Chow Meow
I had Chinese take out for supper tonight. I mentioned to my buddy at work that that was my plans for supper. "Where you going? The place next to Food Lion (Food Tiger if your from Cherokee)?" "Yeah, it's on my way home", I replied. "Chow Meow? Is that what the call it?" He was being serious...Actually it's called New China. But, commonly referred to as the little Chinese restaurant, the new Chinese restaurant...I suppose that we'll start calling it Chow Meow now...That kinda sounded neat.
It's like the old man that said Food Tiger, you know he was meaning Food Lion. Which, sells diet Cran- Pomegranate juice now. Only place in town that does. So, I had Chow Meow and diet Cran-Pomegranate juice. My buddy made mention that Chinese food doesn't fill him up. That's what I wanted. Twister refuses to eat it before a Bear Hunt, but, has an appetite for Thia food afterward. Isn't that a twist? My buddy would have liked the ribs though. He's from Alabama and those folks do wonders to ribs. The best ribs I've ever had came out of Tuscaloosa Alabama.
Now, someone is going to say the old cat's and Chinese food joke...That is so...Go ahead, pick your own word. My ancestors came from Scotland, they ate Haggis. Big deal.
I was at my Stepsons the other day. My Grandson was watching some little video. It was supposed to teach vocabulary, blah blah blah and multiculturalism...Multiculturalism. Kids are taut to respect pop culture more than anything else these days. They don't even know their own culture.
Dear Mr. Kephart. I just read his book about the people of these Mountains. He painted no pretty picture, and it ain't. He was wrong that people here supported the Union "overwhelmingly". That's a myth. But his discussion of dialect ain't. Allot of what he wrote in that chapter is still alive and some of it...Well, maybe it's hidden in a holler. Terms such as seed, knowed, heared, year in place of years, double and triple negatives will slip from my lips. And, like the Indians that were not allowed to speak their own language in a boarding school, kids today are shamed if they say any of that in wrong company. We use our R's here and we place emphasis on the last syllables of a noun. We speak differently than the people in other regions of our perspective States. Just like Mr. Kephart said.
Eating ethnic and speaking Hill Billy.
The Appalachianist
It's like the old man that said Food Tiger, you know he was meaning Food Lion. Which, sells diet Cran- Pomegranate juice now. Only place in town that does. So, I had Chow Meow and diet Cran-Pomegranate juice. My buddy made mention that Chinese food doesn't fill him up. That's what I wanted. Twister refuses to eat it before a Bear Hunt, but, has an appetite for Thia food afterward. Isn't that a twist? My buddy would have liked the ribs though. He's from Alabama and those folks do wonders to ribs. The best ribs I've ever had came out of Tuscaloosa Alabama.
Now, someone is going to say the old cat's and Chinese food joke...That is so...Go ahead, pick your own word. My ancestors came from Scotland, they ate Haggis. Big deal.
I was at my Stepsons the other day. My Grandson was watching some little video. It was supposed to teach vocabulary, blah blah blah and multiculturalism...Multiculturalism. Kids are taut to respect pop culture more than anything else these days. They don't even know their own culture.
Dear Mr. Kephart. I just read his book about the people of these Mountains. He painted no pretty picture, and it ain't. He was wrong that people here supported the Union "overwhelmingly". That's a myth. But his discussion of dialect ain't. Allot of what he wrote in that chapter is still alive and some of it...Well, maybe it's hidden in a holler. Terms such as seed, knowed, heared, year in place of years, double and triple negatives will slip from my lips. And, like the Indians that were not allowed to speak their own language in a boarding school, kids today are shamed if they say any of that in wrong company. We use our R's here and we place emphasis on the last syllables of a noun. We speak differently than the people in other regions of our perspective States. Just like Mr. Kephart said.
Eating ethnic and speaking Hill Billy.
The Appalachianist
posted by Hill Billy Rave | Wednesday, February 17, 2010
8 Comments:
I like it. I'm a fan of regional dialects in general and the mountain colloquialisms in particular. I still accidentally call lunch dinner and dinner supper because of the boy I dated in college.
I've got a West Virginia one for you. My grandparents are from a little town called Nitro somewhere close to Charleston. And my grandmother tells me to 'poosh' the door closed after I get something out of the fridge.
And maybe I'm weird, but I think I would try cat if given the option. It's all just meat on feet. Apparently, Peru has a big festival where they eat cat. They also eat guinea pigs, supposed to be a delicacy. Maybe Pet Smart for your next dinner? ; )
I'm Traveling-Ed's pop. Graduated "Cow College" in Raleigh a long time ago. All my mom's relatives were from the Tenn, NC, GA area. My G'mom said she lived in three states and never moved more'n ten miles. Mom was from Blue Ridge, Ga. Her birth place was so far back in a holler you had to walk in or ride a mule. G'mom was born in Cherokee, NC. I think she was probably a little bit Cherokee. All my mom's family and her uncles family moved to Gaston County to work in the cotton mills back in the late 20's.
Loved to hear G'mom and HER mother talk. I heered some real mountain folk talkin. Miss them all.
Follow your blog some. Don't let the flatlanders take over.
OK, didn't expect to see my dad commenting here. Guess the link on my blog works.
Southern people cannot place my accent,other than to know it is somehow southern. Has to do with moving all over the Southeast, first with my folks and then with my Uncle Sam. All the regional differences were pretty much coexisting peacefully. Until the 10 years spent living with a Louisiana girl. Then it got all corruptred up after that.
pipsqueak, I drove through Nitro a couple of times. I always thought to take a picture of a place called Nitro, but there wasn't much to it, as I recall. Though it may have just been my route. As I recall of my trips through WV, there was a lot more up a hill and down a hill than there was of anything else. Like you were driving 250 miles for every 100 miles of progress.
Murf, I'm paralleling dialect to language. Ebonics, as you want to say...Well, that's dialect. And, it's far different from Southern Appalachian dialect. Dialect is all over America, something you big city folks just can't understand. You'll don't know nothing ;)
Pippy, ought to have known you were a dialect fan. being the anthropology thing and all. Those language Nazis have changed it, at least on line, but Websters defined Dinner as the noon meal. I've got some non mountain co workers I confuse with saying dinner break.
I've heard of Nitro.
One of my guys in Reserves used to have a Bolivian GF and he has had guinea pig.
Ole Engineer, come right in and set right down. I don't know allot of that areas, but a little. Blue Ridge Ga, Ranger NC...Ocoee River, Valley River. I drive past there once in a while. Ranger is probably about the furthest zip code in NC.
Yeah, "heered" is an Appalachiaism. "I heered it comin down at me and I pulled the hammer back an let her drop, kilt it dead".
Ed, I see my dad in the oddest places too...Like...here...Ol, Uncle Sam will corrupt you. He messed with my accent. Toyed with my dialect. Those Louisiana folks, I have a time keeping up with them. my Brother...Who possesses some Mountain Dialect, but not as much as me, is having to keep up with them now. He's closer to Arkansas and Texas. Says that folks there associate with them as much as anywhere.
But...Rock N Roll story. Back when 3 Doors Down came out with the Super Man stuff, I saw them on TV. I said to my Ex, then Live in GF, that they were from a Gulf State. Not La, but maybe Bama or Miss. Sure enough, they were from Mississippi.
It's plumb warm in Ga! I saw a pretty girl in shorts and a tank top. A real eye pleasure. It's been so cold and wet, snowey with ice back home. Maybe the snow at my place is getting melted off today.
You a granddad?
I take it you're reading "Our Southern Highland?" I don't remember the part of him talking about the support for the Union, but I always thought that the support for it came from north of there, in the Watagua basin of W NC and E TN. Its been a few years since I read the book.
sage, the day I flew home from Iraq, my Stepson and his wife had a son. He's 2 1/2. Smart as a whip too.
I done read it, Sage. He talked about it in "Who are the Mountaineers?" Yeah, part of Watauga was Union and about every County had an enclave of Union Sympathizers. Or people that just got pissed off about both sides, because no one liked Northerners or the war time tax. after al, one thing that drove the South to secede was a tax.
Numbers wise, allot more volunteered for the Confederate Army, than the Union.
Tennessee? I don't know what their problem was.
I'm surprised no one mentioned the mountain delicacy . . . , and I am not going to either. Anyway, I like this here "writin'" because folks try to remember and record what they know. I am not sure that there is a "proper" way to say anything. I may have mentioned looking at some papers of my high school buddy's grandpa . . . now I said "grandpa," I have to go back three grandpas to get to that Waaar, and noticing he being from around Kingsport, Tennessee, had applied for an army pension having fought in the Waaaar . . . and trying to get a US Army pension. He was one of three in the county that enlisted in the Union Army from his county. The rest were right minded and joined the Confederates as did most of the Cherokee in the area around Cherokee, North Carolina. I ain't talked to his grandson since. I ain't never . . . :>) Apps right about them Union folks. They was everywhere. Bill App, we missed you at our get together in Spartenburg. Know you were busy. . . Col was there as were 15 total . . . no cat meat that I know of . . . Golden Corral . . . still like the Twin Dragon in Brevard we might not have known everything we were eating. Take care. Bill
Yeah, Bill, I missed it. If I wasn't at Drill, I'd been working the house any how. I've got mud for a drive way and limbs down all over the yard.
Twin Dragons is alright, but it ain't as good as it once was. Or, we done got used to it one.
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