How do you do? Learning to say hello

You know what I still struggle with even after five years of living in England? The simple act of greeting someone.

A solid handshake

When meeting someone for the first time, I often stick out my hand. It’s anyone’s guess whether the person will leave it at that or also lean in for a kiss (more on this below). If two men are meeting for the first time, a handshake does the job.

I should add that in a work setting, we shake hands when first meeting someone. Thank goodness I’m not residing in some country where kissing is the appropriate form of business greetings, or worse, sealing business deals. Mainly because I’d probably be fired by now.

Cheek to cheek

With friends and even acquaintances you may be meeting for the first time, it is common to kiss each other on the cheek (female to female, male to female). This is not really a kiss. It’s more of a cheek touch, slightly puckered lips and a light kiss noise, all to give the illusion of a kiss but not really kissing. An air kiss, if you will. Sometimes they throw in the double kiss and as you pull away, you see them going for your other cheek.

I’ve been in the situation where I’m pulling away after the kiss and the person says, “And one more for the other side!” Then I have to lean back in for the second kiss. I usually blush and say something like, “Oh, two kisses. Lucky me!” when I’m really wondering why the heck we didn’t leave it to just the one. Seems like it would have saved us both from the awkwardness. Then again, who wouldn’t want to kiss me twice?

I’ve heard that depending on the country and situation, the number of kisses can be three or four. If I’m ever in one of those countries during one of those situations, I think I’ll just stand still with my eyes closed while they do what they need to do.

Plant your lips here

I have no idea which side you go for when cheek kissing each other. I usually take my cue from the person I’m greeting. It all happens so fast and you want to look like you know exactly what you’re doing (so don’t listen to me at all). Unfortunately, more often than not, we both do the bobbing motion until one of us turns their cheek in the opposite direction and contact can be made. When I met one of Scott’s friends for the first time, I accidentally bobbed the wrong way and planted a big smacker right on the man’s lips. That wasn’t weird at all.

It also happened more than once, thankfully not with the same friend.

Let’s hug it out

I like hugging. When I greet my English friends, they usually get pulled into a hug when they were just going for a quick cheek kiss. I’m trying to work on it, but auto-pilot kicks in and my arms just fly around their necks.

Although a hug requires more body contact, it somehow seems more comfortable and also more meaningful with close friends and family. Luckily my American friends over here like to hug as much as I do.

Alright? Alright? No, not all right

Sadly, no one in England has ever said, “How do you do?” to me. I’ve watched enough period dramas to know I should reply with, “How do you do?” It’s funny I can understand that but I still can’t quite get my head around this next one.

A very common greeting is “Alright?” You might hear it in passing from a coworker or when you see someone you don’t know very well in an informal setting. And just like the olden day “How do you do?” you can just repeat it back.

But I sound like an absolute goober saying, “Alright?” It just sounds all wrong in my accent. And when I just try to relax into it, I run the risk of answering with “aight” and sounding like I’m straight out of The Wire.

So for the first few years of living here, I would reply with, “Hi, I’m good, thanks for asking. What about you?” Or “I’m ok, thanks. How are you?”

The person suddenly stops, surprised. Oh, right, a conversation. 

“Fine, thanks,” they might answer and then carry on with their business.

(You are always “fine, thanks”. No one wants to know how you really are. See, I’m catching on.)

With friends, a person might say, “Alright, mate. How have you been?” and then it seems acceptable to expand on your current state of mind/health.

But for the everyday occurrences with acquaintances, I still find it all a bit of a mystery.

These days, I usually just give a courteous smile and a hello in response to “Alright?” Sometimes I’m the one who is surprised when they follow it up with, “You ok?” Oh, right, a conversation!

“Yes, fine, thanks.” And I carry on with my business.

There are many phrases the English use that I find endearing, funny, or clever. Many of them I want to incorporate into my vocabulary. “Alright?” is not one of them.

Hello, I think I love you

Hello, hi, hi there, and hiya are all commonly used over here as well. So, I do manage to get by. And my personal favorite, “hey”, is becoming more mainstream thanks to the deluge of American television, movies and people. Heyyyy!

Give a little wave

I personally like the wave. I feel like I’ve got that mastered.

If the queen does it, then I know it’s ok. That’s going to be my new rule in life.

(Clearly drawing a hand was too hard so I stuck a mitten on her. And a scarf. Look, she’s waving because I drew little lines around her hand!)

Disclaimer: Generalizations have been made based on my experiences in England. I’m happy to hear about yours. Maybe you never cheek kiss during an introduction. Sounds like I need to meet more of your people. Maybe you are quite regularly met with “How do you do?” Please tell me you also frequently hear “Good day!”

I’ll miss more than Yorkshire pudding

When we move back to the US, I’ll really miss the vacation time we get over here. The fact that everyone from the McDonald’s employee to the CEO gets at least 20 days paid leave a year is pretty incredible.

One Thanksgiving years ago, Scott and I were telling family friends about the vacation time in the UK. One of the American friends boasted, “Well, I get 20 days too. Everything comes out of it – vacation, sick days, whatever. It’s great.”

No, no, my friend. You don’t get it. We get 20 days* vacation and our sick days don’t come out of that pool of days. We don’t have to worry about not being able to go on vacation in July because we had food poisoning in January.

And what we get in the UK is even less than what people get in France, Germany, Italy, and many more countries.

Let that marinade for a minute.

So, when I think about moving back to the US, I worry about this.

I’m used to this.

I want this.

I need this.

*Scott and I both get even more days. We are very grateful for trips like this.

You Capture: everyday things

When I first moved to London and I was interning at a well-known magazine in Canary Wharf, I thought commuting was so exciting. I liked being on the Jubilee line with all the pinstripe suits and designer bags. I watched women pencil appointments in their beautiful leather bound diaries. I saw men who couldn’t wait to get to the office to compose emails so they used their Blackberry, their Macbook, the edges of the morning newspaper.

Everyone was going somewhere. I liked the way that felt.

Although I had commuted in DC the summer before, this was different. More important. More exotic.

These days, it’s just more of the same. I’ve just switched directions on the Jubilee line and tacked on a more expensive train fare.

Even though I still need to get somewhere, I wouldn’t say I still find the rush and the buzz exciting. Some days it can be downright soul-destroying.

But then I have days like I had this week.

I had an assignment to shoot everyday things. While there are  many – too many – things in my life, I couldn’t think of how to capture any of them.

A row of shoes by the door, a cup of tea, a quick kiss goodbye, a stack of mail, a pile of work, a plate of pasta, an iPhone on charge, a glass (or three) of wine, an overflowing laundry basket, another episode of Family Guy, a nearly empty tube of toothpaste.

I was standing on the platform, with a camera in my own designer bag and I knew the only thing I felt strongly captured “every day” for me was just that. Waiting for a train. Switching lines. Passing the same commuters every morning. Going somewhere. Getting there. Coming home.

(This week’s photo is actually two of my photos layered – a photo from my seat on my evening commute and a photo of the Tube map on the platform with a reflection of the tracks captured in the plexiglass.)

London bombings five years on

Five years ago today I was running late to work. I don’t remember why but I remember having to stand on the train into London and I remember a teenage boy standing next to me. A few minutes before reaching Kings Cross station, the train stopped. We were stopped for quite some time. I noticed the boy looking a bit pale and he asked if someone would give up their seat for him. I remember this because no one gave up their seat and I was hoping to God that he didn’t get sick all over me.

The train jerked forward and once we were inside the station, the driver came over the loudspeaker and announced that there had been an incident at Liverpool Street. He sounded unsure and hesitant. Then he repeated the message louder and more firm and instructed us all to get off the train quickly and evacuate the station.

My fellow passengers groaned and muttered complaints about the need to evacuate. I’ve got a meeting in 10 minutes! Of course the station would be closed on the day of my interview!  Effing train companies! How much do we pay for this service? What a rip-off! Terrible!

Once we were herded outside the station, I made my way to the bus stop. There were loads of people standing around and crowds of people were rushing down the street from the main station. I honestly never thought it was a bombing. I stood with my headphones in, waiting and waiting and waiting some more. I tried texting Scott but my text messages wouldn’t send. I noticed all the other people waiting at the station, punching numbers on their phones, trying to call their bosses to tell them they’d be late. None of our phones were working. I never thought it was due to a bombing.

I overheard two men saying there had been incidents on the Tube. Incidents. That’s what they kept saying. I watched as the crowds got bigger and people seemed to get more agitated and antsy. A bus finally pulled up and I squeezed my way on to it. In between songs, I heard people talking about an incident at Kings Cross. Behind the bus, the crowds were pouring onto the street and the people were more panicked. And I still never thought there had been a bombing.

The bus driver announced that we were being diverted and a few minutes later,  there was a scream from the back of the bus. “Oh my God! That bus is on fire!” and “Did you see that?” and “The bus blew up!” From the sound of the blast (and now knowing what happened), the bus that blew up on 7 July 2005 was only a block away from me.

The bus I was on stopped immediately and we were all told to get off. I had only been working at my summer job for a few weeks and didn’t want to be any later than I already was. I walked the rest of the way to the office. I had no idea what had happened that morning.

There was only one other person in the office and he told me there had been bombings on the Tube and I told him about the bus. Later I would find out that one of the bombs went off on the Piccadilly line, just outside of Kings Cross – my usual route to work. Later I would also find out that the bombers came into London on the overland train I usually took. Later I would find out that the bombers got on at my same station in Bedfordshire. Later I would realize just how lucky I was to be running late on 7 July 2005.

I stayed in the office for a few hours, watching the news and waiting for some sort of public transportation to be up and running. Scott was out of town on business and had been trying to call me all morning. He had no idea I had missed my regular train and that I wasn’t on the Piccadilly line just before 9 am.  Sometime that afternoon, my mobile rang for the first time and I was able to talk to Scott for a few minutes before getting cut off.

It took me over five hours to get home that night. I walked with hundreds of people through the streets of London, marveling at the absence of cars and buses and delivery trucks. Marveling at the quiet and seemingly calm city,  but still stunned. Marveling, but still scared.

I didn’t go to work the next day. I stayed home by myself, watching the news. A few days later, police found a car at my station which they believed was linked to the bombers. CCTV footage was released showing the bombers waiting on the same platform, boarding my usual train.

I wasn’t a 7/7 victim. I wasn’t on the bus or the Tube lines that were bombed. I wasn’t on the train into London with the bombers. But I was supposed to be.

Or you could say, for some reason on that day, I wasn’t supposed to be.

Leftovers

I try really hard not to talk about work on my blog. For some people, that may be difficult because we spend more time at work than we do at home. I spend more time with my coworkers than Scott. I actually really like my coworkers so I choose to spend time with them outside of work hours as well. That’s a whole lot of my life spent associated with my job and yet I have never wanted to talk about it much because…well, nothing good ever came from talking about your job on the Internet. Am I right or am I right?

When we were on our road trip, we met people living their dreams. We met two former teachers and Fulbright Scholars who gave it all up to open a bed & breakfast in Montana and focus on their writing. Their neighbor runs a hole-in-the-wall bar next to the B&B. He used to be a lawyer in Philadelphia but one day he thought, what am I doing in this suit in this city? He wanted to wear offensive t-shirts and sell beer and be his own boss. So he did just that.

After meeting people like this for three weeks straight, it was hard to be excited about coming back to England. On top of that, a good friend of mine was in the beautiful and courageous process of donating a kidney to her cousin. I could hardly talk about it without getting choked up because, well, it seemed like everyone was doing something meaningful but me. What’s my dream going to be? How do I know what I am meant to be doing in this life? Who can I give my kidney to???

The day we returned to work after the road trip I sent Scott a melodramatic email about how I was feeling frustrated with things, feeling like I needed something more. I told him I was disappointed that I wasn’t making a difference in someone’s life.

My kind, thoughtful husband let me rant and simply wrote back, “You make a difference in mine.”

***

Two days later, I saw a coworker over lunch and she had mentioned that she had sent me details of a job she thought I’d be perfect for. I hadn’t received her message while we were traveling and figured I’d missed the deadline but what the heck, I’ll apply anyway. On paper the job looked pretty good. After my first interview, I felt really positive about it. And I guess the most important point has been mentioned already in the previous sentence. I felt good about the job. I felt something and hadn’t that been exactly what I was looking for? I wanted to feel good about what I was doing, how I was contributing, progressing, sharing, developing, living. This job excited me. I felt I could make a difference. And luckily they thought I could too because I was offered the job.

***

It’s not so different from my previous job. I’m not opening a bar or dedicating the next year to writing my first novel. I don’t think it’s my dream but I think it may spark some new ideas of who I want to be and what I want to do. What I can say is that I think I will be happy there. I think I will grow there. I think it will be good for me and I will be good for them. And that’s enough, isn’t it?

***

We went to the cinema this past weekend and we bought a bag of popcorn and Diet Coke. We ate most of the popcorn before the film even started. We left the burned bits and the half-popped pieces in the bottom of the bag. When the film was over and most everyone had left the theater, we got up to leave. I grabbed the Diet Coke but noticed Scott had left the bag of popcorn on the ground.

“Why didn’t you grab the bag of popcorn to throw away?”

Scott, busy doing something on his Blackberry, mumbled, “It doesn’t matter. People are paid to clean the theater.”

As we were walking out, I looked back at our row of seats, feeling guilty about the popcorn when I noticed a man standing where we had been sitting,  I didn’t think there was anyone left in the theater.

He looked at me and I thought he was going to shout something about us being lazy and/or rude for not throwing away our trash. But he just kept staring at me, saying nothing. As we walked towards the exit, I whispered to Scott that I thought the man was going to approach us about how we left our trash. Scott scoffed. I looked back to see the man picking up our bag of popcorn and another bag in the row in front of ours.

We left the cinema and got in our car. I watched the man walk out of the cinema and cross the road in front of us. He had our popcorn bag bundled up under his arm and two other bags folded in his hands.

“Look, he took our popcorn,” I said.

We sat there, watching this man take our leftovers and get in an old beater.

I don’t know his circumstances but I think it’s safe to assume this man was in need of food if he was going around picking up bags of burnt popcorn and half-eaten hot dogs.

Scott said, “That’s really sad. I feel sorry for him”

“Me too. I wish we had left more popcorn.”

***

I’ve been thinking about that man and the popcorn. I don’t know what the right thing would have been to do – should I have approached him with some money? Should I just pretend I didn’t see it so I wouldn’t embarrass him? I don’t know. Do people with plenty of money go around picking up other people’s leftovers just because they hate waste? In which case, should I not feel sorry for him at all?

I don’t know.

All I know is that it snapped me out of feeling sorry for myself. I am lucky enough to have a job, a home, food on the table, a loving family, the list goes on. So what if I don’t know what my big dreams are. So what. I should consider myself lucky to have the opportunity to have dreams at all. I should be so grateful I don’t need a kidney or know of anyone dear to me who needs mine.

I should feel so lucky to enjoy life’s little extras like popcorn at the movies.

Sometimes you need life to give you a good smack once in awhile.

You Capture: best shot this week

We had planned to go up to Northumberland this past weekend to spend time with Scott’s mom. I had plans to take a bazillion photos of sheep and cows and the sea. I was going to wow you with photos of “traditional English country life.”

Instead we went to Yorkshire because there was a death in Scott’s family.

My photography was put on hold.

But then I got thinking – as you do when someone passes away – and I thought that some of the things I see nearly every day are just as good a photography subject as any.

I just have to take the time to really look at them.

Flowers in bloom in Spa Fields.

Rush hour in London.

The view from the meeting room in my office.

I know I was only supposed to post one shot, but life is too short.

And because life is really, really short – don’t forget that there’s still time to enter the Potato Crisp/Chip giveaway.

I miss the dreams about my teeth falling out

The other night I dreamed I had a baby. I didn’t dream of the pregnancy or the labor. I just had a baby in the dream. I wasn’t freaked out or anything. It just was what it was. I named the baby Graziella but called her Grits for short.

I kept misplacing the baby.  But I wasn’t freaking out about where my baby was. It was the same sort of feeling when you misplace your favorite necklace. Funny, I could have sworn I put the baby right here. Where did that baby go? Oh well.  Baby’ll turn up eventually. Now what’s on TV?

Turns out my dad put the baby in the garage because the baby was in the way. This didn’t freak me out either. There Grits was, sitting in her carrier baby seat thingamajig, in between the cars.

We went on a trip and I put the baby in my bag. I forgot about Grits and hours later realized the baby was in my bag and she must be hungry. I asked Scott to get baby food and I tried to feed the baby. Grits wouldn’t open her eyes.  Then I realized she was dead.

I woke up and thought WTF!?! I’m dreaming of dead babies! And I named my baby Grits! Something is seriously wrong with me.

I consulted the dream dictionary on Dream Moods to figure out what it all means.

“To see a baby in your dream, signifies innocence, warmth and new beginnings”

Oooh, this could be good for me!

“If you dream that you forgot you had a baby, then it suggests that you are trying to hide your own vulnerabilities; You do not want to let others know of your weaknesses.”

Huh…ok, I’ll buy that. I am in the middle of frustrating work-related situation so…ok, Dream Moods. Hit me with another.

“If you dream that a baby is neglected, then it suggests that you are not paying enough attention to yourself. You are not utilizing your full potential. “

Exactly! That’s what I’ve been saying! I need a spa day STAT! Also, can I quote Dream Moods in my resume?

“To dream about a starving baby, represents your dependence on others. “

Well, was the baby really starving? I mean, it wasn’t like she was crying or anything. But I did have her in that bag for a long time and she did die. God, this is horrible. I can’t believe my dependency on others has driven me to have dead baby dreams! Feel sorry for me. I need attention! I need you!

“To see a dead baby in your dream, symbolizes the ending of something that is part of you.”

Oh crap. This doesn’t sound good. Where’s my new beginning?! Where is all the warmth and innocence? Stupid baby. You tricked me!

I spent a great deal of time thinking about this. It was all very fitting. There are a lot of changes happening and I have been feeling stressed, frustrated, sad, and worried about what is next. People I am very close to are moving on. Something is ending. This makes perfect sense.

But then I read this:

“To see or feed baby food in your dream, indicates that nurturance and care is needed in a waking situation. Alternatively, the dream may be a metaphor to indicate that you need to eat smaller portions of food.”

Ahhh. I see. Yeah…that’s more like it.

Phew!

Mother Nature is on my naughty list

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. The Brits love talking about the weather. There are books devoted entirely to why Brits make small talk about the weather. That saying “If you don’t like the weather, wait a minute and it’ll change” can be heard often here. (Though I think people use that saying all over the world. Except maybe in the Atacama Desert where it is just dry and more dry. And not many people live there anyway so there probably isn’t a lot of small talk going on.)

Yesterday: While my coworkers excitedly chatted about whether the light snowflakes were sticking or not and who would be the unlucky soul updating the website to inform everyone that it would, in fact, be a snow day, I didn’t join in the excitement. I like snow. I like snow at Christmas. I do not want snow right now. I have a plane to catch!

On my way home last night, all was clear at Kings Cross. When the train passed Finsbury Park, I noticed the snow was sticking. When I got off at my stop, there was already a thick layer of snow and the wind made it look like a blizzard. Of course not a real blizzard. This is England. Please don’t comment about how you know snow and this was not real snow. I know this is nothing compared to what you get in Fargo.

And coming from the DC metro area, I am certainly used to the hype about snow. I don’t know anyone over here running out to stock up on milk, batteries, flashlights and duct tape. No, they aren’t panicking. They just like talking about the impending chaos.

So! Last night I got off at my stop and made my way to the taxi queue. (Scott is out of town or else I’m sure he would have been there to save me from the cold.) There were 50 people already waiting. I didn’t actually count but I did that thing where it looks like you’re counting by raising your head, going around counting each head and mumbling numbers to yourself. It was definitely more than 30. Looked like 50. Could have been 20.

At any rate, that’s a lot of people waiting for taxis and because I only live a 12 minute walk away,* I usually feel bad taking a cab anyway. **

(* Scott would say it’s only 5 minutes. He’s lying. It might be 9 minutes in boy walking terms. I’ll give him that.)

(** Sometimes I limp when I get out of the taxi so they don’t think I’m just lazy.)

I wanted a cab, I really did. But something came over me and just pulled me down the walking path. I guess it was the hypothermia starting to set in and messing with my brain. (Loss of judgment and reasoning is a symptom, you know).

I walked. And I walked. Peter Auty’s “Walking in the Air” was playing in the distance. I was trying to think about happy things like Christmas trees and warm chicken noodle soup. I kept walking.

The wind was pelting the snow against my face. I had to keep taking my mittens off to wipe my face in order to see where I was going. I stopped in an underpass to call my friend to tell her where I was in case I froze to death and never showed up to work. Then I wiped my face again and realized I had lost a contact. I now had only one eye to guide me home.

Forget thoughts of soup and tinsel. I was thinking about curling up in the bushes and waiting for the wild dogs to eat me at sunrise. (We don’t have wild dogs here. Well, we do when they escape from the zoo. But like I said, the hypothermia! The confusion! The loss of reasoning!) I also didn’t want to die with that irritating, slightly creepy Peter Auty song in my head.

Somehow I made it home and lived to tell you this miraculous story.

And to make this point: I didn’t want snow. I didn’t want to talk about snow. And guess who has a snow day? Me! And guess who doesn’t? Most of my coworkers who live south of me. Because weather is really weird and we had a bunch of snow in Hertfordshire but central London got nothing.

Roads were closed, taxi companies weren’t taking pick ups, and I don’t think my heart could take another expedition in the snow so I’ve got myself a snow day. But this just means I have all day to check the weather in DC and panic about it. Fingers crossed I get there tomorrow. (And preferably direct…none of this-layover-in-Pittsburgh-or-rent-a-car-and-drive business.)

Christmas, I’m so ready for you. Snow? I’ll take you on again tomorrow night – anytime after 7pm EST.

This is not my vision

Thanksgiving as an adult isn’t what I imagined it would be.

For starters, I have to work on Thanksgiving. This makes cooking a Thanksgiving dinner very difficult unless you move the celebrations to the weekend or you somehow manage to cook a turkey in less than four hours. I have hosted two Thanksgivings in the UK and my turkey has always taken way longer than expected. Yes, I have a thermometer and yes, I’m following the instructions. It may have something to do with the small ovens and the one oven shelf but it’s Thanksgiving and I’m trying to be thankful here.

I’m also not usually able to go back to the US for Thanksgiving. This will come as a surprise to non-Americans but Christmas is actually bigger than Thanksgiving, not the other way around like you think. (Where did they get this idea?) So I’d rather spend Christmas with my family, though this year my sisters spending Thanksgiving weekend in London. Win-win for me.

Of course Thanksgiving is still something I celebrate even if I can’t be with family. It’s a time when I can gather my friends together and share Thanksgiving with them. Last year I made them wear paper hats. You can do these sorts of things with foreigners.

Thanksgiving abroad is ok but it’s not what I imagined.

I imagined that I’d live a few hours away from my parents and on Thanksgiving morning, I’d load up my hunter green Ford Explorer with brown paper bags of delicious food. In my imagination, I also had matching luggage and Devon Sawa as a husband.

We’d both be in thick sweaters and looking like we just fell out of a J.Crew catalog. We’d drive through the mountains, admiring the fall foilage. We’d be laughing and listening to some undiscovered band’s album that we happened upon. We’d pretty much look like a car commercial.

We’d pull into my parents’ driveway and my dad would come out to greet us as my mom watched from the kitchen window. (Yes, the Christmas movie, The Family Stone, is pretty much my vision, minus the cancer and the siblings swapping partners.)

Living abroad makes this vision very difficult.

I’m trying to be thankful for everything I have this year and there really is so much to be thankful for. But at 5:15 am on Thanksgiving morning, it’s hard not to feel a little bit sad. Unless you’re just up prepping the cinnamon rolls for breakfast. Or the turkey. Never can be too prepared. But certainly not being up for work. No. This just doesn’t fit with my vision at all.

Put the kettle on

Before living in the UK, I imagined that a cup of tea might be consumed in the morning before work or school and then again in the late afternoon with biscuits or finger sandwiches. Because that’s what I’d seen in the movies. I had no idea big burly men in hard hats would stop doing manly things like building houses, digging holes, and hammering roofs to enjoy a cup of tea.

I’d seen construction workers on their breaks in the US. They would hang outside 7-Eleven, smoking and drinking Red Bull or a Big Gulp. Maybe a coffee. But I can’t imagine them making themselves a cup of tea. (They do ogle and cat call. Construction workers are the same the world over but I digress.)

Drinking tea in the UK is not just reserved for Afternoon Tea at swanky hotels where you’re bound to see more tourists than locals. Tea is casual and something you consume all the livelong day.

In fact, a Brit drinks on average 2.1 kg of tea each year. That’s about one of these massive bags per person.

Builders and construction workers are not the only ones stopping for a cuppa. In my office, the men drink far more tea than the women. They are always in the kitchen making a round.

Of course women enjoy a cup as well and don’t have to have theirs with cucumber sandwiches and scones. Drinking tea with English people is not nearly as exciting as I thought it would be!

Although we had tea in my house growing up, I only remember really drinking hot tea when I was ill. The only time I remember tea being served all day was at my Irish-American grandma’s house. When we’d go for a visit, she had the kettle on before we even got out of the car. (Ireland actually consumes more tea per capita than Britain, thank you Trivial Pursuit.)

Our visits centered around her kitchen table, where we laughed and laughed over many cups of tea. We would solve the world’s problems over a shared pot of tea (and it was literally a shared pot of tea. She would just add more water to the same three tea bags all day long. That’s what growing up during the Great Depression does for you.)

My grandma was disappointed when she found out Scott didn’t drink tea regularly. He just didn’t fit her idea of an Englishman. But when he’d come to visit, we’d still sit around the kitchen table while she drank tea. She would say,”Did you know in England they call condoms ‘hats’?” and look at Scott for confirmation of this so-called fact that she must have heard on late night TV. He would turn several shades of red and I’d shriek as my grandma would follow it up with, “Don’t forget your hat!”

So, you see, tea brings people together.

English people love their tea. It gives them something to do. In the mornings, they can make awkward small talk or make a cup of tea. I know what I would rather do!

In Kate Fox’s Watching the English: The Hidden Rules of English Behavior, she writes that tea can be a polite procrastination tactic. Before a business meeting, people make pleasant chitchat usually about the weather and then all find themselves fussing over tea and coffee. There is no talk of business for the first ten or 15 minutes. Fox says it’s down to them pretending this is all a nice social gathering, everyone too nervous to say, “Let’s just get down to business.”

I don’t know if that’s entirely true but I have noticed that the making of the tea is a perfect excuse for a social gathering. If you don’t know the person on the other side of the kettle, you can say things like, “It doesn’t look like it’s going to stop raining today. Nevermind – it’s good for the garden” (they love their gardens)  or the fail-proof, “There’s nothing like a good cup of tea.”

If you know the other person, making a cup of tea is the perfect opportunity to talk about your weekend, talk about your ailing health, or talk about someone behind their back. According to the UK Tea Council, 80% of office workers say they find out more about what’s going on at work over a cup of tea than any other way.

When I interned at a magazine company in London, I was terrified to do a tea round. I had never really made tea for anyone and I didn’t know all the rules. The water must be boiling hot. Water first, then milk. But some people like to have their milk first so the tea doesn’t get filmy. How much milk is too much milk? What constitutes one sugar?

Then there are the logistics of making tea. Who is in the round? Once you’ve asked the nearest four people, you notice the woman sitting by herself in the next bank of desks. Do you ask her if she wants a tea? But she’s never made you one and if you ask her, you might as well ask the other three men in the office. It’s a minefield, I tell you!

And we wonder why Starbucks is so popular.