新概念雙語：高端黑：歐洲人覺得美國人奇葩的7點

Ice, Ice, Baby

冰，冰啊，寶貝

Think about any beverage, adult or otherwise, that you’ve ordered in your life. What’s the primary ingredient, regardless of what beverage you’ve ordered? If you said sugar, you’re close, but that’s not it. It’s ice, of course! Lots and lots of ice! Europeans think that our ice-intensive drinks are totally bizarre. As it so happens, they like things lukewarm over there.

無論你年紀如何，想想任何你所點過的飲品。無論你點了何種飲料，里面的主要成分是什么呢?如果你回答說是糖，那么你已經(jīng)離正確答案不遠了。當然應該是冰啦!許多許多冰!歐洲人覺得我們(美國人)飲料中含冰巨多這點非常奇葩。如果它就這么發(fā)生的話，歐洲人倒喜歡喝溫點的東西。

Air Conditioning

空調(diào)

Well, have you ever noticed how uncompromisingly cold your working environment is? As it so happens, not all of the world’s buildings keep the AC turned up so high. When Europeans step into America buildings, they feel like they’re stepping into the Antarctic.

你可曾注意到你的工作環(huán)境是有多徹骨寒冷?說起來，并非世界上所有的建筑物里都會把空調(diào)風開得這么大。當歐洲人走進美國人的大樓里，他們會覺得自己進入了南極。

The Working Week

工作周

Have you ever felt like 40-hours per week is just too damn much? You’d be surprised about how much it’s taken to get the working week down to that level here in the United States. At any rate, things just simply aren’t that way over in old Europe. The standard is much more relaxed, and there’s a cultural belief that having vacation time, and taking time away to raise a family, is valuable!

你有沒有覺得每周工作40個小時真是太他媽多了?那你在看到美國這邊的工作周降到了什么程度之后，會吃上一驚。至少，美國的情形和舊歐洲世界完全不同。美國的上班(時間)標準更為寬松。而且我們的文化相信，享受假期和把時間花在養(yǎng)家糊口上是非?？少F的!

Sales Tax

銷售稅

Europeans think it’s totally bizarre that the price of an item in a store isn’t what they’ll be charged at checkout. Of course, Europeans pay homage to the tax man in ways that Americans would feel is bizarre, too.

歐洲人在看到美國商店中物品的價格和他們在收銀臺為其支付的價格不一致時，覺得這太奇怪了。當然，歐洲人敬重納稅人這點也讓美國人無法理解。

How Are You Doing?

你好呀!

You probably noticed that Europeans have completely awesome words for saying ‘Hello!’ But, whens the last time you said ‘hello’ to anyone? You say things like: ‘What’s up?’, ‘How are you?’, ‘What’s the haps?’ At any rate, we don’t mean those as actual questions; Europeans think that we do.

你也許注意到歐洲人說“你好!”真的有許多不錯的詞，然而(作為美國人的)你上次用“Hello”和人打招呼是何時?你會用“What’s up?”，“How are you?”，“What’s the haps?”問好。不管怎樣，我們說的這些都不是真的在提問。可歐洲人卻會這么認為。

Tipping

給小費

There, you only leave a tip after a meal if you’re exceptionally pleased with the service, otherwise a tip is not expected. In Europe, service industry employees are paid a decent wage, and this is reflected in more expensive prices. In the United States, service industry employees are paid less than the minimum wage, which is a big reason why those Olive Garden entrees are so cheap.

在美國，只有服務讓你格外滿意，你才會在用餐后給服務員留下小費，否則你是不會給的。在歐洲服務行業(yè)的員工們享受的薪水不錯，而這也反映在歐洲餐館的菜價比美國更貴。而在美國，服務行業(yè)的員工得到的薪水比歐洲服務員的最低薪水還低。這很大程度上解釋了美國的橄欖園(意大利餐廳連鎖店)為啥那么便宜了。

A Foot? An Inch?

一英尺，還是一英寸?

How many inches are in a foot? How many feet are in a yard? What’s an inch? What’s a foot? What’s a yard? Do you have any reasonable answers to any of these questions? The whole world uses the metric system for measurement, yet here in the United States we still stick to Imperial measurements. How many stone are you?

一英尺等于多少英寸?一碼等于多少英尺?一英寸是多少?一英尺是多少?而一碼有是多少?你能在這些問題中理清頭緒，然后作答嗎?全世界都在用公制計量法，而在美國這我們?nèi)詧猿钟糜⒅朴嬃糠?。你重多少英石?