Being homeless is no fun. First, you have to sleep on the street, subject to all sorts of bad weather, crime, abusive cops, and abuse from strangers. Second, you have no money and neither do your friends. This means you have to spend most of your day walking up to tourists and saying, “Dej mi cigo”, while gesturing with two fingers toward your mouth.
But the worst part of being homeless is that you have to listen to young people describe you with new words, or “neologisms”. There are two relatively new terms in the Czech language describing these unfortunates. The first is a slangy shortening of “bezdomovci” to “bezdaci”. The second is a wonderful portmanteau, combining Czech and English together to make the mellifluous, “bezhomici”.
Still, no matter what you call them, and regardless of whether you give them a smoke, being homeless here or anywhere else is just no fun at all.
I assumed, before I read your article, that it must be a Czech amalgamation of bez + homo. ie a male person without a man.
Or is more subtle than that and carries the secondary meaning that if you are without a roof over your head then you are „unmanned“, meaning either robbed of your humanity or your manhood.
Bezdomovec, houmlesák, člověk bez střechy nad hlavou. Stačí krátkodobý výpadek soudnosti a kdokoliv může spadnout do této kategorie lidí na dně. Mnozí z bezdomovců mají zjevně změněnou psychiku a potřebovali by léčbu. Jsme bohatá, vyspělá společnost a přitom bezdomovců přibývá. S vyspělostí asi roste i sobeckost, nezájem o osud jiných. Velmi si proto vážím těch, kdo dokáží být solidární s potřebnými.
„Houmlesak“ another anglicism enters the Czech language. For your word of the day pleasure, here are the words to a song you all know:
Genesis – Another Day In Paradise Lyrics
She calls out to the man on the street
’sir, can you help me?
It’s cold and I’ve nowhere to sleep,
Is there somewhere you can tell me? ’
He walks on, doesn’t look back
He pretends he can’t hear her
Starts to whistle as he crosses the street
Seems embarrassed to be there
Oh think twice, it’s another day for
You and me in paradise
Oh think twice, it’s just another day for you,
You and me in paradise
She calls out to the man on the street
He can see she’s been crying
She’s got blisters on the soles of her feet
Can’t walk but she’s trying
Oh think twice…
Oh lord, is there nothing more anybody can do
Oh lord, there must be something you can say
You can tell from the lines on her face
You can see that she’s been there
Probably been moved on from every place
’cos she didn’t fit in there
Oh think twice…
Jeden můj známý, který strávil několik let v L.A., si vypůjčil americké slovo „bum“ a říká jim „bumáci“. :/
How would you modify the following terms?
Hobo: Hobokak?
Layabout: Lejaboutaci?
Scumbag: Skumbak?
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xevfb_phil-collins-another-day-in-paradis
Fredovi, brňáci by řekli hoboš, lajeboš a skumboš….