Chimo
Those of you who have read Douglas Copeland's Souvenir of Canada will recognise this word. For those of you who haven't, you should –but in the mean time I'll explain. In the 1970s with the Olympics and Expo, draft-dodgers, Trudeau, bilingual cereal boxes and kicking Soviet hockey ass, Canada-mania reached new, dizzying heights. We were hot hot hot, and we needed a word that was cool. A Canadian word. And that word was "chimo."
Ostensibly, this came from an Innuktitut word meaning “bellbottoms are awesome,” Chimo failed to catch on, and with it, Canada missed its big chance to make a linguistic mark on the world.
I say the time is ripe to bring back “chimo” and kick off another phase Canadia-mania; with all our subversive gay weddings, unlocked doors, nationally-subsidised medicinal marijuana programmes and lesbian witches for abortion, who wouldn’t want to be Canadian these days?
Canada is so chimo!
So let’s all do our part, dialectise ourselves and create a chimo Canadian patois. If we keep it up, soon we’ll be as colourful as our Aussie cousins with all their ‘crikey’ and ‘flaming galahs.’
Go chimo!
Ostensibly, this came from an Innuktitut word meaning “bellbottoms are awesome,” Chimo failed to catch on, and with it, Canada missed its big chance to make a linguistic mark on the world.
I say the time is ripe to bring back “chimo” and kick off another phase Canadia-mania; with all our subversive gay weddings, unlocked doors, nationally-subsidised medicinal marijuana programmes and lesbian witches for abortion, who wouldn’t want to be Canadian these days?
Canada is so chimo!
So let’s all do our part, dialectise ourselves and create a chimo Canadian patois. If we keep it up, soon we’ll be as colourful as our Aussie cousins with all their ‘crikey’ and ‘flaming galahs.’
Go chimo!
6 comments:
Wasn't Ryan Atwood from Chimo....er...ahhh i mean Chino. Nevermind!
There used to be a town in northern Québec called 'Fort Chimo,' but then they changed the name to 'Kuujjuaq' – which is super-easy to say. I vote we change the name back to shore up support for our chimo new Canadian patois.
In fact, I like 'chimo' so much, that I'm going to reorganise my blog labels so that Canadia-related stuff will be labeled thus-wise and international stuff will be labeled under a yet-to-be-chosen designation. Any suggestions?
Incidentally, I don't think Ryan Atwood was from Fort Chimo (but we can pretend he was).
Chimo - that's Sugoi!
I'm considering either "Dorks Gone Wild" or "Neo-Maxi-Zoom-Dweebie" as the new label for all my nerdy posts about international politics, the U.N., and changes in flag dimentions of Central Asian republics.
Any thoughts?
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