To ask overseas folk what British quirks they think are weird/funny?

[Burntmybiscuits]

Us Brits are always on our high horse, making light humour over the habits of other countries (particularly the U.S!), so I thought it would be funny to see what people overseas find 'unique' about us!

Just remembered another one: Smiling at people you don't know. Its that very quick you might miss it meaningless polite smile people do as you walk by. After yrs living here i started doing it too and when i visited my home country forgot you usually only smile at people you know and are about to have a conversation with. Cue me flashing a smile at random man across the room who stares like a loon back at me thinking i'm giving him the come on .

I do have to say, in all my yrs in the U.K I never come across carpet in the kitchen.

Born and Bred Brit here-
Surprised nobody has picked up the real reason why kids take the cake home from birthday parties!
It's so the parents can eat it once the kids go to bed!
Or is that just in my house 🤔
🤣

Yes to seeing a 2 hour car journey as an incredibly long journey. I never understand those threads like AIBU to decline a wedding invite that means a 2 hour drive there?

Especially when the roads are so pisspoor that the slightest problem means that a 2-hour journey needn't get you very far at all. I allow 45 minutes to drive to an office I sometimes visit that is 18 miles away.
I'm late about 1 time in every 5!

To get to another place I sometimes have to go, it's approx 45 miles but I have to allow 2 hours to be sure of getting there on time. And the road is supposed to a major route, part of the fabled Folkestone-Honiton Trunk Route, which is actually nothing more than a collection of road signs scattered along the south coast.

To be fair, driving for 2 hours in the U.K. is relatively stressful compared to Australia or the US, where most of the time you’re on relatively quiet open highways.

Even U.K. highways can be incredibly busy and require a lot of concentration, partly because U.K. drivers seem to have limited to non-existent merging skills and cause the highway traffic to slow at every junction.

Surprised so many people think it's weird to have kids' tea separately. Toddlers and v young children need to eat about 5/5.30 in my experience. Most people are still at work/commuting at that time at least a couple of days a week. Plus I find I can't cook a 'proper' meal with a baby/toddler around so they'll usually have something I've batch-cooked previously, or something simple like baked potato, sausages, pasta etc. Adults don't want that every day!

LesLavandes When I was little we went to a hotel that had a bidet in the bathroom. None of us had any idea what it was for. Mg mother announced "Oh look there's a little foot bath". When she found out, she used to refer to it as a by- dett

I find UK roads easier because people obey the laws. Makes driving much less stressful And motorway driving is easy.

don't understand the British aversion towards single storey homes.

Well, lots of us don't actually mind bungalows that much, but they don't make much financial sense on an overcrowded island. Land is so expensive here that a bungalow can cost as much as a 4 bed townhouse in the same county. It might be interesting to compare us with Japan which has similar constraints.

"Here in Australia if you are invited to a wedding you go to the ceremony and then the reception."

I think that's mostly the case for a British wedding isn't it?

Often extra people are invited just for the evening party.

Oh god where do I start

@Elouera cook in the bag chicken? I think most people tend to buy the cuts they're interested in (e.g. drumsticks or breast etc) or roast a (non-bagged) chicken?

Here we do one evening meal for all (including dc) how else do you teach them to eat varied, table manners, feeling included in the family chit chat at the end of the day?

A lot of mine have been mentioned - not eating the cake at birthday parties, washing up bowls, single taps (oh the ROWS when we were renovating before I convinced DH that a mixer would still let him have his water either boiling or freezing, it would just give me an option that didn’t involve the enjoyable peril a Race Against Scalding if I didn’t want to wash my hands or face in freezing water.)

Also bread sauce and mint sauce.

But... why don’t you want to taste the ingredients in a sandwich, and why do you like them so soggy? It’s almost impossible to buy a sandwich in a shop that isn’t at least a third mayonnaise.

American in the UK! I've been here nearly 14 years, so there isn't much I find strange anymore lol, but here are a few things I can get my head around:
As PP said:
Separate tea for the kids: even when I was a kid, if a parent was late in from work, then we ate later. Sometimes the dcs and I start eating if DH is running late, but we've always eaten the same meal all together from the time they were old enough to eat proper food.
The wedding thing is strange: we have a ceremony, a reception, and everyone is invited to both.
Petrol stations: people waiting at the entrance to the station to predict which pump might be free first...it drives me crackers! Just commit to a pump and wait!

Our Spanish language students horrified at our pathetic nights out. They had a curfew of 10.30 “in Madrid we go out at 10.30” 😁

Often extra people are invited just for the evening party.

That’s the bit others can find weird and actually quite insulting. My Australian mother nearly fainted when I mentioned that it was common here. As it was she had to come to terms with the idea that there would only be one choice for starter, main and dessert at our wedding unless there were dietary requirements.

@Quarantino I think the point is that in many other countries this is different. My nephew who is two has dinner with his parents at 7:30. He eats what they eat. He has a long nap at his childminder in the middle of the day.

I am almost 50 and have never in my life had a washing up bowl. Do people still actually use these?

And my kids eats with us, always have.

I loved my time in Britain but these things genuinely baffled me... most are repeats...

Carpets in bathrooms 🤢
No elec plug in bathrooms...
Washing machine in kitchen
Washing up bowl...
Christmas ads/jumpers etc. You all do Christmas very well but the build up is massive!!
Prawn cocktail flavoured things...why?!! Just no...
Curry sauce as a chip sauce? Confused me...
Nursery food/kid food... surely kids just eat normal food
Reality shows as national pastimes (strictly, X factor, I'm a celebrity - to be fair I lived in mid 00s when prob at its peak)
Willing to accept a 2 week wait to see a Dr
Suns out guns out! I have never seen so much flesh in my life
Disney holidays
Obsession with school gate politics
School testing (I still can't wrap my head around the testing schedules)
School uniforms (so formal)
Weddings - so many hats and facinators (?), cash bars, the invite system already discussed

A lot more serious ones but not got the energy to pull that grenade... plus completely distracted by the fact people wash chicken!

"Here in Australia if you are invited to a wedding you go to the ceremony and then the reception."

I think that's mostly the case for a British wedding isn't it?

No, you have to make sure you invited to BOTH events. Some are only invited to the ceremony, some only to the reception and then some to both.

My American bil was horrified to see faggots on a menu in a Black Country pub!

Haha. My American relatives haven’t got over seeing that we have chocolates called Minstrels.

Oh god yes the fear of electricity in bathrooms. Baffling and annoying.

To the poster describing two Americans who weren't familiar with "smart casual," we say "business casual." We don't use "smart" for clothes, at least not as much as in the . It means "clever."