The British are back online with another seemingly offensive American term.
A resident of London, claiming to be fed up with foolish tourists, posted on Reddit with a “public service announcement for Americans visiting this summer,” and cautioned that the British “do not abbreviate place names here” — a tendency many Americans weren’t even aware they practiced.
A person recounted an experience where, while having coffee with a group of friends in Victoria—specifically the area in Pimlico within Westminster, London—they overheard “holidaying Americans” shortening the names of locations when asking for directions multiple times.
“The first issue was figuring out how to get to ‘Green’ (Green Park), and they had arrived through ‘Edgware’ (Edgware Road — clearly a completely different area of the city than Edgware itself), the next person was looking for their hotel in ‘Holland’ (Holland Park, obviously not the region),” the frustrated Redditor wrote.
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“…People who live here, we got the general idea of what they were saying yesterday, but it’s an unnecessary layer of friction and could easily turn catastrophic if you’re searching for the wrong thing, asking for directions, or researching a place (Gloucester instead of Gloucester Road, Liverpool instead of Liverpool Street, Leicester instead of Leicester Square, etc.),” the OP added.
Hundreds of angry readers flooded the comment section to add their criticismadditional anti-American observations.
“I find American tourists quite charming at times. They’re generally good-hearted but a bit clueless,” joked a user.
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“This is really strange. What’s the logic behind it? Are place names abbreviated this way in the US? I’m genuinely interested,” another person wondered.
Size,” said an American in reply, “The idea is that you’re not referring to a place two states away. You probably mean the nearest area, or else you’d just search for it on Google… [Size] changes how you discuss directions and locations.
Several upset Americans also noted that this comment appeared to be yet another ina lengthy sequence of ambiguous statements that Europeans ascribe toAmericans.
“I’m in the hotel industry, and this sometimes occurs in America as well,” affirmed one user.
“This experience appears to be restricted to individuals living in a small number of major cities. I’m American and would never provide directions in such a manner,” another person agreed.
“Clearly, British individuals lack the intelligence to understand context,” wrote an especially frustrated user.
While another hostile opponent of the British remarked: “Go ahead and believe that this is exclusive to Americans if it gives you the feeling of superiority you clearly require. Tourists are just tourists. I assume you’ve been one.”
Some users proposed that these annoyed Londoners were merely experiencing the typical effects of the summer tourist season— in line with the‘tournami’ currently ravaging Europe- but lifelong city residents claimed these crowds are not unusual.
In cities like Barcelona, Residents have started using water guns to target visitors as a form of protest against excessive tourism.— prompting Americans to question, perhaps these Reddit outrage posts are the British version.
