Posted on 11/06/2005 1:40:30 AM PST by F14 Pilot
GREENVILLE, S.C. (AP) - U.S. Ambassador to Canada David Wilkins came back to South Carolina this week to share some tales from the north.
The former South Carolina House speaker spoke Thursday to business leaders at the South Carolina Chamber of Commerce.
Wilkins may have shocked his former colleagues when he greeted them in French, but he later went on to explain the language barrier also applies to English-speaking people in Canada who may not understand some Southern ways of saying things.
"There's no Canadian equivalent of 'y'all,' " said Wilkins, who represented Greenville in the Statehouse for 25 years - 11 of those as speaker. "So I have to explain to my Canadian friends that the plural of 'y'all' is 'all y'all.' "
Wilkins said he once spent 15 minutes explaining about a campaign event called a "peanut boil." Things got a little clearer when the reporters he was talking to realized he wasn't say "bowl."
After arriving in Ottawa on June 29, Wilkins has traveled more than 70,000 miles getting to know Canada's places and people. He described them as warmer toward Americans than some news reports suggest.
He learned the importance of his role, when comments he made during debate about U.S. tariffs on softwood lumber made headlines for weeks.
"They give great importance to what we say and what we do," Wilkins said. "Anything you say is scrutinized and given attention to."
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Poor Ambassador Wilkins, he probably needs delousing after spending all that time in Kanuckistan.
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