My Uncle Jack, Aunt Jill, Cousin Joey ...

CANBERRA (Reuters) Tue Nov 18, 1:19 am ET
– Australia's kangaroos are genetically similar to humans and may have first evolved in China, Australian researchers said Tuesday.

"There are a few differences, we have a few more of this, a few less of that, but they are the same genes and a lot of them are in the same order," centre Director Jenny Graves told reporters in Melbourne.

"We thought they'd be completely scrambled, but they're not. There is [sp] great chunks of the human genome which is [sp] sitting right there in the kangaroo genome," Graves said, according to AAP.
http://tinyurl.com/5nt9y8

Thank you for that scientific and grammatically perfect explanation Director Graves. heh. I suddenly feel like hopping around.

From Iberia Nature:

Kangaroo

The word kangaroo derives from the Australian Aboriginal language Guugu Yimidhirr word gangurru , referring to a grey kangaroo. The name was first recorded on 4 August 1770 , by to-be Captain James Cook. Kangaroo soon became adopted into standard English where it has come to mean any member of the family of kangaroos and wallabies. The word Kangaroo is said to be the first word in any Australian Aboriginal language uttered by a European., in this case Captain Cook. The belief that it means "I don't understand" or "I don't know" is a popular myth that is also applied to many other Aboriginal-sounding Australian words. Wallaby is from native Australian wolaba.

Yes, I say .. but what does it *mean* ??

From Take Our Word:

Well, knock us down and call us Bruce, but for a while there was actually some doubt as to whether kangaroo is an indigenous Australian word! The first records of it, from Captain Cook and his naturalist Joseph Banks, indicate that kangaroo was the word used by the Aborigines of the Endeavour River area. From Cook's journal, 1770, we have the following quotation: "The animals which I have before mentioned, called by the Natives Kangooroo or Kanguru." Joseph Banks wrote in his journal in that same year (a month earlier): "The largest [quadruped] was called by the natives kangooroo." A writer in Tasmania in 1787 wrote: "We found, that the animal called kangooroo, at Endeavour River, was known under the same name here." However, shortly thereafter, when the word had been adopted by English-speakers, we find quotations indicating that it was not the indigenous word, and that something akin to patagaran was, instead! In 1792 James Hunter wrote: "The animal..called the kangaroo (but by the natives patagorong) we found in great numbers." William Tench recorded, in 1793: "The large, or grey kanguroo, to which the natives [of Port Jackson] give the name of Pat-ag-a-ran. Note, Kanguroo was a name unknown to them for any animal, until we introduced it." Where did kangaroo come from, then? Some have suggested that it actually means "I don't understand" in one of the Aboriginal languages, but that is a recent and apocryphal explanation. Instead, what we know now is that there were many, many Aboriginal languages in use at the time, and apparently, in one of them, ganjurru was the word for a specific species of kangaroo, not a word for all kangaroos as a whole.

Again, I say ... what does it *mean* ?? Okay ... so maybe it means "large, gray, hopping animal." Looks like nobody really knows.

Here's what the Weird Wagon thinks:

Since gangurru is the most likely origin, we'll break it down from there. Gan = "Giant Axonal Neuropathy" - a *human* gene disorder. Human. Got it? Okay. Gan also means "beget" ... the origin of something (in medicalese.) Guru = sanskrit for - basically - "great" or divine dark/light --- something/someone who dispels the darkness with illumination. Something/someone who reflects the duality of dark/light and is of great wisdom.

So, we have in Egg Saladese: "The origin of a great human." Kangaroo.

Ta da.

See the Kangaroo, feel the kangaroo, *be* the kangaroo ... you *are* the Kangaroo! Just don't get caught in front of one of the lesser evolved ancestors ....

Everything and more about kangaroos:

KANGAROOS - YOUR ROOTS