Unofficial Christ's Hospital Forum

J.R. wrote: In my day, the Bockers were the Estate Workers - Farm Workers - General Maintenance etc. I still remember the time, late 1950's when one decided to end his life by hanging himself in the tube !.

So, are we about to lose the terms, Crug, Flab, Kiff and all the other lovely evocative words that resound of 'Housey' ?

Another blow against the true ethos of CH ?

Agreed, I always thought that Bockers were Estate Staff. It was probably a name unique to Horsham, since according to "A Book of Housey Slang" we have
Crug (1) a Blue (2) 1780 a piece of Bread
Flab 1880 Butter
Kiff 1890 At various times meant Tea, Coffee and cocoa, although in my time it was only Tea.
Swab 1860 A monitor's fag
Undated but I found interesting is
Bluebottle , which I had always related to the Goons.However, it states that the boys and girls at Hertford were known mutually as Bluebottles and Grasshoppers. Similarly the boys in London and at Hertford called each other respectively Jackdaws and Hedgehogs.
All of these words come from when CH was in London, and whilst I accept that language moves on, it would be a shame to lose these unique words which are probably our only informal link to CH in London.

There's a whole book on CH slang, I seem to remember?

Yup I think someone mentioned it on the Housey Slang topic which seems to be reappearing here now!!
Stay on Topic Chaps!

This is interesting....maybe start a new topic?

Yadyada, we don't need to

viewtopic.php?f=23&t=66&hilit=kiff

Thinking about it, ignoring the obvious uniform words such as broady(ie) etc, I do not think that any words are used here now that are distinctively CH. None of the words on this thread are used in my earshot.

Not sure why that is, perhaps the children are more in tune with the 'outside' world and therefore more likely to adopt the slang words of all youth, rather than just CH youth.

The kids still seem to use the word 'squit'. I popped into the tuck shop the other day for some toffee crumble, and I heard the pupils using the word freely...

Yes, that might survive but it is frowned upon by the powers that be!

onewestguncopse wrote:Yes, that might survive but it is frowned upon by the powers that be!

I still don't understand why?! It is a harmless word, and it is part of the school's tradition. It isn't intended to cause offence to anyone so why do they have to stop using it? Isn't it a bit pointless and unnecessary to try and ban it?

(Great Plum, how was the toffee crumble? )

lonelymom wrote:

onewestguncopse wrote:Yes, that might survive but it is frowned upon by the powers that be!

I still don't understand why?! It is a harmless word, and it is part of the school's tradition. It isn't intended to cause offence to anyone so why do they have to stop using it? Isn't it a bit pointless and unnecessary to try and ban it?

(Great Plum, how was the toffee crumble? )

When I was just a wee little lass we had a cat (black) called Nigger. No offence was meant to anyone, including our Nigerian neighbour. To my grandparents, 'nigger' just meant 'black'.

In NZ c1980 we had a pet black sheep called Spook. No problem until some smartypants who had lived in places other than Taranaki explained to the kiwis that Spook was a derogatory name for West Indians.

Our current all black cat is named Efel, and our most recent pet sheep was Willie.

xx

icomefromalanddownunder wrote:
When I was just a wee little lass we had a cat (black) called Nigger. No offence was meant to anyone, including our Nigerian neighbour. To my grandparents, 'nigger' just meant 'black'.

The re-make digital re-mastering of the film 'The Dambusters' had the name of Guy Gibson's black labrador dog expunged from the film.

Maybe they should have re-named the film...... 'The Blastbusters'

Political Correctness gone mad !

I believe we still have in the loft some of my daughters' soft toys - golliwogs. My sister-in-law was very hesitant about buying a similar one for my grand-daughter, but thankfully she did. How can children be expected to understand that their much-loved toys are seen by some ignorant people as a symbol of abuse?!

I just love it when someone comes into the charity shop and asks "Do you have blackboard and easel for a child?" or " Do you have any gollywogs?"

lonelymom wrote:

onewestguncopse wrote:Yes, that might survive but it is frowned upon by the powers that be!

I still don't understand why?! It is a harmless word, and it is part of the school's tradition. It isn't intended to cause offence to anyone so why do they have to stop using it? Isn't it a bit pointless and unnecessary to try and ban it?

(Great Plum, how was the toffee crumble? )

I think it has been frowned upon more severely since the change of leadership at the top...

The toffee crumble, was of course, excellent!

Great Plum wrote: I think it has been frowned upon more severely since the change of leadership at the top...

The toffee crumble, was of course, excellent!

But why? I honestly don't get it! I've never head the word 'squit' used in a derogatory way, far from it! So why is it frowned upon?