Ruth Budge wrote: I come from England, have >lived in Australia most of my life - and after all, both countries are supposed >to speak the same language! However, after all these years, I still find that >the occasional Australian phrase comes up which I don't understand, I still use >expressions which turn out to be particularly English.
When my husband and I were first married, his Polish grandmother went back to Poland to visit her relatives. I remember her saying she and her sisters spoke "American Polish". Since they came to the US as youngsters, when they encountered new things (television, say), sometimes they made up words or phrases for them. Naturally these were different from the real Polish words for whatever it was. Another thing that happened was that she and her sisters kept some of the 1920's or 30's ways of saying things, since they weren't hearing anything different. Meanwhile the Polish their cousins were hearing was evolving and changing, so when the two got together, sometimes they had to do a lot of rephrasing and explaining to get the meaning across. Lynn Carpenter in SW Michigan, USA alwen at i2k dot com To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace-chat [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
