ATMs use Cockney slang

DamnYankee

DamnYankee

Loyal to the end
You'd better get ready to use your loaf if you want to get your hands on some bread in London.

Over the next three months, a cluster of East London ATMs will be offering customers the chance to withdraw cash using written prompts in Cockney rhyming slang, the area's colorful and often impenetrable dialect.

The origins of Cockney rhyming slang are obscure. It is thought to have been used by market traders who needed a way of communicating without tipping off their customers.

It works by replacing a word with a short rhyming phrase. For example: "Money" becomes "bread and honey," which in turn is shortened to "bread." Similarly, "head" becomes "loaf of bread," and then just simply "loaf."

Few use the slang with any regularity now although most Britons know a few common phrases, such as "trouble and strife" for wife and "apples and pears" for stairs.

ATMs run by a company called Bank Machine offer a language option allowing customers to enter their "Huckleberry Finn" instead of their PIN, and rather worryingly informs them that the machine is reading their "gallbladder of lard" at a prompt about examining their card.
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http://www2.journalnow.com/content/2009/sep/13/atms-use-cockney-slang/

Charver can now bank in his native language.
 
:D

Although i'm slightly further north of East London.

Apparently the chap who came up with this idea wants to do other dialects such as Scouse, Brummie (that's Birmingham), Scotch and Geordie. Maybe there'll be a Cumbrian one eventually.
 
charver said:
:D

Although i'm slightly further north of East London.

Apparently the chap who came up with this idea wants to do other dialects such as Scouse, Brummie (that's Birmingham), Scotch and Geordie. Maybe there'll be a Cumbrian one eventually.
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Cokney's would fit right in in the south, ya'll.
 
My wife is talking about taking a trip to Europe in 2011. I've decided Germany would be our destination rather than the UK. They'll be easier to understand.
 
A selection of British accents

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BV8KfpE3BA"]YouTube - The Fast Show - We're Cockneys[/ame]
 
Southern Man said:
My wife is talking about taking a trip to Europe in 2011. I've decided Germany would be our destination rather than the UK. They'll be easier to understand.
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Ich bin einen der Southerner, Ja? That comes as no surprise. With all those Nazi in the south ya'll oughta be real familiar with German! :pke:
 
I would never go to Germany, there's nothing I wish to see there. The places in Europe I would like to visit are the UK, Italy (Vatican), and Ireland (the one ancestry over there I find cool)...
 
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