LONDON — If you understand ‘Roon up they ahpples and grahb some beys, we’re ruhnning out of bayrd’ — or rather, ‘Run up the apples and grab some bees, we’re running out of bird’ — you will have absolutely no problem beating the language barrier prominent in the United Kingdom.

Technically there is no language barrier, considering our cousins across the pond are also fond of the English language. But technicalities aside, their English is by no means our English.

Beneath the endearing British accent is a mess of language mutilation that might as well constitute this island’s language as something straight out of Chewbacca’s furry mouth.

Between deep accents similar to the first quoted sentence of this article and a centuries-old phenomenon called rhyme slang exemplified in both quotes, the language barrier in the U.K. is nothing short of gargantuan.

Americans tend to associate British accents with sophistication and proper manners, which is certainly how the entertainment industry has chosen to showcase it. Think Spice Girls or Lindsay Lohan (pre-cocaine addiction) in ‘The Parent Trap.’ Those accents, however, are far from typical of the everyday Brit.

While grabbing coffee at my local Starbucks, the woman behind the counter asked, ‘Would you fancy anything else?’ Fairly standard question. However, allow me to rephrase. What she really asked was, ‘Wooyd yer fahn-say eh-nay-fin eylss?’

My under-caffeinated brain took that to mean, ‘Word’s your pants, they are nothing else.’

Well, how dare you talk about my pants? And yes, you’re quite correct, British barista: They are nothing else, just standard pants.

After repeating herself two times, I finally got the gist that she was saying something about my order and not my attire.

If it’s not the accent that digs the hole of dissimilarity, it’s the British lexicon itself. For example, rhyme slang, as exemplified in the beginning of the article.

If you’ve seen the film ‘Green Street Hooligans’ (and if you haven’t, you should drop this article right now and go watch it — really, go), you’ve had a taste of this playful language adaptation. To achieve rhyme slang, take a well-known phrase or reference, rhyme the second part of it with a common word, and use the first part of the phrase synonymously with the common word.

Suddenly I feel unsophisticated with my American canon of ‘abreevs.’

Short crash course: apples and pears = stairs, but is referred to as apples; bees and honey = money, referred to as bees; bird and lime = time — well, I trust you’re catching the flow of things.

So if you ever visit London and hear something along the lines of, ‘He loves to get in bulls when he’s Brahms,’ you might want to go to a different pub because the man described likes to fight when he’s intoxicated (bull and cow = row, or a fight; Brahms and Liszt = pissed, or drunk).

Besides the complex and beloved art of rhyme slang, the words used here are just different. The crosswalk is a zebra, the elevator is a lift, the sidewalk is called pavement. No, it really doesn’t get any more literal.

I don’t feel so badly about my ‘abreevs’ anymore. At least Americans are creative enough to call the place they park the driveway and the place they drive the parkway. Take that, you literal cheeky Brits.

Just remember, if you’re going to scarper to the U.K., make sure to rabbit like the locals and to wear your weasel. I’ll let you figure that out on your own.

Jessica Smith is a junior information studies and technology and television, radio and film major. Her column appears weekly, and she can be reached jlsmit22@syr.edu.

Published on September 26, 2010 at 12:00 pm