I have mentioned before that I have made many new friends through writing BlogWithMom.com. I truly enjoy learning about my new friends, their families, their favorite foods and favorite activities. It is a good feeling knowing that if I need some advice or online help, all I have to do is send a Facebook message or an email and they will be there with an answer for me.
I am really interested in learning about the lives of the women I meet that live outside of the US. My family and I have never traveled outside of the US and usually repeat our vacations at our favorite places like Disney World, San Antonio Texas, St. Augustine Florida, and visiting family. Since Thanksgiving, I have been swapping holiday information with one of my UK friends. Since they don’t celebrate Thanksgiving, a few of them didn’t realize what US families were experiencing during the week of Thanksgiving. I had a great time explaining the traveling, family get togethers, great food and Black Friday shopping that goes along with the Thanksgiving holiday. Kathryn, one of my UK friends, asked if we had a Boxing day that followed Thanksgiving, which sounds like Black Friday, where they hit the January Sales. She said their Boxing day had traditionally been about eating leftover turkey until you were sick, but now it is the day to catch those early morning bargains at the start of the January sales.
Once Kathryn and I got to talking about our differences, she began to tell me about different words that she called “British-isms.” I told her that we were going to the circus on Thanksgiving Day and would be eating cotton candy and she told me that her family calls it “candy floss.” Before I knew it, she was telling me about prams and pushchairs. Have you ever heard of a pram? She described it as a carrycot on wheels, where the baby lays flat, more like a baby buggy or the strollers that allow us to easily connect a baby carrier while the baby is still small. Pushchairs sound more like the strollers that are used after the baby is much larger and can set up on their own. It’s amazing how items that we see every day can have so many different names. Do you have friends that live in a different country than where you live? What have you learned about their culture or their lifestyles that intrigues you?