Quote:
Originally Posted by Lwize
I'm from the US, and although I have a vague notion of what "fancy" means, it's not a term used over here, expect when describing how someone's dressed or a cheaper cut of red meat.
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Yeah, we are separated by a common language. I sincerely believe it causes more confusion when there are 'slightly different meanings' than if you were dealing with a completely different language heh.
In Canada 'Fancy' means something 'elaborately decorated/designed'. The latest iPhone is a 'fancy new phone' or some shiny new shirt may be deemed a 'fancy shirt'.
In the UK 'Fancy' is used more like 'desires' or 'wishes for'. You 'fancy' the woman you are attracted to. You can 'fancy a tasty drink'.
Heh.. the internet does help to prepare each other to 'translate' depending on the users before we all embarrass each other on actual visits. Some examples:
In North America 'pants' are trousers. In the UK they are 'underwear'. In case you hear an American saying "I got something on my pants" he doesn't mean.. ya.
We all know 'fanny' is different right? A cute almost 'child's word' for bum in the USA is a very unpleasant word like ****** if used in the UK.
A Canadian director names the film 'knocked up' but it really isn't a different meaning.
It does mean 'visited, a guest came and knocked on your door'. They 'knocked you up'.
To describe women pregnant by some casual sex you could be very polite and sort of 'hidden implication' to just say she was 'knocked up' (her lover came to her house one night).
It actually does mean the same thing but in the USA they don't say 'knocked up' or 'rang me up' anymore but still retain the 'expression'.
One word that got me confused for a while (after moving to the UK) was 'chuffed'. For some reason I assumed it must mean something like 'chafed' as in being irritated. So people would say they were 'chuffed' about something and I'd say "Oh that's too bad. sorry to hear it".
Also for about a month I never really knew why people were 'sussing' thing or had them 'sussed out' or I thought it meant they were something 'the opposite of chuffed'.
But for sure those words which are used in different or only partly similar ways really do cause the most 'wtf' moments I think.