chuma.org

A week ago now I got an e-mail from a Russian guy by the name of Alexander Nickolsky who told me what “chuma” actually means (apparently):

Just FYI:
‘chumovoy’ is an adjective. It’s from ‘chuma’ – lit. plague, in slang exclamation ‘chuma !’ can be translated as ‘wild’, or ‘cool’ or more precisely – ‘unbeliveable’, ‘fantastic’
used for expression of admiration of something Example

• I’ve got a new Pentium III 800 Mhz
• Chuma !

So there could be ‘chumovoy tall-tale teller’ Note that ‘chumovoy’ is derived exactly and only from the slang meaning of ‘chuma’ and is not connected with the primary meaning of ‘plague’.

I can live with that. I’ll have to add this to an about page sometime.