English question(Rip Van Winkle)?

Question

hi

I'm studying English.Could you please help me?

Let's say you live in a foreign country for a long time,

and you go back to your home town after 10 years.

Your home town has completely changed you felt like a stranger.In this situation,do you say

"I felt like Rip Van Winkle"

I got this from the dictionary,but I've never heard this.

Thanks.

Answer 1

"Rip Van Winkle" is a short story by the American author Washington Irving published in 1819, as well as the name of the story's fictional protagonist.

The story of Rip Van Winkle is set in the years before and after the American Revolutionary War. Rip Van Winkle, a villager of Dutch descent, lives in a nice village at the foot of New York's Catskill Mountains. One autumn day he escapes his nagging wife by wandering up the mountains. After encountering strangely dressed men, rumored to be the ghosts of Henry Hudson's crew, who are playing nine-pins, and after drinking some of their liquor, he settles down under a shady tree and falls asleep. He wakes up twenty years later and returns to his village.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rip_Van_Win...

Answer 2

Some people wouldn't know what you were talking about.

Rip Van Winkle is a man who fell asleep and when he woke up 20 years had passed.

Answer 3

Yes, because he fell magically asleep for a long time and woke up to find his town completely changed.  It's a fable.  :o)  It's also a highly specific idiom, which is probably why you haven't heard it.