Serviettes. Did I ask for something strange?

[ALongHardWinter]

There were no serviettes on the stand for sauces,straws etc so I asked the server for some. He gave me a funny look and said 'Some what?' I repeated my request but he still looked blank. So I said 'Tissues?'. He said 'Oh right. I've never heard them called serviettes'. Really? That's what I've always called them. Anyone else encountered a blank look when asking for a supposedly common place item?

It doesn’t really matter what everyone calls them. OP was in McDonalds talking to a McDonalds crew member, and McDonalds call them napkins.

So if the crew member has never encountered the term serviettes before then he will of course be confused at people calling what he knows as napkins something else.

A tissue?

You aren't offending me helen I just think you were wrong.

Napkins is what I'd say but I'd know what you meant if you said serviettes ? Is serviettes French or posh or something haha

Nope. Nobody gives a fuck. But it’s quite fun. A bit like knowing another language which is only useful for spotting mistakes in TV dramas.

I howeveee would never then say " a tissue" as they are two totally different things

Brilliant

However

Serviettes here! I'm Irish

My dad would always call them that, but I would always say tissues xD

Calling them serviettes was common(place).
Serviettes themselves were common.

I've always said serviettes.. napkins sounds terribly posh to me.
I also remember at Brownies.. making SERVIETTE rings! No one ever said napkins. To me napkin is cloth and serviette is paper.
A few years ago I was in an independent food shop (mainly asian food but sold a lot of british and eastern european too) and asked for some bran. I had to repeat myself several times. The assistant then called a colleague. I had to explain what bran was, they'd never heard of it and certainly did not sell it.

It was believed by the upper classesat one time to be common to use a foreign word when there was an English word that could be used
E.g.
Napkin/serviettes
Water closet/toilet
Looking glass/mirror

Honky - only you would spot that.
Bertrand would spot it too - but they wouldn't dignify it with a response!

I'm not wrong, Heading. You are I'm afraid. If that's how you speak in day to day life then I can see why you're confused, however.

We're talking about the term serviettes remember.

"We had it drummed into us that 'serviettes' were common' if we're talking about the term serviettes, that is incorrect. If we're talking about serviettes themselves, than that is correct, but we were discussing use of the term not whether serviettes/paper napkins themselves are common. For the term you use 'was'.

then*

Yes, Brilliant gets it

When I was a childminder one of my mindees had a very snobbish GM. We were all invited for a birthday party and the GM ordered my 5 year old to use a Napkin. She asked what a Napkin was and the GM said, “I would hate it if ........ grows up not knowing what a napkin is”

Quick and as a flash, the mindees mum said, “Don’t worry about that Mother, just worry that she might grow up to be a pretentious snob”.

I could have kissed her. My DD, who is now in her 40s still talks about it whenever the ‘serviettes’ come out.

They're often called bevnaps in bars etc

Serviettes themselves aren’t “common”. Calling them serviettes is.

Trust me on this stuff. I don’t know much, but I do know about this. All questions willingly answered. You shall go to the ball, my fellow mumsnetters.........

I wish people would speak proper English like what we does.

I’m 40 and I’ve always called them serviettes.

In FrNce however, serviettes means sanitary towels...as I found out when I was 12 and in a pharmacy asked for what I thought were tissues! The bloke looked really oddly at me and brought out a pack of sanitary towels.
I was like ahh non, pour le nez!

They maybe don't speak French. In this country- napkins.

In French - can be any kind of towel/tissue/napkin.

I call them that
I am common though