Jamaican Translation

This page is dedicated to my man Paul Hand, who up until a few months ago had no culture in him what so ever. The only Black or Asian people Paul ever seen were on TV and even then he thought it was special a effect. After months of training and getting the piss taken out of him Paul is now at his final step in being a fully cultured human being (once he gets his hair cut). So here you go Paul you have 3 days to learn Patois (PATWA) = Jamaican Slang)

Lesson 1

Batty = backside or anus

Batty-Bwoy or Batty Man = homosexual man (as of this writing, Dec 2001, homosexuality is still illegal in Jamaica!)

Batty Riders = short shorts or thong undies, usually worn by women

Marga = skinny or thin, from meager

chu deh, chu yah, chu dat = look there, look here, look at that

Curse Words: Jamaican curses are dirty rather than religious. Bumbo clowt = a cloth to wipe your bum with.

Raas! A half-nasty swear word, from the Rastafarian dialect, but a rasta would never say
it! Raas! is kind of like 'dammit!' or 'For christ's sake!" in english.

fi is 'to be' or 'to have' or 'for', 'a fi me cyar'=that is my car

Lesson 2

	Singular		Plural
1^st person	mi, I	I or me	wi	we or us
2^nd person	yu	you	yu, uno	you, you all
3^rd person	im	he, she, her, him, it (animate)	dem	they, them
	shi	she, her
	har	her
	i’, it, hit	it (inanimate)

Standard English	Variants
thing	t’ing, ting
nothing	nutten, not’n’, notin’
no	nuh, noh, nu
can’t	cyan, cyaan, kaan, kean
(be)cause	caw, cau’, caa
boy	bwoy, bway

Lesson 3

A fe me cyar."

Translation: "It’s my car."

"Mi a —go lef today."

Translation: "I am leaving today."

"Im is badda dan dem. No badda mi."

Translation: "He is worse then they are. Don’t bother me."

"Bwaay! Mi ded tink de test was eazy."

Translation: "Boy! I thought that test would have been easy."

"Is the dutty duppy man dweet."

Translation: "The dirty ghost did it."

"Tek you time an mine it bruk."

Translation: "Take your time, you might break it."