Lost in Translation: The Great Anglo-American Language Divide
Unexpected Toppings: A Pizza Peril
My office used to indulge us with free lunches featuring a different cuisine daily, which repeated weekly. Pizza day was always eagerly anticipated, especially among our vegetarian Indian colleagues, who appreciated having both veg and non-veg options available. One particular day, I noticed a pizza adorned with neat, red circular slices.
“Hmm, a tomato pizza? Interesting. I wonder how it tastes with just tomatoes,” I mused to myself.
Without hesitation, I took a bite, expecting the refreshing tang of tomatoes. To my surprise, it tasted different—savory, with a hint of spice. Just as I was processing this unexpected flavor, a colleague behind me in the pizza line remarked, “Hey, I thought you don’t eat pork?”
Time seemed to freeze as the realization hit me like a ton of bricks. I had just bitten into a slice of pepperoni pizza!
Years later, I realized it was a classic case of mistaken toppings, a scenario that had haunted many vegetarian newcomers like me in the past.
Brinjal: The King of Vegetables
A couple of days later, Italian cuisine graced our lunch menu, featuring a dish made out of brinjal. As I loaded my plate and began heading back to my desk, I spotted my American colleague making his way towards the lunchroom.
“What’s on the menu today?” he inquired.
“I’m not entirely sure of the name, but it’s something made with brinjal,” I replied confidently.
“Made with what?” he asked, looking puzzled.
“Brinjal, you know, brinjal? The king of vegetables with a crown on its head?” I explained, hoping my description would bring clarity.
“What the heck is brinjal?” he shot back, his confusion growing.
Now thoroughly perplexed, I silently wondered, “Why doesn’t he know what brinjal is? I’m definitely speaking English! Am I pronouncing brinjal correctly?”
To clear up the confusion, I led him back to the lunchroom and pointed at the dish. “Here. Look at this. This is brinjal!”
“Oh, you meant eggplant! This is eggplant lasagna,” he exclaimed, suddenly enlightened.
I stood there momentarily speechless. The nuances between British and American English had clearly tripped me up yet again.
Converting Cultures: Metric Mind in an Imperial World
The differences between Anglo-American cultures weren’t just about culinary mishaps; they extended to measurements too. Switching from the Metric to the Imperial system of measurement was a head-spinning task for me. Back in India, I understood distances in kilometers, temperatures in Celsius, and weights in kilograms. Naturally, trying to grasp measurements based on miles, Fahrenheit, and pounds was like navigating a foreign language.
So, when people would say, “What a nice and sunny day! It’s 85 out there,” it made no sense to me for a long time. Thank goodness for my decent math skills; I could mentally convert those strange-sounding numbers to make sense of the temperature.
Before GPS became common, I often sought directions from locals.
“Excuse me, sir, how far is the mall from here?”
“It’s about 15 minutes,” they would respond.
This confused me because in India, where traffic is notoriously chaotic, estimating distance in terms of time is highly subjective. We measured distance in kilometers and then calculated how long it might take based on traffic conditions. Eventually, I’d rephrase my question.
“How many miles from here, sir?”
And often, they had no answer. They were so used to thinking in terms of time because in the US, traffic is regulated enough that even GPS systems can accurately predict travel time to a destination.
Whenever I visited a doctor and the nurse asked for my weight, I’d confidently state it in kilograms, leaving them puzzled. This continued for years until I finally got the hang of the Imperial system of measurement and reluctantly started converting it to pounds.
Another thing that tripped me up for quite a while was the date format. In India, we used the dd/mm/yy format, while in the US, it’s mm/dd/yy. I had a habit of putting the date first, which led to confusion. The real problem arose when both the date and month were below twelve, making it impossible to use common sense to figure out if it was the Indian format or the US format. For instance, if I wrote 10th September 2005 in the Indian format as 10/09/2005, they would mistakenly read it as 9th October 2005.
Through these humorous and occasionally confusing cultural adjustments, I learned that embracing the differences added a unique flavor to my American experience. It became a journey of learning and laughing, where each misunderstanding turned into a funny anecdote to share.
