Where "Bogey" Comes From
The word comes from Dharug, the Aboriginal language of the Sydney region, where it meant to bathe or swim, and is recorded as early as 1788 in pidgin English exchanges between Aboriginal people and colonists.
By the mid-1800s it had been fully absorbed into everyday Australian English, and it survives today in real places, like Newcastle's convict-carved ocean pool, the Bogey Hole.
It was stinking hot, so they drove out to the creek for a bogey before dinner.
How Aussies Actually Use It
Used for any casual swim or bathe, whether at the beach, in a river, or in a backyard trough.
Distinct from the golf term "bogey," which is an unrelated borrowing from British English — and distinct from "have a bogey," the fuller phrase version of the same idea.
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