I was reading something today totally unrelated to anything food related when I came across something which grabbed my attention.
As I'm sure everyone knows, English has these little idioms we use when someone asks a dumb question with an obvious answer. We use rhetorical question such as:
"Do bears shit in the woods?"
"Is the pope a catholic?"
The writer of the piece I was reading used "Do children hate broccoli?" with exactly the same meaning - "Of course. Everyone knows that!"
Other languages have the same constructs. That one works in English, but if I were to translate it to Chinese, it wouldn't work that way at all. It would just be a rather strange but literal question.
And I see that not only as a linguistic difference, but a cultural one regarding children's food choices.
For the record, both my children loved broccoli; it was me who was reticent on the matter. Still not my favourite.
