I lived in Edinburgh for a while and when I was there I learned certain Gaelic expressions for which I would like to know the correct spelling (since you hardly ever write it the way it sounds). So help me out here.
Cheers/To your health - Sounds something like ‘Slange’ or ‘Slange Va’
(This will sound weird): Up the arse/Up yours - Sounds something like ‘Pok me hod’
I would be eternally in your debt if you could help me here. It has been annoying me for weeks.
And while we’re at it… maybe some other foreign people can tell me what these things are in German/Finnish/Japanese/whatever. Please include phonetics as well, or otherwise I could never show off towards my friends…
[url=http://violet.umf.maine.edu/~donaghue/toasts.html]Here* I found that I had suspected, that Slainte is Gaelic for “To your health!” and that it’s pronounced as if you quickly slurred “It’s a lawn chair!”.
Can’t help ya with the other one though-or with ones in other languages.
I also found a site that listed a band called [i}Slainte Mhath*. Could that be it?
And I’m having problems remembering to preview today. What in the world did I do to that link up there? Oh, I see(on previewing this post). I forgot to close it off. sigh
It’s “slàinte” - the accent goes the other way in Scots Gaelic (it’d be “sláinte” in Irish).
The other one is pòg mo thòin (Irish póg mo thóin) - kiss my arse. Phonetic pronunciation being “Pogue Mahone”, the original name of the band the Pogues.
While I was living in Japan teaching English, one of our students was a good friend with another English teacher there and always brought her little toddler, Yo-chan, to the lobby to hang out and play.
One day Yo-chan was sitting in his high chair with a sippy-cup of tea, and I was sitting at the table reading. Well, I hear Yo-chan giggling and look over at him. He takes his sippy cup, holds it up over his head, yells “KANPAI!!!,” takes a huge gulp, then puts it down and laughs hysterically at his own cleverness.
