~ I am English ~

[Wooden cupcakes ~ how adorable are these?!]

I always feel a bit envious of my friends/readers in the States - we don't have an equivalent of the 4th of July here (for obvious reasons) or Thanksgiving. I'm racking my brain to come up with a national celebration that we have here in the UK. We have Bonfire Night, but that's hardly a public holiday. Wikipedia tells me that St George's Day is supposed to also be the National Day for the English but i have yet to see any evidence of this - my diary doesn't even have it listed. The concept of national pride has always been a tricky one to navigate here - if someone is seen flying a Union Jack and singing rowdy songs about "Engerlaaand" then we generally mark them down as a fascist who votes for the extreme right. I've never come across someone who claimed they were proud to be British - i don't believe there is such a thing as britishness anyway. If you live in the UK you most likely identify yourself as English, Scottish, Welsh or Irish. Never in my life have a I described myself as British - i always say i'm English. And every time i go abroad i realise how very English I am, though it would take many many posts and much head scratching to explain what that means exactly.

The only time i witness any kind of national pride support is in sport, particularly when the World Cup or the Olympics are on. This week i've been watching Wimbledon, the only sport i'll actually make a point of following; everyone has been behind "our boy" Andy Murray, the latest home-grown tennis hope. He got knocked out in the semis, of course, but it was actually quite refreshing to be chatting about "our boy" with my taxi driver yesterday. I felt a tingle of connection with my fellow countrymen and I quite liked the novelty of it all.

Happy Saturday / 4th of July everyone :)

Comments

[Sophy]

This was interesting! We're Americans, celebrating the day with Kenyan coffee and German strudel for breakfast. I'm not sure what else is on the menu but it will probably include some British tea and later, some Irish stout. We also watched a travelogue about Florence, Italy. We try really hard to teach our kids about culture from all over. I'm not sure when I display American pride....I'll probably wear green white and orange today. (I like to be the odd one out in the sea of red white and blue).

[darlene]

yeah, its quite similar being canadian though we do have 'canada day' on july 1st and its nice because we can get our canadian pride on and wear red and white and wish our country happy birthday ... but am never really quite sure what it means to be canadian beyond the cliches of 'eh' and 'toque' and well yeah all that snow ;-)

[Carol]

This is an interesting post Susannah... I describe myself as British, whether or not it's because my Dad was Scottish and I feel that I incorporate the variety of my roots in the term 'British' I don't know. I'm a terrible patriot though ;-) I'm a Federer lover I'm afraid when it comes to tennis *lol*

Sounds rather negative, but I never follow the womens game at Wimbledon anymore because I've grown bored of Serena and Venus dominating the game year after year. They are excellent players though, but they have never excited me the way that Steffi Graff did.

[stacy]

I would describe you as an English Muffin. Hot and yummy. ; )
Is that completely sexist of me?
xo

[susanna]

Happy 5th of July, Susannah! It's interesting that you don't consider yourself British - instead, as English, Scottish, Welsh or Irish. I'm Canadian (ex-British Colony) and all my grandparents were from the U.K. My nana and poppa were from England and I grew up understanding that they were British. Mind you, they also lived in British Columbia and, for a while, in that province's capital, Victoria. That has got to be the most "British" place in Canada. It would be interesting to hear your opinion after seeing what we, English Canadians, consider "British"/English as it would to hear a French (France) person's opinion on Quebec or French Canada.

My sister studied in London for semester and she said that there was a holiday that involved red clown noses?

[charlane]

:) I'm stuffed from eating holiday food and the whole concept of you all singing Engerland just tickled my funny bone. Too cute.

[jen]

What a deliciously wonderful blog you have! I have discovered you for the first time recently! Yes, I am afraid you might be jealous of my 4th of July celebration. I crashed a wedding party on the street and watched some friends wow the audience with their vaudeville/acrobatic performance. This is my idea of a celebration. No fireworks needed!

[Susannah]

Susanna - LOL! that would be very british wouldn't it :) Red nose day is a charity event organised by Comic Relief: http://www.comicrelief.com/

[Kamsin]

Hi, I lurk on your blog from time to time. Anyway, just wanted to say I think of myself as British and personally see more pride in being a Brit than in being English. Maybe it's having had a Scottish grandfather, although I was born and raised in England. But, I only call myself English when I'm overseas and explaining the difference is more trouble than it's worth. Andy Murray is a Scot, so I wonder if there's not a contradiction in calling him 'our boy'. Anyway, I don't think most Englanders (I may have just made that word up) really know the difference between being British or English, so explaining it to foreigners can be a bit tricky! But I'm proud to be British whatever that means, but maybe less so to be English! So maybe it just shows, as you seem to have the opposite feeling, that we're all a bit confused about just who we are in the UK, or maybe that there's lots of different versions of who we are?!

[bella]

St. George is my father's patron saint (we are Serbian Eastern Orthodox) so every May 6th (which is also cinco de mayo) we celebrate with a huge home cooked feast!

come by my place later and see the video I made of our summer so far.. i used one of the songs you shared a while back (because it was the only MP3 I could find on my computer.. cannot figure out how to convert MP4's, damn it!)

Enjoy your day!!

[Fiona]

I was only thinking the other day how great it is that most countries have a day to celebrate their country. Us Irish have St. Patrick's Day, Americans have 4th of July and Canada Day was recently. That's amazing that there's no English national holiday. Maybe it's because a lot of national holidays grew out of celebrating their independence.
PS I love the wooden cupcakes! Where did you get them?

[Tahni]

its funny because i have always wanted to be english. all the history, the beautiful countryside, and the accent. maybe i am influenced by books and movies, but what can i say?

[Amisha]

I am among the minority of the people who like to watch tennis. I didn't get to see the men's finals cause I was travelling but I wish had been able to. Did you get to see the finals?