It was interesting getting a chance to experience Australia and the Great Ocean Road with people from the UK. There were things they found different that reminded me of home and probably vice versa. For example, going out to breakfast during our Great Ocean Road trip just seemed like what you should do on vacation, but my UK travel partners found this a real change of pace. At one of the breakfasts the eggs were served on thick sourdough toast and one of them found this very unique. I thought to myself, that’s Texas Toast! Before we left to go on our trip I called their hotel room and asked if I needed to pack some dress pants, not sure if we would be going to any nice places for dinner. This resorted in a lot of offline discussion, which led me to believe that they were deciding whether this would be a completely casual trip or not. But what was really happening is they were trying to figure out what I meant by “dress pants”. They would have called them smart trousers. This made me laugh because both phrases are strange.
When I was on the wine tour with people from the UK and also some Aussies there was a lot of discussion about how the two cultures greet each other. An Aussie who had lived in the UK said she had a strange reaction when meeting someone from the UK and being asked “Are you alright?” which is the equivalent of “How are you?” in America. She said it sounded like she was always being asked whether she was physically ill. I sat there in silent agreement. Of course the person from the UK had to explain that it was better than the Aussie greeting of “How are you going?” Again, I sat there in silence thinking, yeah, that’s kind of a weird greeting too.
Some of my favorite Aussie terms:
G’day
No worries
Brekky – breakfast
Bikky – cookie
When I was on the wine tour with people from the UK and also some Aussies there was a lot of discussion about how the two cultures greet each other. An Aussie who had lived in the UK said she had a strange reaction when meeting someone from the UK and being asked “Are you alright?” which is the equivalent of “How are you?” in America. She said it sounded like she was always being asked whether she was physically ill. I sat there in silent agreement. Of course the person from the UK had to explain that it was better than the Aussie greeting of “How are you going?” Again, I sat there in silence thinking, yeah, that’s kind of a weird greeting too.
Some of my favorite Aussie terms:
G’day
No worries
Brekky – breakfast
Bikky – cookie
Pumpkin - squash (they say butternut pumpkin)
Favorite popular drink – lemon, lime and bitters – refreshing and delicious!
Favorite popular drink – lemon, lime and bitters – refreshing and delicious!
1 comment:
Hehe - I like your comment and it's so true about the English greeting, 'you alright?' It really threw me.
Have you ever got caught out when Aussies called their flip flops thongs? http://sorrydadenglandisweird.wordpress.com/
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