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I got to thinking about something that Hussar said awhile back.. He called to his Fathers attention how he was using slang on Polish words.. His Father refered to an Automobile as a Cara.. LOL, that is what we called it all of my life. This led me to look at other words that we butchered

Automobile Samochod We called it a CARA

Orange Pomarancze ANCZKA

Tomato Pomidor Merdyci

Jaga, What is a Banana in Polish We called them Bananese.

Hussar, You are a smart person.. Why dont you look up some othjer words that we butchered <img src="/images/graemlins/wall.gif" alt="" />

Frank,

orange as ANCZKA is probably from "pomaranczka" - very cute

car and "cara" - unknown in Polish slang. In Polish car is either "samochod" or "auto".

banana in Polish is just "banan" - simply. Many words which originated in oriental languages have the same or similar pronunciation as in their country of origin.

THe word for "tea" - in Polish "herbata" is unique and different than in other Slavc countries. It is just a combination of two words "herba+ta" from herb and Chinese word for tea.

in Russian it is "chay" or "Czaj"

Frank, what did you call the cloth used to wash dishes...dish-rag --- we called it a "may-ook" (that is how it was pronounced, I have no idea how it might be spelled.)

WOW Nancy,
You got me on thaT ONE.. I remember a towel as a Recznik, but a wash rag escapes me.. Spelled with a hook on the E..

A feather bed was a PIERZYNA.

PS! I am having a lot of fun with this as I try to recall
the words that we used growing up.

Although Jaga and other Poles understand me.. I have trouble understanding them.. They talk too fast and use words that I never heard before..

Frank,

recznik is in Polish towel
and "pierzyna" is a quilt! So this is really Polish!

as for mayook - I do not remember this word or any word with this pronunciation.

Jaga,
I keep thinking about Nancy's question.. Does this make any sense to you??

Mokra Wlota??? A wet rag?????

My parents used to say "Chodz tu" for "Come here" but I always heard it as "hutch to" and only recently learned the way it is actually spelled and pronounced (more like hodge than hutch).

As for that dish rag, I guess it was a family thing.

Check this poem which is infested with Polish American Slang, or, better put it, Pidgin Polish.
Dziad i Baba
Byl sobie dziad i baba.- stara bajka sie chwali....
On sie Dzianem nazywal-na nia Mery wolali.
Bardzo starzy oboje, na retajer juz byli,
Filowali nie bardzo, bo lat wiele przezyli.
Mieli hauzik malenki, peintowany co roku
Porc na boku i stepsy do samego sajd-loku;
Plejs na garbydz na jardzie, stara picies co byla
Im rok rocznie picies�w pare buszli rodzila.
Kara byla ich stara, Dzian fiksowal ja nieraz-
Zmienial pajpy, tajery i dzionk sluzyl do teraz.
Za kornerem na strycie przy Frenkowej garadzi
Mieli parking na dzionki gdzie nikomu nie wadzil.
Z boku hauzu byl garden na tomejty i kabydz-
Choc w markiecie u Dzioa Mery mogla je nabyc.
Czasem ciery i plumsy, bananusy, orendzie,
{...}

I had to truncate the poem because I gave up correcting those Polish diacritic marks which don`t appear in html. The full Word version with Polish diacritic marks can be seen on

http://www.republika.pl/jerzybo/DziadBaba.doc

Jerzy,

Jeepers, I can barely figure out real Polish, now you are slinging slang at me...

Please tell us more about this poem.

I have an old illustrated book called Dziad i Baba by Jozef Ignacy Kraszewski, and it seems to start nearly the same -
Byl sobie dziad i baba
Bardzo starzy oboje

Then, on your page, there are some words in green - are those the slang words? (popcorn must be one ...)

so what is the story <img src="/images/graemlins/rolling.gif" alt="" />

The only thing I learned were all the nasty phrases from my grandfather or grandmother when they were in a mean mood. <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />