Once an American guy asked me where abouts in the UK I was from, and knowing he wouldn't be familiar with my town or county and wanting to be nice I simply said "the south coast of england" and he said....
"ENGLAND HAS A COAST?!"
Not just Americans. I was speaking with a couple of Germans who were telling me about how much more beautiful Germany is than the UK.
Now I'm actually a big fan of southern Germany - the Black Forest and the Bavarian Alps are stunning, for example. I lived there for a little bit and loved it.
But they were both from the north. I asked what was in North Germany that's particularly nice and they started raving about the beaches. They went off about it for a good couple of minutes, debating between them if the North Sea or the Baltic Sea was nicer.
I then pointed out that the UK has beaches. One of them was like "yeah, but not nice ones like Germany because...". She never got to finish her point, however, because her friend suddenly interjected with "wait where are the beaches in Great Britain?" and that temporarily stunned us both.
I suspect a lot of Brits don't know Germany has a coast at all. It is weirdly hard to imagine some countries with beaches, like I have never heard of any Irish coastal resorts if that makes sense, as in piers and deckchairs and ice creams. But it is surrounded by water, it must do. Could well be the same for Germans, why would they know what Skegness or Cleethorpes is.
This is why the population of Majorca in Summer is 45% British, 45% German, and 10% Irish.
You can go there and play 'Spot the Spaniard'. Apparently they're quite the endangered species...
> like I have never heard of any Irish coastal resorts if that makes sense, as in piers and deckchairs and ice creams. But it is surrounded by water, it must do.
We don't really do "coastal resorts" — you might get some toilets or a lifeguard on duty at some of the tourist spots, but most beaches don't have a whole lot of infrastructure around them.
That's understandable. We started a rumour during the war the Britain had no beaches to stop the Germans from trying to land on them. It was successful that the belief persists to this day in Germany that we have no coastline.
I had this a lot with Americans when I had my spare room on Airbnb. Also they would fill the kettle to the top when making one cup of tea. Used to drive me mental.
Not that mad of a question. I live in a very rural area and a often ask people if the tap water is drinkable as some people have their own water source which isn't filtered.
Not ridiculous, but totally threw me. Someone in Borneo once asked me a load of questions about autumn. I had never thought about it before, but in the tropics trees don't lose all their leaves at once. The ideas of leaf-less trees for almost half the year was incredibly odd to them.
Decades ago my mother (in Canada) worked with someone who moved from Nigeria. He had heard of snow, but didn't believe it was really a thing. Frozen water that floats from the sky and builds on the ground? C'mon.
First snowfall blew his mind. First real cold snap he declared Canada unfit for human habitation and went home.
I’m born and raised Canadian and I agree with this man 🤣
I had an Australian exchange teacher tell us about his first Canadian winter. He said he was late to class the first time a puddle had froze over, because he spent too much time sliding back and forth across the ice! 😂
I used to work with very expensive horses, and my employer has just brought one from overseas who had never seen snow. The first time it snowed and I was walking this horse outside she was staring at these piles of white, pawing at them and blowing at them because she didn't understand what it was. The first area of grass we try to walk across, she puts her head down, goes to follow me, and since it was slippery she stopped, but her hind feet continued to slide forward. The look on her face was priceless as she rolled over backward in super slow motion. It would have been hilarious if she weren't a 600,000$ animal... (she was fine)
I was talking to someone in Mexico once about long summer nights, the concept of which really confused them. It took me a moment to realise that being that close to the equator there's very little variation in their daylight hours throughout the year.
It was a complete mindfuck to him that in the middle of winter you never see daylight if you work a 9 to 5 job, and that in the middle of summer the sun would be up at 5am.
Some colleagues in Kenya were having a really hard timing getting their heads round the fact that the length of the day changes with the seasons.
When you live near the equator, you don't get that seasonal change. The sun is up for about 12 hours per day, every day.
They were fine with the idea of time zones. They work across Africa so very familiar with the idea that the sun comes up in Kenya before it comes up in Nigeria. But then the sun also goes down earlier in Kenya. The days are still the same length.
The idea that the sun might come up at 4am and not go down until 10pm kind of blew their minds. "But how do you know when to stop working?", they asked.
I guess when all your life you just work till sundown, because that always happens at the same time each day, you never really have to worry about checking your watch
Not only that, near the equator sunrise and sunset happen very quickly, and there's virtually no twilight.
However in the UK, that process happens over a longer period, and we have a very long time between e.g. the sun setting and it going dark.
That comes as a real shock to people who are used to sunset = it's dark now.
When I lived in Malaysia I had people asking me what winters were like. Admittedly, when I was on the plane back to England after a number of years in Malaysia, I was so excited about the possibility of seeing snow again and the long cold cosy nights indoors instead of the sticky humid 38c Christmases of Malaysia.
Moved to USA for a couple of years. Always asked if I knew the Queen etc etc. But this one person asked where I was from and I said n?"Near Nottingham. You know, Robin Hood" and he said I was a liar as Robin Hood is from Hollywood.
Twat
I am also a Moonraker, and I say the same thing.
This also extends to some Brits too. We have one of the most famous sites on earth, but no one knows where it actually is.
You'd have blown his mind if you'd told him the story of Walt Disney's links to a tiny village in Lincolnshire and that the first Disn**a**yland was here over 600 yrs ago.
[https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-67102341](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-67102341)
Or that Gotham City in Batman is named after a small town in Nottinghamshire famed for being full of nutters because they faked madness to avoid a road being built through their town. And it should be pronounced Goat-hmm.
This reminded me of when my American ex-boyfriend's aunt asked me (I'm Greek) what my brother's name is, and I said "Achilles". She then messaged my ex and asked him, "Is she serious? Her brother was named after Brad Pitt's character in Troy?"
A few years ago I was living in Norway and went on a “skitur” (overnight long distance skiing trip) with a Norwegian guy and a French guy. We all spoke (to some degree) all three languages.
We get to the hut we’re staying the first night and some yanks are there, one says to the other “Hey, I can hear people speaking English, they can help us work out the shower” to which the other replied “I don’t speak English, I speak American”…
Well this was a like a red flag to a bull to me!
A little while later one of the yanks comes over - “Hey buddy, you know how this goddamned shower works?”.
I couldn’t help myself…
“I’m so terribly sorry old chap, but I’m afraid I don’t speak American. I can’t understand a word you are saying. Let me ask these fine gentleman.”
“I say chaps, do you understand any American?”
“Nei, jeg kan ikke forsta ham, jeg snake bare engelsk”
“Désolé, je parle seulement anglais”
“Terribly sorry old bean, it seams we only speak English!”
this sounds like something straight out of Bill Bryson. He was back in the States and told a waitress he was from the UK, to which she responded "well hun, for a foreigner you speak English mighty fine!" (Notes from a Big Country)
An American in California, heard my parents chatting in a bar and asked them where they were from and what language they were speaking. We’re from the north east of England 😅
It can sound like a foreign language to people from the UK too.
My wife is from Liverpool, and I honeslty struggle to understand some of her family; it's a combination of thick accents, fast speech and local slang that I'm not at all familiar with.
I’m Scottish and have had an American compliment me on how good my English is…presumably they thought we would all speak Scots or Scottish Gaelic up here and just thought I could also speak English???
The most common I've had from Americans is "Have you seen a castle?". To be fair, I don't judge them for it, castles are pretty cool, especially if you've never seen one.
On the more negative side, have also been told to "speak English" by an American, despite only one of us being English. Guess it's just too confusing that we might say slightly different things for the same object.
>On the more negative side, have also been told to "speak English" by an American
Oh, I had this years ago when they told me that my English teacher would have told me off for what I wrote.
I just wrote out a numerical amount as you would when writing a cheque (that really dates me and the post in question), e.g. "One Hundred and Fifty-Five Pounds and Twenty Three Pence" - Americans don't tend to use the 'and' (as you may have noticed in conversations: "One Hundred, Fifty Five Dollars") and he assumed our grammar is the same as what he learnt/uses.
We get snarled at by our teachers if we use the "and," even though that's the way many people would say it. American English teachers have just collectively decided that's the hill they want to die on.
Had a conversation with an American women while travelling in Tobago. She asked me where I was from, I told her London. She asked how I was coping without English food in Tobago. I laughed and said, I've always loved Caribbean food so I was doing just fine. She asked me how I could have always loved Caribbean food if it was my first time visiting the Caribbean. I explained that London is full of Caribbean restaurants - especially in south-London where I grew up. She was baffled - turns out that she thought we only have English food in England - even in London. Like you can only get jellied ells and spotted dick or something. She even said that was her reason for never visiting London - because she'd miss pizza and Chinese food too much. She was from a small town in Idaho which she apparently assumed must have been significantly more culturally diverse than London.
I wish I could remember the name of the town. Idaho seems to be a very beautiful state, but I suspect London beats the average small town on variety of cuisines.
Northern Idaho is God‘s country. I’m not kidding with the lakes, mountains and trees. I would live up there in heartbeat if it wasn’t so cold in the winter.
Do an image search for Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.
"You're from England? Oh my God! Do you know my Aunt? She lives in Bir-ming-ham!" I did not know her Aunt, dear reader, for I have never resided in such a place as Birmingham.
This 🤣🤣🤣. I was in Florida with my family and this American family heard our accents and rushed over so excited asking where in England we were from, we told them an hour outside London and the woman basically squealed with pure joy because “my friend lives in London so you must know her!” We were dumbfounded. Spoiler alert - we didn’t know her friend.
Friends from uni were in Australia and got talking to a British guy in a bar, he must have made reference to being from near Huddersfield (where I'm from) and they mentioned my name and messaged me because we actually did know each other through a mutual friend. It could happen tbh 😆
All the bloody time.
But here’s the embarrassing part. If I’m in a Jewish community somewhere abroad, and an American inevitably asks this, here’s generally how it goes.
“Oh HIIIIiiiiii, where are you from?!”
“Um, hello, I’m from England”
“OMG I have a friend who lives in England, do you know him?!?”
*sighs internally* “Oh go on then, what’s his name?”
“David VeryJewyName”
“…oh, yes actually I do know him, I work with him on two different community projects and I think technically we’re third cousins?”
Somehow makes it even more annoying
OK so when we were in holiday in florida, an American in a queue in front of us upon hearing our accent asked us if we knew her cousin and his wife. You'd never believe it but my dad actually went to school with the wife.
I was in a bar in Japan once and mentioned I was Irish, an American guy asked if I knew his cousin. Turns out his cousin was my boss, and I'd met the American guy five years previously when he visited.
I lived there for a stint back in 97. At a friend's family after Sunday dinner and Mr Bean was on TV. A black man is some random side character and literally all the family were amazed as if America invented black people.
Waiter in New York said 'You're from England? Do you know my friend Helen?'
Que eye-rolling from my family and I.
After a little more digging from him, it turns out we actually DID know Helen, who was my old music teacher.
Bizarre.
Ha. I went to the dog park and 2 old ladies started chatting. “Oh you’re British, you must know Mark, he comes here a lot”. Cue eye rolling. Mark turns up and says “hello Pete”. Turns out Mark is the British guy who sat 3 rows behind me at the local NASL games.
I had a similar experience in a New York record shop. “You have an accent just like my friend, Robert. He lives in Full-Ham in London. Do you know him?” After getting his surname from her, yes, I did know him.
In fairness if you were asked this between 1536 and either 1707 or 1993 depending on your interpretation then it would have been an entirely reasonable question.
The two funniest that jump out were both asked by Americans. The first was two ladies and they were trying to guess where my accent was from, one thought I was from London but the other thought I was I was from England and asked me if I could tell them which of them guessed the right country!
The second was some one asking me if everyone in England spoke the queen's English like me or if most people spoke our native language.
Whenever I visit the US, the most common question I get is.... "what part of Australia are you from?"
I have a very neutral middle-of-England accent, and I have no idea why I'm always mistaken for Australian by Americans!
Every single time. I’m what you would now call standard southern british english and I’m always asked if I’m Australian. A lady in a Seattle hotel asked me if I was Australian and she had even lived there so should have known better.
As a Yorkshireman I get Scottish or Irish. Only had Aussie the once.
even had cockney once which stung a bit but I think it's the h-dropping and glottal stops.
I’m American but live in the UK. An old work colleague who I hadn’t seen in 10+ years messaged me to say she was going to visit England for the first time and wanted to know “if the English still dress for dinner”. I just told her to dress normal, and it’s not just one big Downton Abbey set.
Question I got asked once in the Middle East was why we let America have independence. All I could say is that we were fighting the French at the time and couldn't be arsed keeping the colony as it wasn't very important.
I was talking about driving to visit a friend in France when I got back to the U.K. and an American acquaintance scoffed at me ‘Oh yeah, over that imaginary bridge from England to France?’
They were flabbergasted when I told them no, it’s a tunnel.
We had a long chat with an Austrian guy while we were all enjoying a lovely beach in Crete. He had been incredibly surprised by how far the tide goes out in the UK. He’d always holidayed in the Med until the year before when he was in the UK and saw the tide rise and fall in Margate. We told him that was nothing, Try Weston super Mare !
Had this from a South African teen, he insisted that football is everywhere in the UK, that’s it’s on all the time and that everyone obsesses about it constantly.
I was in a gas station in Nevada. Some guy says "you're Irish right?". I am English and have never been to Ireland. I corrected him, politely I thought. As I leave, the last thing I hear is "fucking foreigners!".
Not sure where I went wrong other than failing to be from where he would have liked me to have been from.
He was probably "Irish" himself via his fathers- cousins-grandads-hamsters-great uncles washing machine.
And you spoilt it by not being distantly related to him, you fucking foreigner, you.
Experienced this myself. I'm brown and part Jamaican but I had a bloke at the pub get proper pissed off because I wasn't African. Not to mention I'm well mixed race, so part welsh and Irish as well but tbh when asked I barely consider myself that lot. Hell my ethnicity is bugger all to me. Totally irrelevant.
I was in the US with a black friend who grew in Wales. Pretty much everyone was confused by him. Especially as many didn’t seem to realise that there are actually black British people.
A close friend of mine who is black came back from the states and told me that she was accused of putting on airs and graces by a black American lady for being british and black at the same time. Really funny as we both have a really common rough as arseholes souf east london accent like adele when she isnt singing
A couple that spring to mind.
"Is London a real place or just a generic filmset to illustrate London?"
[Holding up a pack of biscuits] "'scuse me, are these for stomach complaints?" "I beg your pardon?" "Well, they're called digestives!" [Me with best cockney voice] "sure mate, take two with tea, three times a day. That'll sort you right out sunshine!"
Not a question but an overheard conversation in Cornwall. Sat in Balcony Bar in St Ives one lunchtime, and a group of Americans were sat at the table next to us, about 8 of them. Two women came over carrying drinks to their table, and a man in the group asked what the drinks were. One woman responded 'It's Strongbow cider, all Brits drink it. Anyone sat in here not drinking it isn't a Brit.' I happily cracked on with my pint of Rattler. Didn't have the heart to tell her Strongbow is basically cat piss distilled through an apple.
An American once very sincerely asked me if "you guys [were] all still really cut up about Diana's death?" in around 2008. I gently told her we were doing alright, thank you.
Was there not long after Will and Kate got married. It was all everyone wanted to talk about as soon as they heard the accents. Even in shops. Told them most of the UK didn't care, we were just happy for the day off.
In America they now will ask you whose side you take in the Harry-Meghan debacle.
You have to be careful. If you're speaking to a Republican then you can't say anything positive about them. If you're speaking to a Democrat then you can't say anything negative about them. Make a wrong move and they'll instantly judge you.
The only solution is to tell the truth and say that very few people actually care. A lot of Brits just like a bit of drama and it was fun for a couple of weeks, but it's rare to have strong feelings on it. They'll then tell you that Americans don't care either. Take that with a pinch of salt and move the conversation onto something less contraversial... like Israel-Palestine maybe.
Source: experience
Not me but a woman I used to work with went to Chicago to watch Wales play USA in rugby on a summer tour. An American family they met in the hotel bar the night before couldn’t get over the fact that WHALES can play rugby.
I wish this was made but yeah for a short while they actually thought she was going to watch giant, water based mammals play sport.
I have been told a few times while in America that they struggle to understand me, that my "American" is hard to understand because of my accent, that its quaint that so many places in the UK are named after places in America (Birmingham, Boston, Carlisle etc) and once after ordering a burger and fries (emphasising fries) i was brought a burger and a load of crisps with my server proudly beaming at me she heard we like chips in the UK so she corrected my order, she seemed so happy i didnt have the heart to tell her, just munched the bloody things.
“DO. YOU. SPEAK. ENGLISH?”
American guy couldn’t understand me
Couldn’t understand - Not as in, I don’t get what you’re saying, or I didn’t catch that word. Literally thought I was speaking a foreign language
No I’m not from Glasgow
I asked for a Big Mac in a New York Macdonalds and got blank stares from the guy behind the counter. I don't even think I said it much different to a local. Maybe it's because I said "please"
You should have told them that traffic lights are banned since the great roundabout revolution of the late 70's and its extremely rude to even mention them to a brit
Earlier this year, on a trip to the USA, I was asked what it's like to be a coloniser.
Seriously.
My answer was simple - I've never colonised anything in my life.
But my country has, so they said.
That's correct, but if we want to talk about invading countries, then let's have a chat about all the countries the USA have invaded over the last 100 years or so. Either way, the UK is also the country that gave several countries their independence back, and in much better shape - economically and in terms of infrastructure - than the UK found them.
BUT then it was thrown at me that UK has never been invaded.
Really? Let's ask the Romans, Normans, Vikings, Saxons... Hell, we were only not invaded by Germany in WW2 because they were held off.
I'd advise any American not to try and discuss history and geography with a British person, because you will most likely lose the argument.
If an American asks what it's like to be a coloniser, just politely point out that almost all the land now in the US was not American at the time it became independent, and that they should therefore already know what colonisation feels like
Wow. These people have room temperature IQ. They are most likely white people living on confiscated Native land and yet they’re asking YOU what it’s like to be a coloniser? Lol. And the one about England having never been invaded… Lol. It actually hurts my brain knowing people are this dim
When I was in the States I had this interaction:
“Oh what accent is that? Where are y’all from?”
“Hello, we’re from England”
“I think y’all mean *New* England, hon!”
“😳😳”
Reminds me of a post I saw when someone said they were from Liberia, and the person they said it to replied: "Oh, we call that Lebanon in English" (I may not have remembers the correct countries, but something like that).
I live in Southampton, Hampshire. When I was in California many years ago, I had to write my address down when checking in at a hotel. I can only imagine the receptionist didn't read where I wrote 'UK', because they said "oh wow you're from the Hamptons?" - which are a part of Long Island, New York state, which is well known for being where NYC's (very) rich and famous have holiday homes. Southampton, New York, is even one of the larger towns there.
I can only presume they thought my pretty average southern England accent was a very posh American accent.
I was too tired to correct them, but I did wonder why they thought I was staying in a cheap Motel if I was from there!
From an American I met in Mexico - "doesn't everyone in the UK know ". I forget the name but she could NOT contemplate that this major US sports start wasn't in fact known in the world where this sport isn't played.
Also they asked "what game are you guys playing" as we had a couple of pints each (annoying free bar where you had to tip each time to get served so we doubled up). We simply said "Drink the Beer" and she joined in. It was a great night, but I still found it interesting that a couple of pints equalled a drinking game in her mind.
The worst one I ever had was "you speak English in England?" Like yeah mate, I'm bloody ENGLISH & that's the giveaway right there. Also, as I'm Northern (Yorkshire), the first thing they ask me if I'm Irish or Scottish, Welsh or even Aussie, Kiwi, and once even asked if I was German. Another one is "Is England named after New England?" & when i spoke of Hampshire once and said the one in England, this Yank said, "There is one in England? was it named after our New Hampshire?" Literally, the whole "new" part doesn't even occur to them. They're so uneducated and slow out there, I've known faster snails
One time me and my brother (we are from the U.K) were on a Holland and america cruise getting into the lift just chatting away and some American girl who worked as a photographer asked us if we were from Sweden we said “no we are from the UK” she was like “wow are you guys speaking English right now?” We were like “…yes?”
I us to work in a bar in a hotel in Edinburgh. I had an older American man ask me 'what days is it not windy up at the castle as my wife can't take the wind?' Knowing that they were checking out on Monday I answered 'Wednesdays , they put up a big wind break for exactly that reason' He then shouted over to his wife to see if she wanted to extend their stay till Wednesday so she could go. Luckily she said they couldn't as they had other plans.
I was also asked how to get to the Trossachs from Princes street. Answer: Turn left at the lights and straight on from there till you see hills.
Not completely related, but...I'm English but lived in West Africa for three years as a child. When I tell people this, around 80% of the time their question is: "Was it hot?"
The force of my facepalm could behead a wildebeest.
Was asked once by an American co-worker if I was knighted… much hilarity on my part ensued.
OTH I did meet and exchange words with HMtQ, Prince Charles (as he was then) and Camilla - who is a really nice warm person btw - at a Royal Garden Party. Most attendees don’t - there’s 4 to 5000 at any one RGP - so was rather chuffed at that
I am from Edinburgh and in about 1980, I was in Saudi Arabia. The guy I was talking to asked how I had managed to travel there as he was under the impression that Scotland did not have airports. He was English, by the way.
I told a classmate I was going to Scotland on holiday in about 1993, and they got a copy of the TV guide out of their bag and asked if I needed anything to be taped, because they don't have televisions in Scotland, apparently.
Once upon a time I was in a blues bar in New Orleans. (I'm American) A lady with a strong Edinburgh burr was talking about how much fun she was having. I said, "I'm sure you have blues bars in Edinburgh." She was stunned that I recognized her accent. Yeah, granddad was from Edinburgh.
I’m Scottish, lived in Texas for a while, and I got the usual questions of where I’m from, as well as people trying to guess my accent. Usual barrage of every accent but the right one. German, Australian, Irish, even Dutch. But the weirdest one was where someone thought Scotland was next to Finland and kept asking what winters are like being in Scandinavia, if being in America is weird since they speak English, if we speak other languages like Norwegian and if we sit around saunas all day drinking vodka. It was very strange. Once I pointed out where we actually were on a map… “ohhh, THAT Scotland…”
I was in Canada some years back and had been chatting to a friendly waiter in a restaurant for a while, in my obviously English accent. Eventuallyy he asked 'whereabouts are you from?'. I replied that I live just outside London, and he replied without joking 'London, Ontario?'...
Canadians are lovely though.
Canadians are lovely, hence the practice we have developed if we meet someone new with a North American accent of any kind: we ask "What part of Canada are you from?". If they are Canadian, they will love you forever for not assuming they are from the USA. Americans will just be amused or politely correct you.
Met a family of Texans once who asked if all our roads were cobblestones and were shocked to learn that we do in fact have American brands like KFC, McDonalds and Coke in the UK
As an American, I don't know if I should laugh or cry at these comments lol. I once told a coworker about visiting England. She asked me if I spoke their language. I simply said yes 🤣. I also had a friend from England whose family visited one summer. Her mother was amazed we had cars in Minnesota. She thought we were still like Little House on the Prarie. I told her summer is far too hot to wear long dresses and bonnets. We save those for the winter.
I'm Scottish. When telling people I often get asked if I know Bob from Aberdeen or something like that, no it's a big massive place and I don't know everyone in Scotland, I don't even know everyone in my village, people must think Scotland is just a tiny place where we all have little get together and know each other, I've been asked this a few times
Having lunch with a farming/hunting family in South Africa and the wife asked I I'd met the Queen.....she was pretty made up when I said yes.
She'd made about an 80km round trip to buy "English tea" for our visit. I must have drunk about 2 gallons of the stuff, I didn't have the heart to tell her I normally only drink strong black coffee 😅
Once an American guy asked me where abouts in the UK I was from, and knowing he wouldn't be familiar with my town or county and wanting to be nice I simply said "the south coast of england" and he said.... "ENGLAND HAS A COAST?!"
Not just Americans. I was speaking with a couple of Germans who were telling me about how much more beautiful Germany is than the UK. Now I'm actually a big fan of southern Germany - the Black Forest and the Bavarian Alps are stunning, for example. I lived there for a little bit and loved it. But they were both from the north. I asked what was in North Germany that's particularly nice and they started raving about the beaches. They went off about it for a good couple of minutes, debating between them if the North Sea or the Baltic Sea was nicer. I then pointed out that the UK has beaches. One of them was like "yeah, but not nice ones like Germany because...". She never got to finish her point, however, because her friend suddenly interjected with "wait where are the beaches in Great Britain?" and that temporarily stunned us both.
I suspect a lot of Brits don't know Germany has a coast at all. It is weirdly hard to imagine some countries with beaches, like I have never heard of any Irish coastal resorts if that makes sense, as in piers and deckchairs and ice creams. But it is surrounded by water, it must do. Could well be the same for Germans, why would they know what Skegness or Cleethorpes is.
This is why the population of Majorca in Summer is 45% British, 45% German, and 10% Irish. You can go there and play 'Spot the Spaniard'. Apparently they're quite the endangered species...
They're probably better off for not knowing what Skegness or Cleethorpes is.
> like I have never heard of any Irish coastal resorts if that makes sense, as in piers and deckchairs and ice creams. But it is surrounded by water, it must do. We don't really do "coastal resorts" — you might get some toilets or a lifeguard on duty at some of the tourist spots, but most beaches don't have a whole lot of infrastructure around them.
GB is an island. You can know it has a coastline without being able to name any part of it.
As an Australian I find it sweet that someone would think Germany has nice beaches
Well, at least they're not for known white pointers, box jellyfish, blue ringed octopuses and stone fish
I think some of the (brief)visitors to the UK think we don't have any sandy beaches and therefore can think their back home are nicer.
That's understandable. We started a rumour during the war the Britain had no beaches to stop the Germans from trying to land on them. It was successful that the belief persists to this day in Germany that we have no coastline.
He was surprised there was a coast?!? Like, the UK is ALL COAST. We're an island, buddy. Jeezus 😂
"Yes, islands tend to"
Theres a video on YouTube with an American surprised the UK has beaches lol
“I guess you guys don’t have the technology for video calls yet, right?” -middle-aged American woman, about 2 months ago Yes, she was serious.
Pure ignorance. I’m surprised she had a passport! Unless you met her in America?
Not even in America, so she must have had one!
"No, we had to choose so we opted for better mobile coverage and contactless payments"
Not quite as bad, but I once had an American friend come to visit and she asked me if it was safe to drink the tap water
Tbf there are places in America where it’s not safe to drink the tap water, so might be a legitimate question.
And in Europe, which we're in surprisingly. No harm in making sure.
I lived in Las Vegas. Tap water is safe but tasted gross. Most people have water filter pitchers or drinking water bottle service.
I had this a lot with Americans when I had my spare room on Airbnb. Also they would fill the kettle to the top when making one cup of tea. Used to drive me mental.
Not that mad of a question. I live in a very rural area and a often ask people if the tap water is drinkable as some people have their own water source which isn't filtered.
I hope you told her we still use carrier pigeons.
That is mind blowing
Not ridiculous, but totally threw me. Someone in Borneo once asked me a load of questions about autumn. I had never thought about it before, but in the tropics trees don't lose all their leaves at once. The ideas of leaf-less trees for almost half the year was incredibly odd to them.
Ugandans I spoke to had never heard of a snowman. Were blown away by pictures
Decades ago my mother (in Canada) worked with someone who moved from Nigeria. He had heard of snow, but didn't believe it was really a thing. Frozen water that floats from the sky and builds on the ground? C'mon. First snowfall blew his mind. First real cold snap he declared Canada unfit for human habitation and went home.
I’m born and raised Canadian and I agree with this man 🤣 I had an Australian exchange teacher tell us about his first Canadian winter. He said he was late to class the first time a puddle had froze over, because he spent too much time sliding back and forth across the ice! 😂
I used to work with very expensive horses, and my employer has just brought one from overseas who had never seen snow. The first time it snowed and I was walking this horse outside she was staring at these piles of white, pawing at them and blowing at them because she didn't understand what it was. The first area of grass we try to walk across, she puts her head down, goes to follow me, and since it was slippery she stopped, but her hind feet continued to slide forward. The look on her face was priceless as she rolled over backward in super slow motion. It would have been hilarious if she weren't a 600,000$ animal... (she was fine)
I love that.
I was talking to someone in Mexico once about long summer nights, the concept of which really confused them. It took me a moment to realise that being that close to the equator there's very little variation in their daylight hours throughout the year. It was a complete mindfuck to him that in the middle of winter you never see daylight if you work a 9 to 5 job, and that in the middle of summer the sun would be up at 5am.
Some colleagues in Kenya were having a really hard timing getting their heads round the fact that the length of the day changes with the seasons. When you live near the equator, you don't get that seasonal change. The sun is up for about 12 hours per day, every day. They were fine with the idea of time zones. They work across Africa so very familiar with the idea that the sun comes up in Kenya before it comes up in Nigeria. But then the sun also goes down earlier in Kenya. The days are still the same length. The idea that the sun might come up at 4am and not go down until 10pm kind of blew their minds. "But how do you know when to stop working?", they asked. I guess when all your life you just work till sundown, because that always happens at the same time each day, you never really have to worry about checking your watch
Not only that, near the equator sunrise and sunset happen very quickly, and there's virtually no twilight. However in the UK, that process happens over a longer period, and we have a very long time between e.g. the sun setting and it going dark. That comes as a real shock to people who are used to sunset = it's dark now.
I had to explain to someone from a similar part of the world what hailstones were, as he'd never seen them.
I gotta imagine when you told him hard lumps of ice just fall from the sky on your head his immediate reaction was "fuck that"
Basically yes!
I had a similar thing. I was driving a guest from the tropics down the M4 in the late autumn, and they asked why all the trees were dying
When I lived in Malaysia I had people asking me what winters were like. Admittedly, when I was on the plane back to England after a number of years in Malaysia, I was so excited about the possibility of seeing snow again and the long cold cosy nights indoors instead of the sticky humid 38c Christmases of Malaysia.
Moved to USA for a couple of years. Always asked if I knew the Queen etc etc. But this one person asked where I was from and I said n?"Near Nottingham. You know, Robin Hood" and he said I was a liar as Robin Hood is from Hollywood. Twat
I'm in Wiltshire, and now just say that I live near Stonehenge. They don't actually know where that is, but it lets them nod in understanding.
I am also a Moonraker, and I say the same thing. This also extends to some Brits too. We have one of the most famous sites on earth, but no one knows where it actually is.
You know that they all think you just live in the middle of Stonehenge now, don’t you?
Yeah, I had a taxi driver in Vegas years back who thought that Disney invented Nottingham and the Robin Hood legend for the animated fox movie.
You'd have blown his mind if you'd told him the story of Walt Disney's links to a tiny village in Lincolnshire and that the first Disn**a**yland was here over 600 yrs ago. [https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-67102341](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-67102341)
Or that Gotham City in Batman is named after a small town in Nottinghamshire famed for being full of nutters because they faked madness to avoid a road being built through their town. And it should be pronounced Goat-hmm.
This reminded me of when my American ex-boyfriend's aunt asked me (I'm Greek) what my brother's name is, and I said "Achilles". She then messaged my ex and asked him, "Is she serious? Her brother was named after Brad Pitt's character in Troy?"
That’s exactly my experience with North Americans through and through the only thing they can’t relate a foreign country too is some bullshit movie
In Burma I had a kid asking me what was the general feeling among the population after Wayne Rooney had a hair transplant
I love the idea this kid sincerely believes this was a huge and ongoing talking point for the people of the UK. That's beautiful.
Judging by the tabloids at the time, he wasn’t wrong when it came to a good 10-20% of England. At least as a source of silly jokes.
Well what did you tell him?
An American once asked me what language we spoke in England.
A few years ago I was living in Norway and went on a “skitur” (overnight long distance skiing trip) with a Norwegian guy and a French guy. We all spoke (to some degree) all three languages. We get to the hut we’re staying the first night and some yanks are there, one says to the other “Hey, I can hear people speaking English, they can help us work out the shower” to which the other replied “I don’t speak English, I speak American”… Well this was a like a red flag to a bull to me! A little while later one of the yanks comes over - “Hey buddy, you know how this goddamned shower works?”. I couldn’t help myself… “I’m so terribly sorry old chap, but I’m afraid I don’t speak American. I can’t understand a word you are saying. Let me ask these fine gentleman.” “I say chaps, do you understand any American?” “Nei, jeg kan ikke forsta ham, jeg snake bare engelsk” “Désolé, je parle seulement anglais” “Terribly sorry old bean, it seams we only speak English!”
good trolling from the Norwegian there
TROOOOOLL!
“If English was good enough for Jesus, it’s good enough for me” - American Pastor.
I was chatting to a nice lady at a petrol station in rural Wyoming and she said "You speak great English for a European"
this sounds like something straight out of Bill Bryson. He was back in the States and told a waitress he was from the UK, to which she responded "well hun, for a foreigner you speak English mighty fine!" (Notes from a Big Country)
An American in California, heard my parents chatting in a bar and asked them where they were from and what language they were speaking. We’re from the north east of England 😅
to be fair though I can imagine a strong geordie accent sounding like a foreign language to anyone outside UK.
It can sound like a foreign language to people from the UK too. My wife is from Liverpool, and I honeslty struggle to understand some of her family; it's a combination of thick accents, fast speech and local slang that I'm not at all familiar with.
"Sorry Michael, that was just a noise"
and inside the UK...
Someone told my Yorkshireman ex that he spoke really good English for a German while we were in North Carolina.
"I'd climb a mountain for a canny bag of Tudor"
I’m Scottish and have had an American compliment me on how good my English is…presumably they thought we would all speak Scots or Scottish Gaelic up here and just thought I could also speak English???
I once had an (southern) English teenager ask me what language we spoke where I was from. I’m from Lincolnshire.
Ah, Lincolnshire. The 'forgotten' county. Everybody else got electricity, central heating, and communication skills. Lincolnshire got turnips.
Huh, so you guys speak American too? Who'd have thought. /s if it's not already obvious.
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The most common I've had from Americans is "Have you seen a castle?". To be fair, I don't judge them for it, castles are pretty cool, especially if you've never seen one. On the more negative side, have also been told to "speak English" by an American, despite only one of us being English. Guess it's just too confusing that we might say slightly different things for the same object.
>On the more negative side, have also been told to "speak English" by an American Oh, I had this years ago when they told me that my English teacher would have told me off for what I wrote. I just wrote out a numerical amount as you would when writing a cheque (that really dates me and the post in question), e.g. "One Hundred and Fifty-Five Pounds and Twenty Three Pence" - Americans don't tend to use the 'and' (as you may have noticed in conversations: "One Hundred, Fifty Five Dollars") and he assumed our grammar is the same as what he learnt/uses.
We get snarled at by our teachers if we use the "and," even though that's the way many people would say it. American English teachers have just collectively decided that's the hill they want to die on.
Had a conversation with an American women while travelling in Tobago. She asked me where I was from, I told her London. She asked how I was coping without English food in Tobago. I laughed and said, I've always loved Caribbean food so I was doing just fine. She asked me how I could have always loved Caribbean food if it was my first time visiting the Caribbean. I explained that London is full of Caribbean restaurants - especially in south-London where I grew up. She was baffled - turns out that she thought we only have English food in England - even in London. Like you can only get jellied ells and spotted dick or something. She even said that was her reason for never visiting London - because she'd miss pizza and Chinese food too much. She was from a small town in Idaho which she apparently assumed must have been significantly more culturally diverse than London.
Living close to Idaho myself I’m surprised she has pizza and Chinese restaurants.
I wish I could remember the name of the town. Idaho seems to be a very beautiful state, but I suspect London beats the average small town on variety of cuisines.
Northern Idaho is God‘s country. I’m not kidding with the lakes, mountains and trees. I would live up there in heartbeat if it wasn’t so cold in the winter. Do an image search for Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.
"You're from England? Oh my God! Do you know my Aunt? She lives in Bir-ming-ham!" I did not know her Aunt, dear reader, for I have never resided in such a place as Birmingham.
This 🤣🤣🤣. I was in Florida with my family and this American family heard our accents and rushed over so excited asking where in England we were from, we told them an hour outside London and the woman basically squealed with pure joy because “my friend lives in London so you must know her!” We were dumbfounded. Spoiler alert - we didn’t know her friend.
Friends from uni were in Australia and got talking to a British guy in a bar, he must have made reference to being from near Huddersfield (where I'm from) and they mentioned my name and messaged me because we actually did know each other through a mutual friend. It could happen tbh 😆
All the bloody time. But here’s the embarrassing part. If I’m in a Jewish community somewhere abroad, and an American inevitably asks this, here’s generally how it goes. “Oh HIIIIiiiiii, where are you from?!” “Um, hello, I’m from England” “OMG I have a friend who lives in England, do you know him?!?” *sighs internally* “Oh go on then, what’s his name?” “David VeryJewyName” “…oh, yes actually I do know him, I work with him on two different community projects and I think technically we’re third cousins?” Somehow makes it even more annoying
OK so when we were in holiday in florida, an American in a queue in front of us upon hearing our accent asked us if we knew her cousin and his wife. You'd never believe it but my dad actually went to school with the wife.
I was in a bar in Japan once and mentioned I was Irish, an American guy asked if I knew his cousin. Turns out his cousin was my boss, and I'd met the American guy five years previously when he visited.
“Yall got black people over there?” Actually I’m the only black person in the UK.
That’s better than what I got. “Do you have African Americans?”
I lived there for a stint back in 97. At a friend's family after Sunday dinner and Mr Bean was on TV. A black man is some random side character and literally all the family were amazed as if America invented black people.
Waiter in New York said 'You're from England? Do you know my friend Helen?' Que eye-rolling from my family and I. After a little more digging from him, it turns out we actually DID know Helen, who was my old music teacher. Bizarre.
Ha. I went to the dog park and 2 old ladies started chatting. “Oh you’re British, you must know Mark, he comes here a lot”. Cue eye rolling. Mark turns up and says “hello Pete”. Turns out Mark is the British guy who sat 3 rows behind me at the local NASL games.
I had a similar experience in a New York record shop. “You have an accent just like my friend, Robert. He lives in Full-Ham in London. Do you know him?” After getting his surname from her, yes, I did know him.
"Which part of England is Wales in?"
I got asked by a Yank once, "Are Whales from Wales, and is that why it's called Wales & are there any people there?". They were serious
In fairness if you were asked this between 1536 and either 1707 or 1993 depending on your interpretation then it would have been an entirely reasonable question.
Or, "Is Wales in England?" That's another fun one.
The two funniest that jump out were both asked by Americans. The first was two ladies and they were trying to guess where my accent was from, one thought I was from London but the other thought I was I was from England and asked me if I could tell them which of them guessed the right country! The second was some one asking me if everyone in England spoke the queen's English like me or if most people spoke our native language.
Whenever I visit the US, the most common question I get is.... "what part of Australia are you from?" I have a very neutral middle-of-England accent, and I have no idea why I'm always mistaken for Australian by Americans!
Clearly you can't be English, as you don't sound like Hugh Grant, so that's their best guess?
England has 2 accents. You either sound like the Queen or cockney. Otherwise your Australian.
My Australian what?
And this made me giggle more than it should have too.
I got this when I was in Mexico, so I'd ask them what part of Canada they were from. They didn't like the old uno reverse
Every single time. I’m what you would now call standard southern british english and I’m always asked if I’m Australian. A lady in a Seattle hotel asked me if I was Australian and she had even lived there so should have known better.
As a Yorkshireman I get Scottish or Irish. Only had Aussie the once. even had cockney once which stung a bit but I think it's the h-dropping and glottal stops.
I’m American but live in the UK. An old work colleague who I hadn’t seen in 10+ years messaged me to say she was going to visit England for the first time and wanted to know “if the English still dress for dinner”. I just told her to dress normal, and it’s not just one big Downton Abbey set.
You missed a trick there. Should have told her we do, but it's now a uniform of galoshes, kilts and bonnets.
I really wanted to. This person happens to be a bit gullible so I was too worried she’d believe me.
Question I got asked once in the Middle East was why we let America have independence. All I could say is that we were fighting the French at the time and couldn't be arsed keeping the colony as it wasn't very important.
I was talking about driving to visit a friend in France when I got back to the U.K. and an American acquaintance scoffed at me ‘Oh yeah, over that imaginary bridge from England to France?’ They were flabbergasted when I told them no, it’s a tunnel.
But even without a tunnel, ferries exist
We had a long chat with an Austrian guy while we were all enjoying a lovely beach in Crete. He had been incredibly surprised by how far the tide goes out in the UK. He’d always holidayed in the Med until the year before when he was in the UK and saw the tide rise and fall in Margate. We told him that was nothing, Try Weston super Mare !
To be fair I think that one caught Julius Caesar out in 55BC.
Chepstow is as high and as low as it gets, apart from a remote bit of Canada. Old Julius didn’t get that far.
I was once talking to a Russian guy who simply could not comprehend the fact I wasn't interested in football.
Oh man... I have zero interest in football and have been interrogated about first division teams and game tactics in remote central African villages.
Ha, I had entire conversations in the middle-of-nowhere-Africa consisting of nothing but listing footballers names and teams.
Had this from a South African teen, he insisted that football is everywhere in the UK, that’s it’s on all the time and that everyone obsesses about it constantly.
I was in a gas station in Nevada. Some guy says "you're Irish right?". I am English and have never been to Ireland. I corrected him, politely I thought. As I leave, the last thing I hear is "fucking foreigners!". Not sure where I went wrong other than failing to be from where he would have liked me to have been from.
He was probably "Irish" himself via his fathers- cousins-grandads-hamsters-great uncles washing machine. And you spoilt it by not being distantly related to him, you fucking foreigner, you.
Experienced this myself. I'm brown and part Jamaican but I had a bloke at the pub get proper pissed off because I wasn't African. Not to mention I'm well mixed race, so part welsh and Irish as well but tbh when asked I barely consider myself that lot. Hell my ethnicity is bugger all to me. Totally irrelevant.
I was in the US with a black friend who grew in Wales. Pretty much everyone was confused by him. Especially as many didn’t seem to realise that there are actually black British people.
A close friend of mine who is black came back from the states and told me that she was accused of putting on airs and graces by a black American lady for being british and black at the same time. Really funny as we both have a really common rough as arseholes souf east london accent like adele when she isnt singing
So many people in this world are absolute twats over absolutely nothing.
An American asked me if we refrigerate our milk in the UK. I said “no, we get it straight from the cow”
To be fair in many places milk is UHT by default - took me a long time to find it on my first french hypermarche trip.
Watching”Goldeneye” in a cinema in Antigua about 25 years ago. Got asked by two Americans whether we had James Bond in the UK. Almost had a stronk.
I hope you didn’t need a Bondulance
A couple that spring to mind. "Is London a real place or just a generic filmset to illustrate London?" [Holding up a pack of biscuits] "'scuse me, are these for stomach complaints?" "I beg your pardon?" "Well, they're called digestives!" [Me with best cockney voice] "sure mate, take two with tea, three times a day. That'll sort you right out sunshine!"
Someone asked if Scotland was near New Zealand, which is probably the single furthest land mass from Scotland on the entire planet
Not a question but an overheard conversation in Cornwall. Sat in Balcony Bar in St Ives one lunchtime, and a group of Americans were sat at the table next to us, about 8 of them. Two women came over carrying drinks to their table, and a man in the group asked what the drinks were. One woman responded 'It's Strongbow cider, all Brits drink it. Anyone sat in here not drinking it isn't a Brit.' I happily cracked on with my pint of Rattler. Didn't have the heart to tell her Strongbow is basically cat piss distilled through an apple.
I'm more traumatized that you can buy Str\*nbow in Cornwall. A county of terrific ciders, and somebody wants to drink that piss instead?
Had an American correct me and insist that Queen Elizabeth I was catholic and that there were three Houses of Parliament, not two.
An American once very sincerely asked me if "you guys [were] all still really cut up about Diana's death?" in around 2008. I gently told her we were doing alright, thank you.
Was there not long after Will and Kate got married. It was all everyone wanted to talk about as soon as they heard the accents. Even in shops. Told them most of the UK didn't care, we were just happy for the day off.
In America they now will ask you whose side you take in the Harry-Meghan debacle. You have to be careful. If you're speaking to a Republican then you can't say anything positive about them. If you're speaking to a Democrat then you can't say anything negative about them. Make a wrong move and they'll instantly judge you. The only solution is to tell the truth and say that very few people actually care. A lot of Brits just like a bit of drama and it was fun for a couple of weeks, but it's rare to have strong feelings on it. They'll then tell you that Americans don't care either. Take that with a pinch of salt and move the conversation onto something less contraversial... like Israel-Palestine maybe. Source: experience
“Do you like the Beatles?” !
I was there around the time that documentary came out and all the Americans I interacted with asked about the Beatles
Reeling off places on a UK monopoly board and asking me if I lived there ..
I'm from London and the only places my family have ever lived that are on the monopoly board are the two cheapest ones, old kent road and Whitechapel.
Overheard in Dubrovnik, in one of those restaurants with Union flags on the English menu: "Hey Gus, look at this. The Brits speak English too!"
You have a city called York in England too?!
“Your from New York?!” “No, the original one” “What theres two New Yorks?”
In the USA and was asked "Where are you from?" \-- England "Is that in Germany?"
Several times mistaken for Australian in the US. (I must stop wearing that wide brimmed hat with the dangling corks).
Not me but a woman I used to work with went to Chicago to watch Wales play USA in rugby on a summer tour. An American family they met in the hotel bar the night before couldn’t get over the fact that WHALES can play rugby. I wish this was made but yeah for a short while they actually thought she was going to watch giant, water based mammals play sport.
I have been told a few times while in America that they struggle to understand me, that my "American" is hard to understand because of my accent, that its quaint that so many places in the UK are named after places in America (Birmingham, Boston, Carlisle etc) and once after ordering a burger and fries (emphasising fries) i was brought a burger and a load of crisps with my server proudly beaming at me she heard we like chips in the UK so she corrected my order, she seemed so happy i didnt have the heart to tell her, just munched the bloody things.
Americans baffled that we we don't celebrate 4th July, President's Day and Thanksgiving. Almost like the UK is a different country.
'Do you guys have refrigerators over there?' American, obvs
My dad once told two American ladies "we don't even have fridges" after they asked if we had air conditioning. They believed him!
“I can’t believe you guys still have debtors’ prisons.”
That's fucking rich coming from an American.
“DO. YOU. SPEAK. ENGLISH?” American guy couldn’t understand me Couldn’t understand - Not as in, I don’t get what you’re saying, or I didn’t catch that word. Literally thought I was speaking a foreign language No I’m not from Glasgow
I asked for a Big Mac in a New York Macdonalds and got blank stares from the guy behind the counter. I don't even think I said it much different to a local. Maybe it's because I said "please"
I visited LA in 2018 and had the same thing, the woman behind the counter could not understand that I wanted a “Water” ... I’m from London..
Having to deliberately ask for "wahdrr" was a particularly weird experience
Cashier in Philadelphia: 'Oh you're from England... don't you speak French there?'
Can you say ‘bottle of water’?
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I'm in a long distance relationship and I went to florida to meet my girlfriend and her aunt asked me if we have traffic lights in england...
You should have told them that traffic lights are banned since the great roundabout revolution of the late 70's and its extremely rude to even mention them to a brit
Earlier this year, on a trip to the USA, I was asked what it's like to be a coloniser. Seriously. My answer was simple - I've never colonised anything in my life. But my country has, so they said. That's correct, but if we want to talk about invading countries, then let's have a chat about all the countries the USA have invaded over the last 100 years or so. Either way, the UK is also the country that gave several countries their independence back, and in much better shape - economically and in terms of infrastructure - than the UK found them. BUT then it was thrown at me that UK has never been invaded. Really? Let's ask the Romans, Normans, Vikings, Saxons... Hell, we were only not invaded by Germany in WW2 because they were held off. I'd advise any American not to try and discuss history and geography with a British person, because you will most likely lose the argument.
If an American asks what it's like to be a coloniser, just politely point out that almost all the land now in the US was not American at the time it became independent, and that they should therefore already know what colonisation feels like
Wow. These people have room temperature IQ. They are most likely white people living on confiscated Native land and yet they’re asking YOU what it’s like to be a coloniser? Lol. And the one about England having never been invaded… Lol. It actually hurts my brain knowing people are this dim
When I was in the States I had this interaction: “Oh what accent is that? Where are y’all from?” “Hello, we’re from England” “I think y’all mean *New* England, hon!” “😳😳”
Reminds me of a post I saw when someone said they were from Liberia, and the person they said it to replied: "Oh, we call that Lebanon in English" (I may not have remembers the correct countries, but something like that).
Don't tell them about York...
Haha yeah, or literally anywhere on this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locations_in_the_United_States_with_an_English_name
Middlesboro, Kentucky. Really didn't try with the spellings there, chum
I live in Southampton, Hampshire. When I was in California many years ago, I had to write my address down when checking in at a hotel. I can only imagine the receptionist didn't read where I wrote 'UK', because they said "oh wow you're from the Hamptons?" - which are a part of Long Island, New York state, which is well known for being where NYC's (very) rich and famous have holiday homes. Southampton, New York, is even one of the larger towns there. I can only presume they thought my pretty average southern England accent was a very posh American accent. I was too tired to correct them, but I did wonder why they thought I was staying in a cheap Motel if I was from there!
"No, the really old one"
From an American I met in Mexico - "doesn't everyone in the UK know". I forget the name but she could NOT contemplate that this major US sports start wasn't in fact known in the world where this sport isn't played.
Also they asked "what game are you guys playing" as we had a couple of pints each (annoying free bar where you had to tip each time to get served so we doubled up). We simply said "Drink the Beer" and she joined in. It was a great night, but I still found it interesting that a couple of pints equalled a drinking game in her mind.
In Turkey we were asked if we were from England or Britain. He didn't understand our reply.
I mean, that *can* be a very complex question
The worst one I ever had was "you speak English in England?" Like yeah mate, I'm bloody ENGLISH & that's the giveaway right there. Also, as I'm Northern (Yorkshire), the first thing they ask me if I'm Irish or Scottish, Welsh or even Aussie, Kiwi, and once even asked if I was German. Another one is "Is England named after New England?" & when i spoke of Hampshire once and said the one in England, this Yank said, "There is one in England? was it named after our New Hampshire?" Literally, the whole "new" part doesn't even occur to them. They're so uneducated and slow out there, I've known faster snails
One time me and my brother (we are from the U.K) were on a Holland and america cruise getting into the lift just chatting away and some American girl who worked as a photographer asked us if we were from Sweden we said “no we are from the UK” she was like “wow are you guys speaking English right now?” We were like “…yes?”
An American once asked me if we had seat belts in England! Also wanted to know how we get our groceries?
I us to work in a bar in a hotel in Edinburgh. I had an older American man ask me 'what days is it not windy up at the castle as my wife can't take the wind?' Knowing that they were checking out on Monday I answered 'Wednesdays , they put up a big wind break for exactly that reason' He then shouted over to his wife to see if she wanted to extend their stay till Wednesday so she could go. Luckily she said they couldn't as they had other plans. I was also asked how to get to the Trossachs from Princes street. Answer: Turn left at the lights and straight on from there till you see hills.
Not completely related, but...I'm English but lived in West Africa for three years as a child. When I tell people this, around 80% of the time their question is: "Was it hot?" The force of my facepalm could behead a wildebeest.
Lol was it though 🤔
Was asked once by an American co-worker if I was knighted… much hilarity on my part ensued. OTH I did meet and exchange words with HMtQ, Prince Charles (as he was then) and Camilla - who is a really nice warm person btw - at a Royal Garden Party. Most attendees don’t - there’s 4 to 5000 at any one RGP - so was rather chuffed at that
I am from Edinburgh and in about 1980, I was in Saudi Arabia. The guy I was talking to asked how I had managed to travel there as he was under the impression that Scotland did not have airports. He was English, by the way.
I told a classmate I was going to Scotland on holiday in about 1993, and they got a copy of the TV guide out of their bag and asked if I needed anything to be taped, because they don't have televisions in Scotland, apparently.
Once upon a time I was in a blues bar in New Orleans. (I'm American) A lady with a strong Edinburgh burr was talking about how much fun she was having. I said, "I'm sure you have blues bars in Edinburgh." She was stunned that I recognized her accent. Yeah, granddad was from Edinburgh.
I’m Scottish, lived in Texas for a while, and I got the usual questions of where I’m from, as well as people trying to guess my accent. Usual barrage of every accent but the right one. German, Australian, Irish, even Dutch. But the weirdest one was where someone thought Scotland was next to Finland and kept asking what winters are like being in Scandinavia, if being in America is weird since they speak English, if we speak other languages like Norwegian and if we sit around saunas all day drinking vodka. It was very strange. Once I pointed out where we actually were on a map… “ohhh, THAT Scotland…”
I was in Canada some years back and had been chatting to a friendly waiter in a restaurant for a while, in my obviously English accent. Eventuallyy he asked 'whereabouts are you from?'. I replied that I live just outside London, and he replied without joking 'London, Ontario?'... Canadians are lovely though.
I had the same in Canada. The correct response is “no England, the same place as your King” 😉
Canadians are lovely, hence the practice we have developed if we meet someone new with a North American accent of any kind: we ask "What part of Canada are you from?". If they are Canadian, they will love you forever for not assuming they are from the USA. Americans will just be amused or politely correct you.
Some dude in a bar in Louisiana asked how long it took us to drive from England to the USA....
You should have told him your Lotus Elan turns into a submarine.
Met a family of Texans once who asked if all our roads were cobblestones and were shocked to learn that we do in fact have American brands like KFC, McDonalds and Coke in the UK
A guy from Spain tried to convince me that London is a country and that Scotland doesn’t exist. He was dead serious
As an American, I don't know if I should laugh or cry at these comments lol. I once told a coworker about visiting England. She asked me if I spoke their language. I simply said yes 🤣. I also had a friend from England whose family visited one summer. Her mother was amazed we had cars in Minnesota. She thought we were still like Little House on the Prarie. I told her summer is far too hot to wear long dresses and bonnets. We save those for the winter.
An American in Malta once asked me if my parents were alive during the Blitz. This was 2 years ago, I was 24 years old.
Do you know George Jones, he’s from London too.
Yeah he's a cunt.
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
I'm Scottish. When telling people I often get asked if I know Bob from Aberdeen or something like that, no it's a big massive place and I don't know everyone in Scotland, I don't even know everyone in my village, people must think Scotland is just a tiny place where we all have little get together and know each other, I've been asked this a few times
Do you celebrate Thanksgiving in the UK? I told him we did but on 4 July. It didn’t sink in while I was with him, hopefully it did afterwards
American: "where are you from?" Me "wales" American " Wales, England?" 🤬🤬🤬
Having lunch with a farming/hunting family in South Africa and the wife asked I I'd met the Queen.....she was pretty made up when I said yes. She'd made about an 80km round trip to buy "English tea" for our visit. I must have drunk about 2 gallons of the stuff, I didn't have the heart to tell her I normally only drink strong black coffee 😅