Marrickville pause

For those of you who don’t live in Sydney I need to explain that Marrickville is an inner-west suburb of Sydney, right underneath the flight path for Sydney Airport.  You can sometimes wonder if the planes are going to miss the pedestrian bridge at the railway station, and if you are on that bridge, you can examine the undercarriage of a plane in some detail.

So the Marrickville pause is the break in conversation that happens as a plane goes overhead.  Locals are accustomed to stopping in mid-sentence and resuming what they were saying once the plane has gone over. It is a common expression in the bars and breweries and distilleries of Marrickville (of which there are many) where it is employed to take a sip of whatever drink you have.

Normally in conversation, if you wish to pause, you need to make use of a filler like um or you know to retain your right to speak, but  in this case fillers are not needed.  You simply stop, knowing that the other person can’t speak over the noise.  Not unless they have a very powerful voice or some degree of speech training, in which case a you know or two might still be needed.

Marrickville Pause is the title of a song by upcoming singer on the Marrickville block, Ella Haber, which may be the reason more people know about it.  As the joke spreads you can have the Stanmore pause, for example, or the Petersham pause or the Inner West pause. I can find no sign of the Tullamarine pause.  Perhaps it is still a Sydney thing.