Divided by a common language?

Before I forget let me put you out of your undoubted misery over the contents of the International Shelf. Remember, these are grocieries which Americans consider define the British culinary palate. In fact a couple of you made shrewd guesses.

It looks like we're defined by our brands, but not necessarily the ones you would expect. Coleman's is a big one, with English mustard, horseradish sauce, piccalilly and a selection of packet sauce mixes, sausage casserole being the most ironic as it is pretty hard to buy what we would define as a sausage here. Heinz salad cream, soup, beans, spaghetti hoops and that old favourite from your childhood, tinned treacle pudding. McVities chocolate digestives and hob-nobs (surprisingly no custard creams or rich tea biscuits). Cadbury's, although now US owned, was represented by their drinking chocolate but the confectionery wasn't Cadbury's it was Rowntrees; fruit gums, fruit pastilles and Yorkie chocolate. There was Sarson's vinegar and Hayward's pickled onions, Ambrosia rice pudding, Ready-Brek, Hartley's Jam and Chiver's Marmalade (not Robinsons). Branston Pickle and Branston baked beans, Robinson's Barley Water. And yes, there was Bisto and Bird's Custard Powder, although no-one I have spoken to here has ever heard of custard apart from frozen custard, which is really just like ice cream and not like custard at all.

America is a land of surprises; really you must expect the unexpected. Whatever you think it will be like, it will be different - in weather, in topography, in food, in language.

In weather, for example, yesterday was a beautiful, warm, spring-like day, and although there isn't a vestige of green to be seen on any of the trees as yet, it really felt like winter was over. The air was warm and full of bird-song. Two layers of clothing was a layer too many. I seriously contemplated sitting out on the porch in the afternoon, although it hasn't been readied for summer yet. I felt like taking my shoes off.

But in the night we were hit by a  mini tornado which tore round the house and rattled the storm-screens, and threw what sounded like shrapnel against the roof tiles. Today it is wet and miserable, not cold, but the leafless trees are thrashing about and the barely-emerged daffodils are all lying flat, their petals crushed and creased. There is a power cut just up the road.

On our way back from Warren, last week, the temperature was below 40 degrees, a chilly 4 degrees celsius, and as we drove back across the high plateaux of rural Pennsylvania we saw the most amazing sight, once again, surprised by America's ability to produce the unexpected. I am not sure how this occurs, they call it an ice storm, but every tree, every branch and twig and thorn, every leaf and blade of grass on those exposed hilltops was covered, entirely encased, in clear, thick ice. They looked as though they had been dipped in glass. It wasn't frost, or snow, it was transparent ice.

Where the sun shone on them, the trees sparkled and blazed, and when the wind blew we would hear the ice-trees creaking. I am told that at times people wake up here to find their entire gardens, outdoor furniture and cars covered in ice like this, and they have to chip it away in order to open their car doors.

America is like a boastful teenager. Everything is bigger, better and altogether more than it is in the old world and they like to do things differently just because they can; it's a sort of rebellion. Language is a case in point. They are making it up as they go along, inventing new words and new ways of pronouncing old ones for no perceivably good reason other than it establishes them as independent, unrestricted, unhampered by the old-fashioned ways of doing things. It's a bit of a 'not invented here' syndrome; if it wasn't invented here, or at least reinvented, they aren't interested in it.

Here are a few examples. 'Expiration' has replaced the perfectly servicable 'expiry' as in 'this card has no expiration date.' One 'acclimates' oneself to new circumstances or a new situation, as opposed to 'acclimatising' oneself.  I recently heard a gentleman describe his small-holding as a 'farmette.' What we would call a 'mobile' telephone they call a 'cell', but in fact that is just as well as Americans pronounce the word 'mobile' as we would pronounce the brand of petrol 'mobl'. 'Petrol' in any case, is 'gas' here. I will never forget the billboard on a long long stretch of Texan highway which proudly encouraged us to stop and refresh ourselves at the next available service station, (a mere 172 miles distant), called Buc'cees, where we could enjoy 'the cleanest rest rooms in Texas, eat great food and get gas', not, to a British traveller, a great incentive!

While the 'i' in 'mobile', 'tactile' and 'facile' has utterly disappeared from the American mouth, so has the 'h' of 'herbs'. 'Fresh 'erbs', they say, not even with an attempt at a French accent, these are definitely not 'herbes' which might explain the missing 'h', but distinctly American ones like 'baysl' and 'orEgano' and 'cilantro' which is what you and I have innocently called 'coriander' for years. Spring onions are 'scallions', croissants are 'crescents', sausages (if you can find them) are 'links.' A filet is a 'fillAy' but a buffet is a buffETTE. Demi and hemi are pronounced 'dem-EYE' and 'hemi-EYE'. Why? Oh, just because it's different, and it is indicative of the thirst for freedom and new possibilities which this land represented for millions of people who were just sick to death of the old, hind-bound, dyed-in-the-wool habits and attitudes of their original counties.

I'm not knocking it, just describing it. But I worry about it. Are we becoming more and more divided by a common language? Because there are times when, although speaking English, I am looked at here as though I am speaking an entirely different language and while 'Oh you're English, I love your accent' is very gratifying, it isn't much use when nobody understands a word you say.