Differences: US vs UK

[cleckner04]

Is it right that in the US you don't have a big meal on Christmas day because you've had Thanksgiving?

We always had a big ham for christmas day. And thanksgiving is for turkey. But still a big meal for both holidays.

 

[twinkle1975]

Phew - was just wondering after something someone said on tv the other day!

 

[honeybee2]

we call Jelly, Jam in the Uk and Jello, jelly.

Errr, fags in the Uk, cigs or smokes in the US, and all the baby stuff- crib (we call it a cot).

I do drive but used to catch the bus everywhere.

Our chocolate is deep and very creamy/ milky which is probably why we are all addicts.

You tend to drink more coffee in the US instead of tea (I loooove tea!) and we mostly have milk in our coffee.
We can't drive until we are 17 but we can drink at 18 years.

We have incredible home brewed/ local brewed beer/ ale.

Our portions are alot smaller.

Chips to you are fries

Crisps to you are chips

Petrol/ diesel to you is gas.

Our homes tend to be alot smaller and are alot more expensive (tsk!!!!)

Where I live in south wales, most houses are terraced and used to house miner families (I get the impression American houses are detatched?)

We have adopted the turkey at xmas but traditionally for us its a goose or a duck.

We tend to put our xmas decs up at least 12 days before xmas (most films I see, they put them up xmas eve?)

Our food is certainly not all pie (hahaha!!!)

Your veggies are called other names- eggplant etc

We dont make a huge fuss at halloween (we get sweets in for the kids sometimes)

The sidewalk to us is the pavement

A hen night to you is a bachelorette party

We have; nursery, primary school, secondary school, college then university- you have junior high, high school & college

We get a lot of finding for our universities

We have midwives and not doctors to deliver babies- as this makes the proceedure less medical as possible as it is seen as a natural progression here, and the midwives are not invasive and only touch when they have too.

 

[JASMAK]

I don't know if it is because I live in Canada, but I think that there is alot of misconceptions, just reading through. Alot of the things are the same here in Canada as the US too, as described by some of the UK posts, I noticed. For example, the above post...we have jam, and jello is jello or jelly. The bus is used lots here, or skytrain, seabus, subway, train etc...depending on what each city offers, many don't even own cars, or use a co-op car. We have the same chocolate as the UK and some of the same as the USA. I ONLY drink tea, and although coffee is very popular, tea is usually offered just as often as coffee, or more often. We drive when 16 and drink at 19, but some of our provinces are younger for both of those. We have smaller portions that the states based on when I have gone out for dinner in the states, as well as different options for example, at McDonalds and KFC. We call fries, fries, but we also use the term 'chips'. Chips are pretty much called chips, and although last night I ate 'crisps'. Gas is gas, but diesel is diseal and that word is never called gas. Gas is for gasoline. I cannot comment on home prices as I think that varies widely. I live in the suburbs and a three bed rancher (one floor) goes for about $400K here, but on the mainland, you would be looking at probably 1 million for what we have here. Our house is big, but on the mainland, my friend has 600 square feet. She lives in the city. We have detached, semi-detached, condos, apartments, townhouses...you name it. You pay more for big and more private, of course. We have turkey at Christmas. We usually have a big dinner at Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving (Canada is earlier in the year than USA). We put Christmas decorations up usually in November. We call veggies, veggies, unless we are speaking of specific veggies. Like "what kind of veggies are we having?" Halloween we go door to door and the kids dress up. That is it. No dinner, sometimes you go to a party etc, or bonfire. Sidewalk has to be specifically made, not part of the road, otherwise it is pavement, or road. I have heard the term hen night. Bachorette party is not used that much here. We use stagget instead. We have preschool, elementary, high school, and university. We get funding, aid, scholoraships, and student loans for university here. There are midwives here, and from all the talk from the UK and USA, it sounds like our OB/GYNs are way more nonevaisve. They only do things if they HAVE to, and we have family-centred labour wings/policies. You are encouraged to write a birth plan. Midwives can come into hospital or you can choose a homebirth.

 

[CeeDee]

We have both attached and detached homes. Our attached homes are called townhomes, duplexws or villas.

In my family we typically have lamb for Christmas because we just had turkey at Thanksgiving and we don’t eat pork.

We put up Christmas decorations the weekend after Thanksgiving, so late November. Crazy thing is you could probably buy Christmas decorations the end of September.

 

[cleckner04]

It seems like christmas decorations come out SO early now. I've seen some just after Halloween season is over. Ridiculous. And the music on the radio is already christmas crap in November. I love christmas but by the time christmas actually comes around I am so burnt out on it these days. Because everyone blows it so out of proportion and christmas seems to last 2 months now.

 

[MizzDeeDee]

Is it right that in the US you don't have a big meal on Christmas day because you've had Thanksgiving?

We always had a big ham for christmas day. And thanksgiving is for turkey. But still a big meal for both holidays.

We have ham and turkey, but that is more about me. I don't like the turkey but I LOVE ham... especially the way my mother makes it ... with pineapples and cherries and brown sugar...yum yum yum!

 

[sma1588]

all the holiday stuff is out soooo early now its crazy! halloween and x-mas togather and easter and valentines togather. right now in cali and a few other states in the cities are going pretty cheap like a $400k house is now going for about 150k even alot of million$ homes are being sold alot less. the legal age for us to drink is 21, to buy cigs is 18 and getting a drive permit is 16 but there are alot of restrictions on it now.....

p.s i think we find every holiday an excuse to have a party and have lots of food!!!!!!!!!
and i know our hospitals provide us with almost everything for baby and ourself but most of us pay for our insurance ..

the carseat/strollers are alot different altough we do have some like the ones common in the uk we usually just use the travel system thats not as fancy and doesnt look as roomy for baby but i have to say i like our carseats better

 

[x-MummyToBe-x]

Anyone from the USA wanna trade spaces with a UKer for couple of weeks?

 

[sma1588]

i would love to if i could lol


oh yah we also have MW that deliver i think it just depends on the hospital your in because my hospital is kaiser and you usually only see the doctor 1 time during preg. unless your high risk other than that its a MW who delivers baby in the hospital unless you need a c section then its your doc. but the thing that sucks about that is it could be a random doc or MW who delivers the LO. we have a 3 day min. stay with a vag delievery and 5 day with c section i think u guys get to go home alot earlier


from what i have heard we have alot more department stores like jc penny,sears,macys and knock off stores like ross and other places like that. yours are more like little shops other than the food stores with other items like clothes and other home supplies? that would be like our superwalmart ( i may be wrong on this, its just what i thought from reading on here)

 

[honeybee2]

your super walmart to us is Asda, seeing as walmart now own our ASDA stores. Other food stores include sainsburys, tescos, aldi's, morrisons and Lidl whilst our upper end food shopping is waitrose and Marks and spencers (have you seen our m&S adverts- seriously, they make you want to lick the screen!!!!).

We have plenty of departments stores: john lewis (my personal fav!) David evans, House of fraser, debenhams, BHS, Harrods. We also have alot of high street favs for clothes as well as specific designers. For home appliences etc we brits usually tend to rely on good old argos which sells anything from toys to hamster cages haha!

 

[CeeDee]

It seems like christmas decorations come out SO early now. I've seen some just after Halloween season is over. Ridiculous. And the music on the radio is already christmas crap in November. I love christmas but by the time christmas actually comes around I am so burnt out on it these days. Because everyone blows it so out of proportion and christmas seems to last 2 months now.

I totally agree. I'm burnt out with Christmas before the holiday even happens. It irritates me to see people doing Christmas decorations in October. Really?!

 

[JASMAK]

your super walmart to us is Asda, seeing as walmart now own our ASDA stores. Other food stores include sainsburys, tescos, aldi's, morrisons and Lidl whilst our upper end food shopping is waitrose and Marks and spencers (have you seen our m&S adverts- seriously, they make you want to lick the screen!!!!).

We have plenty of departments stores: john lewis (my personal fav!) David evans, House of fraser, debenhams, BHS, Harrods. We also have alot of high street favs for clothes as well as specific designers. For home appliences etc we brits usually tend to rely on good old argos which sells anything from toys to hamster cages haha!

We used to have a Marks and Spencers...I remember buying little mince tarts from there, although we still can get those at MacLeans (they sell the M&S ones). I wonder if that M&S is still there???

 

[Happy]

I have to drive everywhere because I'm in the middle of no where lol.
In US they have bacon with dessert, seems very strange to me
The UK doesn't have many variations of things like pop tarts we only have two flavours.
Flip flops are called thongs?? or something like that. That confused the hell out of me when I heard it on friends
What's the big deal with cookie dough? I bought some when I was in America because I had heard so much about it and it really isn't very nice.
I'm starving btw hence mentioning so much food

I'm American and I have never ever heard of bacon with dessert!!??

And we say flip-flops, not thongs. Thong=little underwear

Don't base your thoughts on America from TV, plleeeeesee.... It's sooo misleading.

the thongs thing was from another thread on here saying that's what it was.
When I was in America and went out for dinner they would always ask if I wanted a side of bacon.

A side of bacon?? Haha that's so funny! Where in the world were you? The only time I've ever been asked that is if I'm eating breakfast...

I was in florida 4 weeks ago and saw the most bizarre dessert. Ice cream sundae with bacon on the top!!! It was in Dennys

 

[sma1588]

ya for some reason every1 is trying to put bacon on everything. me and OH were watching a show about foods/bacon and they were putting it on cupcakes,in icecream,dipping it in chocolate,makeing gummy bacon all kinds of weird stuff. i have no clue y ther doing it, its nasty if u ask me

 

[cleckner04]

Eww that sounds gross. Bacon on ice cream. I don't like savory and sweet stuff mixing.

 

[discoclare]

Heston Blumenthal used to do a bacon and egg ice cream years ago. I don't like the sound of it but I wouldn't mind someone buying me dinner at The Fat Duck to try!

(for US readers Heston Blumenthal is a famous British chef who holds 3 Michelin stars)

 

[Kimmi82]

Lol Ive just spent about 20 mins reading this thread, I love it!! Its the expressions that I love the most, when I get going no person from the US would have a clue what I was going on about!!

 

[odd_socks]

its the little things i love the differences with (correct me if im wrong )
Rubbish UK Trash US
Nappy UK Diaper US
Trousers UK Pants US
There are loads but I love it

 

[LucyintheSky]

Is it right that in the US you don't have a big meal on Christmas day because you've had Thanksgiving?

Christmas dinners are usually as big as Thanksgiving dinners. It depends on the family too, but it's definitely not true that we don't do Christmas dinners because of Thanksgiving! My family does turkey dinners on Thanksgiving and ham dinners on Christmas!