Sounds like...

Don't know about you, but whenever I come across a new language, I like to get nasty and learn all the fruity stuff. Feck, I remember cursing my head off within a few days of arriving in Tel Aviv, much to the delight, and then horror, of my private tutor/Israeli girlfriend*.

So, lots of cursing in Arabic, less in Hebrew (why is that? Hebrew sucks for the profanity-prone). Anyway, recently I heard the father-in-law cursing something new in Arabic, "manoosh". After asking him what it meant, I was met with a deathly silence. mrs. anglosaxy glared at me. After being slapped across the back of my legs, I was quietly informed of its meaning. Which made me smile even more.

Trouble is, what with watching some of the World Cup, I've been reminded constantly of this word whenever Portugal play. A certain player, called Maniche, is automatically raising a laugh whenever I hear him mentioned. When he went down like he'd been shot in the kneecaps against Ingerlund on Saturday [ cries again into his beer ], my "that fecking manoosh" seemed very appropriate.

And no, I'm not telling you what it means. Go get yourself an Arab speaker.

* Yeh, I got acquainted with the locals pretty bloody sharpish - did I ever tell you the story of my meeting a girl here on the beach after only one hour in Israel, and then spending the next 6 years with her...? Oooh, if it hadn't been done before, I would be tempted to tell a yarn or two about just why I'm here...