A few years ago, I visited the country of the Solomon Islands. On my trip I went to a small village. I met the chief of the village. He was very kind and asked me to have dinner with him the next day.
The next day, I went to his house at 6:30pm ready for dinner. He was surprised to see me! He said, “We have finished dinner! We ate it at 1pm this afternoon!”
WHY DID THIS CONFUSION HAPPEN?
In his culture, dinner was the meal in the middle of the day! He ate it at noon!
In my culture, dinner is eaten at night!
We both used the SAME WORD, but we were talking about DIFFERENT things!
IS THAT STRANGE?
No it is not strange! There are actually many words for meals. They can be used differently in different parts of the world! Let’s look at some:
- dinner - can be eaten at noon or night time
- tea - is eaten at night time (like dinner!)
- lunch - eaten at noon
- supper - eaten at night time
- afternoon tea - and afternoon snack
- morning tea – a mid-morning snack
Do you know all these words? What words do you use for meals in your country?
QUESTION:
If someone asked to come to their house for tea:
- What time would you go?
- What kind of food and drink do you think they would have?
Put your answer in the comments!
I know 5 words of them , I’d not known ” tea” until I read the explanation above . in my country , we ‘d called meals at the same way .
when someone asked me to come to thier house for tea , I think I’ll be there at 5:00pm . But I’ll ask them what time they ‘d like to see me before I come .
I think they’ll have soup , noodle , salad and desert with jelly , muffin .If that’s the celebration , we’ll drink beer , sodapop , or champagne . if i’s a normal day , we’ll drink drinking water or tea.
i should go for tea about 5 or 6pm,and they’ll have cake,desert and fruits!
Hi John,
it’s very interesting, I always thought the tea break is in the afternoon about 4 pm and drink tea or coffe with cake, biscuits or fruits, but after your explanation I have some doubts….maybe I should go at 6.30pm like a supper??!!!! It’s better ask them what time I need go there……
In my country the meals are:
colazione = breakfast
pranzo = lunch
cena = supper
merenda = afternoon tea
caffè = everytime of day
bye
Mmmm! Your comments all make me hungry!
Yes I agree with you all – they best way is to agree on the time before you go!
Well, I have finished my ‘colazoine’ – now time to go to work!
Hi everybody,
If it is a tea invitation then most probably it is in the late afternoon time 4/5 or 6 pm. Here in my country, people always like to serve tea and coffee in all occasions as a traditional habit. so I think they don\\\’t really list the tea time into the three main meals; the breakfast, lunch and dinner. the three meals name in Arabic are:
Al-Futoor = the breakfast
Al- Ghada\\\’a = the lunch
Al- Asha\\\’a = the dinner
P S Tea time break is my favorite .. let\\\’s cheer up and go for a tea ^_^
Thank you Sara!
I have just finished my Al-Futoor and am about to go shopping!!
TIP: ‘Let’s cheer up’ is mainly used when someone is sad or maybe crying or depressed. A more natural way to say this would be: Let’s go out and have some tea!