Essential English phrases

Cleveland's own name for itself, popularised by the Cavaliers and now on everything from beer cans to airport signage. Using it marks you as someone who lives here rather than visits.

Cold air crossing warm Lake Erie picks up moisture and dumps it as snow inland. It is why the forecast can say two inches downtown and eighteen twenty miles east, on the same afternoon.

The lake-effect corridor running east of the city through Chesterland, Chardon and into Geauga County. Annual snowfall there can be double the west side's. It is a genuine factor in choosing where to live.

The Cuyahoga River divides the city and the split is cultural as much as geographic. People genuinely organise their lives around one side, and 'I don't cross the river' is said only half as a joke.

The low industrial river valley between the two sides, now bars, boat docks and offices on the East Bank. Still working docks upstream — you will be held at a lift bridge for a freighter.

The Regional Income Tax Agency, which collects municipal income tax for roughly half of Ohio's municipalities. Used as a verb — 'have you done your RITA?' — and it demands a return from every adult resident even when no tax is owed.

The strip of grass between the pavement and the kerb. Almost nowhere else in the English-speaking world calls it this — it is a north-east Ohio marker, and it appears in city ordinances about who mows it.

The Midwestern interjection for a small accidental collision or a squeeze past someone — 'ope, just gonna sneak past ya'. You will start saying it within a year without deciding to.

The Cleveland Clinic, and by extension the health-care economy generally. It is the largest employer in Ohio, and in this city 'my wife works at the Clinic' explains a whole household's life.

The RTA's rail network — the Red, Blue and Green lines. The Red Line has run from downtown to Hopkins airport since 1968, the first such link in North America.

The freeway loop wrapped around downtown where I-90 and I-77 meet. Traffic reports assume you know where the Inner Belt Bend and the Dead Man's Curve are.

Cleveland's own sandwich: grilled kielbasa in a bun under chips, coleslaw and barbecue sauce. Invented here and effectively unavailable outside north-east Ohio.