Today I'm going to talk about five

surprising things that sound rude in English.

This is from my experience, as well as my

understanding of Chinese, because some of

these are direct translations from Chinese.

These things are more of a subtle

difference in tone, but they do make a difference

to how you come across in writing or in speaking.

So the first thing that I've noticed is 'wait'.

I know that in Chinese, it's very common to say

(Chinese)

And it's quite polite to say, "Just hang on a second".

But if you tell someone to 'wait' in English

it does sound a bit impolite.

A better translation I think is 'hang on a second'

or 'could you give me a moment?'

or 'please, can you wait a second?'

So this 'wait', I hear quite a lot

but does come across as slightly rude

so be careful of that one.

This leads me onto my second point

which is that imperatives in general

do come across as a little bit rude in English.

Maybe tell me what time we should meet

'cause you want the other person to tell you.

So you say, "Tell me when we should meet."

Check something, do something, see this, watch this.

Any imperatives where you're just telling someone

to do something do come across as quite rude.

So a better way to phrase it is gonna be

to turn it into a question.

Please, could you let me know what time we're meeting?

For example, or please, could you have a look at this?

Or please, could you check something?

I know that in Chinese, it's very common to say

'qing' at the beginning

and then just the imperative afterwards,

like (Chinese)

but it is more common in English

to actually turn the whole thing into a question.

The next thing I wanted to mention is the word 'already'.

So I think in Chinese, it's common to say

(Chinese)

Like to express that something is finished.

It's happened, it's done.

People might say, "I already saw it."

So whilst in English

it also means that something is finished.

There's a bit more emphasis on it's already been done.

So if you say, "I've already done it."

It can sound a bit defensive.

Like, "I've already done it."

Like the emphasis is on, it's finished, it's done.

Like, "I've already done it, I've already seen it."

Like, "Why are you asking me?

I've already seen it."

Which I think is not what people mean to say

but I've just noticed this slight tone,

difference in tone.

The next point I wanted to mention

is to do with the phrase 'excuse me'.

Now, 'excuse me', is probably a strange one

'cause you're thinking 'excuse me' sounds very polite.

Maybe even more polite than sorry

which it is when used in the right context.

The times that I most frequently hear 'excuse me' used

is maybe on the street when there's a stranger

who wants to ask me something, they'll say 'excuse me'

And it's a very polite way to just open conversation

and ask for something, for some help maybe.

Another way that I hear this phrase used

is on the street when someone is annoyed with you.

So let's say that you're standing in the way

or you've done something to bother someone

they might say, "Excuse me."

And there's a tone of annoyance there.

And I'll talk a bit more in detail

about how to tell if a British person is annoyed

or angry in a later video.

They're using this phrase 'excuse me'

to express their irritation with you.

And the other time that you might hear

the phrase 'excuse me' used is perhaps in a big lecture

where there's many people

and you want to ask a question

and again, there's more distance between the speakers.

Okay, so bearing those three contexts in mind

if you are one-to-one with someone

and you want to say, "Oh, let's look at this."

If you say 'excuse me' it can sound a bit jarring

because it suddenly sounds like there's more distance

between you, maybe sounds a bit more formal

or maybe like you could be annoyed

or irritated about something.

So I wouldn't use the phrase 'excuse me'

in a one-to-one situation.

I would say something like, "Oh, sorry

can we just take a quick look at that?"

So notice again how I've changed it into a question.

Can we just take a look at this?

And it doesn't mean that you're actually

asking for permission, you're letting the person know

please, look here.

Okay, the next aspect is 'I want'.

We're often taught as children not to say

'I want' like this, it should be 'I would like'.

You know, some parents have phrases like,

'I want doesn't get'.

It should be 'I would like it' or 'please can I have it?'

So don't say 'I want', say 'I would like'.

So those are some sort of subtle aspects I've noticed.

And then I just wanted to mention quickly

about hedging and how to use it.

If you want to say 'this way is better'...

'I think this way might be better'

So you're adding a sense of uncertainty

which makes you sound more polite.

Another example is 'I don't know why',

can become 'I'm not quite sure why'.

Another one, 'this was wrong'.

'I think there was something that

might not have been quite right here.

Could you take another look at...?'

So then you're offering further suggestions.

Okay, so you can see all of this flowery language

that's added in to make the speaker sound less harsh,

less direct and therefore more polite.

From these examples you can see

how convoluted the British way of speaking is

I know many Chinese speakers find

English emails confusing.

In the future, I'll talk about that

in more detail, but the topic of the next

video is discussing a stereotype against

East Asian people. I hope you like it.

Thank you for watching, I'm Susie, see you soon!