Eat Sleep Dreamers as you know I teach British English because I am British.
And today I thought I'd show you how to be British in five easy steps.
First of all we need to start with some geography.
Great Britain is made up of three countries England, Scotland and Wales.
And if you add Northern Ireland then you get the United Kingdom.
So someone from Britain is British.
That is the adjective.
We also use a noun Brit, a Brit.
So I'm British that's the adjective and I'm a Brit is the noun and they have the same
meaning, someone from Britain.
Alright, so you want to be British.
Here's the first thing you need to do.
British people love talking about the weather, we're obsessed!
'Oh isn't nice today.'
Maybe it's because the weather changes so much, there's so much to talk about.
One minute it'll be really cold 'Brrr it's bloody freezing' and the next minute it'll
be like the Sahara desert 'I'm melting'.
It's also pretty much the only acceptable thing that you can start talking to a stranger
about.
Anything else and they'll be a little bit unsure but weather, no we all love talking
about the weather.
A few phrases that you could use to start a conversation with someone.
'Isn't it nice today?
that's a good one, 'oh isn't it nice today?'
'Isn't the weather terrible today?'
'Is it ever going to stop raining?' that's a good one.
In Britain we love drinking tea.
It's our national sport.
In fact a cup of tea can solve pretty much any problem that you have.
You could have had the worst day at work, you get home, you make a cup of tea and the
world feels a bit better.
So we have black tea and then we add milk and sugar if required.
If someone has offered to make you a cup of tea they'll probably say 'How do you take
it?'
and that means how do you want me to make your tea?
So you have a few options.
I would personally say I'd like it strong and that means not much milk.
You could also say milky which is a lot of milk and then for sugar you could say one
spoon of sugar, two spoons of sugar.
So I would personally say 'milk and no sugar'.
And then we have a few slang words for tea.
So a cuppa is a cup of tea, a cuppa.
Or in the north of England they'll probably say a brew, a brew.
They both mean a cup of tea.
So someone says 'Would you like a cuppa?'
and that means would you like a cup of tea.
Number three apologise for everything.
Especially if it's not your fault.
This is so so British.
We apologise for everything.
So let's say someone spills their drink on me I would apologise to them.
'Oh I'm terribly sorry.
So sorry to get in the way of your water.
I know, it's crazy.
I'm fully aware that it is crazy but I guess it's like a reflex, we just do it because
of habit.
We also start every request with sorry.
'Sorry, could you possibly lend me a pen?'
'Sorry, do you know where the train station is?'
I guess we're just trying to be polite.
British people love queuing, in fact I think that we are the best queuers in the world.
If there were an Olympic games for queuing we would get the gold medal, easy!
In fact if we see a queue, we'll join it even if we don't know what it's for, we'll still
join it.
'What are we queuing for?
You don't know?
Ok.'
Ok, that's not exactly true but we do like queues because I guess we like a sense of
order and fairness so that everyone gets their turn.
And whilst you are in that queue you can chat to someone about the weather, it's perfect.
Two British activities together in one moment, queueing and talking about the weather, amazing.
Finally British people love sarcasm.
What is sarcasm?
It's a statement that clearly means the opposite of what it seems to say.
Why do we do it?
Well usually to insult or mock something in a humorous way.
Basically we are trying to be funny.
So imagine it starts raining and you don't have an umbrella.
If you were sarcastic you might say something like 'oh that's just what I need'.
Well that isn't just what you need, that's the last thing you need but we say it to be
funny.
What about if something goes wrong, for example you drop a glass on the floor and it smashes.
You might go 'Oh well done, yeah brilliant' and again that's just trying to make light
of the situation to make it a bit humorous.
Guys let me know in the comments below, which of these things do you do in your country
and which of these things are different.
I'd love to hear from you.
So let me know in the comments below.
Guys I hope you enjoyed that video, a little look into some aspects of British culture.
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Thanks so much for watching guys, this is Tom the English Hipster, saying goodbye.