G’day Ma’am

Neil — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 05:22:36 +0000

We celebrated the Queen’s Birthday today at work with a big sponge cake. I seem to be celebrating Britishness more outside of the country than when I was in it (with the exception of football tournaments, though I doubt that is getting much celebration this time around). This one was celebrated because the president of the company is an Australian and out there they get a day off work, while a few of my colleagues pointed out to me back in April (I still had to look it up again to make sure of the date!) when it was St George’s Day. There was no celebration for it but I think while working in England it was always a day that passed without notice until a couple of weeks later when someone would raise their head from their monitor and say ‘Oh, it was St George’s the other day!’

I suppose it’s normal to be more aware of your national celebrations when you are abroad but I’ve been surprised that Americans seem to be more aware of it than Englishmen. I can’t see a 4th of July passing and a couple of days later a Limey reminding Yank that he forgot to celebrate. I never seem to use those slang names so I thought I’d throw them in there – I should try to get more of those in here in future, maybe something a little more ‘exotic’ like a Pom reminding a Septic.

neilwill » slang

G’day Ma’am