
‘What’s your most embarrassing ‘I’m not from around here’ moment while travelling within the UK?’ – 24 people who made a regional faux pas
Despite being a comparatively tiny country, the UK is massive when it comes to regional diversity: just ask people in different counties what they call a bread roll and the insane amount of different answers will prove the point. But while this regional richness is a wonderful thing, it can also be a bit confusing.
User Commercial_Neat7942 posed this question on the AskUK subreddit, and followed up with their own example:
What’s your most embarrassing ‘I’m not from around here’ moment while travelling within the UK?
I once spent 20 minutes in a Newcastle chippy trying to decode what the lad behind the counter was saying before realising he was just asking if I wanted mushy peas. My southern brain could NOT compute. What’s your moment of geographic shame? When did you accidentally reveal you’re a proper tourist in your own country?
Which prompted an outpouring from people still cringing from having made a hyper-local fool of themselves.
1.
‘Englishman (Surrey) and moved to Dundee. Similarly went to a chippy. Came home with mountains of chips as I didn’t realise when they asked if I was having a ‘supper’ that literally means ‘with chips’.
So I was ordering for a few people and got suppers (as I didn’t really know why he kept asking) and then added the chips on at the end thinking I needed to ask for chips to get chips.’
–GrandDuty3792
2.
‘I had the opposite when I moved down from Aberdeen to Gateshead, went to the chippy asked for a fish supper and got a ‘Do you want chips with that?’.’
–mattjimf
3.
‘Me on family trip at 14 in a motorway services somewhere in Scotland. Just woke up as we stopped and ushered into get food. Walk up to counter and ask for a Big Mac and coke. Met with a string of unintelligible sounds. Apologise and repeat request for Big Mac and coke but adding large please. Same weird aggressive shout but this time looks annoyed.
Apologise and say I can’t understand you. He repeats the sounds louder and clearly pissed off now. Everyone is staring at me. Lady behind taps me on the shoulder and very slowly and calmly said ‘He’s sayin’ this is nay a Mcdoonalds, de ye ken?’. Realised I’m in a Burger King. Died and asked for a Whopper. Never felt so soft and southern in my life.’
–utukore
4.
‘Me, English bloke visiting Northern Ireland (Newtownards, specifically), asked a bloke behind the counter in KFC where Tesco was. He told me, I said something like ‘Sorry, where was that?’ then he told me again. I just said thanks. I did not understand a single word, other than ‘road’. I still have no idea where Tesco was.’
–KingslandGrange
5.
‘When I asked for a Jalfrezi in Birmingham. Spice level is vastly different from where I am from. Went lightheaded from breathing too fast. Waiter showed his sympathy by dancing around and saying ‘Wooooo, you are in Brum now, son’.’
–VideoFancy1506
6.
‘When I was 11 we moved to Durham from Wales. First month there, it was snowing. It was snowing and the school bus was parked at the bus stand. Basically the snow was too bad for the bus to go up the hill, but I didn’t know this.
I went to the bus to get on and the driver said ‘gan hyem’. I replied pardon. He said ‘gan hyem’ five times more and more and more aggressively then grabbed me by the arm and asked if I was a radged. I went home very confused.’
–fkin0
7.
‘I was on a Scottish island and I loudly proclaimed that there was a whale in front of locals. It was in fact not a whale but a rock in the bay.’
–SecTeff
8.
‘This is more of a ‘been in Australia too long’ thing, but in Australia if the chippy asks if you want sauce, or really anyone asks you, they mean ketchup. Chippy on the Isle of Skye asked me if I wanted sauce, I said yes, he (patiently, but annoyed) said ‘Red, white or brown?’. I still don’t know if white was tarter, mayo or salad cream.’
–Ohmalley-thealliecat
9.
‘Fishing in Ayrshire with my brother when we were kids and a young lad said to him: ‘Did ye catch a gud’yen?’. My brother, in his perfect little English accent, replied: ‘No, it’s a trout, actually.”
–SalParadise100
10.
‘I seem to remember this was a service station somewhere near Birmingham, back in the late 90’s. Buffet style, where you move along the line to get food from different sections. My friend was in front of me, pushing along his plate on those metal rails. The lady serving had a Dudley(?) accent and said ‘Would you like a ‘try’?’ He assumed she was asking if he wanted to sample the peas or something, and said ‘No thanks, they look fine’. I had to point out that she was offering him a tray.’
–plimso13
11.
‘When I first lived in Cornwall, being called ‘my lover’ by middle-aged female shop assistants was disconcerting.’
–Brave_Reaction_4968
12.
‘I’m a Londoner who did her degree in Newcastle. It was a big shock that Greggs down south don’t sell ‘stottie cakes’.’
–Both-Friend-4202