Guest Post: John Finkelde

One of the reasons I started a blog was because I wanted to connect with other pastors. One of those pastors that I've met through the blog world is John Finkelde. Click on his name to check out his blog. Now the cool thing about John is that he's from Australia!

Guest Post John Finkelde:
Today, 26 January, is Australia Day. It's the founding of our nation day, much like the fourth of July.

So in honour of all things Australian here's some Aussie slang you can use on your friends or enemies if you prefer!

RIPPER it means brilliant! We used to use the word bonza but that has gone out of vogue and is no longer a ripper word

NO WORRIES it means ... no worries!

MATE means friend, dude (no Australian in his right mind would ever say dude!)

MAAAAAAAAAAAAAATE what you say to your mate when he has done something outrageous, unbelievably funny or nothing at all actually!

BARBIE no not the doll, it's short for BBQ

ARVO short for afternoon

FOOTY short for aussie rules football (also called AFL) during which we don't wear any wimpy protection like helmets and pads!

ONYA short for good on ya. Usually used with mate as in onya mate

You may notice we love to shorten things. Except test cricket that is which is a game that goes for 5 days. Yep you read it right 5 days ... and sometimes it's still a draw after all that time. We got test cricket from the Poms (that's England) so blame them.

CROOK means sick, as in can't go to work

CHOKA BLOK means full as in the car park is full. Oh a car park is a parking lot

FOOTPATH that's a sidewalk

OR STRAY LAH that's what it sounds like when we say Australia

So next time you meet an Aussie try some of these words out on them - they will love it!