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Serious satire
"Humor is a funny way of being serious"
-Thomas Edison
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Copyright© 2001-2010, Renato Obeid
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"Top blog/Renato Obeid's World/Today's pick: This rambling weblog is worth reading not so much for its satirical posts but more for its insight into the minutiae of life in Lebanon, including the etiquette of road accidents and how to hire a taxi.”
-Jane Perrone, The Guardian
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Friday, August 13, 2004
BEWARE OF IMITATIONS - counterfeit canines My cousin Omar, like his brother and sister, quite frequently gets ten out of ten on English tests but he's also doing well in "Australian" too – he's picked up (via osmosis – I don’t actually set out to teach him) a couple of Australian words from me. Most recently, he surprised me with the word "mongrel". Seeing he knows the word already, I thought I'd properly define it for him. Starting with the primary meaning of the word, I told him that a mongrel was a dog of mixed breed, not of pure-bred pedigree. "A fake dog?" he asked. I explained to him that there's no such thing as a fake dog – all dogs are real (except Scooby Doo) but some are pure-bred whilst others are mixed breed.I also gave him the secondary (pertinent definition) – in Australian slang, a mongrel is a mean detestable person.
Not all Omar’s slang is perfect though – he says ‘’dig’’ instead of ‘’dick’’ (I didn’t teach him either of them).
My brother Guy also did his bit to propagate Australian slang. When my cousin Hala was visiting him in Melbourne in 1997 he jokingly told her that his friend Justin was a ‘’c**t’’ (insults are often a term of endearment in Australia). When she met Justin she said ‘’hello Justin, pleased to meet you. I hear that you’re a ‘’c**t’’ (not knowing what it meant). Not surprisingly Justin the c**t was gobsmacked. Serves him right for being a c**t.
10:37 am
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