At a job like mine, a person has to savor the humor (but sometimes just laugh because your choices are that or cry). The girls really made me laugh last week. First, they were asking me about corn dogs. They had heard of them but had no idea of what they were. In the UK they have a vegetarian brand called "Quorn" (pronounced "corn") so that confused them (and me when I first got here. I thought "wow, they eat a LOT of corn in some odd dishes"). They confessed that they were picturing corn on the cob on a stick when they heard "corn dog." Understandable. I tried to explain it, but they don't have cornmeal (concequently no corn bread) in the UK so that makes it a bit more difficult to explain. I likened it to a "battered sausage" in England speak but explained the the cornmeal batter was a bit sweet. I brought a couple for my lunch the next day that they were able to investigate and stare at :)I've been eating PBJ a lot at work lately and since staff food is closely scrutinized by patients (I understand why - it's all they think about - and it would be really hard to be eating a big meal if the staff was sitting there with a salad or something). One of the girls asked, "are you a vegetarian?" I laughed and said "NOOOO. . . the only reason I don't eat clinic sandwhiches is that they don't have enough meat on them" (staff can have sandwhiches prepared at the clinic for them but an English sandwhich has about one piece of thinly sliced luncheon meat and lots of butter on it. No thanks. I need about half of a package of meat on my sandwhich.)
After my explaination another patient paused and looked at me commenting "there must not be many vegetarians in America." I laughed even harder and explained that I knew just as many vegetarians in America as I did in England (I lived in Boulder!!!). I joked with them, "the reason you think that is that you have this stereotypical picture of every American daily having a steak as big as their thigh that is practically falling off of their plate, don't you?!" They sheepishly nodded and smiled. That's Texas. That is not America. I made sure they got that straight.
Ironically, the next day when I brought my corn dogs they were vegetarian. . . go figure.
2 comments:
My first thought when you mention Corn Dogs is the Minnesota State Fair. Never had them at home but enjoyed them at the fair once a year. Even the US has some pretty interesting foods.
Funny post! I'm wondering about those sandwiches in England. Not much meat - but do they come with an extra "h," hence sandwhich???? Did you ask Philip how many servants he actually moved through his base?
Vegetarian corn dogs??? Give me a break.
Dad and I are sure glad that the Boulder people didn't corrupt you and make you into a vegetarian.
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