I find the difference in the meaning of 'fanny' to be endlessly hilarious, honestly. Especially when other people don't know it. I also have something of a tendency to remark that forgetting your rubber is far more serious in the US than in the UK...
Ach! I had completely forgotten that rubber in England means 'Eraser'... Also regards to the panneküchen thing: in the Netherlands 'pannekoek' refers to the crêpes, and we have special restaurants just for pannekoeken (pannekoekhuis) where you can have them with sweet stuffings (jam, sugar, syrup...), or with savory stuffings too! It's not uncommon to order a pannekoek covered in cheese with salami. (Also really good) American-style pancakes are called 'flensjes' if I remember correctly, and are eaten like Americans do: butter, syrup...
"Sick" and "wicked" as positive terms are both pretty general in US English, I think? At least, I've been encountering them occasionally for at least twenty years.
Hahaha really? I love how that, for a country that historically hated our guts, there are so many phrases in English that have 'Dutch' put in front of them.
But to a Southwesterner, including a Californian (or, I believe, Texan) "chili" with the terminal "i" refers only to the Texan dish; a capsicum pepper is a "chile" (terminal "e") and various chile-based sauces have the word in their name, such as chile colorado and chile verde.
I think its from all the pennsylvania 'deutch' german settlers doing stuff back in the day. Americans are horrifically bad at other countries sometimes. We be like "countries, countries... Well theres us, FUCK YEAH AMERICA USA USA!!! Then uh. Canada? They're our hat. Um. Mexico? Then...lower mexico? Something something. Oh yeah europe. England, obv, someones gotta be hella gay, who else would play all the villains in our movies. France. Uuuuuuuuh....the place that does all the chinese foods, whats that, Japan? Yep, pretty sure thats all the countries."
It's because we hated your guts. Like. Dutch courage? The sort of 'bravery' you get when you're piss-drunk. There are others,too. xP
Oh yes, I know! And Dutch treat or going Dutch. Or how Dutch oven also refers to farting in bed under the sheets. What tickles me is that I don't have the impression that the French have as many things attributed to their country as we do! (Though I might be completely wrong - I do know that both countries have some really nice insults they like to sling at each other)
You might actually be right there, though for sure we have a lot more fun insulting the French nowadays than we do the Dutch. We quite like you these days. ;P Aha I've found the list I was looking for in my etymology book (okay, it's a pop-etymology book a little bit, but still). I think a lot of these are very archaic/not really used any more, but they are fun. And insulting to Dutch people. Sorry. xP Dutch courage: drunk courage Dutch feast: a meal where the host gets drunk before his guests Dutch comfort: a lack of comfort Dutch wife: a big ol' body pillow (apparently it's also gay slang for something but the book doesn't say precisely what, only that 'it's much more ingenious') Dutch reckoning: a price that gets raised if you argue about it Dutch widow: a prostitute Dutch uncle: a nasty old stern man Going dutch: splitting the bill because you're tight-fisted (originally, anyway) double Dutch: nonsense Oh, there's a couple of French ones here too, though you're right, not as many. xP French letter: a condom French leave: truancy (the French apparently call it filer a l'anglais because they hate us too. xP) And there's some Welsh and Irish ones, too. Of course.
@TwoBrokenMirrors these are amazing! Oh my god what a spiteful country! :D I love how most Western European countries behave like an incredibly dysfunctional family towards each other - doesn't help that we've been constantly invading or bickering with each other for the last few millennia.
@Fish butt It's glorious isn't it? We are so spiteful. World leader in passive-aggressively stealing other people's languages and then calling them nasty names. And if Europe was an actual family I think they'd all have personality disorders. xP ...Which is why when I saw people on Tumblr claim it's only ever POC country accents that get mocked, I sort of wondered if they'd ever been to Europe.
*happily rolls around in this thread* The computer world is full of these - "root" (the highest privileged account on a machine, or the act of gaining root-level access to a device or system) and "nonce" (a one-time cryptographic key) have quite different and rude meanings in Australian and British English, respectively, if I recall correctly.
@WithAnH wot a nonce! What does nonce even mean? I love it already as an insult but I'm afraid it means something awful that'll get me in trouble
