Saturday, February 22, 2014

Yo, people! Whatcha doin?

Have you ever come across teenagers speak? or Do you have any teens on your friends list? If yes, you will relate to the post, if No, then you will know why people of my generation"roll our eyes" and "scratch our heads" when we hear them speak.




"Kirrak" " whatcha doin?" "Yo" "thope" "requestion" "hayloo".and many more...
       Do the above words sound familiar to you?

Those are familiar words to me which I keep hearing often, sometimes in my society or on my social networking site where I am connected to many teenagers.

I once read aloud a comment by a teen on my FB page which read " Kirrak Picha" and my daughter chuckled and said "Mom, that's not the way you say" and corrected me with the right pronunciation. Even before i could gather what it means, another comment pops up"WUU2". There are many such instances like these where I am left rolling my eyes or SMH (shaking my head) when these teens speak or txtspk(text speak) missing their vowels.

A few years back, I would always respond to their " Hey mom/aunty, wassup?" and other teen talks with a confused look and go into a thought bubble " Have these Gen Z descended from another planet?". Their talks never made any sense to me.

But now, I hv jnd d kewl klub( i have joined the cool club), I do'nt want to be known as an "unkewl aunty" in my neighborhood, you see.

So now, when they "wazzup"? or "sup?" i cheerfully answer in good humor without showing my confusion " it's the sky" or " roof" or whatever is above me at that time.

Now, the teen vocab adds to a 'kinda' 'chillin' moments at home too, which we moms and pops of 'Gen Z' take with a chill pill.

It so happened on my latest train journey, I was sitting on the lower side berth and my son was above me in the upper berth. Out of the blue, my son darted across his berth with a cheeky smile "Hey mom!, sup?" and I as in practice was about to say" roof" or "sky", suddenly i realized his cheeky smile and changed it to " yo sonny, it's you who'z up".

At times they greet their dad with "Yo Pops",as in Hello dad and the husband too would answer with a drawling "Yo-oo-oo  ma-a-a n" or "Yo dude".

Now, "We the not so young" momz and popz easily figure the missing vowels, hanging apostrophes and comatose comma in "Yo! whag'wan ere?"and we don't think  English ka "condition serious hai" anymore.

We pretend to simply chillax, but,  Shhhhh....don't tell these Gen Z' that we are allergic to this teen and txtspk, okies? Lest they think we are unkewl.

This post exclusively written for condition serious hai in association with the cadbury 5 star facebook page.

The teen dictionary for this post
Kirrak - awesome
thope -flop
whatcha doin? -what are you doing?
picha - picture/photo
WUU2- what are you up to?
kinda- kind of
chillin - relaxing
chillax- chill+relax
chill pill- be cool as in 'don't get tensed'
kewl- cool
yo- hi
"Yo! wha'wan ere, mah"- Hi, what's going on here"
requestion- request+question




16 comments:

  1. Interesting post. Looks like you are living in the midst of some cool teenagers. Enjoy the slang.. See you later G. (G is short for homey-G which means friend.)

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    1. yes, there are cool and very sensible teenagers around me.
      oh, did'nt know about 'G'. Thank you, will use it on them. and in the teen lingo
      see you is C'ya ...so C'ya S'G' :)

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  2. Gosh!! I didnt get most of the words, initially! The dictionary in the end helped me understand the teen words! I am still a year or two away from this lingo I guess! You are doing great with it, Asha!! And enjoyed reading this post! Good luck for the contest! Cheers :)

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    1. yes, you can still wait for Aaryan to turn 13 or 14. That is when it will start maybe. TYSM, Shilpa ( thank you, so much in their text language)

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  3. Wow - you are one super aware young lady (teeen ??? )

    And yes, I am chillaxing :)

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    1. TYSM, Ramesh. and yes, i know you are having a Kirrak (awesome) time traveling.

      TYSM( thank you so much)

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  4. Seen a few, but dont understand many....for me tough times:)

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    1. oh yes, it is pretty tough at times. Thanks Renu:)

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  5. Haha, Asha! Loved reading this post!

    Am learning these words too as I work with a lot of peppy youngsters and I keep myself afloat by staying in touch with they speak, text and converse. It frightens me, as a writer, that words are being reduced to what they are now.....such is the pace of life.

    But lets look at the happy side of life - we are learning new things, aren't we?

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    1. True Swapna, it frightens me too and i don't like it one bit. But, do we have a choice? We have to go with the flow and like you say. we are learning new things. If language had not evolved perhaps we would also be speaking shakespear's english. But honestly, i hope this language remains playful and nothing becomes offiical about it.

      Thank you, Swapna:)

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  6. After reading the first para i thought to myself "hah! How difficult would koolio lingo be, ice been there before"

    But i seriously found a few words alien :o

    Well written.

    Updated my blog,do drop by

    Cheers
    CRD

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    1. Thank you, CRD for the visit and comment:)

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  7. This is a very interesting post. Many of these expressions are new to me. In our house also this language is very popular.

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    1. Thank you, ma'am, in teen homes this language seems popular.

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  8. Ha Ha :) I find it exceedingly annoying when I hear this kind of language and even more so when I see it in writing. I sometimes wonder if there will be a generation in future who cannot write complete sentences. Nice take

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  9. True Aarti. Most of them happily misplace the punctuation or spelling. Thanks for your visit and comment:)

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