[Mihalic] dumb piano definition
John Burton
john.burton at anu.edu.au
Fri Dec 3 17:45:01 EST 2004
Welcome, Pat.
How about getting some of your mates along? Stikim ol.
Re piano definition, it (and the unmentionable 'mixmasta' one I suppose) is
worth tracking down just to see whether anything sociological is revealed.
I'd hazard that the piano one dates to the late 1920s/1930s, though I'm not
sure why. Weird and wonderful things were flown to Wau from 1927, such as
race horses, by miners with more money than sense. (The descendants of the
horses live at Winima.) There were n pubs and logically n pianos (where 10 <
n < 20). There were undoubtedly pianos in Moresby, but no TP. There were
probably pianos in Rabaul and Madang, but surely not so many larrikins to
make up TP jokes or mishear their barmen (Yali, war hero and 1945-50 cult
leader, was employed at a Wau pub in 1926).
John Burton
> This is my first contribution, after having my name down below so long.
> This was one of Frank Mihalic's
> favourite stories about Tok Pisin. I always had the
> impression it was more of a white man's make-up story than
> anything that was used on a regular basis. Clearly it is not
> a term, but a description.
>
> Pat Gesch
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