Friday, June 4, 2010

Things I Don't Know...and Things I'm Learning

I can't begin to think about how overwhelming America must be to visitors and even more to those who are not native English speakers.  Despite the fact that I've moved to another English speaking country, I discover so many things each day that I don't know or don't understand.  Some are completely mundane, and some make me feel like an idiot.  But, I came to be overwhelmed and learned, and that's definitely happening.  Check.

I kept a list all week of things I don't know that I wouldn't even blink about knowing back home...
  • my cell phone #
  • todd's cell phone #
  • my home phone #
  • my office phone #
  • how to get home from work
  • paper sizes (A4, A3, A2...they get bigger as the numbers get smaller)
  • how to order coffee (see previous post: Rainy Day in Dunedin)
Words I learned...
  • answerphone - voicemail
  • noticeboards - bulletin boards
  • Fresher - freshman
  • busking - standing on a street corner playing music & hoping people throw money in your donation bucket
  • travelator - moving walkway
  • pigeonhole - mailbox (like in an office, not outside your house...that's a letterbox)
  • togs - swimsuit
Sayings I learned...and translated :)
  • "done by the smell of an oily rag" - running on fumes
  • "she threw her toys out of the cot" - took her toys and went home Update June 8th: Per my friend Dave from college who now lives in England with his wife (who he met in NZ) and son, I think I mis-translated this one.  It's more like "threw a trantrum."
It's Queen's Birthday weekend (thank you Her Majesty!), so we have Monday off.  We're headed to Queenstown and Wanaka for the weekend (A is Dunedin, where we live. B is Wanaka, and C is Queenstown).


View Larger Map

Ciao!
Posted by Laura at 5:11 AM

1 comment:

  1. DavidJune 5, 2010 at 1:49 PM

    You will grow to LOVE the international paper sizes - they make a lot of sense and follow a pattern. Like, A4 is half an A3 (the largest size is A0). Also envelopes have a corresponding system, such as B5 which is a bit bigger than an A5 so you know the paper will fit.

    I wonder if the "threw toys out of the cot" translation is right... in the UK the same expression means something like, "threw a tantrum".

    Talking to Claire about NZ destinations... being winter might make some things hard for you right now, but maybe in 6 months. Claire recommends Kaikoura where she swam with dolphins. I can see you're headed to Queenstown (or are there right now) which is very cool since she and I had our first dates there :) Its a cool town in a beautiful setting. If you are planning any backcountry / wilderness type excursions I would recommend the Rees-Dart Track, which actually starts not too far from Queenstown and is both beautiful without being too challenging. Though, its a multi-day excursion. I have heard amazing things about Milford Sound also, though I haven't been but perhaps there are some less-demanding ways to reach it than days of walking.

    L8a
    Dave

    ReplyDelete

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)