Differences between England and Canada

Before I arrived in England, I thought everything here would be basically the same as in Canada. I knew that people would have accents, but I didn't realize that I would feel like there was language barrier some of the time. English children speak with a slang that it took along time to become familiar with! I have to be careful when I speak not to say the word "pants" because in England it means underwear. I have to say "trousers" instead. It has also taken some time not to look shocked when small children ask me for a "rubber". What they really mean is that they need an eraser! The children always snicker and giggle when I ask them to put their candy wrappers in the garbage. They tell me that I should be saying "put your rubbish in the bin!" And candy wrappers are really "sweet wrappers" anyway!

Also posing a problem for outsiders when they first come to England is the fact that there are no public washrooms, no public garbage bins, and no telephone books in London. This was a source of major inconvenience for me as I tried to find my way around in my first days here. There are no public washrooms and no public garbage bins because of the possibility of being bombed when the IRA was still active. But the lack of telephone books, there is NO excuse for. The lack of telephone books is a particular problem because there is no way to find addresses if you don't already know where they are! I found this out the hard way as I was trying to find out the address of an office in downtown London. When I walked into a bookstore to ask about telephone books, I was told that they exist, but no one seems to have them. This is also a big problem because no one in London seems to know where anything is. The only way to find out where things are is to use the telephone directory which costs money, and then phone the office and ask for their address. A bit complicated indeed!