english and the americans
Saturday, November 29, 2008 (3:19 PM)
some weeks ago, i was watching greek uncovered - the making of greek tv series. not as in the language of greece but the system of fraternities and sororities. during the interview, a couple of the actresses were asked if they thought franny - an egocentric character - got her comeuppance. interestingly, both of whom have never heard of the word and they were like:
"what? comeuppance? what does that mean? must be a british word."
something to that extent. i was surprised that they've never heard of that word. i kinda suspect it's not exclusively british.
more interestingly, last week during my spanish class, i was asking elena how to say "fishmonger" in spanish and denton, an american classmate, was asking "what? fish?"
i went, "monger."
and a frown emerged between his brows.
i repeated, "fishmonger."
he said, "fishmonger? what's that?"
i went O_O!
then his wife, a singaporean, who is also in the class asked him, "what do americans call people who sells fish?"
denton went, "er... i don't know. fish... er... salesmen?"
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