Even something as simple as soft drinks can be subject to cultural disparities.
Despite sharing a common language, the UK and other English-speaking nations like the US have numerous cultural differences. From variations in spelling to having two distinct sports referred to as “football”, there are many factors which set us apart from our counterparts across the Atlantic.
This phenomenon isn’t exclusive to the US, as illustrated by a Canadian expat living in London who recounted her culture shock experience when attempting to order a specific drink at a restaurant.
In a viral video, Jenna Bennett expressed her confusion when she requested a Sprite with her meal, only to be informed by the waitress they only had lemonade.
While this would make sense to anyone from the UK, Jenna was perplexed as, to her, “lemonade” referred to an entirely different beverage.
She shared her story on TikTok, saying: “I will never forget the first time I tried to order Sprite in a London restaurant. This was about a month after I moved to London and I went out to eat by myself. The waitress comes over and is like ‘What can I get you?’ and I didn’t know what I wanted to eat but I knew what I wanted to drink, so I said, ‘Can I have a Sprite please?’
“She looks at me and she’s like, ‘Oh we don’t have Sprite but we have lemonade’. My initial instinct is just that she didn’t hear me, I said Sprite but she thought I said something else. So I said it again, and she replied with the same thing.
“So now I’m extra confused. In my mind, I’m like, where do I go from here? Because clearly there’s some kind of misunderstanding.”
Jenna went onto explain that to her, lemonade is something crafted with fresh lemons, reminiscent of “what you used to sell as a little kid on the side of the street”.
In places such as Canada and America, “lemonade” commonly signifies the traditional homemade blend dubbed “old-fashioned lemonade” or “American lemonade” here in the UK, consisting simply of fresh lemon juice, water, and sugar, without any fizz.
The puzzled patron eventually understood the mix-up when the server had an epiphany about their crossed lines of communication.
She recounted: “It wasn’t until I started describing the can that she said to me, ‘Oh, we call that lemonade’. When was somebody going to tell me that the UK calls Sprite lemonade?”
In the end, Jenna relented and let the server bring her what the UK calls lemonade, although she anticipated a non-fizzy beverage. Her surprise was palpable when presented with a glass of Fever Tree lemonade, which she described as “super bitter Sprite”.
Viewers of the video were left scratching their heads as Jenna insisted that the UK “calls Sprite lemonade”, as they argued Sprite is simply a brand of lemonade rather than a specific drink on its own.
And others also pointed out any beverage with an “-ade” suffix typically denotes a carbonated drink on this side of the pond.
One commenter explained: “The UK calls Sprite ‘Sprite’. They understood what you wanted but they didn’t have any, so offered you the next closest alternative. Hope that clarifies things.”
Another said: “Sprite is a brand of lemon and limeade. Made by Coke. As a Brit, I always find it fascinating that US lemonade isn’t fizzy. Any drink ending in ‘ade’ in the UK means a fizzy drink.”
