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Alamagoozlum
Written by Jimmy
In my household, my mother used the word Azamagoozala. She learned it from her mother in 1930. It is what you say to babies and small children when they get into something they shouldn’t. Rather than shout NO, you shout Azamagoozala – it certainly catches their attention but rather than scare the kid, they turn, stop and then giggle. Really nice.
We assumed it was our word. A little secret phrase belonging only to our family, passed on generation to generation. We used it with our kids and I laugh now as my nieces and nephews use it with their kids. Everyone from about age three can pronouce it and shout it about.
Well, my sister just found out that it exists as a word – the actual word is Alamagoozlum, which was first heard in North America in the mid-1800’s and appears to be a rather strong cocktail. Hmmm. So it seems my family has for 5 generations been shouting at children who are touching fires and knifing hamsters – ‘Margarita. Martini. Whisky Sour! And not even pronouncing it correctly. This explains an awful lot, as I put the knife down and go and fix myself a vodka tonic…
And we even have a nice song for it: