Offshoreism of the day

[OwlHoot]

I thought the verb meant to hint or say subtly. ...

It does mean exactly that (if we're still talking about the verb "intimate").

[SueEllen]

Innit, bruv.

Nah you just teach them to say

******* init bruv

[vetran]

So:
It was you making the mistake, not him.
You assert that this guy worships a Donkey (your capital D no doubt added for importance of said donkey)

I was suggesting that I was less skilled than him.

[vetran]

He laughed at a non-Brit for using a word, correctly, in a way that he didn't know. When it was pointed out, instead of admitting he got it wrong, he continued to justify himself. That really is execrable behaviour.

Rubbish. It's an entirely normal word which educated people will know. It might not be used every day (or at all in the Daily Mail), but it's certainly not archaic or obscure. For all you know, it is in daily use in India - they have a tendency to use more formal terms in written communications.

edit:
And it turns out the usage is common in Indian English. here we have it from the horse's mouth.

2. Intimate

In India, there is a rather unusual usage of this word in the context of informing or notifying someone, which connotes common ancestry with “revert”. “Once I revert, I will intimate you” can be intimidating to handle, we imagine.

so its an Indian Englishism. Pretty much what I said.

Thankyou.

[OwlHoot]

so its an Indian Englishism. Pretty much what I said.

Thankyou.

But "I will intimate you" in that sense is ungrammatical in British English. It would be more correct to say "I will intimate to you".

But no British person would say that on its own these days as it sounds absurdly quaint and precious. They might at a pinch say something like "My boss intimated to me off the record that I'd have a decent bonus this year, but I won't find out officially until next week."

[BlasterBates]

But "I will intimate you" in that sense is ungrammatical in British English. It would be more correct to say "I will intimate to you".

But no British person would say that on its own these days as it sounds absurdly quaint and precious. They might at a pinch say something like "My boss intimated to me off the record that I'd have a decent bonus this year, but I won't find out officially until next week."

The offshore gentleman said "he will intimate when it is done", which is perfectly correct.

[northernladyuk]

Apparently he will 'Intimate' when done.

made me chuckle, I would probably insult their God or Donkey if I tried to speak Hindi.

He laughed at a non-Brit for using a word, correctly, in a way that he didn't know. When it was pointed out, instead of admitting he got it wrong, he continued to justify himself. That really is execrable behaviour.

Rubbish. It's an entirely normal word which educated people will know. It might not be used every day (or at all in the Daily Mail), but it's certainly not archaic or obscure. For all you know, it is in daily use in India - they have a tendency to use more formal terms in written communications.

edit:
And it turns out the usage is common in Indian English. here we have it from the horse's mouth.

2. Intimate

In India, there is a rather unusual usage of this word in the context of informing or notifying someone, which connotes common ancestry with “revert”. “Once I revert, I will intimate you” can be intimidating to handle, we imagine.

The offshore gentleman said "he will intimate when it is done", which is perfectly correct.

There was certainly no suggestion from the original post that the verb was treated as a transitive verb.

[Gibbon]

The offshore gentleman said "he will intimate when it is done", which is perfectly correct.

But its not good English idiom, and idiom is important for clarity; which why there are hundreds of English born post grads employed on TEFL courses around the world. English has few rules which makes it very hard for non-native speakers to learn the correct idiom.

For instance we would never say "He seemed to be a very annoyed policeman", we would say "The policeman seemed to be very annoyed".

[OwlHoot]

The offshore gentleman said "he will intimate when it is done", which is perfectly correct.

Yup, assuming he meant "indicate or hint confidingly" rather than just a synonym for "indicate" or "inform".

[NotAllThere]

Once you get used to speaking to foreigners, you make allowances for strange idioms, and different English usage. vetran's example was just sillyness on his part, combined with an apparent (and obviously massively misplaced) sense of superiority.

I was once asked how the snow had been for my ski holiday. I replied it was a bit mushy - when my (German) boss didn't understand, I looked up the word for "mushy" in German, and tried that. She went quite pink and started laughing. She wouldn't tell me what I'd said that was so funny.

Turned out it is a slang word that means the same as when a woman might be described as "wet".