Friday, October 28, 2011

Apples, pears and other cockney rhyming fruits

I think the most well known bit of Cockney rhyming slang is probably 'apples & pears' meaning stairs, but fruits are used in other phrases too.

Apple itself is used a fair bit, apple tart means either heart or fart, apple-pie is the sky, apple core is a score meaning £20. Apples and pears is also used in the criminal fraternity to mean court, there being stairs between the dock and the cells beneath.

For your summer holidays you may spend time on the apricot (apricot & peach = beach).

A cherry is used for face (cherry ace), a dog (cherry hog, cherries=cherry 'ogs = the dogs, ie greyhound racing).

Lemon (squeezer) = geezer, a "prune and plum" is the bum and of course raspberry (tart) is also a fart. Orange is used as a (racist) term for a Japanese person, "orange pip" being the full rhyme. Orange squash is rhyming slang for dosh and refers to money.

The list goes on, bananas tend to have a lot to do with bowel movement, banana splits for the shits and banana fritter for a toilet (the shitter)!


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