Sunday, January 11, 2009

From The USA Phrasebook: The Difference Between Northern And Southern California

More interesting reading:
A single word neatly demarcates North from South: 'hella', an intensifier which means very or really, as in 'she's hella cool'. Southern Californians know the term, which easily identifies someone from the Bay Area, but never use it. (A variant is 'hecka', but avoid it if possible.) 'Hella's' East Coast correlate is Boston's 'wicked' which has spread to some degree throughout New England (Mainers use it). In Boston you can say something is wicked, period; in Berkeley or Moraga or surrounding areas of the Bay Area, the word cannot stand alone.

Meanwhile people from SoCal convey their general disdain for the North by commonly referring to the area as NoCal instead of NorCal. 'Grippa' is a sometimes-heard SoCal term meant to deride the NorCal 'hella'. It is used in the same way as hella, but in a condescending or sarcastic manner: 'Being from NoCal is grippa cool' - not.

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