Check out how this Brit-influenced Bollywood review reads in American English:
[Salaam Namaste] has a frothy first half and an emotion-filled second half with the climax that warms the very cockles of your heart. And, as a bonus, there is a cameo by Abhishek Bachchan at the fag end. [Link]
Someone needs to take a rubber to the end of that review. It’s the kind of movie review-cum-double entendre which I’d never plunge into. At least not without a safe word.
Not that Americans don’t do the same, only it’s intentional. Ang Lee’s new gay cowboy Western is entitled Brokeback Mountain. The subtlety of the encoding is truly humbling. Heath Ledger and Donnie Snarko stare longingly at each other for the entire length of the trailer, but heaven forbid that they act. The love that dare not, is the wet sari that must not.
I say let the rainbow flag fly. Bollywood has long repaid the compliment.
Fag is British slang for a cigarrette – it just means the ash and stuff at the end of a fag.
In India too. ‘Fag’ is universally used as slang for a cigarrette. No homosexual connotations whatsoever.
R
to continue what PB added – fag end means towards the end. Its frequently used in sporting commentaries such as cricket where they talk about the fag end of an innings.
“Fagged” in India also means tired i.e. “I’m fagged out”.
You forgot “cockles” …. someone did this on purpose. I just know it.
Manish must have been a big fan of Benny Hill.
He’d probably love Graham Norton too…Not necessarily in the Biblical sense, of course….Dammit, he’s got me doing it as well now 😉