Robin's Blog on life in America
Week starting October 18th - Lisa with one eye
The weather will be colder, and Lisa will no doubt be getting to grips with her vision (carefully not bending over). TJ and his crew are coming back to finish off their landscaping work and to extend the parking space at the front of the house.
And maybe we will find time to do other things as well!
Robin's Thoughts on America
There was a very amusing and pertinent article recently circulating on the Internet of the thoughts of Scott Waters, an American tourist on an extended stay in England. The furor it caused prompted a column in The Guardian providing a riposte from the Western side of the Atlantic. They are well worth comparing, so I reprint them below for your enjoyment.
Thoughts on a Strange Country
An American in England
The food is generally outstanding
There are no guns
There are too many narrow stairs
Everything is just a little bit different
The pubs close too early
The reason they drive on the left is because all their cars are built backwards
Pubs are not bars, they are community living rooms.
You’d better like peas, potatoes and sausage
Refrigerators and washing machines are very small
Everything is generally older, smaller and shorter
People don’t seem to be afraid of their neighbors or the government
Their paper money makes sense, the coins don’t
Everyone has a washing machine but driers are rare
Hot and cold water faucets. Remember them?
Pants are called “trousers”, underwear are “pants” and sweaters are “jumpers”
The bathroom light is a string hanging from the ceiling
“Fanny” is a naughty word, as is “shag”
All the signs are well designed with beautiful typography and written in full sentences with proper grammar.
There’s no dress code
Doors close by themselves, but they don’t always open
They eat with their forks upside down
The English are as crazy about their gardens as Americans are about cars
They don’t seem to use facecloths or napkins or maybe they’re just neater then [sic] we are
The wall outlets all have switches, some don’t do anything
There are hardly any cops or police cars
5,000 year ago, someone arranged a lot of rocks all over, but no one is sure why
When you do see police they seem to be in male & female pairs and often smiling
Black people are just people: they didn’t quite do slavery here
Everything comes with chips, which are French fries. You put vinegar on them
Cookies are “biscuits” and potato chips are “crisps”
HP sauce is better then catsup
Obama is considered a hero, Bush is considered an idiot.
After fish and chips, curry is the most popular food
The water controls in showers need detailed instructions
They can boil anything
Folks don’t always lock their bikes
It’s not unusual to see people dressed different and speaking different languages
Your electronic devices will work fine with just a plug adapter
Nearly everyone is better educated then we are
If someone buys you a drink you must do the same
There are no guns
Look right, walk left. Again; look right, walk left. You’re welcome.
Avoid British wine and French beer
It’s not that hard to eat with the fork in your left hand with a little practice. If you don’t, everyone knows you’re an American
Many of the roads are the size of our sidewalks
There’s no AC
Instead of turning the heat up, you put on a jumper
Gas is “petrol”, it costs about $6 a gallon and is sold by the liter
If you speed on a motorway, you get a ticket. Period. Always
You don’t have to tip, really!
Scotland, Wales, Ireland and Cornwall really are different countries
Only 14% of Americans have a passport, everyone in the UK does
You pay the price marked on products because the taxes (VAT) are built in
Walking is the national pastime
Their TV looks and sounds much better then ours
They took the street signs down during WWII, but haven’t put them all back up yet
Everyone enjoys a good joke
There are no guns
Dogs are very well behaved and welcome everywhere
There are no window screens
You can get on a bus and end up in Paris
Everyone knows more about our history then we do
Radio is still a big deal. The BBC is quite good
The newspapers can be awful
Everything costs the same but our money is worth less so you have to add 50% to the price to figure what you’re paying
Beer comes in large, completely filled, actual pint glasses and the closer the brewery the better the beer
Butter and eggs aren’t refrigerated
The beer isn’t warm, each style is served at the proper temperature
Cider (alcoholic) is quite good.
Excess cider consumption can be very painful.
The universal greeting is “Cheers” (pronounced “cheeahz” unless you are from Cornwall, then it’s “chairz”)
The money is easy to understand: 1-2-5-10-20-50 pence, then-£1-£2-£5-£10, etc bills. There are no quarters.
Their cash makes ours look like Monopoly money
Cars don’t have bumper stickers
Many doorknobs, buildings and tools are older than America
By law, there are no crappy, old cars
When the sign says something was built in 456, they didn’t lose the “1”
Cake is is pudding, ice cream is pudding, anything served for desert is pudding, even pudding
BBC 4 is NPR
Everything closes by 1800 (6pm)
Very few people smoke, those who do often roll their own
You’re defined by your accent
No one in Cornwall knows what the hell a Cornish Game Hen is
Soccer is a religion, religion is a sport
Europeans dress better then the British, we dress worse
The trains work: a three minute delay is regrettable
Drinks don’t come with ice
There are far fewer fat English people
There are a lot of healthy old folks around participating in life instead of hiding at home watching tv
If you’re over 60, you get free tv and bus and rail passes.
They don’t use Bose anything anywhere
Displaying your political or religious affiliation is considered very bad taste
Every pub has a pet drunk
Their healthcare works, but they still bitch about it
Cake is one of the major food groups
Their coffee is mediocre but their tea is wonderful
There are still no guns
Towel warmers!
Cheers
An Englishman in America
. Customer service is either so warm it’s like you’ve made a new friend for life or so brusque you feel as though you’ve just been ordered back into your cell after your five-minute phone call with your lawyer. There’s no middle ground.
. You need to tip for everything. If you think maybe you should tip, you should tip. You should be tipping me for this article.
. If you don’t tip in a restaurant, the waiter or waitress will make a smart remark and your evening will be ruined. I’ve seen it happen.
. People tip because the waiting staff are paid low hourly rates.
. The waiting staff are paid low hourly rates because employers have successfully tricked their customers into taking on a significant portion of their staffing costs. If you don’t like the sound of that, all is not quite lost – there is a socialist running for president this time.
. You can have anything you want, as long as you can pay for it.
. And as long as you tip.
. You can fill up your car at a petrol station using a couple of nickels and an old button.
. Something as tiny and insignificant as a bicycle could never be considered remotely comparable to a car, and to expect it to abide by the same rules of the road is considered utterly absurd by cyclists, pedestrians and drivers alike.
. Coins have become so worthless that restaurants sometimes refuse to take them – even thieves have been known to turn their noses up at some of them.
. They’re only really used for the laundromat. Because strangely enough in this land of modern conveniences, it’s apparently too much to ask to want a washing machine in your apartment.
. Nobody is worried about burglars even though they have fire escape stairs stuck to the outside of their building and the living-room window has been propped open for six months because an air-conditioning unit is sticking out of it. And, no, a flyscreen won’t keep them out.
. Although I admit it: a flyscreen is a good idea. I haven’t had to kill a wasp or a moth for months.
. Apartments usually come unfurnished, and Americans think the idea of sitting on someone else’s sofa or sleeping in someone else’s bed is disgusting. Come on – they’re not in there with you. “They might as well be!”
. Far more Americans than the often-quoted 14% have a passport. But even if the number is low, relative to other countries, the fact is that they can quite happily cover .8m sq miles of vastly varied terrain without one. That’s more than double the .7m sq miles of the EU , which many British holidaymakers will be visiting.
. It’s best to think of the police as a sort of occupying army and avoid them accordingly – particularly if you are not white.
. TV news is rabidly partisan, while the broadsheet press pretends to be objective and neutral. Whereas in Britain …
. Remember when British leftwingers thought Boris Johnson was too much of a joke to become mayor of London and then he went and did it anyway? That’s what’s happening with Donald Trump and the presidency.
. That story about the pig was probably the first time anyone here had heard of David Cameron.
. Celebrities walk around major cities as bold as brass. The other day I sat next to Dominic West, Damian Lewis and John Slattery in a restaurant.
. Yeah, that’s right. And bragging is considered perfectly OK.
. And so is telling someone sincerely that you think they, or something they have done, is amazing and fantastic.
. I mean it.
. No, really.
. I’m not being sarcastic.
. Honestly. That’s just my normal voice.
. A lot of the trains and subway carriages look like whoever built them said, “OK, well, it works – what more do you want?” And left it at that.
. But basically, you’re lucky in most parts of the country if you have any trains or subway systems at all.
. If you get out of your car and walk from A to B in Los Angeles or Miami, people will think you are a surprisingly well-dressed and purposeful-looking homeless person.
. If you’ve got good health insurance, the doctor will give you everything you need … and more.
. If you haven’t … Oh, God. Good luck to you.
. A lot of people consider “Oh, God” swearing.
. Medical companies believe you will respond positively to a TV advert for, say, a sleeping pill that includes 10 minutes of warnings about side-effects that include danger of death, erections lasting more than 24 hours, and the fact that you may find yourself driving a car while asleep and not remember it the next day.
. If you do need a sleeping pill the slow, ponderous and worthy tones of NPR (National Public Radio) may fit the bill. Do not listen while driving or operating heavy machinery. Or if you have an erection that has lasted more than 24 hours.
. Americans love telling stories, and they’re really good at it.
. And they’re really creative with language, especially slang.
. If you watch European football (soccer) here, it’s a morning sport, after which you can do other things with the rest of your day. As long as you haven’t kept to your old British football-and-drinking regime.
. It’s perfectly respectable to drink Coca-Cola or other similar drinks with a meal.
. Order a cup of tea in a cafe or restaurant and you will be confronted with a glass or mug of lukewarm water with a teabag of some alarming flavour, like pomegranate or boysenberry, floating sadly on the top like a punctured dinghy, and some “milk” that is probably 50% cream, delivered on request. I’m just going to say it once: the water needs to be at boiling point for the tea to infuse!!!
. Just order a cup of coffee. They know what they’re doing with coffee.
. If you eat pizza with a knife and fork they look at you like you just ate a sandwich with a spoon. New York’s mayor, Bill de Blasio, caused major controversy by eating his the European way – the weakling.
. A plate of Doritos and some guacamole is considered a full meal.
. Bars don’t usually serve food. Just keep on drinking.
. But drinking on the street is illegal – except in New Orleans, where it’s compulsory.
. People still love smoking, and the glowing retro-futurist coloured lights of e-cigarettes haven’t really caught on yet.
. They have no universally agreed upon way of saying goodbye (a kiss on the cheek would be unforgivably inappropriate and borderline actionable). Most common is just to pause for a moment, perhaps give a barely perceptible nod or slightly awkward wave ... and then simply walk away.
. The weather really means business.
. Americans are acutely conscious of race, in the way British people are acutely conscious of class.
. Lots of people you don’t expect to own guns or support the right to bear arms do .
. No massacre, no matter how awful, will prompt Congress to tighten America’s gun laws. There will have to be a wider cultural shift. Lots of people do care about this. But they’re not sure exactly what to do.
Perhaps next week I will find time to add a few pithy comments of my own!