English is English . . . right??

I thought it would be fun to share a few tidbits about some differences in the English language that Ian and I have discovered. You would think it's all English- right?? WRONG.

Here are a few of our favorites.

Pants= trousers Pants are not pants here. Ian found this out the hard way at work. I believe he was talking about the dress code in the office and said "pants". Unfortunately here that means underwear- oops. (This is probably one of my favorite London stories so far!)

Underwear= knickers (not short plaid golfing pants). They sure do have a lot of words referring to undergarments.

Right away=Straightaway . As in- do this NOW. This is slowly becoming one of Ian's favorites.

Try= Give it a go. This is Ian's favorite new phrase. He uses it all the time- he will definitely be bringing this one back to the states

Bye/Thank you= Cheers. They say this every time they get off the phone and also commonly interchange it with Thanks. Very weird!

The letter Z= Zed. This is pretty strange- especially when someone is spelling for you and they say zed.

Zero= affectionately referred to as naught (as in 0.01 naught point naught one). I have been doing a lot of work with spreadsheets (quite a change for this sales/mktg girl) and I had to ask my co-worker to repeat himself twice. Pretty embarrassing.

Yield= Give Way. As in the street sign. We have also learned that to a pedestrian, give way means look right first or you may get run over. Apparently pedestrians do not have the right of way here!

Friend/Buddy= Mate. Not much of an explanation needed here- everyone is considered Mate- female or male- friend or foe.

We will be sure to add more as we come across them. Hope everyone is having a good Thursday and looking forward to the weekend:)