A-Level: (n.) Advanced level exams. Teenagers take these at 18 to qualify to go on to university. You can either leave school at 16 and work somewhere rubbish like a pot pie factory or make a choice to carry on in education and do your A-levels. But A-levels are really tough so only the nerds and swots end up doing them.
Agony Aunt: (n.) An Agony Aunt works on a magazine and you write to her with your “problems.” She’s meant to help you out, but in reality I reckon the work experience intern opens them and then everyone in the office has a laugh about your bum spots or the fact that your feet look a bit webbed. I would be an amazing Agony Aunt ’cos I always keep it real and people like to hear the truth, don’t they?
’Arris: (n.) Bum, rear. See also: jacksie.
ASBO: (n.) Anti-social behavior order. The police give ASBOs to people to stop them causing trouble in a certain place. So if you always cause trouble in the park, your ASBO might forbid you visiting the park for 6 months. The Bruton-Fletchers have a LOT of ASBOs.
Baps: (n.) Boobs. Also boobies, breasts, blouse potatoes.
Bashment: (n.) A party.
Bint: (n.) An annoying woman. “’Ere I was standing in the line at KFC, right, and this BINT pushes in before me and orders a Bargain Bucket!”
Boffin: (n.) Boffins are the people at school who always get straight A’s and remember to bring their books and pens and know which class to be at on the right day and time. Their homework never gets “stolen by a big dog” en route to school. When you ask a boffin what they want to do in the future they say, “I want to be a research scientist for NASA.” They don’t say, “’Ere, come round my gaff at about seven, I’m prank calling the zoo pretending to be an escaped lion.” Me and Carrie are not boffins.
Brassic: (adj.) Skint, penniless, broke, etc. “’Ere Shizzle, you coming to the mall on Saturday?” “Yeah, but mate I am totally brassic so I’ll just be window shopping. I can’t even afford any McNuggets.”
Bricking it: (vb.) Scared, nervous, so terrified you feel like you might have an accident in your thong. “So, did you call dat hot boy on Saturday then?” “No, bruv, I was proper bricking it!”
Buff: (adj.) Buff means a nice fit body. A hottie. “Is he working out a lot? He is looking well buff.”
Butterz: (adj.) Ugly, minging, not attractive. Sort of “butt ugly” taken to the extreme. “Don’t let me snog Harry, even if I’m drunk right? He is well butterz!”
Buzzing: (vb.) Feeling really excited.
Cark it: (vb.) 1: To die. “He’s off school. His gran carked it—he has to go to the funeral.”2: To stop working. “OMG. We were halfway to Romford and Wesley’s car totally carked it.”
Chas ’n’ Dave: (n.) Terrible old-fashioned British music duo. One plays piano, one plays guitar. They both have beards. The sort of CD your mum and dad put on at New Year’s after a few glasses of booze and start dancing to and you get seriously worried that one of them might slip and break a hip.
Chav: (n.) Chav is a not very nice word people often call me and my friends ’cos we wear hoodies and gold hoops and listen to R+B and own Staffordshire Bull Terriers and don’t live in posh houses. People say chavs cause a lot of trouble. I don’t think I am a chav, and if I am it stands for “charming, hilarious, articulate, and vibrant.”
Choong: (adj.) Sexy, handsome, hottie. “Oh my days, who is that new boy in class? He is proper choong, man, I can’t stop staring!”
Chuffed: (adj.) Happy, pleased. “Awww, Wazzle is well chuffed, his ASBO doesn’t stretch as far as Wembley Stadium so we can get tickets for Beyoncé!” or “Man, check out my new gold scunchy! Only a quid in Claire’s Accessories. I am well chuffed!”
Dossing: (vb.) To lie about doing nothing. “I’ve been dossing about all day.”
Dubstep: (n.) A type of very fast British dance music that has to be played loud. The total opposite of Chas ’n’ Dave. If you put this on in the car you can be sure your mother will be in a really bad mood when you get where you’re going and will have pointed out at least once that there is “no tune” and she is “getting one of her migraines.”
Earwigging: (vb.) Listening to something you ain’t supposed to be. What mothers do when you’re on the phone. Or when a boy you fancy walks past and you want to hear what he’s saying.
EastEnders: (n.) A soap opera about London folk which plays three times a week on BBC1 in Britain. It is properly depressing but everyone is addicted to it.
Elizabeth Duke: (n.) Jewelry shop in Britain that posh people take the mickey out of ’cos it’s not exactly Tiffany. “OMG I love that diamond-covered clown-shaped pendant! Where’d you get that?” “My Wes got me it from Elizabeth Duke for Christmas!”
Emmerdale: (n.) British soap opera that is on TV five times a week. It’s set in a village in the countryside in Yorkshire, England. Everyone in Emmerdale has snogged each other or got divorced at least once and they argue about pigs and corn all the time. My mother likes Emmerdale a lot.
Faffing about: (vb.) Spending a lot of time very busily not achieving anything. “Why are you late?!” “Oh god, sorry, I got up at seven AM and I’ve been faffing about ever since. I sort of started straightening my hair, then I started typing an e-mail, then I lost my keys and then I couldn’t find a skirt and then one thing led to another and I decided to categorize my sock drawer into ‘daywear,’ ‘fancy,’ and ‘sports/casual.’”
Fancy: (vb.) To have the hots for someone. “I fancy him! I fancy him rotten!”
Fangita: (n.) Lady-bits, front-bum, mimsy. “I had to rearrange my thong, it was strangling my fangita!” or “We spent half an hour in biology looking at photos of fangitas. It proper put me off lunch, I can tell you.”
Fizzing: (adj.) Angry, irate.
Flog: (vb.) To sell something. “I’m going to flog my bike, I need some cash.”
GCSE: (n.) The exam sixteen-year-olds take before they can choose to move on to A-Levels. Everyone who is sixteen in Britain takes GCSE exams. Then it’s your choice whether you want to quit school FOREVER or study for some A-Levels, bearing in mind that studying for A-Levels will involve carrying on at school and being moaned at by teachers for another two years.
Geezer: (n.) A man, a bloke, a guy.
Git: (n.) Annoying person. “He’s such a total git sometimes! I said to him, ‘Bruv, who’s more buff, me or Beyoncé?’ And he said Beyoncé!” or “OMG, this old git was in front of me in the supermarket queue taking ten hours to buy a tin of peaches and some false teeth glue.” See also: bint.
Gob: 1. (n.) Mouth 2. (adj.) To spit. “He walked into class and gobbed his chewing gum on the floor! Ugh!”
To get the hump: (vb.) To take offense. “So she says to me, ‘’Ere, was that dress on sale in Top Shop or something ’cos it well looks cheap?’ Well I proper got the hump, I did!”
Grass: 1. (vb.) To tell the police/teachers/someone’s parents about someone. Nark, tattle, sing, tell, spill, squeal. “I had no choice mate, I had to grass her up!”2. (n.) a narc.
Hacked off: (adj.) Annoyed. “Is that lovebite on your neck from my Trevor?! OMG I am TOTALLY HACKED OFF!”
Headbend: (n.) Something so weird it makes you think your head is tripping out. “What? The most gorgeous boy in the whole school has said he thinks I’m hot? OMG what a head bend!”
Hen party: (n.) A party before a wedding for all the bride’s friends where alcohol is consumed and women tend to get a bit rowdy and dress up in silly costumes and sometimes a stripper appears. This is in preparation for the time after your marriage when you sit about in a cardigan watching Emmerdale.
Hoodie: (n.) A hooded sweatshirt or sports top. The British are obsessed with hoodies and think that if kids wear them with the hood up it means they’re a criminal. LMAO. “Hoodie” has now come to mean “kid who causes trouble,” i.e., “I’ll tell you who I reckon stole my car stereo. It’ll be those HOODIES from down the road who hang out by the chicken shop!”
Jacksie: (n.) Ass, rear end. “I ain’t going to karaoke with Carrie no more. She sings six Mariah Carey songs in a row and chucks a diva-fit if you touch the microphone. What a pain in the jacksie she is.”
Jog on: (vb.) Get lost, go away, buzz off. “He came over here trying to hit on me. I said, ‘Jog on bruv, no chance.’”
Khazi: (n.) Toilet, loo, lavatory. “Yes mother, me and Wes were supposed to be going out for pizza, but don’t worry, he’d LOVE to spend the night with his head down our khazi poking it with a spanner working out why it ain’t flushing. No, really. No, I ain’t being sarcastic.” or “Where’s Dad?” “Oh, he’s on the khazi, he’s been there an hour. He reckons it’s the only place where he can get any peace.”
Knackered: (adj.) To be tired, shattered, exhausted.
Knob: (n.) A penis. But it’s an insult too. “Stop being a knob!”
Lairy: (adj.) In the mood for fighting. Aggressive.
Liberty: 1. (n.) Someone who is really cheeky and just does whatever she wants. “She is a right liberty, she is.”2. Someone who takes liberties.
Merk: (vb.) Kill, murder. “OMG, that’s another kid on the news got merked on Saturday night. Someone shot him.”
Modded car: (n.) When you take a normal car and make it unique by sticking and gluing bits to it and changing the wheel trims and putting lights on it and installing a proper loud stereo. My Wes has a modded banana yellow Volkswagen Golf, which is proper brilliant. Modding a car is just like on Pimp My Ride, except there, they get proper professionals to make the car look amazing and the owner always cries with happiness—unlike when Bezzy Kelleher starts the fake fog machine on his Vauxhall Nova and people basically cry with laughter.
Mush: (n.) Mouth, gob. “Oi! Shut your mush!”
Munter: (n.) Ugly, minging, not hot. “I thought I’d pulled a right hottie at that party… then the lights went on, and I was like, ‘What a munter!’”
Narky: (adj.) In a bad mood. Takes offense easily.
Nicking: (vb.) Stealing, thieving.
Norks: (n.) Knockers. Also: boobs, boobies, norkers, norgs, norgers. See also: baps.
NVQ: (n.) National Vocational Qualification. An exam you take in Britain instead of your A-Levels specifically to get a job like a plumber or an electrician.
Pearly king: (n.) Old British person from East London who turns up on special occasions in a jacket and hat covered in about a million white buttons. It’s like a special tradition dating back from Ye Olde times of England when poor London folk had no TV or Playstations or R+B to listen to so they spent the long nights waiting to die from smallpox and sewing buttons onto their clothes and thinking it made them look fancy like the real royal family. My Nan loves pearly kings and her eyes all light up when you mention them, but she once got tipsy and told me she’d snogged one at a party in 1950 and was shaking buttons out of her undergarments for the next week.
Pikey: (n.) A not very nice slang word for a gypsy or basically anyone who looks a bit poor. Real pikeys live in trailers and get hassled by the government for not paying taxes. I often used to tell our Murphy that his real family were pikeys ’cos it used to make him cry. Sorry, Murph.
Right hump: (n.) To totally take offense about something. See also: get the hump.
Row: (n.) An argument, a spat. “Wesley and Bez are having a right old row out there! Bezzy got McDonald’s barbecue sauce all down Wesley’s new car seat covers. He’s going mental!”
Rude: (n.) Someone who thinks they’re tough or a bit of a gangster. Often combined with girl or boy: “She acts like she’s a rudegirl, but she ain’t all that.”
Scrounging: (vb.) Begging.
Shubz: (n.) A party, a knees-up, a gathering. “Leticia is having a shubz on Saturday night when her mum and dad are out. Everyone is invited! You coming?” “Nah, mate, I’ll just read the police report afterward in the Ilford Bugle.”
Sixth Form: (n.) A school where you go to study your A-Levels that is often in the same school where you took GCSE’s. Basically it is a building full of boffins and school nerds who actually learn things for their own pleasure and want to be brain surgeons and who know all the capitals of the world and crap about the Ice Age and stuff (i.e., not me at all).
Skiving: (vb.) Bunking off, skipping off when you haven’t got a good excuse.
Skunk: (n.) A type of grass or marijuana.
Slapper: (n.) A girl who is very well known to the boys in the local area due to her, ahem, friendly and outgoing nature. “Pghgh, no wonder he’s started going out with Suzanne, she’s a right slapper.”
Snog: (vb., n.) An open-mouthed kiss, which may or may not include tongues. I once snogged Carlton Brown behind a bush after a Year eight disco and he bit my face by accident and his breath smelled of Big Mac gherkins. It was proper disgusting.
Sovereign ring: (n.) A ring that you might buy from somewhere like Elizabeth Duke. It looks like it is made from an old fashioned British sovereign gold coin.
Spots: 1: (n.) Zits. Red lumps full of pus that appear on your face the day before a party and make you look like a freak. Also: spotty (adj.).
Staffy: (n.) Staffordshire Bull Terrier. A dog that a lot of chavs own. Oh, and the Wood family owns one too, called Penny, but as I say, we aren’t chavs!
Stroppy: (adj.) Sulky, in the mood to throw a hissy fit. Also: stroppiest (adj.) and strop (n.). “She gave me her stroppiest look when she saw I looked better in that dress than she did!”
Sucking teeth: (vb.) Some people suck their teeth to let you know they’re not happy with you. “I said to her, ‘Are both those seats taken or is your ass just so wide it’s spilling onto the second one?’ But she just sucked her teeth and turned her head.”
Take the mickey: (vb.) To make fun of someone or have a joke with them. Taking the mickey can be nice or not nice, depending on how far you take it. Like I take the mickey out of my Carrie a lot for being so vain. But Latoya Bell is just plain unpleasant when she takes the mickey. In fact, she’s just a bully. Also: take the piss.
Tight: (adj.) Mean. “I’ve been really taking the mickey about his new haircut. Okay, I know I’m being a bit tight.”
Trackie: (n.) Track suit or sweat suit.
Up the duff: (n.) Pregnant, knocked up, in the pudding club. “OMG, I saw Katy drinking vodka outside Perfect Chicken and she is totally up the duff too!”
WAG: (n.) British Football term meaning “Wives and girlfriends,” i.e., the women who turn up to games to support their husbands/boyfriends dressed in $50,000 of designer gear and get drunk on champagne and snog other footballers that aren’t their boyfriends, then end up on the front of The Sun newspaper falling out of a nightclub being sick in their $5000 Miu Miu handbags.
Well minted: (adj.) To have lots of cash. “Have you seen his car? Man, he must be well minted I reckon!”
Wide: (adj.) Dodgy, shady, dishonest. “I wouldn’t lend him money if I were you, he can be a bit wide sometimes.”
Wiffling on: (vb.) Yaddering, chattering, blathering. “I thought my class speech was going so well. But then I got distracted and started wiffling on for half an hour about my favorite sandwich. OMG, epic fail.”