Hello again and welcome back to across the pond. Hello Alan. Hello, James. Last time in this segment, we talked to Anlan and James about how British and American people would react in some real life situations. Today, let's carry on that discussion and look at some more scenarios. Moving on to the next question. So we were talking about mostly acquaintance or friends or all of those people know. Let's move on to strangers. First situation in the strangers category, you're walking on the street and someone bumps into you violently. What would you do James?

You watch where you're walking.

You would get angry and just shout at them?

Yes, especially because it's the violent nature of the bumping. And it's not like an accidental bump or anything like that. A lot of Americans would say, hey, you watch where you're walking.

Ah~Watch it. I guess unless you notice this person is significantly larger than you then probably keep your mouth shut.

They're not actually trying to be mean. It's just they want you to pay attention. So they just get really serious.

And British people?

So we would say excuse me but in a really angry tone of voice.

So it’s passive aggressive.

Yes, it will be very very passive aggressive. We wouldn't actually say watch where you're walking or shout to them unless you are a bit taller or a bit bigger, and you're prepared for someone to have a fight with you. But most cases we would just say, excuse me.

I think ‘excuse me’ is usually used as a weapon in British English.

We use it for everything. It's all in the voice. It's all in the pronunciation.

You get the scoff first, excuse me.

If you hear British people say, excuse me, it doesn't always mean that they're being polite, perhaps It’s because they're angry. Um, moving on. You've just walk through a doorway. Imagine there's a door that you can pull open. But if you don't pull at it, then the door will shut itself. And you just walk through a doorway. But the stranger following is not quite there yet, but they're getting to the doorway. Would you hold the door for them? What would you do? Let's start with Anlan this time.

I would say in this type of situation, I would just keep holding the door for them. It's gonna be a little bit embarrassing. Normally, what would happen is if the person knows that you're holding the door open for them, they will start to walk a bit quicker and they'll start to rush through and then keep saying thank you a lot.

What if there are lots of people? Let's say they're 10 people, they're all walking behind. Would you keep holding the door for 10 people? Or would you just do for the first two.

No, what would normally happen in that situation is your hold a door open for the first person, then that person will open the door for the second person, and then so on and so forth.

It's like a relay.

Kind of.

What about in America? What would Americans do?

It's actually more or less the same in this situation. A lot of Americans would hold the door and the person walking behind would notice that and probably would speed up. And same with a group of people, it's kind of like a relay. In this sense it's quite similar.

But if a stranger holds the door for you and you speed up, would you generally say thank you to them.

Yes.

All right. And now moving on to major topic queuing, lining up. I know you love this topic online as a brit. You're in a long queue at the supermarket and you notice a cashier right next to your till he or she is locking on, so a new till will be open. What would you do? Starting with James, what would Americans do?

They'll be off to the races.

So you just fight other people to the new till, yeah?

Yes, they'll try to get into the new line to get till faster.

Can I actually... About supermarket queuing, there's something that I always wanted to ask, is it very common in America for people to switch queues in the supermarket?

So you mean going to another line?

Yeah, as in... you can see, for example, ABCD four tills. And then sometimes you see A is perhaps... it looks longer, but it's faster. You originally in another queue. And then you can see A is moving faster. And then you see C is moving faster then you switch back to C. Does that happen a lot?

It's fairly common. They wouldn't keep switching. But yeah, people will tend to try to get into the faster moving lines, to the shorter lines. This is especially true on weekends when the supermarkets are the busiest.

Because in some cultures, it seems that when I do that, and people give me a strange look, even if I'm not jumping the queue, but it just seems like in some cultures they’re less tolerant of that behavior. Let's ask Anlan what would British people do?

A British person in that type of situation would be expected and probably would most often tell the person in front of them that that queue is opening up.

How nice, instead of racing him to the new till.

No, in that type of situation, I think we would just let the person in front of us know. If you just go straight to that queue yourself, that can be seen as quite rude.

So you tap them on the shoulder and say that till is open.

Yeah.

Okay, now the last question of the day is also about queuing. Now we know that British people, they think queuing is like one of their national sports. So when another person decides to queue at the side of you rather than behind you, what would you do? Let's start with James. Being an American, if someone stands next to you, when they're supposed to stand behind you, they're still queuing. Would you tell them?

Yes, I would say line is back there.

Oh, sort of direct stand behind me.

They would say ‘get in line, line’s back, line starts back there’.

Would you actually say this to people who are trying to jump the queue as well?

Absolutely.

How common is it for people to say that for just strangers to pick out the queue jumpers and say line’s back there?

That's... everyone would do it, because everyone in line will be like, hey, line’s back there, get in line, they would yell.

All right. So it's difficult to jump the queue in America. What about in Britain, what would you do? Someone stands next to you rather than behind you When they're queuing.

In this type of situation what we probably do is we would shuffle a little bit to make sure that we're always just a little bit ahead of that person.

So shuffle as he moving slightly forward.

Yeah.

What if they move with you?

Then you just keep shuffling until you can't. The thing is this always reminds me that most times when I go on a plane or if I'm waiting to board a flight, this generally happens. There is always people going... trying to... because there never is a real queue when you're waiting to go on a plane. So there's always people who are queuing either side or trying to queue another direction. And in that's type of situation I would normally shuffle forward. And if I'm really, really wanna be assertive, I would use my bag to stop them going any further.

But you can do all of that, physically, passive aggressive, or just aggressive, you would not tell them in words. Why wouldn't you do that?

We just wouldn't really, it's all little subtle messages that you give to that person. So as long as you’re in front and that is your place, then that's it, that’s the most important thing.

Is it a bit like that this is sort of the hidden rules that everyone should obey. I shouldn't be the one teaching you this.

Yeah.

All right, I think on that note, we're gonna sum up. Obviously, most of these situations, I think there are quite a few differences. How do you feel about hearing from each other that you will be dealing with this quite differently? James, how do you feel?

About in general about all these? A lot of these, if the British people did these in America that would lead down to a breakdown in communication.

And what about Alan?

I would say that from British perspective, American seem very, very direct. It’s actually a little bit refreshing to be honest. Sometimes I kinda wanna say to people who try and jump the queue: Oi, don't do that.

You do get British people say that.

Yes, you do.

Just no on average.

No. I don't know. It's a little bit refreshing that you're able to do that.

All right. And on that note we're gonna wrap up today, and hopefully we will be able to do another episode of across the pond very soon where we will discuss some other situations then see how Americans and British people respond to these situations differently. Thank you again for coming to the show. Thank you, James. Thank you, Alan.

Thank you very much.

Bye everyone.

Bye.

Bye.

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