What is this "British" culture of which you speak?

Well strand - how you can you tell we brits have a certain colour of skin.

I love a drink and tan much better than most people. Goes to show we brits come in all colours and sizes and that's what makes britain to me - difficulty in classifing us.

"Oh I know the Brits here by what they wear (football shirts, badly fitting shorts, tank tops etc), the amount of tattoos they have - and also by the colour of their skin. Usually very pale white with patchy areas of sunburn. And by how much beer they drink. Or alcohol generally.

Actually that's not fair. That's only a certain type of Brit."

sounds like the William Hague type. All that's missing is a baseball cap on backwards.

So swapshop and tiswas (yep I'm also middle aged so remember those).

But anything else as I don't see the Italians the Spanish identifying their culture by two tv programmes that the majority of their under 20's would have no clue about.

Claig - I know Italy well but as you you know it better I'm sure you speak far better Italian than me - and know the locals - would they honestly tell you they identify their country by how they organise themselves in a shop waiting to buy something and by programmes they had when they were little?

Nope - they are ITALIAN - they have their food and their huge religion.

Our knowlege of our own cultures pales in to comparison.

Yes it sounds like you will have to move up into the hills to avoid the British beach invasion during peak holiday periods. The best thing to do is to pretend you are French, start gesticulating and just keep repeating "je ne parle pas anglais". I have had to make use of that on occasion.

Ha ha. No believe it or not the Caribbean! I think Virgin must have been doing some cheap deals or something.

Oh crumbs I can't say that can I? Agh. How do I avoid ending up on the "I think MN should be renamed Snobsnet" thread?

Although I have holidayed alongside them and mostly they are great, good parents etc. Much less annoying than the very loud and obnoxious Americans.

Not that all Americans are like that of course...agh it's a minefield!

what foreign land are you in? Essex?

Oh I know the Brits here by what they wear (football shirts, badly fitting shorts, tank tops etc), the amount of tattoos they have - and also by the colour of their skin. Usually very pale white with patchy areas of sunburn. And by how much beer they drink. Or alcohol generally.

Actually that's not fair. That's only a certain type of Brit.

exactly right strandeadatsea, of course there is a huge commonality of culture. Those of us who have lived abroad have really experienced it.

If you see someone standing at a zebra crossing, waiting to cross the road, in the Piazza Venezia in Rome, and they are still standing there waiting 2 hours later, then you know that they are certainly English and very possibly Scottish. They soon learn to ditch their English ways and to follow that old adage, "when in Rome, do as the Romans do". They learn that you have to blindly start crossing the road, because only then will the Romans bring their cars to a screeching halt and allow them to cross the road.

I am an expat at the moment, living in a country where many of my friends are NOT from the UK. Yes I get on with them, yes we often have lots in common. BUT as soon as I meet a fellow Brit we instantly fall into a comfortable conversation because we have shared references that others don't have. Be it cbeebies or the state of our economy, you can easily talk to each other without having to explain yourself all the time.

Of course there is a common culture. Whether you were brought up in Scotland or Cornwall, we all watched either Swap Shop or Tiswas on a Saturday morning; everyone shops at Boots, Next and Tescos; we all stayed up late to watch the election results (ok, many of us did!); you hum those first few bars of Grange Hill or EastEnders and everyone knows what you are on about.

And there is a commonality to our humour too. Sarcasm, irony - we all have it, at least more than others in this world.

For me personally the other nationalities I feel I "get" better than others are the Scandanavians and Dutch. More so than Australians.

scaryteacher, you are right, everybody abroad knows the British queue and are polite and say "I'm very sorry to bother you, but would you please mind awfully if ..."
They laugh at our customs, because they are different.

Yes I have lived in those countries, so I know what feelings arise. In London, the French will congregate in French bars to watch the Rugby or the football when their national team plays. That is natural, because they want to share with people who feel the same patriotism for their country.

Queuing is the answer ladies - the Brits do it; that is our 'national trait'. I have noticed that no-one else queues like we do, the old Belgian bats at the fish stall in the market on a Friday don't seem to have heard of the word!

Is teh Beano Scottish? Fantastic, that makes up for Gordon Brown

GrandHighBooba, have you ever lived outside the British Isles? If you have then I would be surprised if you didn't feel a greater commonality with Welsh, English and Irish people.

"I would say that you don't know what defines your own culture until you are a few thousand miles away from home, you meet a fellow countryman and you chat about the stuff you miss and the stuff you hate about the place you both find yourself in."

But other european countries don't feel that way when they are overseas - they recognise that they feel when they are at home.

Claig - I'm assuming you've lived in the countries you mentioned as if not I cannot imagine going many miles away outide my country's borders and heading for the nearest english expat place. This is what my dh does (and he's not english and he's certainly not multicultural!).

well yes I am English and see things from a mainly English perspective. But I think that I share more in common with Scottish people than I do with Belgian people, for example.

by Beano do you mean one of Gordon Brown's international conferences or the much more nationally important british institution of Dennis the Menace and Gnasher?

actually, despite having no Scottish blood, when I came to Scotland, it felt like coming home, and I realised how un-English I am in many ways.

claig, I do think that you're projecting an awful lot of your own cultural norms and assuming they are universal british-isms. Which is interesting in itself, and, i suspect, typical of what many people would do in consiering this question.

There's a longish joke about the the darts teams from two local pubs having a fight.... until a gang from a neighbouring town turn up. So they forget their differences and fight together as a town... until a bunch from a neighbouring county show up. So they forget their differences and fight together as a county.... until people from a neighbouring country turn up. So they forget their differences and fight against the oncomers as a country.... etc. You get the picture?

The UK has had to be that 'gang' on a lot of occasions in the past. Forgetting differences and tackling a common enemy. This is another important place for reference points.

Well, you were on stronger intellectual ground with the Beano...

"we possibly both read the Daily Mail." - are you KIDDING?

so not all the good things of England have penetrated that far North yet? But at least we both share the knowledge of what the famous print newspaper is.