THIS VIRUS REALLY SUCKS……………MacGyver

Sunday evening and we were lounging around in the TV room……me sprawled on the couch and he ensconced in his recliner with the laptop on his knees reading some alarmist blog about how the virus had now grown teeth etc…… when MacGyver comes on. They’re in their office, confined like the rest of us and he says in his MacGyver style, young and gentlemanly……. `this virus really sucks!’ No no no………..I mean the virus does really s…k but I have absolutely no intention of talking about it. What I’d like to talk about is profanity and delicious swear words. Not the virus…… we’ve talked it to death……and it’s still there………..and we’re all so weary…….. like battle worn soldiers. In the first lockdown we were a little lost and panicky and raided the supermarkets for toilet paper, virus killing sprays and swatters etc….and then what we could actually consume. Yiannis…..the husband….. got all fired up and bought, besides the ones mentioned, a huge sack of onions, potatoes, wholemeal pasta so we could eat healthy and loads of tinned milk because…………. those Wuhan bats might spread it to our cows on this sun kissed island of Crete. The onions and potatoes sprouted and the wholemeal pasta never got eaten because I like my gluten and the tinned milk……… it’s still there…….our cows are ok. Then everybody went mad with homemade bread and sharing recipes etc and…….. we all gained a few kilos. After that we marvelled at how nature was repairing itself in our absence………`wow’ they said……. the waters of Venice were so clean that you could see the fish and sea turtles and dolphins  frolicking about in the canals and the Wuhan  skies were never so clear and the birds had come out to sing and in Singapore, the seals came out to bask in the sun and roll about on the marble steps and parks etc etc…………and we all clasped our cheeks and were equally wowed and said ` this is a blessing in disguise ‘ ……….. why are all blessings always in disguise somebody tell me? Then there was a light at the end of the tunnel, so said Fauci……hurray! hurray! the vaccines are coming…….but….. shadowy conspiracy theories poked their sinister heads out and warned us of vaccines that would interfere with our RNA and woe betide….……. and all very cloak and dagger……… inject a chip into us and shadow our every move and thought like Big Brother. Now……. we’re at the end of our tether. Just roll out the bl…..dy vaccines and shadow us if you must……….. we just want to get on with our lives.  

Excusez-moi….. I got carried away there with just a bit of a ramble and a dabble…….but back to profanity, the very timbre of our speech. This takes me back to my childhood with my siblings, on a rubber estate in Malaya which afterwards became Malaysia. It was all very British then………………. ………language, education, civil service, beers, justice, railroads etc…….and swear words. I remember my dad and his buddies slapping on a  bloody and a bugger and a bastard on to third parties. The women used a more subdued repertoire of foul language …….something to do with animals and devils……. and it was always directed at us……………the kids who couldn’t swear back because they’d wash out our mouths with Sunlight soap. So I grew up harbouring a secret ambition……..to bite into the ultimate forbidden fruit………..to interject my utterances with a certain panache…….with a`bloody’ here and a `bloody’ there……..not the other  two `b’s…….much too crude for my delicate taste. I did fulfill my aspirations as soon as I got to Uni and got a huge kick out of blasting third parties to hell with my preferred `b’ word……but never in their faces, mind you, just like my dad and his buddies. Then the whole thing evolved into something more casual, blasé, so very cool, sitting around on a bench in campus………..

` I wouldn’t bloody know what to do with my life…’ I would say, yawning and pretending I was some sort of Virginia Wolfe……. all very bored.

` Me neither….. bloody hell…’ my friend would drawl out.

Then they ruined it all when they brought in the ` f ’ word. Absolutely no finesse…….crude, rough,  and  to your face word. There are Hollywood movies I can’t watch because every other word is the omnipresent ` f ‘. In Greek it’s a ` g ‘ word……..`gamoto’ ……Phew! I actually managed to cough it out. It’s uttered from the back of your tongue and slightly aspirated……a velar sound…..google it if you must. It’s as crass as the ` f ‘ word and it’s a mouthful. It’s too rough for my palate. I prefer the…… ……… ` ah sto kalo ‘. I can’t really translate…….it implies…….`go to hell’………. if you direct it to someone else but if you say it to yourself, it’s like……..` oh shit! ‘. It reminds me of the time when Yiannis’ aunt and I were crossing a side road some very long time ago. This woman driver came out of nowhere and almost swept us away with her and I said……. `ah sto kalo ‘……… in the sense of……..………`oh shit we nearly got killed ‘……… and she threw her head out of the window while still driving like the devil and shouted back at me,…….. ` you go to hell! ‘

But the swear words I like best are the sibilants…..the ` s ‘ words, all nice and hissy….They pack the full punch of of the ` f ‘ word……but so much nicer to the ears. MacGyver says it so well…..and I do agree with him that…..

 this virus really s……ks!

 and if they don’t roll out the vaccines fast……..

 it’ll really be sh……tty!

  and we’ll all be so scr……wed!

Would love to hear your favourite expletives. Feel free to use the hissy words…….and the others……… if you must.