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BS: British-American cultural differences 3
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Subject: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Jim Dixon Date: 19 Sep 01 - 12:37 PM Here are links back to BS: British-American cultural differences and BS: British-American cultural differences 2. While you're at it, check out American Cultural oddities from 1998. In answer to the tipping problem, I think a good rule of thumb that works in both Britain and America is this: If you get service at your table, you have to tip. If you have to pick up your drinks or food at the bar and carry them to a table yourself, you don't have to tip. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: GUEST,JTB Date: 19 Sep 01 - 12:39 PM In Britain, many are fond of smoking an occasional fag. In America, that's quite a different undertaking! |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 19 Sep 01 - 12:46 PM If you get service at your table, you have to tip. Unless the service is unsatisfactory. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Lox Date: 19 Sep 01 - 12:58 PM Smoking a fag Brit = consuming a cigarette US = shooting a homosexual haha lox |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 19 Sep 01 - 01:17 PM A lot of these "British" things are just as true of Ireland incidentally. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: GUEST,allie kiwi Date: 19 Sep 01 - 06:34 PM re: tipping Is there a common percentage that you tip? Like I just calculate 10% in my head? Or is that insufficient? |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: irishajo Date: 19 Sep 01 - 06:49 PM What is a rasher? I'm not sure if this is a British or solely Irish term, but I figure someone ought to know. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Snuffy Date: 19 Sep 01 - 06:57 PM A rasher is a slice (but only of bacon), and is a commonly used word on both sides of the Irish Sea |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: irishajo Date: 19 Sep 01 - 07:00 PM Thanks Snuffy! I've wondered about that for a long time. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Jim Dixon Date: 19 Sep 01 - 07:13 PM I once looked up "rasher" and I found that it meant "any piece of meat cut thinly so it can be cooked quickly." It is related to "rash" as in "Don't do anything rash," meaning, "Don't do anything too hastily." It is rarely used in America, and I have never heard it used with reference to anything but bacon. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 19 Sep 01 - 07:31 PM So what do Americans call rashers of bacon? Slices would it be?
I've also heard the term used for Kosher bacon substitute, which is some other kind of meat (?turkey) sliced thinly for frying or grilling. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Jim Dixon Date: 19 Sep 01 - 07:33 PM Phoaks: (Kat, do you mind if I borrow that word?) Don't miss Lizabee's message at the end of the previous thread. Lizabee: Your spelling is fine with me! And your information agrees with mine, but it raises a couple of questions: 1. What is a hurdle, in British usage? 2. If kids can't buy fireworks, what DO they do with the money they collect when they go around calling "a penny for the guy"? (I know that in some cases the money is collected for charity, but is that the only thing nowadays?) |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Murray MacLeod Date: 19 Sep 01 - 07:37 PM A hurdle is a moveable panel made from thin interwoven saplings, used to create temporary pens for livestock. Murray |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Gloredhel Date: 19 Sep 01 - 07:56 PM GUEST allie kiwi, Tips in the US, or California anyway, are usually 15-20%, depending on how cheap or generous you are, and how good the service was. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Lox Date: 19 Sep 01 - 08:09 PM Kids nowadays tend to buy sweets until they are about 8 They then buy fags (cigarettes) until the age of about 14 They then move on to Hashish and weed Parents tend to be completely oblivious (maybe I'm exaggerating a bit, they probably start earlier) lox |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 19 Sep 01 - 08:15 PM Or they might get their big brother to buy the fireworks for them.
Last year after Guy Fawkes was over I remember some hopeful laddy standing outside the shops with a stuffed Santa Claus, saying "Penny for the Santa" - I don't know how he did, but I thought it showed real initative. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: running.hare Date: 19 Sep 01 - 08:23 PM once you've copiced your Hazel you use whole wands (lengths of hazel) as the upwrites of your hurdle (panel)(the weft I think in weaving terms) & then you take wands you've split down the centre, (lengthways), and weave them in & out of your uprights. (there your weft) origanly, like murray said they where used for making tempory live-stock pens, but now your more likely to see them in peoples gardens than the british country side. 2. If kids can't buy fireworks, what DO they do with the money they collect when they go around calling "a penny for the guy"? (I know that in some cases the money is collected for charity, but is that the only thing nowadays?) ????????????????? Sweets (candy) or pokamon cards I expect! I was never alowed to demand money with menaces so although i think occasionaly i made a Guy I never profited from it. Ohh & trick or treeting has become farely normal over here in reasent yrs, but again my parents wer't keen so i think I went twice & only to v close neighbours. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 19 Sep 01 - 08:35 PM Never asked for slices, or rashers, of bacon. Order bacon 'n eggs for breakfast and you get two slices. If you want more, ask for a side order of bacon. And specify how you want the toast since that varies all over the place. If the toast comes buttered (or just greased), you are in a greasy spoon (tip 10%). If it comes plain on a hot plate or wrapped, with butter and jams on the side, you are in a slightly higher class establishment (never tip less than 15%). The one thing you never get (thankfully) is cold toast in a rack (demand your money back). |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: weepiper Date: 19 Sep 01 - 08:42 PM In Scotland we've had 'trick or treating' for a couple of hundred years but it's called guising here (short for disguising I think). But kids don't - or didn't when I was wee - automatically get stuff for turning up at the door...you had to perform for it! As an unrelated ditty has it: 'tell us a story,sing us a sang, show us yer bum or oot ye gang!'. :-) |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: irishajo Date: 19 Sep 01 - 09:22 PM I'd call it a piece of bacon, not a slice. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Bert Date: 19 Sep 01 - 09:38 PM A rasher is a slice of bacon. A favourite English cut of bacon is gammon. You will never see it in the USA. In Cockney Rhyming, slang a 'gammon rasher' is a 'smasher' or a very nice looking young lady. So if you hear a Cockney saying "Cor! look at that gammon rasher" don't go looking for a slice of bacon. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: robomatic Date: 19 Sep 01 - 10:15 PM This may be a bit dated, but to announce oneself by one's fist upon a door in England was to 'knock up someone' whereas the same term in Yankee-land was quite different: to get a girl pregnant. A certain amount of titillation in England as I'm sure they knew the American take was taken advantage of on an old Goon Show:
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Chris Amos Date: 20 Sep 01 - 01:50 AM Hi, My mother, who was Irish, used to use the word rasher about thin people. "he looks like a rasher of wind" the only other use of the word i have come across. Chris |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Jim Dixon Date: 20 Sep 01 - 11:17 AM This page from the Green Wood Trust contains some illustrations of hurdles and hurdle construction. This page, from the Wessex Coppice Group, contains a nice illustration of a hurdle garden fence. This page contains some information about how to lay a hedge. Here's another page about hedgelaying. And while you're at it, you might as well learn something about drystone walling. It appears these traditional skills have disappeared from the United States, if they ever existed here at all. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: MMario Date: 20 Sep 01 - 11:37 AM Drive around New England much Jim? Many drystone walls - and some of them are brand new - some hundreds of years old. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Bagpuss Date: 20 Sep 01 - 11:37 AM If you asked for a piece of bacon in scotland you would probably get a bacon sandwich (any scots feel free to correct me). One thing I have noticed has a different name all over the UK is a bread roll. Back in Geordieland we always called it a (bread)bun (only for wimps - everyone else used stottie cake for their butties), in other parts of the north I have heard it called a barm(cake). What does everyone else call it? Bagpuss |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Rt Revd Sir jOhn from Hull Date: 20 Sep 01 - 12:00 PM In Hull, it's a bread cake. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: weepiper Date: 20 Sep 01 - 02:24 PM Bagpuss, we'd call it a bacon piece or maybe a piece and bacon, but not a piece OF bacon. Round here a bread roll is usually a bap. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: awig Date: 30 Aug 02 - 09:17 PM Here in Coventry (in the English midlands) we call a bread roll a "batch". It seems to come from the same root as "bake" (or batch production) and I believe it also appears in the King James bible as the "batch of life". We even had a "Batch bar" (a sort of sandwich shop, but using batches instead of sliced bread) just round the corner from us for many years. I've always considered batch to be a Coventry oddity since I've never come across it being used anywhere else. Is that true?
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Amos Date: 31 Aug 02 - 06:45 PM Our New England fields are full of finely made drystone walls very similar to those Jim -- but then we were probably Englishmen when they were first laid down!! One other thing I have notice English Catters do which I don't think Yanks do, do is start obscure threads with titles like "are sessions elitist?" as though seeking to make a fact out of two or three score of opinions. Odd, that! In MHO, anyway. Regards, A |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Leadfingers Date: 31 Aug 02 - 06:55 PM A hurdle is also the obstacle in a 100,200,or400 metre race or in a steeplechase.Gawd I'm a smartarse. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 31 Aug 02 - 09:33 PM Just got back from a swing through the warm southern states. Drank gallons of iced tea. I understand that in some places they actually drink tea hot! And in a coffee cup! However, I have to admit, with winter not too far off, a cup of lapsang souchong warms the cockles and the muscles. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Gurney Date: 01 Sep 02 - 01:04 AM On the bacon theme, in the midlands, they cut rashers from the Flitch. My Mum used to reminisce fondly about one of her old teachers, 'Flitch" Bacon. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Venthony Date: 01 Sep 02 - 03:20 AM Rashers of bacon was a phrase commonly used by both officers and enlisted men during the American Civil War. It sounds Greek. Does, perhaps, the word have a military etymology? T.
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Amos Date: 01 Sep 02 - 11:07 AM The Am Her says "Etymology unknown" for 'rasher', which is unusual in itself. But it certainly doesn't sound Greek to me. One possibility is that it derives from Middle German rasch meaning fast, since bacon was probably the first "fast" food, being cut thin. The original MacMuffin, as it were. The word bacon itself is of Middle German origin. Regards, A
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Bassic Date: 01 Sep 02 - 11:14 AM The hurdle in Athletics (Track and Field) is actually used in the 100m for women, 110m for men, 400m for both men and women and the 3000m steeplechase. These are the standard length races run at major events, World Championships, Olympics etc which have official World Records. Does this make me an even smarter arse! He he.. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Bassic Date: 01 Sep 02 - 11:17 AM To the best of my knowledge, Steeples are no longer used as an obstacle in athletic events due to eclesiastical intervention and on health and safety grounds (groin injuries)..........OOOOOOOOoooooooooooooch |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 01 Sep 02 - 02:46 PM The OED says origin of rasher unknown, but people have been trying for explanations for a long time. The OED inserts this note: "Minsheu (1627) explains it as a piece 'rashly or hastily roasted'." Rashed means burnt in cooking. Some words formerly common in America are being or have been lost. Flitch of bacon was common in my childhood, but has disappeared because now everyone buys bacon in a package of slices, by weight. The last time I bought a flitch was to take it along to a rough field camp, some 40 years ago, because we thought a side of bacon would keep better. It had to be special-ordered by the butcher- they haven't cut bacon for years, it comes from the meat processor and wholesaler already sliced and packaged. Venthony is correct, rasher was commonly used in America until at least 1930. Again, probably a victim of the way bacon is now packaged and sold. Like a number of other words, apparent absence of rasher in America is the result of changing custom or habit. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Gareth Date: 01 Sep 02 - 03:28 PM The Dunmow Flitch, Of folk custom interest. A sade of bacon given every year to an old couple in the Village of Dunmow - Essex UK who could prove that they haddent had an arguments in ???? Long. But note the Word "FLITCH" |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 01 Sep 02 - 03:43 PM Makes me wonder how it could be proven. Listening devices put in every old couple's home? Lie Detector? An on-site, unrelated tenant? This would have made a good episode for "Last of the Summer Wine." |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: The Walrus Date: 01 Sep 02 - 05:43 PM One question: On the very few times that I have bought uncooked food in the US, the only bacon available has been "streaky". Are other bacon cuts available in the US? and if not where does the best bacon go? Walrus |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Bill D Date: 01 Sep 02 - 06:01 PM a 'flitch' is a general term for slices of something kept in their original order and often sold as a unit...(wood veneer is a prime example).. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: McGrath of Harlow Date: 01 Sep 02 - 06:47 PM The Dunmow Flitch custom died out - it is said because they couldn't get any couples who qualified. (Young or old.) Though maybe it was more to do with rationing in the war.
Batch loaves turn up in supermarkets these days down South. Or atv least that is what they are called - it means the are soft and not crusty. |
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Subject: RE: BS: British-American cultural differences 3 From: Dicho (Frank Staplin) Date: 01 Sep 02 - 06:58 PM Here in Canada (and the US) we have back bacon or Canadian Bacon. Bacon cut from the loin that has little fat and is cut into round or oblong slices. The only kind we use now since fat must be avoided! |