The Off-Color Dictionary of Turkish Slang — Frikik (Free Kick)

Our Off-Color Dictionary got started when our Turkish nephew, Yanki, suggested (back in 1996) that we prepare a page of the most commonly heard Turkish language swear words. If we left them out, he advised, our coverage of ‘Practical Turkish’ would be incomplete. How could Turkish language learners cope, he pressed, without a basic knowledge of everyday Turkish swear words and slang?

And so he persuaded us that you can never get a comprehensive feel for a language unless you are familiar with its off-color slang. (This is especially true of a language like Turkish, in which off-color words may be intermingled with ‘polite’ everyday speech, without the blinking of an eye. The word boktan springs firstly to mind, for example.)

And here’s one of our favorite off-color Turkish colloquialisms…

frikik (free-kick) — when, for example, a woman exits a car in a skirt and accidentally (?) opens her legs to expose her undies, the man who observes the event is said to have been awarded a ‘frikik’. The term originates from the soccer term, Free Kick — and is equally applicable if the man catches a glimpse of exposed breast when a woman accidentally (?) bends over too far in front of him.

As an off-shoot of frikik, there is also:

frikige yatmak — [for a man] to wait in a convenient place to get a frikik; lit. to lay down for a free kick

and

frikik vermek — [for a woman] to award a frikik, on purpose;

lit. to give a free kick

Illustrative Examples:

Hülya Avsar is a favorite Turkish female star of stage, screen, and TV. Besides being personable, talented, and pretty, she’s… ummm…sexy — which just multiplies her legion of fans. And Hülya’s frikik ‘antics’ inspire her sister celebrities — who emulate her, on purpose.

So when actress-model Hande Ataizi began slipping from the celebrity headlines she decided to take action — in the fastest way she knew how… The other night while she was out bar-hopping with her latest flame, she wore a silk micro-mini dress — and upon departing the bar-scene to return home, she gave photographers what they described as “The Frikik (Free-kick) of the Year!“

write by Gideon