bananas

Question

0A group of acting students are having a hard time pronouncing some of the medical terms and french words as they weren't given anytime to prepare. They read the lines on cue cards. So some of them start to replace the medical terms with common terms and some even completely skip the hard-to-pronounce words. When it is over, one of the instructors says "It was just bananas."02br02br00What's the meaning of bananas here? Any idea about the origin?02br02br00Thanks!0-

RayH · Accepted Answer

1blockquote

01cite10New2grammar12cite10What's the meaning of bananas here? Any idea about the origin?12blockquote

10Apparently, this is an exceedingly rare idiom. Your question is the first I've ever heard it. It seems to be used to refer to chaotic situations.02br
02br
00Here is one of the very few quotes I was able to find where it's used in context. It describes the chaos of the U. S. evacuation from Saigon.02br
01i00There were corpses, there were burned-out tanks that people had used to come in, there were pieces of02br
00bodies lying in the fields and on the streets. It was just bananas, total chaos. People screaming, "I02br
00want a place on this chopper!" and not being able to communicate because of the language barrier02br
00and because they would not listen. . . .02i02br
02br
00Here is another from a music industry related site:02br
01i00It was just bananas, dog! You could feel the floors shake.02i0-

Hoa Thai · Answer

0 Hi N2G,02br
00"It was just bananas" = "It was just nuts" = "It was just crazy"02br
02br
00Bananas00 in the slang sense of "nuts" is first recorded 1935 (ref: 01u01span05000 02span02u01span00 )02span01u01span00 02span02u0240hrefhttp://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=banana

BarbaraPA · Answer

0I'm surprised you haven't heard this before, Ray. 01i00I'm going bananas02i00 is pretty common for 01i00I'm going nuts/being driven crazy02i00. 02br
02br
00It was crazy/caos - just like the other said.0-

RayH · Answer

1blockquote

01cite10Grammar Geek12cite10I'm surprised you haven't heard this before, Ray. 11i10I'm going bananas12i10 is pretty common for 11i10I'm going nuts/being driven crazy12i10. 12br
12br
10It was crazy/caos - just like the other said.12br
12blockquote

10I have no problem with "I'm going bananas" it's "It was just bananas" that surprised me.02br
00Besides, going nuts/crazy isn't exactly the same thing as uncontrolled chaos happening all around you.0-

Goodman · Answer

0We have going banana, going nut already; why not add "going ape" since apes love bananas and let it go bonker!!02img

02img

0-

New2grammar · Answer

0I've heard of going Martha among other similar type of phrases. I know who she is but have no idea what the expression means. 0-

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