Remember my posts about usage differences in English language? Here is a little illustration. As I was walking by this sign posted at a construction sight, I had to stop and spend a few moments to juggle the different meanings of the words in my head so they fit together.
It’s just one underground pedestrian passage that’s out of commission, not the whole subway system.
The other day I was traveling between offices in the afternoon and had what increasingly becomes a very rare occasion of finding myself in the City of London. With my handy little camera, I took a few pictures. It was a bit late in the day and the lighting conditions were deteriorating, but here are a few shots. (click any photo to enlarge)
First, a few perspectives through the office windows.
View towards the London Eye and, unfortunately, against the sun.
View towards the TV tower. Nothing of note here, except that I liked the composition of what I assume are the folded sun umbrellas, the spires of the church that I cannot name, and the tower in the distance.
On my walk towards the train station, I passed a fairly popular picture spot, with the dome of the St Paul’s opening up at the end of a narrow pedestrian street.
And here is the cathedral in all of its glory.
Finally, two opposing views alongside Cannon Street where it intersects Queen Victoria Street.
In England, just as I remember in latter years in America with ads against insurance fraud, TV campaigns against benefit fraud do a pretty good job in sending the appropriate message. A benefit thief may not mend his ways outright upon seeing an ad like the one below, but seeing many of them is likely to sow some doubts in his brain.
But in this particular ad, I am primarily astonished to see a depiction of what seems to be a neighbor dialing the fraud hotline to turn the purported thief in. It is a duty of a good citizen to report a crime, no doubt, but this particular scene leaves a lot to be guessed what the actual crime is (I bet that unless you are a recipient of these “benefits for living alone”, you’re as baffled as I am in regards to the nature of the problem), and there is a clear connotation of the neighbor alerting the authorities based on her personal conjectures.
I am fortunate not to have lived through that myself, but I am very familiar with the histories of the Soviet-block informer societies, and I am shocked to see this apparent suggestion to snitch. Then again, a Brit colleague of mine once noted with a modicum of self-deprecation that the British are largely expected to tell on one another. It must be working, if you believe the “600 calls” claim.
Remember, I wrote in the past about the recycling scheme instituted by the Greenwich council? Basically, the dry recyclables go into the blue-cover bin, the food waste and the garden refuse into the green-cover bin, and the rest goes into a large garbage bag (soon to be replaced with a black-cover bin). Not very taxing for an average resident, after all.
Many people, of course, are either unwilling or unable to follow these rules. What happens to the offenders and their garbage? Surprisingly, the often quick-to-fine - or even prosecute, as linked from that old post, - authorities thus far resort to a gentle reminder, which isn’t in the least threatening. I’ve seen quite a lot of these notices around.
click images to enlarge
It’s been a bit over a year since England curbed smoking in public places. For those of us who cannot stand the smoke, life has become considerably more pleasant, especially when it comes to dining out. The unfortunate souls who can’t exist without cigarettes, conversely, have been having much harder time indulging in their habit. Obviously, almost all of the smoking is now done in the open air, but even that is supposed to be limited to specifically designated zones. Here is a brief photo-essay of how that works in Canary Wharf.
Let’s start with a picture of the Canada Square quiet oasis of a park.
The signs declaring the park a no-smoking zone are quite prominent, and there are more than half a dozen of them in various places (at least three are visible in this picture). Of course, there are always smokers who prefer to have their pleasure in the altogether fresh air, sign or not.
I admit that I have not yet worked up the nerve to come closer and unceremoniously take a picture of a stranger, so you’ll have to take my word that the people in the shot are having a smoke (although, the guy’s form is clearly that of shaking off ashes). You can also discern that there is a no-smoking sign within a few meters of these guys.
The signs are all positioned inside the park area. Obviously, that means that staying on the sidewalk immediately next to the park puts a smoker outside of the limits of prohibition. Here is the lunch-time Smokers Row.
There is an area on the street known as North Colonnade, which is explicitly set aside for smokers.
These last two pictures were taken in the early hours of the day, but don’t let that mislead you. There are rarely people in this place ever. Could be the resentment of being confined to a red-paint-boundary box. Could be the fact that this happens to be by far the most wind-swept spot in the entire Wharf.
One of these days I’ll figure out how to make a picture of the wind to illustrate.
Natasha arranged for a vision check-up for Becky a few days ago. We haven’t been to that NHS office before, and Natasha turned out to be overly optimistic about the ease of finding a parking spot near the office. By the time she had parked some distance away and walked with Becky into the reception, it was 7 minutes after the appointment time.
“We cannot take you now”, they were told, “since you are late, starting the appointment right now will push the subsequent appointments back, and we cannot have that.”
Natasha tried to reason with them, but to no avail. She and Becky turned around and left, and I suppose that she will look for another provider when she re-schedules.
Can a medical office ever be so efficient as to spend exactly the allotted time on each appointment? Can a patient who is a few minutes late really screw up the entire remaining schedule? For that matter, can anyone remember ever being ushered into the doctor’s office exactly on time of the appointment? I, for one, knew a couple of doctors who came close, but I’m pretty sure that 5-10 minutes later than scheduled is customary.
I think the key here is that an NHS office will likely bill the government and get paid for this visit regardless of whether the services have been provided. A private doctor, conversely, would not want to lose a source of income over a few minutes of inadvertent tardiness.
Beware of being late for NHS appointments!
Something that we see in England considerably more often than in the States: People driving around in vintage cars. And I don’t mean “vintage” as in 1968 Corvette or something, no offense intended. I mean as in 1929 Bugatti.
There are also people who drive around in racing cars - and even DIY cars - which I am often ignorant enough to mistake for a vintage roadster.
Unfortunately, I never managed to take a shot of any of those, on account of not having a camera with me. But now I do. So, here it is, a Tiger Racing specimen, parked on a street in Rochester.
I’ll surely have an opportunity to get a shot of a true vintage car in the near future.
It’s been close to a year since I posted a brief sampler of the linguistic differences between British and American English language variants. I had a clear intent to parlay that article into a potentially fun series. But in the intervening time, I suppose, I lost my ear when it comes to noticing divergences in everyday vocabularies. As a result, off the top of my head I could not think of many additions to my initial list.
That may be partly due to the self-imposed scope. I wanted to include only the terms that are used frequently or, at least, define objects that have a common place in everyday life. I also wanted to look for instances where an American word would be likely misunderstood if used, either because it has a different meaning in British English or is entirely uncommon on this side of the pond.
A beauty like knackered (suggested by the fellow expat Geo) does not exactly fit into these boundaries. It is a word that you’d never hear in the States, but it is considered a slang in England, never replacing exhausted in polite circles. A fun little titchy, which Becky increasingly uses in her teen-speak, is similarly too much of a colloquialism - my preferred American translation of it would be teeny-tiny - to qualify as part of formal vocabulary. And terms such as boot fair, hen night or stag party are too situational to be frequently used.
Well, I’m guessing Posh frock! could be a frequent exclamation in families with girls on shopping sprees, but in this era, girls rarely don dresses, no matter how nice.
Long story short, I realized that the best I can do is mention here the handful of words that were omitted from the original list. The short register has been lying on my desk for months. Maybe, as soon as I post it, new examples will spring to mind, giving me an excuse for another post on the topic.
The most inexplicable omission from the list was the word mate. In the States, I primarily associate this word with the process of procreation, and “I’m meeting my mates tonight” would sound rather risque to an average ear. In England, the plural mates almost exclusively replaces friends - even Becky rarely uses the latter anymore. What’s more, the singular mate is used everywhere as a form of address between men who are otherwise not acquainted with one another but need to engage in a brief transaction, be it over a counter of a sandwich shop (”Do you want a gherkin on that, mate?”) or on a packed train (”Sorry, mate, I’m trying to get off”). When I manage to insert that in my own speech, I’ll know I’ve become anglicized. (Insidentally, a gherkin is what we Americans know as a pickle.)
In schools, what we are used to call grades (as in “My daughter is in 8th grade”) are called Years. A group of students that takes most of the classes together is called a form, whereas I think in the States they would still be termed a class. A principal is branded a head teacher.
The cars in England each possess a bonnet and a boot, rather than hoods and trunks. We were almost detained on our first trip via Eurotunnel, when the customs officer politely asked me to “lift the bonnet” and met an expression of utter incomprehension in return.
And one of the favorites of a couple of my American friends here is pissed, which means wasted as in drunk. Believe me, in England, it’s a commonly used part of everyday vocabulary.
I have not mentioned the concept of the call limit in the past, and yesterday we unwittingly ran afoul of it.
In a nutshell, when a landline phone service is being established in the UK, the phone company determines the monetary limit that the customer should stay under during any given billing cycle. Exceed the limit - and your outgoing calls are summarily blocked unless you pay down the balance with a credit card (if you are so inclined, you can wait to pay your bill in the normal fashion at the end of the cycle, but you will only be able to receive calls during this time).
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Sometimes, a small and fairly inconsequential thing happens, which makes me think: “Hey, I can’t imagine this being handled so efficiently and positively for me in America”.
Natasha received a parking violation ticket a couple of weeks ago. That was before our recent discovery of mobile-phone-enabled payments, but it occurred on a trip to the nearby market, and she never leaves on such trips without enough coins to pay the parking fee. She did procure the appropriate sticker and attached it to the inside of windshield as required.
When she returned to the car a couple of hours later, she found a violation notice attached to the windshield on the outside. The parking sticker was lying face-down on the dashboard. It must have fell off. The text of the notice referred to “failure to pay or to properly display the proof of payment”. The penalty did not distinguish between the two: £50 if paid within 14 days or £100 thereafter…
Contrary to my recent rant about cell phones, they do come in handy in more than obvious ways.
For instance, more and more parking lots around England allow you to pay your parking fee by calling an automated processing service, so you no longer find yourself in a pickle when you do not have enough coins to feed the ticket machine.
Say, you browse a store, any store, and come across an attractive item that is on sale. You’d be lukewarm to the idea of obtaining said item at its original listed price, but an ability to buy it at a discount closes the deal for you.
Now, suppose, as you reach the checkout and a clerk scans the barcode in, the original non-discounted price comes up on the register. You point out to the cashier that the advertised price is considerably below what they are attempting to charge you. What do you hear in response?
Going through a short backlog of topics that I consider worth commenting on as far as observations of British life go, I am going to address a fairly obscure one today: The seemingly universal recoil towards wearing real fur.
Natasha and Becky have both faced this on a few occasions now, while I do not remember this general attitude to be so widespread back home in the States. To be honest, I’ve heard enough stories involving PETA protests and seen enough posters of gorgeous nude celebrities (“I’d rather go naked” campaign) to suggest that the British - and Europeans, in general, - cannot be any more animal-rights-minded than Americans, but when you repeatedly encounter regular people appalled with the idea of wearing a fur-accented garment, it makes you wonder whether the entire culture adopted a certain attitude.
I could only be stealthy for so long. A speed camera finally caught me in the act.
As far as I can tell, I ran afoul of one of the weirdest of the speed limits. In a “built-up urban” area, the national limit is 30 mph, unless posted otherwise. And when it is not posted otherwise? The only thing that indicates this limit is the presence of lamp-posts - you will never find explicit signage.
So, apparently, on our way out of Wales, on a road that I would not deem urban, my brain did not register the lamp-posts. And now, I have received an official letter, advising me that the driver of my car “is alleged” to had driven at the speed of 41 mph in a 30-mile zone. “This allegation is supported by photographic and/or video evidence”, solemnly states the letter.
In one of my very first posts, I noted that adjusting to driving on the left side of the road is not that hard. I am sure anyone who ever rented a car in England would agree. You need some initial buffer time to get used to it, but paying close heed to omnipresent white arrows on blue background and following cars in front of you is all you need. Turning into a road empty of traffic will occasionally trip you, but not for long.
Furthermore, switching to driving on the right, when you go to the continent, and then again to driving on the left, when you return, is a transparent subconscious transition, once you know well how to do both (cursory to that, since most of my continental driving is done in my own car, I drive there on the right behind a right-hand steering wheel, and do not notice much difference either).
But occasionally, your subconscious plays a trick with you.
You can park your car facing either way in England, and when I occasionally drop Kimmy off at school, I cross the road to park on the opposite side without turning around. When I pull out later, my first maneuver is a u-turn. The other day, there were no cars parked opposite of me when I returned to the car, so I was able to do a majestic forward-only 180° turn. There were no cars moving on the road either until a few hundred meters into driving, when I saw a van coming directly at me and flashing its headlights.
Yes, I was driving on the right. Without a reference normally provided by moving cars, and deceived by having had the car parked against the direction of the traffic, my brain decided to kick into the right-side auto-pilot mode…
The combined speed of the two vehicles was low enough to allow me to realize my mistake, gracefully move to the left and even apologetically wave to the driver of the van. I have no doubt that he still aimed his entire reservoir of insults at me as we were passing each other…
Continuing with the threads of road tax, environment and a fight for lower emissions, the newly produced UK government Budget calls for an increase of that tax for the most-polluting vehicles to £425 a year. (among the sources, try this one)
The increase will be put in place in April of 2009, which is after my next road tax due date, but most importantly, after our planned repatriation, so we are likely to escape the extra cost.
I drive a BMW, which are not known for their “greenery”. Disengaging from the discussion on whether me and other “gas-guzzling” drivers deserve to pay more for contributing more than our share to the pollution, the proposed tax amount is just mind-boggling!
Emission levels may have just become the most important characteristic for selecting which car to buy in England.
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I stayed home today, so that Natasha could attend a PTA meeting at Becky’s school in the early afternoon. Whenever I stay home, I normally take Kimmy to school and pick her up, a happy responsibility that evades me on a regular day.
This morning, at 8:45am, as we were driving to Kimmy’s school, the weather was as dismal as it comes: Strong winds, leaden skies, driving rain. At around 10, though, as I looked out the window, the rain stopped, the skies cleared, and the sun was shining brightly. By noon, the gray skies returned and it was raining again… By 3pm, when it was time for me to drive to the school to pick Kimmy up, it was bright and sunny again… |
At 3:07pm, as I was standing in the schoolyard, waiting for children to come out, someone upstairs flipped a switch, the skies changed color as if by magic, and another portion of torrential rain emptied on me and a bunch of similarly sorry parents.
Guess what I see at the moment, at 3:57pm? Would you believe it - the shining sun!
I’ve seen this kind of weather before on tropical islands. Never thought Britain was one…
| I have written in the past about things that I wish were in England like in the States and about things that are seemingly better here. The truth of the matter is, none of those evoke strong emotions from me one way or the other. There is one that does, though, and recently it kind of inaugurated a short and as-yet-unofficial What I hate about Europe list.
I am talking about “pay inside” approach to car refueling. In New Jersey, with its blanket full serve mode, you always pay at the pump, whether the attendant takes your credit card to a booth to run it through or simply inserts it into the pump’s credit card reader. I drove - and certainly bought gas - in at least fifteen other states, with many self-serve stations, and I do not recall a case where the pump would not be equipped with a credit card reader. |
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The concept of vehicle registration in Britain is substituted by the notion of the road tax. Same thing, different name, really, except that the proof of you having paid the tax - known as the Tax Disc - has to be prominently displayed on your windshield (while the proof of inspection does not).
The real difference is in cost. I don’t recall paying more than $80 a year for registration of my FX35 in New Jersey (which was the most expensive to register of all the cars that I used to own). Here, I just paid £205 for the privilege to drive my X3 for another year. Ouch!
| One of the things that I wanted to write about for a while but could not get to were the observations on the street naming practices in England. Under pretenses of clearing my backlog, here is a brief editorial. |  |
First of all, the term street rarely appears itself in the street names outside city center. In the suburbs you are likely to find disproportionate number of roads, with occasional lanes and closes thrown in. Makes perfect sense: The street is an urban invention, and even though suburban areas are no longer villages in the true sense of the word, they retain their traditional names. (To take it one step further, the drive is an extremely uncommon designation). There is a High Street in every sizable commune, always easily recognizable by the dense concentration of small shops; this is where the Brits of old would actually get from place to place on foot; getting everywhere else required some mode of transportation - hence, roads.
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© 2008 Burlaki on the Thames
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