Americans have many misconceptions about the world around us so I am going to clarify some myths about our beloved founding country, England.
True or False: Britain is a country.
Okay so I feel like this one needs to be addressed first. This is FALSE. The country is called England. It is apart of the United Kingdom which consists of England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland. The United Kingdom is sometimes referred to as Great Britain but Britain alone is not a country.
True or False: They are sore about the Revolutionary War.
False. They actually don't care, not even a little bit. They don't learn about the Boston Tea Party or the Battle of Lexington and Concord in their history classes. They just don't care about this particular war. They have been in enough wars and lost enough territory that this one doesn't even make the charts. They do however learn about the World Wars because those are kind of important to everyone.
True or False: They drink tea and eat crumpets.
True and False. They drink tea a lot...like morning, noon, and night but they don't eat crumpets. They do have tea time but it is what they call dinner and they call lunch dinner. Yeah its confusing but you get used to it if you ever visit for more than a day.
True or False: It rains all the time.
True...well kind of. It rains a lot but not for longer than fifteen minutes at a time and not more than Seattle. The rest of the day is just cloudy and sometimes..sometimes the sun makes an appearance.
True or False: They all sound the same.
False. Every part of England has their own dialect just like in the states. A Cockney accent (London) is different than a Scouse accent (Liverpool) which is different than a Geordie accent.
True or False: They have met the Queen.
False. I can almost guarantee that everyone you meet has not met the Queen... that is of course unless you are meeting the Royal Family.
True or False: They eat fish and chips for every meal.
False. While they do enjoy fish and chips, they have other food. They have amazing meals on Sundays called the Sunday Roast which is like an American Thanksgiving with the amount of food they serve.
True or False: Everyone is a soccer fan.
True. Well first off they call it football (along with the rest of the world). Whether they cheer for Liverpool Football Club or Manchester United or Chelsea Football Club, they revolve around the sport. If there is a game on and their favorite team loses you can be sure they'll be in a sour mood the rest of the day.
Although we all speak English, it is hard to decipher what Brits are saying half the time so here is a quick guide to help translate.
