As a British person living abroad, I’ve gradually reached the conclusion that the UK is a particularly misunderstood country. So today I’m going to use this post to take a few misconceptions about the UK.
What is the UK?
Firstly, what actually is the UK? I run into this one all the time, but a surprisingly large number of people don’t actually know what the UK is, or even worse refer to Welsh or Scottish people as English! Pro tip: don’t make this mistake.
Here’s a quick rundown of the different names and what they refer to:
The United Kingdom is a country and a collection of four nations. England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland plus a scattering of British Overseas Territories.
What is England - the nation of England. Don’t call someone from Scotland English. They won’t be so happy.
Great Britain refers to the Island of Great Britain - the largest of the British Isles.
The British Isles are a group of Islands in the North Atlantic including Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man and roughly six thousand other smaller islands
What is Britain? Britain is kind of a messy term. It can be used to refer to the UK or Great Britain.
The Lake District
Who, or what is British? This is much more of an identity question - by the book British people from the United Kingdom, although this doesn’t really answer the question. For example, someone from Northern Island may identify as Irish and be insulted if you call them British, the same to a slightly lesser extent can also apply to Scottish or Welsh people. Just remember the term British is not interchangeable with the term English.
One final tidbit are the Crown Dependencies. The Channel Islands and the Isle of Man are not part of the UK but are crown dependencies. This effectively means they’re independent, self-governing nations, but internationally the UK is responsible for them.
The UK is really rainy
If I had a pound for every time a non-Brit knowingly told me how wet the UK is, or made a rain-based joke, I’d probably have some amount of money. This definitely wouldn’t be enough to undo the clear injustice of this easily disprovable falsehood. Britain is just not as rainy as people think.
Let’s use London to illustrate this. London is the UK’s most populous city and experiences less annual rainfall than New York, Tokyo, Rome, Toronto, Mexico City, Zurich, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Paris, Lisbon or even Sydney.
So please stop telling me the UK is really wet. It’s actually the driest place I’ve ever lived. Please direct your jokes about umbrellas to residents of Montenegro’s capital Podgorica, who receive over 1.6 metres of rainfall each year.
One of Scotland’s famous tropical beaches.
It definitely never rains here…
The UK is anti-EU
Maybe this is the most controversial of these topics. But as a Brit in continental Europe right I feel like I need to say something. Not only am I the demographic most likely to be utterly opposed to Brexit, but I’ve also somehow become an official Brexit representative.
Contrary to widespread belief, the UK is not overrun by frothing-at-the-mouth Brexiteers (although there are many). The UK is surprisingly pro-European. I know this sounds counter-intuitive, but the past five years has ignited a passion for the European project on a scale never seen before. Millions of people took to the streets and marched for the right to a second referendum. What’s more over 6 million people signed a petition to revoke Brexit.
Anti-Brexit protests in Cambridge
The saddest thing now is that whenever I talk to British people there’s a general sense of quiet resignation to the UK’s state. Everyone knows that the UK has made a mistake and will be worse off, but almost like a British person not wanting to complain about an overcooked steak, there’s a feeling that this is our lot, we just have to deal with it. For me, this is the single most depressing thing about Brexit.
British food is terrible
This just simply isn’t true. British food is hugely misunderstood. If you think British food is terrible, I bet you don’t have much experience of it.
We’ll start with a classic. Everyone thinks they understand fish and chips. It’s something you see around the world and is quintessentially British (despite having Portuguese origins). The problem is, it’s really difficult to get genuine fish and chips (you can’t get these outside of the UK, sorry, you just can’t). I’m talking about the North Yorkshire variety, fried in beef dripping and chunky, hand-cut chips. Get in line outside the Magpie Cafe in Whitby and you’ll know what I’m talking about.
Scottish oysters
Pub scotch egg
Another food you’ll struggle to find done properly outside of the UK is British-Indian cuisine. Like all the best fusion cuisines it’s rooted in two very different cultures and this makes it all the better. In my opinion, there’s nothing better than a Saturday night visit to a curry house and it’s one of the foods I miss most from the UK.
Other foods I think are massively underrated include the humble pork pie, Britain’s vast variety of delicious cheeses, my grandmother’s welsh cakes, oh and bread and butter pudding with Bird’s custard.
Of all of the insults to British cuisine that cuts the deepest is when people deride British beer. I love almost all beer, but I have a special place in my heart reserved for ale. If you think you don’t like ale, I have a challenge for you. Find a wonderful, inviting pub. You know the kind of pub that has that delightful indescribable essence of pub. Part community centre, part living room, but above all a collection of oddly sized awkwardly laid out rooms and snugs. Anyway, once you’ve found the right pub, order a pint of local cask ale. Then persist. Try a few pints. I can almost guarantee by the end of the evening you will have changed your view on ale. If not I’ll buy you a Carlsberg or Heineken as compensation.
Cheers!
The perfect pint
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