I’m sure I’ve mentioned it here before but I tutor a friend’s step-son with his English. Like many 13 year olds, he listens to hip hop and rap music. Most of it is in English so he doesn’t really understand what is being said. Every once in a while he asks me what some some of the common hip hop vernacular means. This week we discussed “hood”, “homey”, “sucka” and “bling”.

The first three were easy to explain, but bling was difficult. In order to explain it to someone who is just starting to learn English you have to break it down to the basic concepts and build up from there.

I’m not sure he got it. I was laughing because I thought it was surreal having to explain the concept of Bling Bling and blingin’ to someone. Maybe I will give him the Hip Hoptionary for his birthday.

Fo’ shizzle, mah nizzle.