h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

My name is Feisor and I am an ACE (Assistant Community Editor) here at h2g2. It's my job to welcome you to the site and hopefully show you around a little. I AM a real person, not an automated rely not an automated reply not an automated reply .

Welcome to h2g2 – not just the friendliest on-line community but an incredibly huge, living, breathing guide to Life, the Universe and Everything. It’s compiled by researchers just like you and it's something YOU can take part in. You can write entries on all manner of subjects, and if it's something you think would look good in our Edited Guide (where all the best research goes), you can submit it to Peer Review Take a look at the <./>writing-guidelines</.> for more information on that.

You have made a great start by opening your space - even if it is a little scary I hope when you get to know us a little better you'll tell us a little about yourself - but there's no rush - and it's not compulsory

We ACEs are volunteers here to assist new researchers so if you have any questions please don't hesitate to ask.
You can leave a message on my space just by clicking on my name at the top of this message or by hitting the reply button below - it won't hit back (usually).

I have made a "Hints and Links for New Researchers" page at <./>A719840</.> - if you go there it will lead you to all sorts of places which will help find your way around and get to know this wonderful place

It should keep you busy for a while I am sure that you will love this community as much as we do There's lots of things to see, clubs to join and people to meet - please don't be shy - just jump right in - this is a friendly place. But be careful - it can become quite addictive - believe me I know



Enjoy!!
Have fun!!!
and above all !!!


Feisor

Thank you – can I assume you are one of out antipodean brethren from the G’Day? Actually I am familiar with h2g2 but I got tired of mildly abusive and mostly inane comments from pedantic people with questionable parentage. I closed my account and chose a new name more suitable to the type used by the likes of those that bothered me. You lose all the threads but the benefit is you also lose the idiots. If doing this is against ‘house rules’ – I am sorry. The difference between sitting in the pub and h2g2 is that, in the pub, you can ignore the bores.
PS I am not including you in the above and yes I have read the Hitchhiker's Guide. I listened to the original broadcast.

Thanks for replying - lots don't
Yes I am from Sydney Australia.

No I don't think it's against house Rules - a number of researchers have Alter Egos.

I won't even ask what your nickname was - your secret is safe with me.

I know that we can't always agree with everyone - and although sometimes it's difficult I try to ignore some people here. I think it's a little like a pub in that sometimes you have to just grit your teeth and "unsubscribe". I have found that the more often you bite back and let them get under your skin the more they keep coming

Good luck with the new persona



PS You can include me if you like - I'll just ignore you too and I too have been a fan since the original broadcasts (but in Australia - not on the BBC)

Thanks and you are right. I am off to the pub now – fortunately it is a Moroccan one and nobody other than this pedantic bar steward speaks a word of English. It’s great, no bores (that one can listen to) and very difficult to upset anyone without actually hitting them.
Never been to Oz, I am afraid. Never managed to get east of Madras unfortunately. The best thing I know about Strines is their sense of humour.
Keep in touch by all means. Including people doesn't seem to be the problem - excluding them is far more difficult.

I went to a bar a while ago that was populated by Americans - no one there spoke a word of English either

You know where to find me

The safest and greatest thing about living here (Casablanca) is that all the Americans assume that all Moroccans are terrorists, lock themselves in their compounds and leave the rest of us to enjoy life.
I confess to being an itinerant teacher of the language but the English variety. I’d gladly teach Strine but as I have never managed to get round ‘shot through like a Bondi tram’, I accept the fact that Englishmen are incredibly stupid and entirely monolingual.
On a completely different level, It is little known that Morocco (after Aden) has the most number of seriously beautiful women per square foot (or metre) in the world. When asked how I communicate with my wife (of some five years) I reply "by touch".
My only problem is keeping them out of the flat.

Casablanca - sounds very exotic ...

Strine is almost a dying art - I used to have a friend of "a certain age" who had some wonderful expressions, my favourite was "as restless as a blow fly in a tripe shop" Aussie slang is very expressive ...

Hello again, must be bed-time there?
I wouldn’t use the word ‘exotic’ to describe Casa – it is a big dirty industrial city and mostly French Colonial. Real Morocco is outside (forget Marrakech unless you are a born again tourist) and it is a fabulous country. There are few counties where you can ski in the morning - sky-dive at lunch-time and lie on a hot beach in the afternoon (and drive between the three). Despite the ‘bad press’ the country is by far the best I have lived in - twelve altogether - (Yemen and India come a pretty close second).

For goodness sake don’t let Strine die – it should be a world heritage site. Actually I am researching its origins but come up against problems when you start asking whether it all began in London prisons. No offence but the humour and rhyming slang are different but strangely similar. Until the black Africans got their chance of a say in America – no such thing existed there. If you left the donkey out of Shrek – would anybody watch it?

I did post something on the evolution of English but felt bound to withdraw it on the grounds that it wasn’t boring enough.

I rememner reading a book years ago which I think was called "Let Stalk Strine" or something along those lines. It was by Afferbeck Lauder and some of my favourites were

Egg Nishner
and
snow ewe smite

But Strine is actually vert different from Aussie Slang which owes a lot to Cockney Rhyming slang

oops - visitors just arrived ... gotta go

Continuing ....

What I was going to say is that the Aussie sense of humour goes way beyond the rhyming slang, take for example:

Hawking the fork - prostitution
A few kangaroos loose in the top paddock - mad
As restless as a blowfly in a tripe shop
As flash as a rat with a gold tooth

Unfortunately, it's dying - but I'm doing my best to keep it alive

Please keep up the good work;

Similar English (????) pithy sayings

One brick short of a load of a load
Not the sharpest tool in the shed (Shrek)

and many, many others I cannot think of off the top of my head

The wit is very clever but the best form of this form of humour - in the UK - is undoubtedly Cockney and good on HM’s government for giving Del Boy a monicker (spelling???) or an ‘andle. Even the sheep jokes in Aussie tend to have the same brand of wit to them. Alas – the same cannot be said for politics there or here but at least Bow now has Mr Galloway to represent them.