Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Cultural differences

When the Colorado-born Little Red Hen came to England on her very first visit, Isaac took her to a cafe in Camden and she asked the waiter for "hot tea." This caused much amusement to the waiter, to Isaac, and to the rest of the family when we heard about it. Poor Wendy. She had no idea that in England, tea was hot by default.

I have done a similar thing over here. I asked for orange juice without any ice. Apparently, they wouldn't think of serving orange juice in the USA with ice.

In the the realm of babycare, a buggy is a stroller, a dummy is a pacifier, a nappy is a diaper, newborn babies wear hats whatever the weather, and stranger than that, a lot of women think it necessary to wear a "nursing cover" when breastfeeding their babies. Why?

I was puzzled by that almighty fuss over Janet Jackson's boob mishap a couple of years ago, and also by the men in Friends being so juvenile when someone was breastfeeding her baby. But if American men never see women breastfeeding their babies, because of the nursing covers, they will continue to think there is something to make a fuss about, won't they?
I've just found out that 12,000 women per year are arrested for breastfeeding in public in the USA, even though it is quite legal.

On a final and separate tack, I watched Pretty Woman on Network TV the other night and they kept in the suggestive sex scenes, but censored the swear words. This meant they cut my favourite line - when Viv asks her friend Kit for the name of someone who married someone much richer than her and it all worked out, and Kit says: "Cinder-f***ing-rella."

And now I am doing it too. Sigh.

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