Irritating American names for things

Rothko · 02-11-2020 1:35am

Kermit.de.frog wrote: »

We rely so much on America.

Our culture is basically American, our wealth is from American companies.

American english is superior english anyway so i'm glad it's getting more common in Ireland

Not true at all.

VG31 · 02-11-2020 1:37am

Captain Red Beard wrote: »

Cups. As a measurement.

I never got this. What are "cups"? Are all cups the same size in the US?

freewheeler wrote: »

EYE-raq (Iraq)

AY-rabs (Arabs) as well.

440Hertz · 02-11-2020 1:37am

If you think our culture is American, you didn’t get much past a pub in Boston!

Leg End Reject · 02-11-2020 1:38am

Sardonicat wrote: »

Pantyhose for tights. Panties for knickers.

I quickly scanned the thread looking to see if these had been posted.

They set my teeth on edge. Hideous words that make tights and knickers sound like they're excitedly uttered by a depraved, greasy-haired flasher whilst pulling the knob off himself.

CVB · 02-11-2020 1:39am

Pawsta for PASTA !!!

& calling long pasta Like spaghetti
They call them NOODLES !

Boil the NOODLES!!!!

Purple Mountain · 02-11-2020 1:40am

Sardonicat wrote: »

I haven't heard that in a long, long time. Co. Limerick. Never heard it anywhere else.

I've only ever heard it uttered by Limerick people too. Cousins of mine who thought I was posh saying runners

smellyoldboot · 02-11-2020 1:42am

[Deleted User] wrote: »

"Math" seems to be gaining traction this side of the pond. And those who use the term "soccer" to describe a football game should be forced to operate a hotdog stand in an abandoned carpark.

Association Football is soccer though. In the non-anglified parts of this land.

CVB · 02-11-2020 1:43am

GAS Station ! (For Petrol/Diesel Fuel)

Sardonicat · 02-11-2020 1:45am

Leg End Reject wrote: »

I quickly scanned the thread looking to see if these had been posted.

They set my teeth on edge. Hideous words that make tights and knickers sound like they're excitedly uttered by a depraved, greasy-haired flasher whilst pulling the knob off himself.

Precisely my reaction to those words.
"Panties, oh panties. She puts on her panties and then her pantyhose . Oh JAYSUS! A1 Sharon "

Sonic the Shaghog · 02-11-2020 1:46am

Maybe it's just a rural thing but we always called it soccer, football was reserved specifically to mean GAA football

breezy1985 · 02-11-2020 1:47am

Purple Mountain wrote: »

I've only ever heard it uttered by Limerick people too. Cousins of mine who thought I was posh saying runners

Ya there was a lot of "watch your man off thinks hes from New York with his runners" thrown about when anything other than tackies got a mention.

Sardonicat · 02-11-2020 1:48am

Sonic the Shaghog wrote: »

Maybe it's just a rural thing but we always called it soccer, football was reserved specifically to mean GAA football

Yup. You say football round here you mean Gaelic. If you called soccer football you'd be hounded out of the county.

cnocbui · 02-11-2020 1:49am

It's called soccer in Australia, because footie, or sometimes football, is something entirely different.

breezy1985 · 02-11-2020 1:50am

cnocbui wrote: »

It's called soccer in Australia, because footie, or sometimes football, is something entirely different.

Same as Ireland then

440Hertz · 02-11-2020 1:51am

Sonic the Shaghog wrote: »

Maybe it's just a rural thing but we always called it soccer, football was reserved specifically to mean GAA football

It’s not a rural thing. I’ve had my head taken off by Dubs for using the term football in reference to soccer and you’ll find it gets used in Donegal, where soccer often is a rural thing.

Sonic the Shaghog · 02-11-2020 1:52am

Sardonicat wrote: »

Yup. You say football round here you mean Garelic. If you called soccer football you'd be hounded out of the county.

I remember plenty of young lads getting an awful slagging off aul fellas when they'd ask if they play football, the young lad says I do and when asked is it club X, y or z (local GAA clubs) the young lad would correct and say oh no I mean soccer

Cue the aul lads doing a "ara jaysus" and walking off like the old woman in Fr. Ted when she finds out the film is subtitled :pac:

gammygils · 02-11-2020 2:02am

Expiration date for Expiry date

440Hertz · 02-11-2020 2:04am

I remember an American comedian being quite bemused at the term "washing up liquid" (dish soap in the US). He wondered if they called gasoline "driving around fluid" in England.

~Rebel~ · 02-11-2020 2:06am

cnocbui wrote: »

No kidding. Great when you have an emergency and someone's screaming about a gas leak.

That’s grand, but I’m just pointing out that you saying that gas is a liquid is a bit erroneous, as that’s got nothing to do with the term ‘Gas’ - which is only called Gas because it’s a shortening of Gasoline. The same way we shorten Petroleum to Petrol.

The fact the physical state is also called a gas is unrelated - sure there’s tonnes of English words with alternative meanings, and you figure it out by context.

The “gas leak” thing is a good example, but even still depending on context you know what it means - and either way you’ll be acting fast :pac:

But sure given that it’s been this way for decades, they’ve obviously not had much of an issue distinguishing based on context..

440Hertz · 02-11-2020 2:07am

gammygils wrote: »

Expiration date for Expiry date

The main one that caused confusion is writing the date month, day, year format.

03/09/2021 gets read here as 03 September 2021 and not March 09, 2021. It can cause really serious confusion as nobody in Europe uses that MM/DD/YY format and it's not very intuitive, if you're unaware of it, especially in numerical form.

I've seen it cause really serious mix-ups in business contexts.

Sgt Hartman · 02-11-2020 2:08am

Freshman, Sophomore and Varsity years in College. Why can't they just say 1st, 2nd and 3rd year?

~Rebel~ · 02-11-2020 2:09am

Sgt Hartman wrote: »

Freshman, Sophomore and Varsity years in College. Why can't they just say 1st, 2nd and 3rd year?

Don’t get me started on Starbucks cup sizes!!

440Hertz · 02-11-2020 2:12am

~Rebel~ wrote: »

Don’t get me started on Starbucks cup sizes!!

They're nothing to do with American English though. It's just Starbucks own terminology, and is best ignored.

Church on Tuesday · 02-11-2020 2:13am

The weird pronunciation of Europe as "Eurp"

440Hertz · 02-11-2020 2:15am

Meh! Sure Irish people say Chi cahRR Go for Chicago.

Chris_Heilong · 02-11-2020 2:19am

Calling someone's fringe 'bangs' just annoys me.

gogo · 02-11-2020 2:24am

Sgt Hartman wrote: »

Freshman, Sophomore and Varsity years in College. Why can't they just say 1st, 2nd and 3rd year?

Learn something new every day ... heard of freshman and the rest but could never be arsed to google them

440Hertz · 02-11-2020 2:31am

Sure we've universities that use terms like Michaelmas, Hillary and Trinity terms, borrowed from Oxford & Cambridge.

UCC replaced them after modularisation, with Teaching Period 1, Teaching Period 2 and Teaching Period 3...

Duffy the Vampire Slayer · 02-11-2020 2:51am

Captain Red Beard wrote: »

Cilantro.

Actually the Spanish word. Don't know how they started using it.

Creol1 · 02-11-2020 2:53am

Watching US politics they use the same terms but with somewhat different meanings, which is very confusing: they say "middle class" meaning "working class" and use "liberal" to mean "socialist" or "social democratic".

~Rebel~ · 02-11-2020 3:05am

Duffy the Vampire Slayer wrote: »

Actually the Spanish word. Don't know how they started using it.

Probably crept into common usage through the huge Spanish speaking population I'd say - on a day to day basis, the main place I tend to hear cilantro used is in relation to mexican food anyway.

440Hertz · 02-11-2020 3:12am

Duffy the Vampire Slayer wrote: »

Actually the Spanish word. Don't know how they started using it.

Most of ours just come straight from french:

Courgette Vs Zucchini
Aubergine Vs eggplant

Etc

440Hertz · 02-11-2020 3:15am

Creol1 wrote: »

Watching US politics they use the same terms but with somewhat different meanings, which is very confusing: they say "middle class" meaning "working class" and use "liberal" to mean "socialist" or "social democratic".

Working class is a very very British term. In general you won't find many Americans who would apply it to themselves. I think to be quite honest you wouldn't find many Irish people who self identify as working class either.

02-11-2020 3:17am

fatbhoy wrote: »

Fanny

Word of warning!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7UHKfqXYTU

Jakey Rolling · 02-11-2020 3:26am

con___manx1 wrote: »

Have you ever been to America? Trump is their president and they can't even spell colour. Our culture is nothing like theres. Irish are a much smarter people that's why all there companies are here 😁

There, their, they're - it must be frustrating when you're so much smarter than these foreign idiots with their b*stardised version of English. But, if you are writing to one of these companies to offer your services, you would do well to run your application thru a grammar checker

Hangdogroad · 02-11-2020 3:40am

Bro is bad enough but dont get me started on Brah. Then theres African American slang origin that white middle class bellends on both sides of the Atlantic appropriate. Dolla, bae, pimpin and worst of all "woke".

Oops! · 02-11-2020 3:58am

Stick shift.

SUV.

Sedan.

Oh my gowwwd... Like serously?.......

Young girls and teens speaking and ending almost every sentence in a high pitched tone.

Nodster · 02-11-2020 4:36am

C'mon man we've been on this since page 4 - 6......"do the math"

Kaybaykwah · 02-11-2020 4:36am

Inglitch is nice languish.

speckle · 02-11-2020 5:17am

I would love to be a fly on the wall of the American equivalent of boards and hear what they are saying about us.

Kaybaykwah · 02-11-2020 5:39am

speckle wrote: »

I would love to be a fly on the wall of the American equivalent of boards and hear what they are saying about us.

Well, I was in Ireland last year and my two sons thought that "tires" spel[t](led) with a y was a bit over the top, tbf.

Hamsterchops · 02-11-2020 7:31am

Deeepo instead of depot (deh.pow)
Zee instead of zed.

M.T. Cranium · 02-11-2020 7:42am

speckle wrote: »

I would love to be a fly on the wall of the American equivalent of boards and hear what they are saying about us.

Trust me on this, you are better off not knowing. :cool:

Actually it's not that bad, and in fact there is no large American forum like boards, the forums designed for discussion of current events tend to segregate into political affiliations and only a very brave soul ventures off their reservation into the other half's domain.

If you do want to see what gets discussed in a forum similar to AH (but with mostly conservative only participants) try Free Republic. I think there's a leftist equivalent called DU, have never bothered to go in there (boards more than satisfies my need for left-right intellectual exchange).

Squeeonline · 02-11-2020 7:48am

TheValeyard wrote: »

Vitamins

It's VIT-a-min

It's not VITE-a-min.

Useless sack of fcuking Yankee doodle dandy sh1te.

While I agree on the pronunciation, the word comes from "Vital amines" which could be shortened to VITE-amin quite fairly. It's one of their less egregious words IMO.

02-11-2020 9:15am

The younger crowd in work have been saying realtor for estate agent.
Cringe

Rodney Bathgate · 02-11-2020 9:17am

Cringe

Quantum Erasure · 02-11-2020 9:23am

Fanny

Rodney Bathgate · 02-11-2020 9:28am

Fanny pack

Be right back · 02-11-2020 9:29am

Q-tips for cotton buds. An American asked me once for them, took a while to get what she meant.

Rodney Bathgate · 02-11-2020 9:30am

Cab (taxi)

Irritating American names for things

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