Before I went to America I read an amusing list of differences between our two countries written by an American in the UK. This made me think it would be fun to turn this around and look at the ways America was different to England. Of course we only spent a couple of days in a very small part of this massive country so the differences we noticed might be specific to New York rather than the whole of the United States. Rather then one hundred differences I’ve chosen just fifty, the next fifty will be about Canada.
- New York airport officials are very grumpy and now have my finger prints.
- People don’t thank you when you hold a door open or let them go first. They seem surprised by good manners until they realise you’re English.
- Generally people on the street don’t smile or speak to each other. Have a nice day is a myth. No one says that, in fact most people don’t say more than is strictly necessary.
- You don’t hear people swearing in public.
- There are no drunks on the streets.
- Tipping is the national pastime. Everyone expects to be tipped, even if they haven’t done anything.
- The police all have guns in their belts right next to their right hand. I’m guessing they are all loaded.
- People respect their armed forces and police more than we do. It’s possible the guns might have something to do with this.
- No one seems the least bit surprised when someone gets shot on the street.
- Taxis are all bright yellow and they are everywhere. This does not mean you can get one when you want one although, if you stand on the street waiting for something else, they will all stop and expect you to get in.
- American road signs appear to be written in text speak. For a tourist this is a little confusing. We could have done with a book of translations to help us find our way around.
- Roads are very wide, very straight and the streets are in a grid which makes finding your way about easier, if you can understand the street signs.
- They don’t have roundabouts but there are traffic lights on every junction. This makes walking in the city a slow process.
- New Yorkers like to honk their horns.
- They drive on the wrong side of the road in America and the steering wheel is on the wrong side of the car but they still measure distances in miles.
- All cars seem to be automatic.
- Cars and trucks are at least double the size of English cars and trucks. Commando says, if Americans had to pay as much for petrol (which they call gas) as us, they wouldn’t all drive big V8’s.
- Everyone leaves the engine running all the time, even when they go into a shop or hotel. This may be because petrol is so cheap.
- They don’t seem to have mobility scooters in America.
- Pavements are called sidewalks and they’re very wide.
- Crossing roads is confusing and a touch dangerous. Pedestrian crossings have a red hand for stop and a white walking man for go but cars turning into the road you’re crossing don’t have to obey the red light.
- Jaywalking seems to be the norm although I’m told it’s an offence. This could explain all the horn honking.
- The underground is called the subway and really isn’t that far underground.
- Underground trains don’t stop at every stop and there are no helpful line maps to show you where to go so you have to ask people.
- When someone starts singing on the subway no one takes any notice.
- There are lots of fire hydrants everywhere. Some of them are quite attractive, others are mostly attractive to dogs.
- Not all Americans are fat but the ones that are are really fat. This could explain why the pavements are so wide.
- Chips are called fries, crisps are called potato chips, sweets are called candy and biscuits are all called cookies. Goodness knows what crisps are in America?
- You can drink the tap water and you don’t get sick or die unlike most of Europe and Africa.
- People don’t seem to use knives and forks, just forks, spoon like, in their right hand. The knives they put on the tables in restaurants seem to be for decorative purposes only, or maybe they’re for foreign tourists.
- Food is BIG! Portions are gigantic and the locals tuck away tons of the stuff. Every meal feels like stepping into an episode of Man V Food.
- The restaurant bill is called the check. If you ask for the bill staff look at you oddly.
- After a meal you are expected to leave the money on the table, not wait for the waiter to collect it. Surprisingly, no one seems to steal it.
- The coffee is good everywhere.
- Lots of coffee bars have no seats, just tables where you stand to drink.
- Lattes come in soup bowls.
- The toilets are called restrooms and have water right to the top. This is very strange and slightly disconcerting. Ours only do this when they’re broken.
- Toilet flushes are really violent, like aircraft loos. Lots of toilets flush all on their own. This is also very disconcerting.
- There are lots of dogs everywhere but I didn’t see a single cat.
- There is no dog poop on the streets.
- There is no litter on the streets.
- There are lots of homeless people but they seemed embarrassed about it and hide their faces. Everyone ignores them.
- The hotels and shops have lifts but they’re called elevators. The stairs are for escaping fire only and are not for general use.
- There are lots of warning signs everywhere about everything even things that should be obvious.
- Everyone seems to have a relative or ancestor who comes from the UK.
- TV adverts come straight after the opening credits of the show which is confusing. They are also very long.
- There are lots of adverts for medical conditions, medicnes, hospitals or clinics.
- Nothing is old, not even the historical things.
- We speak the same language but no one understands us and no one appears to be able to spell properly.
- American bank notes are all the same colour so its hard to tell them apart. They stick together and don’t have holograms or lots of colours, just black and green like Monopoly money.
This is a great list. Some of it does pertain to New York. But some of it is pretty universal for America. I live in New Hampshire just northeast of New York. Here pedestrians have the right of way although not all drivers follow the rule. Gas (petrol) was close to $4 a gallon at one point and Americans started panicking and selling all their big cars. Then it dropped down to less that $3 per gallon. Today I spent $2.07 per gallon…for my big truck. 🙂
You’re right about the restaurant food. Not sure why restaurants serve up so much. Maybe it’s because we expect a lot for our money and we won’t dish out good money to eat out very often. Could also have something to do with all the fat people.
I HATE roundabouts. They started putting them in several areas in our state. Most are real small which makes it very difficult to get around when you drive a big car. Commercial vehicles suffer the most. Some tractor trailers (I believe you call those lorries?) would get stuck in them. And nobody seems to know how to use them.
Oh, and we name a lot of our states and towns after European places. I live in “New England” in the state of New Hampshire where we also have towns named Derry, Londonderry, Berlin, Manchester and Dublin. The state of Maine has towns named after countries like China, Norway and Denmark. Apparently we lack ingenuity.
And Yes! My great-parents came over from Ireland. I would love to go there some day and see what it is like. Though I’m told by a colleague who recently returned from there that the food was so-so.
I’m glad you liked this list. It was, of course, very much tongue in cheek although the observations were real. To be honest I am not a fan of roundabouts either but most people here are used to them and know you have to give way to the right (that would be the left in the US) and they do keep the traffic flowing better than all the red lights. Petrol here is very expensive so most people drive small cars. I have a little Mazda 2 and before that a tiny Daewoo Matiz. Our roads are far narrower though so a small car makes sense.
The food was good in America, there was just way too much of it. I’m not sure about the food in Ireland, I’ve never been there but I think the food here in England is mostly good. We don’t usually go for mountain of the stuff though and eating out is expensive.
From what I’ve seen of New Hampshire, I think it’s a place I’d like more than New York and it would be interesting to compare New Hampshire and Hampshire in England, where I live. Maybe one day…
I have not read a list of the British perspective on American customs, so this was very entertaining and informative. Yes, some of the comments were specific to New York City, but not the food portions. Sad but true: “Not all Americans are fat but the ones that are are really fat. This could explain why the pavements are so wide.”
People away from urban areas may have better manners though that is a generalization. Sorry you didn’t encounter polite people. Away from the hustle and bustle of an urban setting, you may observe more civility. “Southern hospitality” is stereotyping too, but I believe there is something to it. Ha!
You spent a long time creating this list. I for one appreciate it. Thanks, Marie!
I’m glad you enjoyed it Marian. I think the lack of politeness is a big city thing in the main. I’ve travelled widely and found the same in places like Paris and certainly London. The people are too busy to bother with being nice which is a shame.
As for the food, if I lived in America I’m pretty sure I’d end up joining the ranks of the very fat people needing wide pavements. Our roads and pavements are very narrow but I guess we have much less space on this little Island.
A comprehensive list.
Thank you.
I loved reading your list.
Thank you Susan. I hope it made you smile.
I think you’ll find that most of us know how to say please and thank you but when we’re in the city all we can think about is getting out of there, so we forget our manners.
We do have a lot of food and mountains of it are wasted each day, which is something we should be ashamed of.
We have mobility scooters and most of them seem to be used by the people who eat all that food rather than waste it.
We all know that our families came here from somewhere else but some of us despise people who come from somewhere else. (Figure that one out!)
I think this list should be posted in the windows of all the shops in New York.
I think, in all big cities, most people are too caught up in their own world to remember manners and I’m sure most Americans are polite. Having said that, I think the British have a reputation for politeness so we probably expect too much.
The people who ride mobility scooter here are also the same ones who eat all the food for the most part. There are an awful lot of them though. We have a saying here “who ate all the pies?” mostly used at football matches but it describes them perfectly.
I guess, when it comes down to it all Americans really do come from somewhere else unless they’re Native Americans. Sadly, I didn’t meet any of them but I think it would have been interesting.
Oh Marie, this is one of your all-time bests!! I was laughing so hard I almost had a medical condition that I have seen lots of ads for regarding peeing oneself. “There are lots of adverts for medical conditions, medicnes, hospitals or clinics.”
Right? Do we really need to know all about what might go wrong and will be considered a simple state of life as we deteriorate?
Too funny but all so true!
I’m glad you enjoyed it Martha. After all the TV shows we get in the UK that are set in New York I thought it would all seem very familiar. I was wrong. The TV in the hotel turned out to be more of a revelation into the American psyche than everything else, at least the adverts did. I wonder what you’d make of the UK?
NYC isn’t a true representation of the USA as a whole, but great observations. I was in NYC several months ago and was quite happy to return to New Hampshire. Tipping isn’t normal/expected in the UK? I could live with that!
From what I’ve seen New Hampshire is much more my kind of place Laura. In the UK we only tip taxi drivers (if we feel they’re worth it) and in restaurants where service is not included on the bill. As a general rule we’d tip 10% on a restaurant bill but it’s not obligatory and wouldn’t be expected in places like Starbucks. The tipping thing was quite strange to us in the US.
Very amusing! I remember visiting New York some years ago and was struck by how clean the streets were and how wide they seemed, so you never felt overpowered by the sky scrapers. Oh, and there really was steam coming out of the drain covers in the street. Did you see that?
It was really warm while we were there, in the mid twenties, so there was no steam but you could feel the warm air as you walked over the subway vents and hear the rumble of the trains.
That was hilarious! I just finished a language history class and read a really amusing article on the differences between American English and British English at http://www.theguardian.com/media/mind-your-language/2010/nov/26/americanisms-english-mind-your-language . It seems our language is very offensive and course to some Brits : )
This was just so funny and you were spot on about the City. It is pretty unfriendly and you do take your life in your hands driving or walking there. Making eye contact is discouraged.
But as you stated, America is very big. Different regions have there own unique personalities. I’m from the south and whenever I am working at the market I immediately recognize when a customer is from the south.
Hope you had a good time at any rate and next time maybe we can meet for coffee!
It does seem odd that two countries who both speak English should have so much trouble understanding each other but I think Guardian readers (or at least the ones in the article) are a little up their own arses (if you say that in America) and not representative of all English people. We do have a lot of Americanisms creeping into our language and most computers by default use American spelling which is annoying to someone who learned to spell in British English. NYC is, I think, like many big cities, in that people are too wrapped up in their own lives to notice each other ot bother with politeness. London is much the same, as is Paris. I did have a lovely time, despite the welcome at the airport, and would like to have seen more of America. Maybe next time.
Talk about manners. I almost got into a fight with a man that worked at the Notre Dame. Never mind the fact that he was a man and I was a woman. He WORKED there. So much for the customer is always right. I don’t even think about police carrying guns here but the military patrolling the streets in Paris with machine guns? At least I think they were machine guns. They were big guns at any rate. That blew my mind a little bit.
Glad you had a nice time.
I’m always glad our police don’t carry guns. I think they have AK47’s or similar in France, they certainly do in Egypt. Frightens the living day lights out of me.
Just googled and the French police carry semi automatic weapons. Still scary.