That cliche never made sense - “You say tomaytoe, I say tomahtoe.” I swear, I’ve never met a single person in my life who pronounces it “tomahtoe” - that includes all sorts of regional varieties of Americans, Canadians, Brits, Australians, Kiwis. No one but no one says “tomahtoe” in real life. I suspect that pronunciation is some sort of urban legend.
“Potahtoe” doesn’t seem to be a real word, either.
ML, no one from the UK says tom-AY-to unless they are trying to sound like an American.
Back to pomelos, apparently you can keep them for ages, right up until Chinese New Year. The longer you keep 'em the juicier they get. I had a super juicy one today in fact. Very high in antioxidants as well.
I say To-mah-to. Every other Kiwi I’ve met says it this was. Aussies too. Po-tah-to on the other hand, I’ve never heard.
Brian
[quote=“Spack”]ML, no one from the UK says tom-AY-to unless they are trying to sound like an American.
[/quote]
Bingo! That’s what’s confusing me. A lot of Brits and Kiwis/Aussies unconsciously adopt a lot of Americanisms in their speech. Thus, in Taiwan, they pronounce it as “tomaytoe”.
It runs both ways. I find myself thinking in the metric system and going down to the “pub” and saying “cheers” and looking for a “fit” “bird” to “shag”. A lot of Briticisms creep up in my speech after years spent hanging with an international crowd.
Ya know, I saw that picture of Gustav, I nearly wet myself. 
:bravo: 
I don’t know a single English person who says to-may-toe. I was in Taiwan (with predominately Canadian colleagues) for two year and now Canada for two and I still say tom-mah-toe. Po-tah-toe I have never heard anywhere, although I have an inkling it might be some aristocratic speak from the 1920s.
North American words I have adopted are garbage can, saying ‘take a look’ instead of ‘have a look’, hood and trunk.
There are some Brit terms that don’t translate well like ‘humping furniture’ which can have two meanings in England and apparently only the sex meaning in Canada (judging by the looks I received). Its a bit like the word fag, which us Brit smokers have to be careful to avoid using, particularly in Vancouver.
Actually it’s not Ausses kiwis imitatating Americans at all …as to us the noth american is to-may-do as you guys ripped it from the Spanish. Personally I copied the Taiwanese way of saying it avoiding swearing in Chinese or Japanese.
Try saying “vacuum cleaner” without making (Chinese) people nearby think you have just uttered an obscenity. You’re safe with ‘Hoover’ but that particular Briticism is unknown in Taiwan.
How about somebody start a “tom-AY-to to-MAH-to” thread so we can get back to pomelos?
Yeah, let’s hear it for the pomelos!!
Yeah I also picked up vacuum cleaner and now say surround wrap instead of cling film.
I think some of these words I picked up before I got to Canada, what with having to teach my Chinese preschoolers the American vocab. But that only extended to teaching the American vocab not the pronounciation, which frankly I can’t do. Everytime I try to say my name (Mark) with a North American everybody pisses (laughs) themselves. I just can’t get that damn ‘R’ to roll the way it should.
Since the mods don’t seem to be interested in starting a US-British English thread, I’ll just put this here.
My son has a Bob the Builder book which was bought in the US. From the language used it’s obviously been “translated” from British English to US English. It has a story about hedgehogs, but these are referred to as porcupines!! 
These hedgehogs look nothing like porcupines. So my question is: Aren’t there any hedgehogs in America? Even if there are no hedgehogs in the US, most American kids have heard of hedgehogs haven’t they?
(There are no pomelos in the book, sadly.)
An interesting and very valid question Spack.
I think I said before I’m English and I moved to Canada (from Taiwan) 18 months ago. Yesterday I saw my first live skunk. I say live skunk, because up to now the only ones I seen and smelt have been splattered across the road with guts all over the place. They do truly stink and the smell really lingers.
I’d heard of hedgehogs, but I’d never seen one until this summer in Taiwan. I don’t think there are any roaming wild in America.
Hedgehogs were something I saw a lot in New Zealand. I miss Bogor cartoons now. I’ve never seen a hedgehog in Taiwan but then again I’ve never seen a live snake in the wild here either.
Surely the question is do hedgehogs enjoy pomelos?
I am fairly sure that hedgehogs would enjoy pomelos given half the chance. In England we tend to feed them bread in milk on a plate (rather than a bowl, to stop it tipping over) or cat food. How the average British house holder came to the conclusion that this is what hedgehogs eat is beyond me. Perhaps they didn’t have any pomelos handy.
The first time I heard the word pomelo was when I was at university in southern China. We had to wait for a ride by the Li River for an hour because the taxi had broken down. There was this 140 year old woman totally in my face selling pomelos. She held it up in front of my face and held it there for a bloody hour repeating pomelo, pomelo, pomelo, pomelo, pomelo, pomelo. I nearly pushed her off the f**king dock. It was one of those China moments.
I remember going to a restaurant in Guilin where they had all the live animals in cages outside, ready for the pot. Anyway, we got pissed and decided to liberate a bamboo rat (much cuter than normal rats, more hamster like). We paid about US$7 for it including the cage. My friend kept it as a pet for a week until he realised his apartment was infested with fleas, and then let it go in the woods.
And then there was the doggy chop chop shop down at the local market. But thats another story…
I saw some emormous snakes in Japan, up to 2 metres long. I also saw racoons (city dwelling racoons), which I am fairly sure are not indigenous to Asia (and neither are hedgehogs).
Stragbasher’s previous avatar - Griff, Mel, Rowan & Pam - they used to like hedgehogs! 
A skunk attacked my family once.
No, really.
We were camping out in Oklahoma, having a picnic with hotdogs and stuff, and a pair of hungry skunks sniffed it out and moved in on our picnic table. Mom, sensible woman that she is, wanted us to run away and let the skunks take what they wanted, rather than risk getting sprayed. Dad, on the other hand, wanted to defend our food. Luckily, good sense prevailed and we got in the car.
The hedgehogss in those Bogor cartoons sure liked the green stuff. Pomelos are green. It just stands reason they would like 'em.