Tarkak9

ugacrew

Tarkak9

MMMMMmmmmmmmm

http://hometown.aol.com/badlandsbook...g%20burger.jpg

Thydney

Thats not really an achievement you know

Dial up alert can't do youtube

robin1234

He doesn't eat, Cheney winds him up again with that key between his shoulder blades.

My major concession to being American is the eating thing. When I eat at the cafeteria at work, I never even take a knife... I use the edge of my fork to cut up the meat. When in England, I use correct k+f etiquette if eating out, just the fork thing if eating in.. (oh hang on, all I eat in England is M&S sandwiches....)

cindyabs

Works both ways,

coopa_troopa

But I don't live in Asia, I live in the US and just wanted to understand why y'all do what you do.

scrubbedexpat097

Precisely.....you live in the US and that is just one of the things that is different than the UK, so why question it. There are all kinds of different customs and ways in all countries and who's to say which is right and which is wrong. You don't have to change your ways but just accept not everyone is the same.

AmerLisa

AmerLisa

Does there have to be a reason for everything?

coopa_troopa

So let me get this straight. Are you saying if a person immigrates to another country they shouldn't question why people of said country do things differently to what the immigrant is used to? Do you not perceive it as the immigrant is intrigued / interested in the habits of his new country?

I DO accept everyone is not the same, that was why I asked. I was just intrigued....not saying either way is right or wrong.

It's like with people from the Middle Eastern countries, don't know if they still do it, but they used to eat with one hand and keep the other hand behind their back. The "non-eating hand" was to be kept for "toilet purposes"....they say there's a reason for everything, so just wondered if there was an interesting reason for the fork-only method is all.

geeandtee

aye, it does, but it was the whole balancing peas on the back of the fork thing. I knew darn well how to do it, but there was just something in me that made me not want to do as I was told.

RoadWarriorFromLP

It dates back to the Revolutionary War. It was much easier to attack the bloody Redcoats by keeping our forks in the right hand, as most of our glorious freedom fighters were naturally right-handed.

Early attempts to drive out the British by using spoons and cloth napkins failed, and it was the forks that turned the tide. Keeping our forks in the right hand reminds us of our stupendous victory against the Limey invasion force.

On the Fourth of July, we savor our victory by eating our burgers and hot dogs with our hands. This is not done merely for convenience, but remains a potent symbol of our freedom to relax and enjoy our sacred barbeque and fireworks free of the need for the defensive utensils that we used to push out our oppressors.

God Bless America, and may He forever defend our right to eat in peace, and without implements of destruction. Amen.

snowbunny

There's nothing wrong with curiosity; in fact I suffer from a constant case of it and spend loads of time researching my own and everyone else's questions.

I think where you stepped out of the curiosity zone and into the judgmental zone was saying that the American way of eating doesn't "look nice." But despite that, you got a fair few reasoned responses from the indigenous tribe.

paddingtongreen

The pedant in me can't resist. The American way, cutting everything first and then wielding the fork, comes from the pioneer days. Knives were scarce, so a family might pass the hunting knife around the table. I prefer to think it was simply that it would be difficult to use a Bowie knife in the British table manner.