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!

I can go one better than 2 tier weddings, I present you all with the 3rd tier.
Back in the 60s and 70s, when we only had one kitchen sink, which the babies and clothes were washed in, your involvement in a wedding may have been to receive a small finger of fruit cake.
This was reserved only for ladies, who probably came to the church to watch the ceremony (to bitch about the bride and speculate if she was pregnant) and was posted out in a very small cardboard box. Some of these ladies would put the very small finger of fruit cake (oh, what deliciousness) under their pillow and dream of their future husband.
There you have it, 10/10 for weirdness!

Steak and owl pie is the highlight of this brilliant thread.
Are the owls farmed 😂😂

I'm really surprised that Americans don't have big easter eggs, would think it would be right up their Street, I know when we had an American teacher over and were telling her about Christmas and pudding, mince pies etc and it bascallywags boiled down to we eat a load of stuff with dried fruit and peel!

Most of this thread is bollocks.

But working with Americans this contribution stands out as absolutely fucking hilarious!

I know this is not everyone or even the majority of British people but, the ability to be intelligent and highly educated yet ignorant about places outside Britain.

YES! This!!!

Such a self-centered, inward-looking nation compared with others.

@ALongHardWinter We queue to get on the bus too and I'm from Scandinavia

Things that I found strange when I lived in England:

• Everything is solved by having a cup of tea.
• Saying sorry all the time, I bumbed in to someone, it was entirely my fault and they still said sorry to me.
• People asking how I am, but don't really want to know, that it's used as a form of greeting instead of a genuine interest in how someone is doing.
• Your cakes, basically just dry sponge.

Washing machine in the kitchen.

I think the poor languages education system in Britain has got to be one of them. I believe overseas kids start learning another language very early on, and are expected to speak in that language during the lesson. In England we usually pick French/German/Spanish, 'learn it' for 3 or so years, most likely drop it (unless you take it for GCSE), and this then eventually filters through to the 'arrogant Brit on holiday' stereotype, where most of us expect you to be able to talk to us in English! This really pisses me off, so will always try my best abroad to speak a bit in whatever language it is, often at my hilarious expense.

For me there are a few, some of which I've seen repeated a few times already:

• the obsession with dogs, including having them live in the house, cooking them dinners with chicken and rice, buying them little outfits for winter, and not being able to leave them outside/at home alone for more than a couple of hours, and spending thousands of pounds on very expensive vet care after the insurance has run out and putting the family into debt.

My friend is a vet and she says you get much more specialist surgery experience in the UK than our home country because the British will spend the money for complex treatment on horses and dogs even if they can't fulfil their original purpose (working animals - she's seen someone with small kids spend £12k, only £5k of which was covered, on a competition horse that will now never be more than a field ornament) rather than humanely put them down. Her first boss used to bring her with him on calls to farms/yards to see struggling animals because she'd always suggest it as an option and on hearing "and we could always just shoot it" clients would pay up instead of asking "is it really that serious?"

• cake for everything, all the time. I like biscuits but don't like cake much.

• meat pies with pastry.

• having to have dinners on certain days. I thought my first workplace was quirky and different because the canteen did fish and chips every single Friday. But I've lived here 15 years now and EVERYWHERE does - even the schools. And a roast dinner is a "Sunday roast" and served at lunch time. And not at dinner time on a weekday.

Windows opening out or not - could this be to do with fly screens that you get in US, Australia, Canada? Don't need them in the UK.

Definitely need fly screens in parts of the U.K., especially with temperatures getting warmer and summers lasting longer. It’s one of the things I miss. Can’t leave a door or window open without something flying in. Plus fly screens can easily be popped out.

NaturalBornWoman I nearly added on that some Americans can be seen as the same, but was going by my experience as someone in Britain(not American).

Oops, posted too soon. The last one was going to be funerals and the fact that nobody shows up.

I went to a couple and it was weird, and a bit sad thinking I'll probably die here in this country and mine will be like that instead of a proper send off.

Further to my comment about lazy language learning, I just had a hilarious memory of trying to order ice cream in Strasborg, France, age about 15.

I meant to say: "Je voudrais un glace à la fraise".

I actually said: "Je voudrais un glace à la frère"!

Yep, I ordered a brother flavour ice cream. The ice cream cart lady was amused, but gracious!

The continued love of carpets in the UK does baffle me, if I'm honest. I obviously grew up with them everywhere incl in the bathroom. When I got to Germany they were already seen as rather old-fashioned, and I'm such an anti-carpet convert now that it surprises me when you read about people moving into houses and doing 'new carpets throughout' instead of something more practical (esp if there are beautiful floorboards to sand down). Carpets particularly make no sense when shoes are worn in the house.

I do think elements of UK class-bound society hang on very strongly in aspects of property and house-buying. The dreadful expression 'master bedroom', for instance. And the looking down on those who rent (this attitude seems to me to be a chicken-and-egg thing with the shocking lack of legal protections for tenants).

The attitude to sick leave, again, baffling. Any company openly doing anything along the lines of the 'Bradford factor' - or treating sickness as a disciplinary matter - here would be the subject of a national scandal.

It's funny how going to a new place you embrace some things and remain resistant always to others. For all the Germans make comments about British people's 'five o'clock tea' (which is what they firmly believe it is called), they are much more inflexible in reality with their 12-noon Mittagessen (always hot. I know lots of families who only ever eat bread/cheese/wurst/salad in the evenings even if people are out all day - the work/school lunch is the hot meal, regardless of its quality - I would not want to entrust my dc hot food-wise to the tender mercies of school meals only all week) and 3pm Kaffeetrinken.

It must be the insane 'chain' system for real estate, where you are all expected to move out and into a new house on the same day. Why? Who came up with this? I'm abroad and here you would expect to buy the house and then take your time to clean and re-decorate when it's nice and empty. I bought my last house 2 months before I actually moved, much less stressful than sitting there with all your stuff waiting for the previous owner to get out..

Isn't the cake in a napkin a sign to bugger off home now?

So things people have told me on Italy about their foreign exchange experiences in England (many traumatised Italians!)

• that there isn't access to water at meal times and everyone seems to drink juice instead of water.
• that there are no napkins on the table to wipe your mouth at dinner
• that a lot of English people don't rinse after washing up (I have since noted this is true!)

Basically that we are savages next to their Roman ways

@GoatCheeseTart where did you live for the 2 months you were cleaning the new house? Did you own both homes at the same time and when did you sell the 'old' house?

Not opening presents at parties

Having to write thank you cards

Moving away to go to university

The number of private schools

Boarding schools

So many public libraries

People being taxed as individuals rather than by household

The staggering cost of childcare

Net curtains- but these have mostly gone

Very gendered clothing for kids

Diluting juice being a staple for kids

Chips with all kids meals

Pasta dishes with more topping/ sauce than pasta

An aversion to eating veal/rabbit

Getting sunburned as a badge of pride

Not knowing where places are in their own country- not travelling around the U.K.- lots o boots never been beyond an hours drive of their home unless to visit specific friends/ relatives/ to move for work/ education

Not being dressed for the weather

Saying sorry to someone who has bumped into them

Still having forced closed adoptions

Lots of women not driving/ not being able to drive

People being precious about small dents on their cars

Trust law

Judges in wigs

Always having a biscuit with tea

Lack of integrated wardrobes in bedrooms

Instant coffee

I stayed with relatives in New Jersey late 1980's, Sarah Ferguson had given birth to her first baby during our time there, many people asked if I'd be visiting her and the baby when I returned home.

My 6 year old was desperate for a carriage ride in Central Park, relatives found this strange as they thought he would ride in a Carriage regularly.

I am sorry to say that NHS in general really doesn't have the name as some in the UK may think. I know hundreds of people who are flying abroad (in europe to their respective countries)and pay for treatment there after experiencing NHS. It's very, very hit and miss. It can be amazing, it can be bad.

However, the state school talk is plain weird. But then again, I am from country where I never heard of private primary or secondary 🤔

Oh my god, how did we all forget bread sauce!? That took way too long to get into the thread😂 Good job.

Yes to weird exchange and completion on the same day. That's very much heart attack situation.😂 I said very frank no to that suggestion when I was buying!

Oh gosh yes, The Daily Bath for children before The 7pm Bedtime. (Though Germans are good at the 7pm bedtime thing too. I have three children and none of them would have ever been put-to-bed-able at 7pm, unless I'd wanted to start the day about 4am).

The very didactic public information culture. 'Traffic light' labels on foods to determine whether they're 'healthy' or 'unhealthy' is one example that springs to mind. I think this connects to the school uniform business I mentioned upthread - and to all the posts flying around on here atm about how you're only 'meant to' go out for an hour once a day (even though I believe no such precise stipulation has been made - correct me if I'm wrong), policing of people's 'essentials', people genuinely asking if they can have a BBQ in their own garden, etc. It's a cultural affinity to 'the rules' (the sense that there is one particular right way of doing things) and lack of an attitude of scope for sensible individual interpretation.

I like to wash my face at bedtime - you can't wash your face properly with a big mixer tap in the middle of the sink, so I prefer separate taps.

I promise you that you can! What’s more the water isn’t either freezing or scalding while you do it.

My washing machine is in the kitchen - where else would it go? No utility room or garage, tiny bathroom (and carrying a half ton washing machine up our curving stair would be such fun, though I suppose someone once did that with the bath). Should I put it in the hall then? Or the living room? Or the garden?

Definitely the not rinsing dishes, mixer taps, lack of dryers, and houses attached to each other.

UK takeaways portions are massive (even by US standards) and very cheap.

Not being able to take food home if you can’t finish your meal.

Food labels a bit misleading. How can something have 3 pepper spice level but have the spiciness of mayo.

Bringing sugary treats into the office for everyone several times a week.

Children in pubs.

Not controlling your children at parties, leaving them there without telling the host, or leaving uninvited children.

The assumption that if you’re non-white you’re likely to be an immigrant.

Wait times at restaurants and movies

Make-up and the obsession with eyebrows and lashes

Obsession with school uniforms- not the great equaliser they love to make it out to be.

Shop times- many people leave work between 5pm and 6pm yet shops close at 5pm or 5:30pm.

Definitely the class thing. It was a right f-ing pain choosing names for our sons because husband thought certain names were too posh. Never even thought of names that way and it even varies on region.

@CatteStreet - 2 of mine went 7pm-7.30am from 12 weeks old. I'd had enough of my kids by that time in the evening and needed a break. Spanish children stay up waaayyy too late.

We've had a few au pairs and they've always found Pantomimes utterly bizarre, they sit there with bemused expressions on their faces for 90 minutes.......
They've all loved Christmas crackers though and I still send them abroad to a couple of our old ones.