Go back to the original "family sayings" post (Monday, October 29). It's been added to seven times now. The German sayings are so difficult to duplicate. I am trying to do them phonetically, and German isn't phonetic. Then I try using the usual German diphthongs, and umlauts, etc., and that doesn't seem to work either.
After doing that, I go to the thesaurus and find synonyms for the word dad used, and use the German-English translator to give me "best guesses". So that's what I've done. I've added the "best guesses" to the list.
News added on January 16, 2008 -- I found out that all those terms dad used were NOT German, but Pennsylvania Dutch. I found several of the terms in a PA Dutch listing of common phrases:
Schushlich -- (hoosh lick) -- meaning clumsy -- yes, that's right. I remember that. Going back to the October 29, 2007 BLOG I don't think that phrase was included, but if it was, this is the correct term. Take a look at this website: http://www.horseshoe.cc/pennadutch/culture/language/idioms.htm. There are many sayings in there that I recall from my father. I guess this is enough said on this subject.
Check out "doplich"; "fergesshlich"; "fershmeerd"; "rootsch"; "SCHOOSLICH"; "SHRECKLICH"; "STROOBLY"; ""BAXY, BAXY; POOH BAH." (Baby talk for "dirty, dirty;" "Pooh bah" for gigag," or to cause to vomit)." Yes, the last one -- BAXY was used a lot around out house with all the little kids always getting "dirty."
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2 comments:
My neice Lori wrote: How did Gramps learn all that Penn Dutch?? I remember him using all kinds of words and I asked him once how many languages he spoke. He just laughed and laughed. :-) He told me he didn't know any other languages, just a few words of things. He used so many different ones and so often too that I really thought "Wow, he knows like every language in the world!". hahaha
My response is that his family came from Reading, PA after they emigrated from Germany in the early 1800s. I have to assume that's where he picked up the words he would throw out now and then. Apparently, they were "family" words -- being part of the PA Dutch community.
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