To get really annoyed by people who live in hot countries claiming that the UK is not hot

[CheckingOutTheQuantocks]

I have some relatives who are in Australia and I'm friends with some of them on Facebook. Apart from their finding the whole Boris Johnson/Brexit thing awfully amusing, they're generally nice people, but there's one of them in particular who can't bloody leave it alone if I post anything about the weather. The other day, I posted about how it was supposed to be the hottest day on record, and she was straight onto it with comments about "That's not hot, that's like a winter temperature for us, you Poms are so soft". She thinks 18°C is "freezing", btw

I'm only mildly irritated by this, but I just don't get why people do it. I know it's ridiculously hot over there and all the wildlife is venomous and all that, but what is the actual point of telling people that all the time when they're just trying to have a whinge about being too warm?

I think people who live abroad forget we deal with these temperatures without air con in buildings/on transport that are not equipped for this heat. It makes a huge difference IMHO.

YANBU.

1. They're probably acclimatised to it.
2. AC is a lot more widespread!

It's just a dialogue.

What's the point in posting that it's warm if you don't want opinions? What's the point in posting that it's warm if everyone knows because we are all feeling it? 🤷‍♀️

She's just making conversation like you are.

Here's my take on it.

1. The houses in the UK are built to retain heat. Houses in hot countries are built to repel heat. (And with air-con. Oh God I miss my air-con).

1. It's a different kind of heat. We're used to mid to late 30's in the last wee bit in NZ in Christchurch. But it's dry heat. It's so humid here. We're really suffering!

And 3. If you wanted to live in a hot, arid desert, then that's where you'd be - and it wouldn't be the UK!

The UK doesn’t have the infrastructure to deal with any extremes of weather. Too cold/too much snow- Canadians laugh at us. Too hot- Australians laugh at us. Too much rain- countries with a monsoon laugh at us.
The only thing we’re good at is grey, chilly and damp.

Give me grey chilly and wet any day over this oppressive heat.

The UK is a beautiful country with beautiful seasons. I especially love autumn. There is nothing quite like autumn in the UK. It's so terribly proper.

YANBU. Australian housing is built to be cooler, ours is build to secure heat inside. Also there is air con everywhere.

I have friends who have been to visit their relatives in Australia, usually in their winter. Friends are all running around in shorts and t-shirts whilst the natives are wearing jumpers.

But yanbu, they should just let us moan.

I seriously never thought I'd be bitching and moaning about the heat in the UK. And I know if I complain about it to my family back home I'll get my arse handed to me on a plate!

Facebook isn't a dialogue, really, is it? For me, it's just somewhere I post random thoughts and say what I've been up to. I don't really do it to garner other people's opinions... My OP was just one example, it's pretty much every time I mention the weather. When we had that cold snap over the winter, I posted a picture of my car windscreen that had iced up, and she replied by posting a screenshot of their weather forecast for the week (which showed it was going to be about 34°C). I wasn't sure what the point was, because I would prefer -6°C over that any day.

My friend who's Brazilian and has lived there (Brazil) most of her life said today how ridiculously hot it is here, and how it feels way to hot for her despite being used to hot weather.

Your relative sounds like mine OP.

Australians have the most dreadful garden fences in the world. They all look like building sites. Tell your relatives that!

Any talk of weather it becomes a competiton even in UK

DM text us all this morning ranting about having to get the bus home from work tomorrow after sitting in her office air con all day, it’s worse for her you see as she’s not been acclimatised to it during the day because of the air con. I have no air con at home no air con in my car and no air con at work. Do I win?

I don’t think 18 degrees is warm though? It’s ok but not that great. When I was going to work this morning, the thermometer in my car read 21, it was fine, it was pleasant but it wasn’t till the sun properly came out that I started to get warm and feel like I needed to take a layer off. I set the car to 18 when I want to cool down, so IMO your friend is right.

The thing I love about the UK is we have proper seasons - beautiful Springs and Autumns - OK not extremes but give me a change of season any day over hot, a bit hotter or a bit less hot in Australia. I wouldn't swap it especially today when I'm fucking roasting

mbosnz I know, but it sounds so feeble to go "But we have no aircon and it's so huuumid". It's true, but until you've suffered the indignity of not being able to get dry after your shower, and having to put talc on your underboob, you just can't understand!

I am from a place with a continental climate (so -30 in the winter and +40 in the summer, with a very short in-between season) and I found today quite tough, being acclimatised to the "normal" British weather.

The comments about air-con are a little bit funny to me. I lived in a tropical place with zero air-con for years.

I have similar conversations with my finnish SIL, though the other way around !

MissCharley it's not hot, but it's hardly freezing, is it? Personally, it's about at the upper end of my comfort zone, because I can wear t-shirts and not bother with a jacket. I will start getting too hot upwards of 20°C, and conversely I will start layering up when it gets below about 14°C.

Australians seem to be fixated with the weather! I can understand it as they do have to deal with extreme heat but as others have said their lifestyles are set up to help deal with it - a/c, shady verandas etc. The "call that a knife?" mentality.

We had 34° in Hampshire today, set for almost 38° tomorrow. And so humid

And if you did mention that it is humid, someone from Singapore would pop up and talk about taking handfuls of the air and wringing them dry so they can breathe them, and the temperature being 40 degrees at the time.

We can't win any competition about horrid weather; we are just also-rans.

until you've suffered the indignity of not being able to get dry after your shower, and having to put talc on your underboob, you just can't understand!

And there is your reply right there!

(FuzzyPuffling You're not wrong about their hideous garden fences!)