Saturday, January 14, 2012

Confusing Crapauds

Bogans in Australian parks like to muck around there late at night.

Presumably this is because none of them have homes decent or large enough to host parties in or, most likely, they'd rather do their depraved activities and leave their filth where someone else has to clean it up.

American author John Zeaman describes them as Shadow People; never seen by regular folk but identified only by what they leave behind.

Classic examples of Shadow People (aka Bogan)'s rubbish includes beer bottles (invariably smashed), crushed cans, syringes, Maccas wrappers and urine.

Milly regularly snuffled up free bonus feeds from left-over Red Rooster chicken bones, discarded Krazy Kebab wrappers and the occasional spilt thick shake that had solidified during its downward slide into the gutter.

Here in Geneva, the parks too are the favoured haunts of the Swiss-French Shadow People/Bogans, who we'll call Crapauds to distinguish them from their US and Antipodean counterparts.

Crapauds in our park leave behind iced tea boxes, mandarin peels, boulangerie bags and exploded fireworks.

Free food for Milly this morning was half an apple, several stale baguettes and a sly lick of an upended bottle of Guinness.

I'm yet to decide what conclusions to draw.

23 comments:

Christine said...

It's at the car-park outside Coles here in Bendigo where you will find these creatures of the night. The lads drive big, shiny utes using a technique I call 'touch steering' - one finger on the wheel while their cars slink around corners on low slung, big fat wheels. There is always a girl(ute chick) with multicoloured, dead straight hair, who wears a mini,mini skirt (ruffled), black top ( plunging and several sizes smaller). bare legs and feet decorated with faux diamante flip-flops. By morning these creatures have disappeared. Only food wrappings and smashed bottles of bundy and coke betray their presence. Or bottles intact discreetly nestled by the public toilet wall. Interesting to learn that this is not just an Australian phenomenon.

Plastic Mancunian said...

Bonjour Kath,

Not heard of a Bogan - but I like the word.

We get them in the UK too. Not sure what we call them though - I might try to introduce "Bogan" (if it doesn't already exist - though I also like Crapaud too).

:0)

Cheers

PM

Kath Lockett said...

....and what glamorous locations they choose, Christine: shopping centres, bus shelters and parks!

....even in the middle of winter - alcohol has surely proved itself to be brilliant at making the drinker impervious to cold.

Elephant's Child said...

And what is it about the tunnels at railway stations to get you to the other platform. I swear that they must hire people to piddle in them - it couldn't smell like that with just accidental exposure. Could it? I am sort of pleased to hear that it isn't just an Oz phenomenom, but also sad that bogans/crapuads/oxygen thieves exist everywhere. Though judging by the number of used condoms they are not planning on breeding which is a big plus.

Katrina said...

In my small town it's the small central park where they use the playground and small skate park (and the public toilet block is there) they young 'ferals are there in their hotted up cars, usually hear the revving of engines and the squeeling of tyres and the young underage girls play on the playground waiting to be awarded the ultimate...to be selected by one of the boys/men to go for a ride and goodness knows what else in a car. The boys who either don't have a car or are too young to have a car, bring their skate boards and display their talent in the park...and of course we have the drug deals that go down..whatever you want can be supplied....oh and lets not forget the most important thing...who gets to do the drive (100km round trip) to get McDonald's for everyone

Hannah said...

Ugh, citrus fruits? The European bogans are clearly more evil.

River said...

Judging by the litter left behind the Crapauds are clearly "up-market" bogans.

There must have been a bogan or two around here last night, one female of the species wandered up and down the drive through driveway shouting at the top of her marijuana hoarse voice from about 11pm to 2am, then this morning when I went out to buy the paper I saw smashed bottles on the footpath. I kicked the glass shards into a pile near a tree, since I didn't want any old people stumbling over them as they wandered past with their zimmers.

Red Nomad OZ said...

So is what your 'crapauds' leave behind considered 'detritus'?? If so, then I must concur with River!!! Maybe there's an island somewhere we could conduct a social experiment (aka 'reality TV show') and put the crapauds and bogans together!!

Kath Lockett said...

PlasMan, I think that 'Chav' is the British equivalent of Bogan.

And 'crapaud' is 'toad' in French but so very appropriate.

Yes, public urination must be in the Crapaud/Bogan/Chav/Shadow Peoples' job description, E-Child. No condoms found here (yet) in our local park but one in our very own garden and I was horrified to see Milly sniff it and then pick it up her mouth. A bit of ineffectual wrestling ensued before she gave it up and I hurried scooped it up in the doggy doo bag.... ~shudder~

Perfectly summed up, Katrina. It's particularly sad to see the feral females in the picture, thinking that these boneheads are the catches of the day.

Hannah, we're talking mandarins, clementines, oranges and my favourite word in French - pamplemousse (grapefruit).

I think you're right, River, but I do wonder if the tougher stuff might come out when the weather improves....?

Write up a treatment, RedNomadOz, and you could be onto a winner. After all, if British TV can have 'Best Junior Butcher' as a TV series, then surely more of us would watch 'Clash of the Crapauds on Corfu island' instead?

Jackie K said...

Hmm, one is tempted to (no doubt wrongly) conclude that Swiss bogans are a bit classier than Aussie bogans, with the boulangerie bags and all (but the fireworks?!)
In our area they hang out at the kids' park at the end of my street, leave ciggies and smashed beer bottles, and drawings of, shall we say, optimistically-sized genitalia on the kids' slide. Noice.

Wally The Walrus said...

Red Nomad Oz: We alrady have such TV shows. They are called Survivor, and Big Bruvver.

As they take their muscle cars screaming up and down the hill near me late at night, I just hope they will prang into a tree (not hurting somebody else) and kill themselves. Cleans the muck out of the shallow end of gene pool.

Kath Lockett said...

JackieK, you've made me realise that we haven't seen too many willy drawings here. I think because of the glut of nudey rudey statues about the place, we're faced with seeing the dangly bits everywhere we go anyway.

Ah Wally, maybe just compulsory sterilisation is the answer, so we don't get any more 'em?

Jayne said...

Guinness?!
Milly must be in touch with her inner Irish Red Setter by now lol.

diane b said...

Sounds like you have upmarket bogans in Geneva. I must be lucky as unlike your other commenters, I don't have a story about seeing any aftermath of bogan activity in my neighbourhood. On the other hand our city of Logan has a large proportion of bogans living here and consequently we all get labelled as being "Logan Bogans" which irks me a little but I can't help a chuckle at the rhyme.
Love the pic. I saw one crap on the footpath yesterday and the human on the other end of the lead didn't pick it up. She is a Logan Bogan.

Kath Lockett said...

There's an Irish pub on the far corner of the park, so I suspect that a reveller wandered home via a quick whizz in the bushes and then forgot where they put their beer....

Logan Bogan does have a nice ring to it, Dianeb and yes, your delinquent dog owner is very deserving of the title.

Vanessa said...

Exploded fireworks??? Are there fireworks going off all the time? While drinking iced tea?

Baino said...

Hmmm sound like a posh bunch. Boguns would be leaving brown paper bags, bottles and heroin needles. I love that everything sounds so much better in French. Even Abattoir has a nice ring to it.

Jackie K said...

That's funny about the lack of willy drawings Kath. Sounds like with all the naked statues in Europe the graffiti-ists have no more to offer in that department so they don't bother! Pretty funny.

JahTeh said...

Totally off topic here but they were giving away free samples at San Churro today so you were in my thoughts dear Kath as I shroomed the new choc delight into my non-bogan gob.

Kath Lockett said...

We do hear a few whizzes and bangs, Vanessa. Usually on a Friday or Saturday night after twelve....

Could be something in that, JackieK. Festoon public areas with statues featuring genitalia and the crudely drawn graffiti versions no longer appear?

Oh JahTeh, I long for a mug of their 'so thick it's evil' hot chocolate and their 'tasting plate' !

Anji said...

Wow! Guiness!

Helen Balcony said...

We have many crapauds in Cruikshank Park, Kath. There are a few car parks there but there is a particular one which seems to be favoured by people to drop Macca's wrappers, drink containers, the cardboard things the Maccas is carried in, entire car ashtrays-full of butts... I'm speechless sometimes looking at the mess. Some people have built a very swanky house on half of a pre-existing block and the council has let them cut a new driveway into the parking lot which means they should have a panoramic view of the park, or so they hope, unfortunately they will have a panoramic view of burping, swearing, stinky-Maccas munching, drunken smoking arguing crapauds.

We had an argument outside our bedroom window late last year. CRAIG!! CRAIG!!!!! I'VE HAD ENOUGH I'M GOING BACK TO BALLARAT!!!1!

Kath Lockett said...

Anji, I think there are a few homesick Irish UN folk in town.

Ah Helen Balcony, we had the same sort of Late Night Discussions in our street in Flemington too. Always sprinkled with a liberal amount of Go Fuck Yourselfs and, if Mr Divvy Van was involved, YOU'RE DUMPED!