Actually you’ll get picked as a Yank long before you start eating. Never mind how, we just know.
See in Australia, we’d say that the other way round.
From the Snopes site:
Their “assertion” is based on the utter lack of primary sources supporting this particular urban legend. It’s a cute story, sure, but that’s all it is: a story. There’s no historical basis for it at all.
I suspect that this is one of those rules of ettiquette with a practical purpose behind it: namely, if you scoop your soup away from your lap, you lessen the chances of splashing it all over your fancy party clothes.
I’ll be the guy with a scruffy goatee wearing Birks and a baseball hat with some strange insignia on it that you won’t recognize. 
I suppose - although I don’t really have some chronic soup-spilling disorder eating soup the other way. Still it was a strange thing to specifically mention when apparently nobody in Australia really cares, but I now know it was total crap, just like everything else on that site.
It’s the only sign I use, and I’m 18. But apparently that’s because I come from a not so big town. As my friend said, “we brought it back with us”. People get it.
As for my spelling of arse… it’s shorter that way? And that’s the way I’ve always spelt it.
How did you know? :eek:
Nah, Aussies love a piss-take.
In NZ get stuffed never means pregnant but it often means get fucked. But you can still say you are stuffed after a meal without anyone thinking you are telling them to get fucked.
Dooku there are few Aucklanders here, so you don’t have to ask the Aussies 
The website didn’t have a listing for New Zealand, otherwise I would have.
FYI, we’re staying at the Ascott Metropolis. My friend’s boss owns a penthouse condo there, and he’s letting us stay there for free. I’ll probably ping you guys in IMHO in a few weeks to ask for bar / restaurant / sightseeing recommendations.
The tip off was, “Lick my cunt you arsehole”.
I mean, it works for me but it did let the cat out of the bag.
I noticed in Mexico that the Cabbies tended to throw bags and things I had in the back seat if I was alone and I’d sit in the front seat, rather than putting our bags in the trunk. In the US i typically go in the back seat. Not sure if it’s because I felt pretentious if I sat in the back or not. The cabbies also like to chat with me (especially after they found out I was an American). I did notice for my female friends they’d sit in the front seat as well. I guess we all felt rude if we sat in the back seat when alone.
I was told in Brazil that the “OK” sign (thumb and index finger) is an insult to men meaning “you sit down to pee”. Anyone else ever heard that?
In other parts of that very same cite of yours, the archers are beneath contempt, why would the heralds pay any attention to them except when they started firing. They would be far more concerned about the knights.
As for the primary sources, I’m trying to track some down now.
I don’t see where the specific phrase, “beneath contempt,” is used in that cite. They weren’t as valuable, because they were peasants: the only people worth taking prisoner were the nobles, because they were the only ones who had enough money to make ransom worthwhile. I don’t think it logically follows that, because you can’t ransom a bowman for much money, then nobody would ever pay attention to them in any other capacity. On top of that, if the heralds did completely ignore the longbowmen, then how the hell do we know that the gesture originated with them? If there is something to this legend, then there must have been someone there watching to write down what they saw, so that six hundred years later we could read it and argue about it on the internet.
Good luck with the sites. I ran a few myself, but it just seemed to be the two or three versions of the same unsubstantiated story posted all over the damn place.
It is considered rude in Brazil, but I’ve always understood it to mean “f*ck you,” and that the circle formed by the thumb and index finger is symbolic of an anus.
In this interview, Roger E. Axtell discusses the Brazilian gesture and other examples of offensive body language. He also repeats the idea that the “thumbs up” is offensive in Australia, so some of his observations might be incorrect–but my Brazilian GF confirms that he’s right about the “OK” gesture’s meaning in Brazil.
Well, that works both ways. There’s no evidence that it actually happened either. I was exactly the same as you (having seen it on the History Channel), but there’s simply no evidence. More importantly, why cut off the fingers of these particulr peasants when captured peasants were killed anyway.
See here for GQ discussion on it, especially confirmation of the general treatment of captured peasants. It’s a shame that Snopes haven’t fixed that article yet.
My comments on some of the points in the site pointed to by Dooku:
I don’t think any Australian would be offended by being addressed on a first name basis at first introduction. First names are pretty ubiquitous at all levels of society.
I wouldn’t bring meat. You could bring some food (e.g. a salad or a dessert), and it would be very common (almost mandatory) to bring beer or wine.
It’s far more common for women to wear slacks or a suit with trousers than to wear skirt or dress in a business setting these days. This must have been written at least 20 years ago.
Wine is a very common gift to bring when invited to someone’s home, and if you come from a place that makes wine (like the US), some wine from your country would be a nice touch. While Australians know they make great wine, they don;t think that foreign wines are all inferior.
Again, this is way out of date. Australian politicians can’t get knighthoods these days, because the honours system is purely Australian these days. So it’s no longer an issue.
Well, if you can’t even get the capitalisation of “Aboriginal” right … My advice would be to be cautious, but it’s not a taboo subject. You may be surprised at the opinions that some people express, though.
These days, accents are more likely to indicate what country people come from, and that’s not a taboo subject.
I didn’t realise that you weren’t allowed to blow your none on a handkerschief or paper tissue in public. I thought you just weren’t supposed to wipe your nose on your shirt sleeve. I must remember to go to the toilet next time I have a runny nose.
I’d leave aboriginal lower case in the quoted sentence. It’s not functioning as a proper noun or an adjective derived from a proper noun. It’s just a regular adjective.
For example; The aboriginal people of the US are known as Native Americans or Indians. The aboriginal people of Australia are known as Kooris, Aborigines or Aboriginals.
No – if you capitalise “N” in “Native American”, then you capitalise “A” in “Aboriginal” when referring to the Aboriginal people of Australia. It’s the name of a specific ethnic group. On the other hand, you can write “aboriginal peoples of Canada”, because it’s not a specific ethnic group.
In addition, I would not write “Aboriginals” – that’s regarded as offensive by some Aboriginal people, because they don’t like you using an adjective as a noun – and “Aborigines” is problematic too – many prefer “Aboriginal people” – thoiugh you just might get away with that. (I once wrote a whole paper on the subject of how to refer to the Aboriginal people of Australia: believe me, I know n awful lot on this subject).
Apologies - read the entire thread before posting, me.