Monday, April 26, 2010

Different words, different meaning in different countries...

Words and phrases that have different meanings in British and Malaysian English.Taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysian_English

Word / Phrase
Malaysian meaning
American / British meaning
last time
previously
on the previous occurrence
a parking lot
a parking space, e.g. "That new shopping mall has five hundred parking lots."
a parking garage (from US English)
an alphabet
a letter of the alphabet, e.g. "The word 'table' has five alphabets."
a set of letters used in a language
bungalow
A mansion for the rich and/or famous; or a fully detached house, regardless of the number of floors it has. Lately, some housing developers have changed the usage of this word further and we now see terms like "a semi-detached bungalow".
A small freestanding house or cottage having a single storey and sometimes an additional attic storey.
photostat
a photocopier; also used as a verb meaning "to photocopy"
a historical copying machine using a camera and photographic paper, which was superseded by the photocopier. See Photostat machine.
slang
accent, e.g. "I cannot understand your slang", when the real meaning is "I cannot understand your accent"
informal spoken language, often unique to a particular country or social group
to follow
to accompany, e.g. "Can I follow you?" meaning "Can I come with you?"
to go after or behind, e.g. "The police car was following me"
to keep
to put away or store, e.g. a parent tells a child "Keep your toys!"
to retain as one's own, e.g. "I must decide which to throw away and which to keep."
to revert
to get back to someone, e.g. in an email: "I will investigate this and revert to you by tomorrow."
to return to a previous edit or state (although this meaning exists in BrE as well.)
to send
to take someone somewhere, e.g. "Can you send me to the airport?"
to cause something to go somewhere without accompanying it, e.g. "I sent this letter to my grandma."

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