What it means
A very Aussie way to say toilet or loo. It started out as the name for the old outside toilet, usually a rough little shed out the back, and now it can mean any toilet at all. It sounds casual, local, and a bit cheeky, with that dusty old-school bush flavour still clinging to it.
Usage examples
"Hang on mate, I'm busting for the dunny, back in two ticks and then we can crack another tinnie by the barbie"
"Pull over at the servo, mate, I have been busting for the dunny since we left the last town."
"The dunny at the campsite was a fair hike in the dark, torch in one hand and fingers crossed."
"Oi, whose turn is it to clean the dunny, because that joint's committed crimes."
"I ducked into the pub and went straight for the dunny before I even ordered a pint."
Where it comes from
Dunny is proper old Australian slang. It goes back to dunakin, a Scots and northern English dialect word for an outside privy or midden. In Australia it got clipped down to dunny, then settled in hard, surviving the jump from the old backyard bog to the modern indoor toilet.
Other ways to say it
Editors of this term
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