it makes you a better person. I’ve introduced it to quite a few people, using while doing one for them.
I have lots of words I’ve pick-pocketed from other languages. Usually to add some nuance different from common English words.
aniyo! from Korean meaning “no!” but more firm.
dubu from Korean meaning “tofu”. There’s a whole host of words that I use for Korean foods, but this one readily translates to “English” and I use Korean anyway.
kaiju from Japanese meaning “giant monster”.
kaja from Korean meaning “let’s go” and easier to say.
kapu from Hawaiian meaning “forbidden” but the most strong (like I’ll “kill” you if you do that).
jiji from Korean meaning “dirty” in the context of don’t touch that or put it in your mouth.
jinjja? from Korean meaning “really?”, as in “are you pulling my leg?”.
verboten from German meaning “forbidden” but more stern.
I’m noting how I use the words, which is likely not exactly how they’re used by native speakers.
I’ll probably think of more later.
Yeah, we usually refer to asafetida as ass powder. As in, “Hey, hand over the ass powder. I need to spice the aloo.” Luckily the kids don’t call it ass powder outside of our house.
“Daijoubu” is a Japanese word that means OK/fine/good enough/no problem. Wife is Japanese, and we use this word a lot around each other. We occasionally slip up and use it around people who don’t speak any Japanese, necessitating some explanation.
WHOA! My mom is from Slovak parents, and I haven’t heard that word since I was a little kid.
Mitzvah actually means commandment (plural: mitzvot). Bar Mitzvah is Son of the Commandment, Bat Mitzvah is Daughter of the Commandment. Mitzvah has come to mean good deed colloquially.
Yiddish/German and Spanglish and Archaic English (ie: yclept) bounce in and out, but this morning I misplaced Lake Superior for a moment and I called it Gitchee Goomi. I blame me mother, who would recite The Song of Hiawatha, like a good St Paul girl.
I throw in spanish here and there. Gracias, most commonly.
Well, in New York City, the English word for “depanneur” is “bodega”! ![]()
I use “Feh” sometimes, though I’m as Gentile as they come. I picked it up while reading the X-Men comic books when I was in college in the '80s – Lockheed, the miniature dragon which had adopted Kitty Pride in the books, didn’t usually speak, but he’d make vocalizations such as cooing, and he’d say “feh” when he was disgusted or annoyed.
Not until I read your post here did I put two and two together: Kitty was a Jewish-American girl from the northern suburbs of Chicago, and clearly, Lockheed picked up that bit of Yiddish from her. ![]()
I use the Dutch word ‘gezellig’ to refer to places that are especially ‘cozy’ or ‘homey’.
Polish person here, I tell my feline overlords to move their dupas all the time. I also use schmutz for unknown yucky stuff.
Dupas, damn you autocorrect
I"ll sometimes use the German gemütlich for that (I assume it’s the same concept.). Or the noun form gemütlichkeit for that idea of warmth/congeniality/friendliness/coziness. See? German is not all about schadenfreude and weltschmerz. There’s nice German compound words out there!
Some people do feel certain foreign words don’t have more meaning than their English equivalent.
(Gift link.)
I’m in Ottawa, which is significantly bilingual, and use some French terms constantly. If I come across something unexpected, like a sudden traffic jam I will almost always say Qu’est-ce se passe ici? Like zimaane I often use Allons-y to get people moving. I will sometimes swear in French-Canadian (which is different from European French swearing) such as Tabernac*. I also picked up Bueno and Scusi from a friend who grew up in Brazil and often spoke Portuguese to his (English) wife - they were both fluent in multiple languages.
*There is a story of a French bishop in WW1 visiting a section of the front held by a French-Canadian regiment who remarked approvingly afterwards on how religious the soldiers were.