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The UK has an incredible amount of accent variation. Look at the size of us compared to somewhere like North America, and we easily have more accents/dialects. The reason is probably because we have had thousands of years to form this language of ours, and in that time we have formed many individual eccentricities in our language which in some parts of the UK vary from town to town. The Americans on the other hand were all Europeans who flocked to the states and needed to adopt a common language, so they used English. Since then, they've had barely a couple of hundred years to establish variations. Sure Texans and New Yorkers might sound different, but I've never met an American I can't understand, and those places are like a thousand miles apart! I've met Scousers, Glaswegians, Cockneys, and even people from my own area (Geordies) that I don't understand! And they are all only a few hours drive away at the most.
Just like you, I can't understand cockney rhyming slang either. If someone asked me for the Duke of Kent, I'd be like WTF? Yet according to goldenarmZ' link it means "rent". You have to be a cockney to understand that basically. If you watch the movie "lock stock and two smoking barrels" (a great British film, I recommend it as one of my all-time favourites) they use subtitles for the dialogue in an East London pub because it's impossible to understand 
I'm quite used to toning down my accent quite considerably, because I simply wouldn't survive in London let alone abroad if I spoke to everyone in thick geordie dialect. I learnt this the hard way on my first trip to London, even buying a bag of chips was an aural ordeal! I also had an American girl once ask me if I speak English when I tried to give her directions in London. That was when I realised I really need to turn it down. I can make myself understood to foreigners no problem but it's quite tiresome!
If you want some British translations, here are some useful sites on the net:
London, South-East England
http://members.fortunecity.co.uk/rc...ockney_faq.html - the language of the "Cockneys", wide-mouthed geezers from London with a very thick accent. Cockney rhyming slang, as it is known. You'll mainly only hear this sort of thing in the East end of London I think. In East London they hate nerdy words like "cop", they use words like "the filth". Londoners cannot say the letter R, it becomes a letter W, and clean (not rude) language is a physical impossibility. Ask a Londoner to say 'horrorist' and it produces funny results! People from one end of London think the other end is the other side of the world.
Newcastle (known as 'the toon'), North-East England
http://www.geordiepride.demon.co.uk/dictionary.htm - the language of the "Geordies", a bizzarre people from the North, weened on Newcastle Brown Ale and always up for a fight. Newcastle is an isolated city by British standards, and the North of England has been kind of shat on in history from both the North (the bloody Scots who we fought off for centuries, and who now get more money thn England!) and the South (who have traditionally neglected the hard-working North of England which made this country industrially so mighty). So there exists a kind of North/South divide in England. Some historians suggest the geordie dialect comes from an old form of Scandinavian. We were invaded by the Vikings (who were barbarians from Norway, maybe that explains why people here can't feel the cold) and they brought with them an odd dialect which Newcastle never really progressed from. Some people reckon thats a load of bollocks though!
Liverpool, Mid-West England
www.whoohoo.co.uk - the language of the "Scousers". These people will nick all of your money, your clothes, your possessions, kick you in, and to add insult to injury, they'll waddle off like penguins with it all! This has some Welsh influences (the Welsh language, by the way, is virtually allergic to vowels!). Like the Scots, they have difficulty with the letter R, it becomes a bit like an L.
There are loads more in England, Scotland and Ireland but I can't be arsed to explain them all.
Visit www.whoohoo.co.uk it is adialect translator, it covers all kinds of British accents, and has now added some Irish ones too. It's a great site, but translators don't work very well for obvious reasons, just like English - Spanish translators. In geordie, for example, much of our word construction is different and it's very difficult to keep up to date with British slang which changes all the time. It's got to be one of the best sites out there though.
Last edited by evil_bastard on Nov-24-2002 at 03:39
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Cockney for foreigners
For example... there's this British TV show that I like to watch called "As if" and I realised that without the subtitles, it's really hard to understand some of the stuff they say. Also, I have don't understanding many things Chris Liberator says in his tunes (What does "it's f*cking ave it ere" mean!?)... this "alternative" English sounds a lot cooler, so I'd like some tips on it. For example, when should I ignore the consonants (such as "h" and "t") and stuff like that 
By the wa, that "woohoo" page is class 
(and the rhyming thing is very entertaining... and confusing 
) So, cockneys would pronounce "right" as if it were "white"? That's weally weird 
Also, what does "to be arsed" mean? 
