Gud on youse

In an article entitled: ‘Culubrating thu daggiest ick-cent of all’ Clare Barry writes for The Age: “Back in the ‘7s, when John Clarke called himself Fred Dagg and got around in a black singlet singing, ‘If it weren’t for your gumboots where would you be?’, I was a simple-hearted New Zealand schoolgirl with no idea that I had an ick-cent. My first inkling of the New Zealand ick-cent came in the ‘8s, when the Miss World and Miss Universe beauty pageant screenings were compulsory viewing for my sister and I. Miss New Zealand stepped up for her 15 seconds at the mike: ‘Gud evening, I hail from Noo Zulund un the Sith Pucifuc …’ Say what? Why’s she talking so weird? Has someone sewn her lups together? Lately, however, I’ve been putting [my accent] back on. Because like high-waist jeans and black-rimmed nerd specs, Earth’s daggiest accent is sunning itself in a rare moment of cool. Call it the Conchord effect … It’s fresh and funny and, coincidence or not, since the Conchords’ unadulterated ‘Kiwish’ hit Australian television a couple of years ago, screens and airwaves here have been humming with strangled vowels.”