British people

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Hello I'm new here.

- I've just joined this forum. Thought I'd post here first as I live in London, England - though I am originally from Devon.

Anyone else based in South East London?

That's funny porgy, because I live in Devon, but I'm originally from London!

Hi there. I'm new too.

I was born in London, although you are very unlikely to hear me say "cor blimey guv'nor".

I worked there too and to be honest I hated London. It is too crowded and the pace is too fast (this was working in The City). Living by the sea is much better as my neighbourhood is quiet with most people aged over fifty.

It is also distincly cleaner than London.

Yes, I agree with you to the same point because I have found it to be stressed to live in London too! I live at Lynton Lodge at Highbury Grove quite near to the Barbican Centre in London.

Couldn't imagine living in London... *shudder* When you say South I think Sheffield

Another from London here.

edit:

I think of that as oop north

When you say south, I think Ayrshire

well, i live at the north pole, so you're all southern jessies to me. ner.

Another Northener here...

Wherever I've lived, the place doesn't seem right unless it's by the sea (avast ye landlubbers ).

You won't ever see me on a boat or a ship, I hasten to add, nor will you catch me eating something as disgusting as jellied eels. I just love the sea because it's very soothing to look at and it provides a superb focus for the Town Centre.

Your description sounds like a "WHAT AM I?" as in the British TV quiz show "Going for Gold"

I haven't seen that programme for ages, is it still on?

Thinking back, It was first on over 16 years ago I think. Presented by Henry Kelly.

CG intro with a giant gold medal spinning on the screen and an irritating theme tune. BBC1 14:00 wasn't it? or was it 10:30.

Damn, I am getting old.

Hello, I'm from Dorset.

I would call it the 'toilet' only as a descriptive word, usually it's called 'the loo' or 'the little girls room'.

When they were small, my sons were confused by the expression 'I'm just going to spend a penny', they wondered why I didn't take my purse with me. I had to take them to the old public toilets in town that still had the old penny slots on the door for entry, before they grasped why someone would say this.

I'm from Surrey but live in London.

I sometimes thought I should have been British as well, since I was nine, but am not so sure.

Part of it may be that many of us with AS love big words and formal speech, which sounds 'British' to many Americans, which in some ways they still look up to*. That's why I gravitated to it - anglophilia was my way of trying to fit in! (Based on how I already naturally sound.)

I've lived my dream - I actually emigrated and lived there a while, in Oxford. It didn't go as well as I might have wanted but now I understand why.

Based on what I remember and what I know now about AS, considering that 25 years ago nobody including over there understood AS, I might have been worse off growing up there. As much as I love tradition, etc., the rigidity of the system and reserve of the culture might have worked against me.

(Most of us wouldn't fit in with the football fans and other blokes at the local.)

That said I obviously still like the country and people very much and have been back to visit.

I like London - like New York it's probably a risky place for an AS person to live and work on his own but as a visitor it's so big and there's so much there (both New York and London are world-class cities) that anybody, AS or not, can find a niche - your own private London if you will.

Had a friend from there and have been - nice people. It's friendly up north.

*It's a love/hate thing in the States as indeed it is in Britain now. Posh speech often gets made fun of - 'Frasier Crane' on American TV was a recent example. But when I was nine I didn't quite understand that. Still, that's part of who I am, whether I'm being affected or not, and that's great. Some of my favourite models for speech are Canadians like Robert MacNeil and Peter Jennings, who speak something halfway between standard American and the BBC model (leaning more towards the first) without sounding snooty like Frasier comically did. I sound too Californian though - like the Beach Boys, not a surfer dude. I'd pay some Henry Higgins to get that tone out of my speech. In the UK turning down the volume of my voice by about a third seems to work well. Doing my best BBC/Patrick Stewart impression I could probably pass for English in maybe Arkansas and nowhere else.

What makes me laugh is when people try to imitate London accents. They always end up sounding Australian instead.