Hey, it’s been a while. If you haven’t read part 1 of this series, you can read it here.
I’ve had this post sitting in my drafts since 2017. Yes, twenty seventeen. After writing that part 1, I guess I lost motivation/interest to write more but here we are, 4 years later. In this part, I’m going to talk about quirks I notice in British people. Let’s get started, shall we?
“Are you alright?”
Since the first year that I studied in England, I noticed that British people like to greet each other with “Are you alright?”. I know it’s for good manners but sometimes I feel like… Do I not look okay? Is something supposed to be wrong with me? Haha.
Students actually answer questions in class.
When the teacher/lecturer asks a question, many British students do respond and usually go beyond by discussing things closely related to the topic. Whereas in Thailand (at least in my old school), when the teacher asks a question, everyone goes quiet and you could hear crickets chirping. Hah. There may be one or two brave souls who actually answer but we rarely ever speak more than we have to in class/lecture.
People talk about the weather a lot.
After living here, I understand why they do that. It’s because the weather changes every minute! One moment the sun is out and the sky is blue, the next moment the sky turns dark and rain starts to fall. In short, the British weather is very moody indeed.
The way British people say the time and the digit “0” is… weird.
Suppose it’s 9:45 and you need to tell someone the time, I would normally say “It’s nine forty-five.” But British people? Nah man, they like to complicate things and make you calculate a bit in your head. They would say “It’s quarter to ten.” Other examples include “8:10 - It’s ten past eight.”, “9:40 - It’s twenty to ten.” and “11:30 - It’s half past eleven.” I find it very intriguing and weird, haha.
Lastly, the way they say “zero” is different from what I’m used to. In maths, suppose the number is 0.5, I would say “zero point five” while British people would say “nought point five”. Yeah, that’s just a little something I noticed while studying here for almost 9 years now.
What other quirks do you notice about British people/culture?
With love,
Nana