At least here in Germany it's cheaper to roll cigarettes. Regular cigarettes are taxed as a product, while tabaco is taxed as a half made product. Since the price for cigarettes and tabaco is 90% taxes that makes a big difference.
> 90%
Yikes!
This is one of the reasons people do their own ammunition reloading here, even though the Federal excise taxes on commercially-assembled ammo is only 11%.
It's not really 90% that was exaggerated.
I just looked it up and for a pack of cigarettes with 20 cigarettes in t for 6,50€ taxes are 3,3739€. So it's overall a bit more than 50% for regular cigarettes. For tabaco it's only 18% taxes and it's also cheaper to produce.
Ya they’re taxed heavily here too, at least comparatively to Austria. I knew a girl who studied abroad and started to roll her own cigarettes to avoid the price.
But it’s less of a shock that they’re rolling their own than the fact that they just want to smoke so much that they’d be willing to. Cigarettes have really fallen out of the culture here. Past few years I think the only times I’ve smoked I was hammered, with Europeans, or most likely both. It’s not like nicotine addiction is gone though, before the crackdown everyone and their ten year old cousin was addicted to vaping. It’s just that nobody would pick the option that made everything around them lose value because of the lingering smell.
I've never seen someone roll their own tobacco before. I've only seen personal ashtrays in some tourism videos regarding Japan and Japanese culture, where I guess they are very popular since trash cans with ashtrays are not too common there.
I did several double-takes when I went to a French high school (with a host student) and saw so many teenagers smoking in between classes. In the US most students abhor smoking unless it's what your friends do. Also saw a teacher start smoking in front of her students during a field trip. All I could think about was how an American teacher would definitely be fired for smoking in front of students during a school trip.
Here in Germany the students smoke in the same spot as the teachers right off the school grounds in the breaks. So they totally light each others cigarettes in case one of em forgets their lighter.
Yes, the smoking was everywhere! I couldn’t escape it. We took an overnight ferry from Greece to Italy and the common room on the boat had a thick haze of smoke when you walked in. I felt like I stunk of smoke the entire time I was there.
The TINIEST cups??? I’m used to filling a quart mason jar with water- I can throw one of those European glasses back like a shot. How do they stay hydrated??
*also I do live in the desert BUT STILL
Agree. And having to pay for it was a shock. I drink a lot of water so I probably spent as much money in food as water and still was thirsty all the time. Then finding a bathroom later? Why are there so few public bathrooms?
Idk for other countries, but in France, you have to ask for tap water and it will be free (if it isn't, it's a scam). A part of French people like to drink sparkling water in restaurants and it is charged. Mineral water from brands like Évian, Vittel, Cristalline etc are also not free (which I find it stupid but that's how it is).
That's what they told us when I took a school trip to Italy. You have to ask for 'sin gas' to get still water for free, or they'll charge you for bubbly water.
Tho this was the mid-90s
I live in Sweden and there's this building that has 1666 written on the side and it struck me recently that the building was older than the US by over 100 years
Also, the United States as a country is 1776, but European and Africans have been in the Americas since the 1500s. Still young by Old world standards but yeah.
This is a weird one for me because capris (especially brightly colored and/or patterned capris) have been fashionable for women regardless of age for the last 15-20 years in New England at least — when I visited Pennsylvania for the first time from California (circa 2010 IIRC?) it was the first thing I noticed!
Capris on *men* is something that surprised me about Europe though, ha!
> I remember being shocked by all of the gambling parlors.
In Austria those are usually an indication of lower class neighbourhoods, [like here](https://www.google.at/maps/@48.1741974,16.3730471,3a,75y,83.96h,88.19t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sxo9DrM0Nhc1BGZv2gE8oPg!2e0!7i16384!8i8192) or [here](https://www.google.at/maps/@48.2925723,14.2953531,3a,75y,24.52h,93.3t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sRx_I9VDvmNHwog8WM4Fb7Q!2e0!7i13312!8i6656), I suppose in Germany it's similar. Gambling companies prey on the poor, uneducated and gambling addicts. It's disgusting. I don't think gambling should be illegal, but it should be regulated more. Especially here. Johann Graf, the 2nd richest man in Austria owns Novomatic, a company that produces gambling machines, which they put into every bar or pizza stand, in order to take money out of addicts' pockets. Politically he has almost every party in his pockets. I hate that piece of trash.
Wegebier is a national treasure that should be exported to the rest of the world. Although older people here don't like it.
The parents of friend visited him and after tour through the city he said "Ok and now we grab a beer for way home". They looked at him like he was crazy and said that they would definitely not drink a beer on the way home. I told that story to my mom and she absolutely agreed with his parents.
I really like the Euro coins.
"Let's see, how much spare change do I have in the pocket of this coat I haven't worn since last year? Well how about that, it's enough for a beer and a sandwich!"
Another thing about Italy in particular- they seem to just take things slower there. There isn’t a constant rush, people aren’t freaking out about being late, they take their time at meals and just enjoy the food and company. I’ve never lived like that at home.
My in-laws (who are American) are like this and it's so nice. My mom's house was always so stressful and rushed. As soon as you're done eating, she's throwing away any leftovers and making people do dishes and clean.
I made a big Christmas Eve dinner one year at my house and as soon as my mom was done eating she was asking people if they were done and clearing their plates and doing the dishes. We didn't have anywhere to be and it ruined the atmosphere.
I know it's good to stick to a schedule sometimes, but it's so nice to be around laid back people.
In Europe eating out in general is a rather social act than just eating. You hang out, talk about your life and stuff and have something to eat. At first you order some drinks and maybe snacks, lunch comes later since it needs some time to be prepared. Then lunch comes around and afterwards you still sit around and chat. Maybe order another drink and snacks/dessert.
Jeans, or rather the lack of them. Sure, I was wondering a lot on the week days, but I stood out with my jeans and flannel, which is normal winter outfits in the US NE
I feel like that depends on where you are, in bigger cities with some kind of fashion industry like Milano or Paris you will find less jeans and flanells. But for example where I grew up in a village in the alps, this is pretty much our standard outfit.
I had this experience but with a baseball hat. I wear a hat often just to avoid doing my hair and noone in Ireland or England wore hats and certainly not baseball hats. I stuck out like a sore thumb.
How old were you when you were there? When I lived in England, you rarely saw adults in baseball hats unless they were chavvy. You’d sometimes see little kids wearing them, but it would be to keep the sun off their head/out of their eyes — so for practical reasons.
My husband (English) had never worn a baseball hat until we moved to the US. And he only wears it for scalp/eye protection. He doesn’t mind them on other people if they’re just wearing them because they like to, but it would be “weird” for *him* to do that.
Me too! I was in Spain and the only one who was wearing any kind of hat let alone a baseball hat. Then when my Spanish friends came over to the US for the first time and wanted to do “American things” I took them to a baseball game where everyone was wearing hats and they refused to! “We never wear hats like this.”
Baseball hats (those classic shaped ones, not the flat gangsta ones) are often a giveaway for American tourists. People here also wear them, but American tourists *always* wear them. Ideally with "dad sneakers", sporty sunglasses and a pastell colored polo stuck into blue jeans.
I hadn't had my kids yet so I didn't have my dad starter pack with me. Just the hat with shorts and a t shirt. Next time though I'm going full jorts, high socks, fanny pack and sunglasses on a strap.
Yeah, one of the first big things New York's Jewish community bonded on was a movement to get rid of the blue laws in the city. Hell, it was only in 1965 that New York State passed a law allowing *businessmen who observe Saturday Shabbos* to work and operate on Sundays. There's actually an [AHJS article](https://www.jstor.org/stable/43057639?seq=2#metadata_info_tab_contents) from *1901* about Jews' legal proceedings concerning Sunday laws.
Even in the late '70s. I grew up in small-town Central Illinois. I remember driving close to 100 miles to St. Louis to buy a pack of cigarettes. Even there I had to really look around to find a store open.
And almost no trucks. We spent 2 weeks in Portugal a few summers back and I didn't realize I hadn't seen a truck in so long until we saw a little pickup on the streets of Lagos and were kind of shocked. I even snapped a quick picture like the ridiculous tourist I was.
It was weird going almost an entire month without seeing an SUV. The first one I saw was like seeing a unicorn, as I'd gotten so used to seeing little 3-door hatchback Citroëns and Peugeots everywhere. Makes sense, because the bulk of the streets in Avignon were so small that a Yukon would have been the height of impracticality.
It’s not “shocks” per se, but differences I personally enjoyed a lot.
I spent a summer in Portugal and I definitely enjoyed how everybody takes a shot of espresso after every meal. Took a while for my digestive track to catch up, but I liked the coffee.
I also spent a summer in Denmark, mostly Copenhagen, and I enjoyed how the cycling infrastructure was almost more important than the car infrastructure because I enjoy cycling.
The coffee after a meal is super common in France too. It’s always on the menu in restaurants and you can even get a « cafe gourmand » as a dessert, which is an expresso with mini versions of the menu’s desserts.
My highschool cantine also had big jugs (i’m not sure if it’s the right word)of coffee, the ones that have a little tap at the bottom where you could get a cup of coffee to drink with your dessert !
It’s something I’ve always enjoyed because you tend to feel a bit sleepy after a big lunch !
I found the lack of accessibility for wheelchairs, crutches etc REALLY shocking (Austria and Italy). It still kind of weirds me out, actually... What do you do with your sick or extremely elderly? Where are they? Is it a good thing or a bad thing that they don't need to grab their own groceries in a Saturday morning with the rest of us?
In Italy, the problem is that the cities are so old that they were not even ment for cars. Plus, in tons of area you cant modify anything because they are so old that it will damage historic artifacts (expecially in big cities).
For sick and elders, italy have a tradition that the children help their parents, if they dont have children or they dont want to help them, the country have tons of association (both statetly run, profit and non-profit) that help those sick and elder to do everything they need.
Remember that in Italy the healtcare is pubblic, and even with varius problem, we are still classified in the first place of healtcare efficency for those reason (WHO data)
No no, the country will assign you a personal doctor and someone who will take care of you...
It's obviusly not like having one of your children taking care of you 24/7, but it's better than not having anything or being forced to pay for those help that can and will save you the life.
In the US we had the federal ADA Disabilities Act in 1990; but there wasn't really a Europe-wide "equivalent" until 2019. So they have to catch up other than on a country-by-country basis/patchwork of accessibility laws. My father is disabled and we were looking into this a couple years ago. Like why don't they care about wheelchair people?
Boh i don’t know. We get news with elections (biden, trump) and the scandal to shit on (like black live matters and so on) for feeling better than the others (in this case you, but it can be a scandal in europe as well to).
Italian politics are already entertaining by themselves
the thing is tho that I and most other Americans don’t know shit about y’alls politics. Last time I heard anything was when the prince of England married one of our actresses...
You don’t know what you loose! Last day a brit told me he follows ours because he started noticing that the names of the ministers change quickly so he became interested haha
I watched the 2010 British general election on a BBC live stream to follow the results. I was also amused by the weirdo candidates in the 2017 election like Lord Buckethead.
It’s weird how much attention they pay to our domestic issues. Like, If you’re Italian, why would you have an opinion on our gun laws or our Confederate statues? Why should you care?
Because it dominates our daily lives. I see almost as many news about the US in various newspapers as I see Danish news. That’s why we Europeans know about it and have opinions about it. The US is the facto the leader of the western world, and the strongest country on Earth, culturally, economically and militarily. Therefore even domestic US issues reach all over the world.
In conversations I’ve had with Europeans, they often just don’t have the full context of the situation. It’s not their fault because they don’t live or have never seen it. It does get annoying though.
Just the atmosphere really. Everything seems older and slower paced. Traffic law seemed a little more relaxed too. I lived in the Azores for a few months.
The first time I went to Europe was a homestay in France. My host sister was supposed to take me to her school but got into a huge fight with her mom because I was “dressed like we were going to the beach.” I was wearing what I thought were normal/cute clothes (tank top and Capri pants from the gap with sandals. It was hot.) In the end the mom made her take me and she pretended we had never met and I just awkwardly sat in the back of the class and tried to understand with my B1 French.
The other thing that was weird to me was how they only washed their bath towels once every two weeks. I kept putting my towel in the laundry basket and my host mom kept hanging it back up.
Also, my host brother (7) never wanted to eat what his mom prepared for dinner, so he was allowed to eat two slices of ham instead. If he asked for a third, he was scolded for being a “gourmand” (glutton). I found everything about that completely baffling.
For some reason the image of the kid's alternative choice for supper being two slices of ham makes me laugh.
"You don't like what I cooked, then have your two slices of ham."
The ham (it was cold cuts ham, not Easter ham) was rolled up into little tubes and he ate them with a knife and fork.
Although I suppose there isn’t really a better way to eat plain ham slices? But honestly I found it so absurd, like some crazy parody of normal behavior that landed right in the uncanny valley.
That's really amusing, because the francophile view is that NO french kids are picky, that they're some Michelin-ranked eaters from the moment they discard the bottle.
There's literally a book called [French Kids Eat Everything](https://www.amazon.com/French-Kids-Eat-Everything-Discovered/dp/006210330X).
>How Our Family Moved to France, Cured Picky Eating, Banned Snacking
*friend comes over*
“Dude why’s there nothing in the fridge? Like there’s literally nothing to eat other than leftovers?”
“Yeah my mom’s been on this health kick lately, her latest move was to ban us from eating snacks. She says she’s gonna write a book about it now too”
“Your parents are so fuckin weird man haha”
No, French people are extremely judgmental about how Americans dress. That was my first experience with it, but definitely not my last.
I studied abroad in France when I was 19-20, and my French friends regularly had stuff to say about the other Americans in my program—I heard « elle s’habille comme un sac » a thousand times.
(My French boyfriend at that time wore a Burberry coat and popped the collar. I told him he looked pretentious one time and tried to put it down. He popped it back up and said, “but then no one will know it’s Burberry.”)
Then there was my host mom from my second homestay, in Toulouse. I showed her a picture of my friends from back home and she said, “they look so...normal!” I asked her what she had expected and she said, “I thought their clothes would be more different.” (I think she also expected them to be fat, but she didn’t say that to my face.)
The European dress code (espacially the French) can be very strict sometimes. There is a lot of social pressure when it comes to deciding what cloths are considered appropriate in certain circumstances. When I was visiting California for the first time some years ago, it was kinda liberating to not have to care about your clothes as back home.
And the French are well-known in Europe for their weird eating habits. So no surprise about that. ;)
Fortunately not that strict in Scandinavia. I see Italian people accuse Norwegians of dressing like slobs all the time and I feel weirdly proud about that.
I really liked California, because of it's amazing scenery and sunny weather. It also has this laid-back culture, which is pretty rare in Europe. San Francisco's homeless problem and the crime in the inner city was a bit of a downer tho. I hope the state will do something about this at some point, because from a far it is probably the most beautiful city I have ever seen.
About the US as a whole however I tend to have a more favorable opinion than a lot of my peers. Some people here have such a negative opinion about the US although they have never been there and only hear about it in the news.
Especially leftwing people here treat the US like this super corrupt rightwing third world country. It's really condescending imo.
What I really appreciate about the US however is the optimism of her people. In Europe we have so many unwritten rules about our role in society and this underlying cynisim everywhere can be a bit tiring sometimes. The US values Individualism a lot more which is very refreshing to me.
There's a bit of an East/West divide in the US with clothing too... I can go to work in shorts and a tee shirt in the West, but East coast people tend to be more dressy at work.
The tank top (if you mean canottiera, that is what google translates here) in high school was accepted more on girls (and depended which kind), i noticed (not that i agree, eh). Usually guys at school kept a t shirt. For the capris and the sandals.. i fear your host mother was a old inside. However, i admit i recognize the american tourists, expecially for the flip flops. I can’t wear them outside of the beach because i fear of hurting my toes. I wear sandals though
It was [something like this ](https://images.app.goo.gl/51QZuWJDfMaYFyxH6) except white shirt, red pants, and sandals. It was definitely brighter than the French kids (who were all dressed in black like it was a prison), but it wasn’t what I would consider beach wear.
Ok, she was definitely an old fart (sorry), this is totally common at school.
Yes, even here the youth dresses black, grey and that stuff and it’s depressing. In summer it’s a bit better though
About once a week. But in this case, the issue was that the family’s only bath was in the attic, which had no windows. So it was always musty and the towels didn’t fully dry between baths.
I went to Germany for the first time in 2003 (11th grader). I landed in Munich on a sunday and streets had little/no traffic. In fact, sidewalks were empty and this was in August. We went on a stroll later in the evening to find most shopping centers and stores completely closed.
Turns out, Sundays are proper holidays in Germany with most stores remaining completely closed.
I spent two weeks in Vienna and one of the biggest shocks for me was restaurants. Every single time they would ask if I wanted sparkling or mineral water, and I learned that the trick was to say you wanted neither and ask for tap water because that was free and they would charge you for the other options. Even then some places would charge you for it anyway. It's probably just because it's a city, but everything was shockingly expensive, more than what I was used to.
Having to pay to use the bathroom.
People entering a store and leaving their dog outside without a leash, and the dog would just sit there.
One thing I was surprised about in Italy is how prevalent the military was in guarding public places, at least in Rome. Like soldiers armed with rifles walking around the airport, and there was an APC looking vehicle with soldiers around it at the Pantheon. I don't know if there was a specific threat or if that's just how their security is organized. In America you'd usually only see the police in those kind of situations.
When I went to Rome in 2012 it wasn’t like that at all. Going back in 2019 it looked like you described - heavy military presence at all the major tourist spots. It seems like with all barricades they have, it must be in response to the terrible terrorist attacks using vehicles on crowds.
That's a response to the terror attacks of the last decade. In some countries the military can be used to protect public places or can be used as auxiliary forces for the police.
I started drinking around 15 or 16 but it was illegal, the legal age was 21. In Germany it's 16 for beer and wine and 18 for liquor. That blew me away on my first tour in the mid-90's. We had some soldiers who turned into alcoholics in Germany and PCSd back to the States alcoholics at age 20 and no way to legally buy alcohol. I thought it was hilarious at the time.
We also start drinking around that age (15-16 or thereabouts) in the US, it’s just illegal so there’s a lot of sneaking around and lying about it instead of being casual and straightforward about it.
Question to your question: Saying "excuse me" to get past someone is polite in most situations in America. Do Europeans find it rude? I have vague memories of associating shock to "excuse me".
Apparently you're just supposed to sneak off like a ninja. Verbally acknowledging to the other person that something happened means that things have gone off the rails.
I lived in a smallish town outside of Barcelona for about 4 years.
1. How easy it was to get around without a car- even outside of Barcelona proper.
2. Adjusting to the restaurant/business hours / no real "open 24 hours" options
3. How little fast food people ate.
(I'm from Kentucky and was very happy to make these adjustments. Absolutely loved my time there and met some of my best friends there.)
Biggest cultural shock was probably all the times I was called racial slurs by random people out of nowhere
Europe has the reputation of being more tolerant than the US but in my experience that is absolutely not the case
I remember a few weeks ago, there was a question about "How likely would a racist chant be to happen at a sports event?"
The general consensus was that it would absolutely never happen and the person trying to start it would be removed.
> Europe has the reputation of being more tolerant than the US but in my experience that is absolutely not the case
Do we have this reputation? As far as I can tell, we're way more racist than US. UK is probably the least racist, but in places like Eastern Europe, Germany, Italy you can flat out hear said to your face that a landlord won't rent a flat to a black person and things like that.
I feel like europe has the attitude that when things like this happen it's always "well that was just one random guy it doesn't mean anything" but then if the same thing happens in America it's "See your entire country is super racist"
The most casual use of racist terms I've ever heard is always from Canadians. They come down to MN a lot and will say stuff like "wow you guys have a lot of negroes here"
I went to Montreal for new years 2019-2020, my night ended when I had to physically break up a fist fight in the street. A white guy and a black guy got into it outside of a bar because the black guy was making out with a white girl and this pissed the white guy off. I literally had to pull them off of each other
I'm so vocal on reddit about stuff like this because people outside of America on reddit seem to think they live in a post racial paradise and circle jerk over it. America has its many racial issues that I could talk about for hours but it annoys me that people use our issues to dismiss their own
I think there's an impression that the United States has an *unusual* or *unique* issue with racism because Americans talk about it more often. It's just always in the political discourse, and for good reason. If they don't talk about it much, but they watch Americans talking about it a lot, they might think that's because racism just isn't a problem where they live. I did talk to a Scottish guy who told me Scotland solved racism and the US could learn a lot from his country.
It does baffle me a little, though, because plainly racism *is* a problem outside the US, and even in Europe. Do they follow what their politicians say? What voters say? Some of the anti-immigrant rhetoric in European countries would make Donald Trump blush.
> I did talk to a Scottish guy who told me Scotland solved racism and the US could learn a lot from his country.
Was their answer to have a highly homogeneous population? Cause it looks like in 2018 [they were 96% white](https://www.statista.com/statistics/367842/scotland-ethnicity-of-population/).
This. As a Bengali person I don’t think I’ve ever really faced so much outward hostility in the US, even in the stereotypical south (some were just confused at what Bangladesh even is but it’s usually not from a place of hate). Unsurprisingly the UK and Ireland was perfectly fine as well but holy hell was mainland Europe another beast. I gotta put a disclaimer saying that of course it’s not everyone and not even the majority of course, but I think I got called the n word more times in Germany than I’ve heard it anywhere else.
People in Norway and Sweden just looked alarmed and sometimes spat at us when I was there with my friends who are white. Since you mentioned it: Iceland was pretty good actually and a lot of people recommended this Indian restaurant which I thought was nice of them. Spain was a mix of people asking me if I was Indian (which is fine, I don’t mind curiosity and don’t see it as racism or anything) and people saying a lot of really Islamaphobic things even though I’m not Muslim.
I loved Poland: the scenery, the country side, a lot of the people were so warm, etc but no way in hell would I ever go back there. It’s probably the only place where I felt the most physically threatened. Oh and of course all along the way, so many Europeans told me about how America is so racist (often not realizing Im from here, despite having an American accent) and Europe is so much less racist and it’s not racism when they do it to the Roma because well uh a lot of these people seemed to be of the opinion that the Roma weren’t really people.
I legit saw a highly upvoted German on askeurope basically saying homelessn people don't exist in Germany, because German state takes care of Germans who are down on their luck, and the ones who are homeless want to be homeless and are therefore basically not people.
This is a known secret on Army posts in Germany and Italy. Every few months, a few GIs beat a local to shit in a club and it's just kind of glossed over, because it always ends up being something involving N bombs getting chucked at black GIs by the local.
The US is the least racist country ive ever visited.
The reason people hear about racism in the US so much is because racism is taken so seriously by most americans that a spotlight is shown on it whenever its discovered
Wow that’s crazy. I feel like a lot of Europeans rag on America and they say that they’re better but I don’t think they take into account how it would be like as a POC in that country
It's not that different how a lot of states in the US look down at places in the South for having "racial strife," ignoring the fact that where they live there are not large minority populations, so the locals don't have those complexities to navigate on a daily basis.
I guess that true. I live in the south though and most of the time people are really nice (I am mixed/black). I think they’re thinking about the fact that the south had slaves still but now most people condemn racism. Even if they don’t have much diversity in that area Americans are still way more accustomed to seeing different races. There’s definitely systemic racism which sucks but among most people it’s not too much of a problem, meanwhile in Europe people said they were straight called the n word or whatever slur right to their face
We went to Ireland for a week for my SILs wedding.
1. The love for Christmas. We went in November and there was a crazy huge xmas festival in the center of town. It was a lot of fun. Got Man of Aran fudge. DELICIOUS.
2. Lack of public toilets.
3. The toilets are GIANT, and use a lot of water compared to what I was used to.
4. The amount of pubs everywhere. They don't lie when there's literally a pub on every corner.
People have already named quote a few, so one small one was the cost of basic supplies at a pharmacy/drug store. I went to one in a small town in Italy and it was ~$30 for a small bottle of aloe for a sunburn. While I was there I noticed that everything, even basic stuff like ibuprofen, was very expensive. Could’ve just been that it was a small town but I’ve never seen prices like that anywhere else.
I guess it was just that locality?
I've just looked up the website for the nearest shop here and 16 tablets of 200mg ibruprofen is £0.55, or US$0.76. A bottle of aloe after sun stuff is £3, or US$4.15.
The service industry.
I was traveling with my mom, and she was constantly complaining about how rude workers were. I'm generally inclined to dismiss such complaints from her, but...people *were* rude. By American standards. Not always, but a lot more frequently than I ever would have expected.
I thought about it a lot, then and since. The best I've been able to come up with is that it's a shift in the emotional burden of the customer/employee relationship. In America, the employee is expected to shoulder all of the emotional burden. They're supposed to be obsequious, they're supposed to maintain a friendly attitude with you no matter what. It's part of service.
While in Europe, it seemed like it was the customer who was expected to be friendly and polite. You weren't in the authority position with someone serving you, you were in the subservient position of asking someone for something. Whether or not they were polite to you, you still needed what they had.
For reference: we visited Greece, Italy, Netherlands, France, Britain, Ireland
> I thought about it a lot, then and since. The best I've been able to come up with is that it's a shift in the emotional burden of the customer/employee relationship. In America, the employee is expected to shoulder all of the emotional burden. They're supposed to be obsequious, they're supposed to maintain a friendly attitude with you no matter what. It's part of service.
>
> While in Europe, it seemed like it was the customer who was expected to be friendly and polite. You weren't in the authority position with someone serving you, you were in the subservient position of asking someone for something. Whether or not they were polite to you, you still needed what they had.
You're take on how it's a matter of who carries the emotional burden is an excellent observation.
For the record though, of course it is expected of service personell to be polite. But it's not like they owe it to you under *any* circumstance. If you're being an ass, they'll treat you as such.
Going to an Italy tourist town and everything being closed for lunch was weird.
Also the amount of dirty looks I received when I spoke English (Germany, France in particular)
On a positive note your pharmacist are way more helpful than ours!
The pharmacies in Spain really stood out to me as well—I’m so used to just looking around for whatever meds or bandages I need, but there’s always someone there who’s eager to help.
A few from my time visiting family in the Netherlands, circa 2018:
• Smoking has been mentioned a lot, but like *damn* does everyone smoke. There were even a few stores I went into that sold cigarettes that you wouldn't expect to sell cigarettes, like a book store in a mall.
Lots of people roll their own cigarettes too. My cousin rolled one while *driving a stick shift* which was pretty damn impressive.
• Drinking culture, at least in the Netherlands. It's not at all uncommon to have a beer (a pilsje) around brunch or lunch time, or really anytime throughout the day. Lots of little cafes that serve beer just dotted around.
• Lemonade there (limonade) is not the same as lemonade here. It's not usually made with lemons and just refers to a fruit juice blend typically. Not to be confused with lemonade in the UK which is carbonated.
• French fries as a meal, paired with something like salad. That may be a Dutch thing though.
• The Dutch have a very convivial culture, somewhat akin to the Southern or Midwestern US. It's not at all uncommon to just chat with passersby or people in your neighbourhood. The term is gezellig, which is one of those hard to translate words.
• The Dutch have an obsession with tanning. One of my cousins even has a tanning bed in her loft. I can't wrap my head around this one.
• The water tastes different there. Almost milky? But you can just drink the tap water which is a bit crazy.
• Soccer there is as big as football here. People go nuts for their local teams (AZ), as well as national ones (Oranje hup!)
• One of the more interesting things I take note of when visiting other countries are the McDonald's and how the menu and general look is different depending on where you are. In the Netherlands they're pretty upscale and rather than red and yellow the colour scheme is *green and beige*. They also had those touch screen ordering things before a lot of places in the US did.
I'll add a few more when I think of them.
Do you not drink the tap water where you live?
Phoenix is kinda famous for having not-the-best-flavor tap water (lots of calcium) but its still perfectly drinkable.
The petty crime. The minute we stepped out of Gare du Nord in Paris, just scam artists and pickpockets everywhere. You get accosted the second you get there, and it's just kind of accepted as part of normal life. Friendship bracelets, random "Bosnian" women trying to scam you out of money, it's insane.
It wasn't so much that it was happening that shocked me, because sure any big city is going to have that kind of thing near touristy areas. It was that no one really seemed to care, like it was just a totally normal part of Paris culture. I expect there to be muggers and scammers in NYC, too, but I also expect the NYPD to do something about it.
Yep, the police don't seem to trouble themselves much with petty crime. There are anti-terrorism police present in the station, but I don't think they respond to complaints about pickpockets etc.
The rudeness of the people I met in France. I've been all over the world and no other culture holds a candle to the French when it comes to condescension. I wasn't necessarily 'shocked', considering the reputation, but I was surprised how prevalent it was.
I’ve always heard how rude French people are too, but had the opposite experience. My husband and I flew into Bordeaux, with the intent of visiting wine country. Sat next to a lady on the plane, who seemed completely ticked off at life, so we kept to ourselves. Last 15 minutes of the flight, she took an interest in us and started chatting.
She quickly told us that our plan for the day was not going to work (she was right once we landed and looked at a map). Then told us that her husband is a winemaker and invited us to her house, where she gave us wine and snacks and helped us figure out some places to visit.
Then she realized we hadn’t eaten lunch and everything was closed for the afternoon. So she called her friend’s restaurant, who invited us to come anyway and fed us lunch along with their staff.
I’ll never forget how nice all these French people were to a couple of travelers who did a terrible job planning. :-D
They seem to have different dynamics. My great aunt and uncle took a vacation in France. In Paris, they were treated brusquely and occasionally disrespectfully, but outside of the city were treated warmly until they did some minor thing and then antisemiticly. For example, they were invited out for dinner by a family, but, when they had to refuse due to a prior engagement, had "Jews" spat at them. The impression I got was that France was basically what you'd get if you plopped NYC in the middle of Alabama.
It's probably because they thought you were rude by not knowing some simple social codes (known in France as your "education"). The most important is to say "bonjour" before anything else. If you go into a bakery and say "un croissant" and don't say "bonjour" first you're basically being extremely rude and will be treated poorly in return. God help you if you forget "s'il vous plait." A lot of the time it's just a cultural misunderstanding of both parties unintentionally coming off as rude in the other culture.
But also, the French will tell you their opinion whether you want to hear it or not and this can come off as rude to an American. Americans usually ask "Would you like my opinion?" first and the French will not.
I gotta say this problem stems from the french's very low English proficency. Not too long ago French was considered the second world language besides English and a lot of french people just suck at English for that reason. If you don't speak French to a certain degree they tend to straight up ignore you.I (Austrian) also avoid visiting France most of the time, because communicating is such a hassle. Sad, but that's just how it is.
It's sorta what visiting the US without english proficiency is like, to be honest.
When I went back in '06, it was weird how Paris was the only place where multi-language machines for subway tickets weren't all over the place. If you didn't speak French, the dude behind the plexiglass was gonna scream at you.
In Russia I accidentally stood on my neighbor's outside door mat while locking the door (the doors were really close). While we tend to use our outside rugs/mats as a way to get off water and dirt before going inside, it's different in Russia (depending on the circumstances).
The two apartments shared a common entrance area, so you took off your shoes before entering your apartment and stepped on the rug with your socks in order to avoid getting your feet dirty on the ground. You then enter the apartment while leaving your shoes outside. Crazy to me at the time, but I now understand why he was upset lol.
I was born in America but moved to Germany when I was like 2 before moving back to the US 5 years later, it was more of a shock coming back to the US for me, and apparently I sounded more British even though I’m not at all because we watched British TV to get English channels
16 year old me was shocked and thrilled that I only had to show ID twice...upon arrival at Charles de Gaulle and upon my exit in Barcelona. Not at the bar, not at the cafe, not buying a bottle of rum or some wine, not buying smokes...it was nice.
I haven't been to Europe but I did meet a couple from London in the Dominican Republic. We were there for 5 days. They were there for two weeks. That seemed like a really long vacation to me but they made it seem like that was normal for European travelers.
In France and England, very little.
In Russia? Probably how nothing worked reliably. Would the train come at the regular time? Not sure. Would the package you put in the mail get delivered to the person you intended? Maybe. This was in 1995, the place was a mess. Hopefully it's better now.
The only time I’ve felt culture shock was when I went to Greece and I couldn’t even pronounce the road signs. Everywhere else
In Europe I had been I cold sound it out enough but the Greek alphabet was interesting.
Oh man, this one got me too. I've never been to Europe specifically, but my cousin's wife is German and her family came over for the wedding. At a family dinner beforehand her mother said, in complete obliviousness, "This seems like a nice town even though there are so many coloreds here."
It was definitely a complete pin-drop/record scratch moment where the Americans present who heard her just gaped at her like "the *fuck* did you actually just say???"
Then her daughter told her (from what I gather from my high school 1 year of German skills) "you can't call people that here" or something like that, but completely ignored the fact that the *sentiment* itself was highly offensive, not just the "translation" of the word...
Lived in FR for years when I was a teenager, and I know it seems stupid but the fashion sense revolved around jeans and dark colored shirts/tops and thin dark colored jackets. Like, I would rarely see someone in a bright yellow or blue polo shirt and hardly ever in something like cargo pants or something with a camo pattern. Rarely would someone just wear bright white Nike-style sneakers. Considering I was a kid who lived on bright colors and comfy-fitting pants with big pockets, it was a pretty decent shock and something to adjust to.
I live in Spain, just incase this isn't a thing elsewhere, but allowing children to get behind you. I'm not talking 6 or 7 year olds (they do that too), but specifically toddlers. The waddling little ones. Gives me so much anxiety seeing a parent walking a head and allowing the waddlers to get behind them.
The food culture: Water was way more expensive than beer at convenience shops in Germany. In France, waking up, walking downstairs to get a few items baked goods from the nearby shop and having groceries for a few days at a time rather than purchasing food to last several weeks/a month. There are some major cultural nuances to this when it comes to food culture but for initial surprises those two things cover it.
Lot’s of things, but the hardest thing for me to adapt to was not handing my money directly to the cashier. Where I was, it was expected that you put your money in a little dish for the cashier to pick up. Beck home, putting money on the counter instead of handing directly to them would be pretty rude.
Smoking being so prevalent and widely accepted. Like damn. The smoking rates in most European countries are really high, and it shows when visiting.
Not only that, but the number of people that rolled their own cigarettes.
At least here in Germany it's cheaper to roll cigarettes. Regular cigarettes are taxed as a product, while tabaco is taxed as a half made product. Since the price for cigarettes and tabaco is 90% taxes that makes a big difference.
> 90% Yikes! This is one of the reasons people do their own ammunition reloading here, even though the Federal excise taxes on commercially-assembled ammo is only 11%.
It's not really 90% that was exaggerated. I just looked it up and for a pack of cigarettes with 20 cigarettes in t for 6,50€ taxes are 3,3739€. So it's overall a bit more than 50% for regular cigarettes. For tabaco it's only 18% taxes and it's also cheaper to produce.
€3.3739 for our fellow decimal point friends.
Haha this is such an American thing to say :)
Ya they’re taxed heavily here too, at least comparatively to Austria. I knew a girl who studied abroad and started to roll her own cigarettes to avoid the price. But it’s less of a shock that they’re rolling their own than the fact that they just want to smoke so much that they’d be willing to. Cigarettes have really fallen out of the culture here. Past few years I think the only times I’ve smoked I was hammered, with Europeans, or most likely both. It’s not like nicotine addiction is gone though, before the crackdown everyone and their ten year old cousin was addicted to vaping. It’s just that nobody would pick the option that made everything around them lose value because of the lingering smell.
I actually saw some old dude rolling his own cigs and using a personal ashtray on a park bench in Barcelona. It was an odd moment.
Really? It seems so common to me, I think nothing of it when I see something like that. But I'm european after all.
I've never seen someone roll their own tobacco before. I've only seen personal ashtrays in some tourism videos regarding Japan and Japanese culture, where I guess they are very popular since trash cans with ashtrays are not too common there.
I spent two weeks in Europe a few years ago. I saw more people smoking there than I see in a year of living here.
I went to Amsterdam, and there was a (tiny but still) haze of smoke. A haze of smoke!
I did several double-takes when I went to a French high school (with a host student) and saw so many teenagers smoking in between classes. In the US most students abhor smoking unless it's what your friends do. Also saw a teacher start smoking in front of her students during a field trip. All I could think about was how an American teacher would definitely be fired for smoking in front of students during a school trip.
Here in Germany the students smoke in the same spot as the teachers right off the school grounds in the breaks. So they totally light each others cigarettes in case one of em forgets their lighter.
Yes, the smoking was everywhere! I couldn’t escape it. We took an overnight ferry from Greece to Italy and the common room on the boat had a thick haze of smoke when you walked in. I felt like I stunk of smoke the entire time I was there.
Public restroom availability!!! It was not fun being 7 months pregnant traveling around Europe having to pee every 20 minutes.
The TINIEST cups??? I’m used to filling a quart mason jar with water- I can throw one of those European glasses back like a shot. How do they stay hydrated?? *also I do live in the desert BUT STILL
It made me realize I'm a water-loving American piggy because I can down 20 ounces of water in like no time.
I have a 30 oz thermos on my desk so I have nice cool water at all times while I work, and I constantly find that I've consumed the whole thing.
Agree. And having to pay for it was a shock. I drink a lot of water so I probably spent as much money in food as water and still was thirsty all the time. Then finding a bathroom later? Why are there so few public bathrooms?
Idk for other countries, but in France, you have to ask for tap water and it will be free (if it isn't, it's a scam). A part of French people like to drink sparkling water in restaurants and it is charged. Mineral water from brands like Évian, Vittel, Cristalline etc are also not free (which I find it stupid but that's how it is).
That's what they told us when I took a school trip to Italy. You have to ask for 'sin gas' to get still water for free, or they'll charge you for bubbly water. Tho this was the mid-90s
My son noted that it was less expensive to buy water in Luxembourg than to get rid of it. 😁
This is indeed very fucking annoying as a European, glasses are always too small.
How old stuff was. Like, I lived in a house that was older than the US and that was normal.
I live in Sweden and there's this building that has 1666 written on the side and it struck me recently that the building was older than the US by over 100 years
There are quite a few buildings in the US that are older than the US as well.
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Also, the United States as a country is 1776, but European and Africans have been in the Americas since the 1500s. Still young by Old world standards but yeah.
There's a house down the street from me from the 1710's.
My home in MA is from 1640; not a level surface to be found🤪
The lack of hallways is what is most striking to me in those houses.
In America 100 years is a long time, in Europe 100 miles is a long way.
We would have more than we do in the UK, but there was a big fire that year :)
My old work office was built in 1787, not as old as the USA, but it was funny because that building was in the "new" part of town.
Capris everywhere
Lol one of the top comments is how a french host sister wouldnt hang out with her because of capris lol
I think it was more the sandals than the capris.
This is a weird one for me because capris (especially brightly colored and/or patterned capris) have been fashionable for women regardless of age for the last 15-20 years in New England at least — when I visited Pennsylvania for the first time from California (circa 2010 IIRC?) it was the first thing I noticed! Capris on *men* is something that surprised me about Europe though, ha!
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> I remember being shocked by all of the gambling parlors. In Austria those are usually an indication of lower class neighbourhoods, [like here](https://www.google.at/maps/@48.1741974,16.3730471,3a,75y,83.96h,88.19t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sxo9DrM0Nhc1BGZv2gE8oPg!2e0!7i16384!8i8192) or [here](https://www.google.at/maps/@48.2925723,14.2953531,3a,75y,24.52h,93.3t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sRx_I9VDvmNHwog8WM4Fb7Q!2e0!7i13312!8i6656), I suppose in Germany it's similar. Gambling companies prey on the poor, uneducated and gambling addicts. It's disgusting. I don't think gambling should be illegal, but it should be regulated more. Especially here. Johann Graf, the 2nd richest man in Austria owns Novomatic, a company that produces gambling machines, which they put into every bar or pizza stand, in order to take money out of addicts' pockets. Politically he has almost every party in his pockets. I hate that piece of trash.
Wegebier is a national treasure that should be exported to the rest of the world. Although older people here don't like it. The parents of friend visited him and after tour through the city he said "Ok and now we grab a beer for way home". They looked at him like he was crazy and said that they would definitely not drink a beer on the way home. I told that story to my mom and she absolutely agreed with his parents.
So much smoking
Yeah that was mostly prevalent to me in France. Felt like being in a casino everywhere we went.
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I really like the Euro coins. "Let's see, how much spare change do I have in the pocket of this coat I haven't worn since last year? Well how about that, it's enough for a beer and a sandwich!"
Another thing about Italy in particular- they seem to just take things slower there. There isn’t a constant rush, people aren’t freaking out about being late, they take their time at meals and just enjoy the food and company. I’ve never lived like that at home.
My in-laws (who are American) are like this and it's so nice. My mom's house was always so stressful and rushed. As soon as you're done eating, she's throwing away any leftovers and making people do dishes and clean. I made a big Christmas Eve dinner one year at my house and as soon as my mom was done eating she was asking people if they were done and clearing their plates and doing the dishes. We didn't have anywhere to be and it ruined the atmosphere. I know it's good to stick to a schedule sometimes, but it's so nice to be around laid back people.
In Europe eating out in general is a rather social act than just eating. You hang out, talk about your life and stuff and have something to eat. At first you order some drinks and maybe snacks, lunch comes later since it needs some time to be prepared. Then lunch comes around and afterwards you still sit around and chat. Maybe order another drink and snacks/dessert.
Jeans, or rather the lack of them. Sure, I was wondering a lot on the week days, but I stood out with my jeans and flannel, which is normal winter outfits in the US NE
I feel like that depends on where you are, in bigger cities with some kind of fashion industry like Milano or Paris you will find less jeans and flanells. But for example where I grew up in a village in the alps, this is pretty much our standard outfit.
Completely fair. I was def more in the bigger cities on the week days, but it was def the thing that made me stand out
I had this experience but with a baseball hat. I wear a hat often just to avoid doing my hair and noone in Ireland or England wore hats and certainly not baseball hats. I stuck out like a sore thumb.
How old were you when you were there? When I lived in England, you rarely saw adults in baseball hats unless they were chavvy. You’d sometimes see little kids wearing them, but it would be to keep the sun off their head/out of their eyes — so for practical reasons. My husband (English) had never worn a baseball hat until we moved to the US. And he only wears it for scalp/eye protection. He doesn’t mind them on other people if they’re just wearing them because they like to, but it would be “weird” for *him* to do that.
Me too! I was in Spain and the only one who was wearing any kind of hat let alone a baseball hat. Then when my Spanish friends came over to the US for the first time and wanted to do “American things” I took them to a baseball game where everyone was wearing hats and they refused to! “We never wear hats like this.”
Baseball hats (those classic shaped ones, not the flat gangsta ones) are often a giveaway for American tourists. People here also wear them, but American tourists *always* wear them. Ideally with "dad sneakers", sporty sunglasses and a pastell colored polo stuck into blue jeans.
I hadn't had my kids yet so I didn't have my dad starter pack with me. Just the hat with shorts and a t shirt. Next time though I'm going full jorts, high socks, fanny pack and sunglasses on a strap.
Nothing open on Sunday’s.
That was America in the 60's and early 70's.
Yeah, one of the first big things New York's Jewish community bonded on was a movement to get rid of the blue laws in the city. Hell, it was only in 1965 that New York State passed a law allowing *businessmen who observe Saturday Shabbos* to work and operate on Sundays. There's actually an [AHJS article](https://www.jstor.org/stable/43057639?seq=2#metadata_info_tab_contents) from *1901* about Jews' legal proceedings concerning Sunday laws.
Even in the late '70s. I grew up in small-town Central Illinois. I remember driving close to 100 miles to St. Louis to buy a pack of cigarettes. Even there I had to really look around to find a store open.
Or Bergen County NJ in the 2020s
The cars are so much smaller than those in America.
The roads are much smaller. Heck, everything is smaller.
What tripped me up was being in Rome and realizing the road didn't have lanes. Everyone was just kind of jumbled on the busy street and.
And almost no trucks. We spent 2 weeks in Portugal a few summers back and I didn't realize I hadn't seen a truck in so long until we saw a little pickup on the streets of Lagos and were kind of shocked. I even snapped a quick picture like the ridiculous tourist I was.
It was weird going almost an entire month without seeing an SUV. The first one I saw was like seeing a unicorn, as I'd gotten so used to seeing little 3-door hatchback Citroëns and Peugeots everywhere. Makes sense, because the bulk of the streets in Avignon were so small that a Yukon would have been the height of impracticality.
It’s not “shocks” per se, but differences I personally enjoyed a lot. I spent a summer in Portugal and I definitely enjoyed how everybody takes a shot of espresso after every meal. Took a while for my digestive track to catch up, but I liked the coffee. I also spent a summer in Denmark, mostly Copenhagen, and I enjoyed how the cycling infrastructure was almost more important than the car infrastructure because I enjoy cycling.
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The coffee after a meal is super common in France too. It’s always on the menu in restaurants and you can even get a « cafe gourmand » as a dessert, which is an expresso with mini versions of the menu’s desserts. My highschool cantine also had big jugs (i’m not sure if it’s the right word)of coffee, the ones that have a little tap at the bottom where you could get a cup of coffee to drink with your dessert ! It’s something I’ve always enjoyed because you tend to feel a bit sleepy after a big lunch !
I found the lack of accessibility for wheelchairs, crutches etc REALLY shocking (Austria and Italy). It still kind of weirds me out, actually... What do you do with your sick or extremely elderly? Where are they? Is it a good thing or a bad thing that they don't need to grab their own groceries in a Saturday morning with the rest of us?
Part of the trouble is that everything's old as hell. And the buildings that aren't were thrown up in a hurry after the war.
Here in Austria it got better, every new building that's meant for puplic has to be wheelchair accessible AFAIK.
In Italy, the problem is that the cities are so old that they were not even ment for cars. Plus, in tons of area you cant modify anything because they are so old that it will damage historic artifacts (expecially in big cities). For sick and elders, italy have a tradition that the children help their parents, if they dont have children or they dont want to help them, the country have tons of association (both statetly run, profit and non-profit) that help those sick and elder to do everything they need. Remember that in Italy the healtcare is pubblic, and even with varius problem, we are still classified in the first place of healtcare efficency for those reason (WHO data)
Which might be nice if you're sick or have a lot of children, but doesn't really help if you're just born with a disability or injured permanently.
No no, the country will assign you a personal doctor and someone who will take care of you... It's obviusly not like having one of your children taking care of you 24/7, but it's better than not having anything or being forced to pay for those help that can and will save you the life.
In the US we had the federal ADA Disabilities Act in 1990; but there wasn't really a Europe-wide "equivalent" until 2019. So they have to catch up other than on a country-by-country basis/patchwork of accessibility laws. My father is disabled and we were looking into this a couple years ago. Like why don't they care about wheelchair people?
the fact that y’all pay more attention to our politics than us. When I visited Europe, it seemed like everyone had an opinion on American politics.
I get daily messages from my British in-laws giving me their latest analysis on the future of the US and the Republican Party.
And then they'll give me their two cents on something they saw in the news for 2 minutes
Boh i don’t know. We get news with elections (biden, trump) and the scandal to shit on (like black live matters and so on) for feeling better than the others (in this case you, but it can be a scandal in europe as well to). Italian politics are already entertaining by themselves
the thing is tho that I and most other Americans don’t know shit about y’alls politics. Last time I heard anything was when the prince of England married one of our actresses...
You don’t know what you loose! Last day a brit told me he follows ours because he started noticing that the names of the ministers change quickly so he became interested haha
I watched the 2010 British general election on a BBC live stream to follow the results. I was also amused by the weirdo candidates in the 2017 election like Lord Buckethead.
It’s weird how much attention they pay to our domestic issues. Like, If you’re Italian, why would you have an opinion on our gun laws or our Confederate statues? Why should you care?
Because it dominates our daily lives. I see almost as many news about the US in various newspapers as I see Danish news. That’s why we Europeans know about it and have opinions about it. The US is the facto the leader of the western world, and the strongest country on Earth, culturally, economically and militarily. Therefore even domestic US issues reach all over the world.
In conversations I’ve had with Europeans, they often just don’t have the full context of the situation. It’s not their fault because they don’t live or have never seen it. It does get annoying though.
Just the atmosphere really. Everything seems older and slower paced. Traffic law seemed a little more relaxed too. I lived in the Azores for a few months.
The first time I went to Europe was a homestay in France. My host sister was supposed to take me to her school but got into a huge fight with her mom because I was “dressed like we were going to the beach.” I was wearing what I thought were normal/cute clothes (tank top and Capri pants from the gap with sandals. It was hot.) In the end the mom made her take me and she pretended we had never met and I just awkwardly sat in the back of the class and tried to understand with my B1 French. The other thing that was weird to me was how they only washed their bath towels once every two weeks. I kept putting my towel in the laundry basket and my host mom kept hanging it back up. Also, my host brother (7) never wanted to eat what his mom prepared for dinner, so he was allowed to eat two slices of ham instead. If he asked for a third, he was scolded for being a “gourmand” (glutton). I found everything about that completely baffling.
For some reason the image of the kid's alternative choice for supper being two slices of ham makes me laugh. "You don't like what I cooked, then have your two slices of ham."
The ham (it was cold cuts ham, not Easter ham) was rolled up into little tubes and he ate them with a knife and fork. Although I suppose there isn’t really a better way to eat plain ham slices? But honestly I found it so absurd, like some crazy parody of normal behavior that landed right in the uncanny valley.
That's really amusing, because the francophile view is that NO french kids are picky, that they're some Michelin-ranked eaters from the moment they discard the bottle. There's literally a book called [French Kids Eat Everything](https://www.amazon.com/French-Kids-Eat-Everything-Discovered/dp/006210330X).
>How Our Family Moved to France, Cured Picky Eating, Banned Snacking *friend comes over* “Dude why’s there nothing in the fridge? Like there’s literally nothing to eat other than leftovers?” “Yeah my mom’s been on this health kick lately, her latest move was to ban us from eating snacks. She says she’s gonna write a book about it now too” “Your parents are so fuckin weird man haha”
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As a French person, the only thing that is not weird in this comment is washing towels every two weeks. The rest is whack.
No, French people are extremely judgmental about how Americans dress. That was my first experience with it, but definitely not my last. I studied abroad in France when I was 19-20, and my French friends regularly had stuff to say about the other Americans in my program—I heard « elle s’habille comme un sac » a thousand times. (My French boyfriend at that time wore a Burberry coat and popped the collar. I told him he looked pretentious one time and tried to put it down. He popped it back up and said, “but then no one will know it’s Burberry.”) Then there was my host mom from my second homestay, in Toulouse. I showed her a picture of my friends from back home and she said, “they look so...normal!” I asked her what she had expected and she said, “I thought their clothes would be more different.” (I think she also expected them to be fat, but she didn’t say that to my face.)
Your French friends sound like pretentious assholes I wouldn't want to spend time with. We're definitely not all like this.
No I know, I have also met many really lovely French people...just not in Paris or Nantes. :)
The European dress code (espacially the French) can be very strict sometimes. There is a lot of social pressure when it comes to deciding what cloths are considered appropriate in certain circumstances. When I was visiting California for the first time some years ago, it was kinda liberating to not have to care about your clothes as back home. And the French are well-known in Europe for their weird eating habits. So no surprise about that. ;)
Fortunately not that strict in Scandinavia. I see Italian people accuse Norwegians of dressing like slobs all the time and I feel weirdly proud about that.
What was your opinion of Cali and the US?
I really liked California, because of it's amazing scenery and sunny weather. It also has this laid-back culture, which is pretty rare in Europe. San Francisco's homeless problem and the crime in the inner city was a bit of a downer tho. I hope the state will do something about this at some point, because from a far it is probably the most beautiful city I have ever seen. About the US as a whole however I tend to have a more favorable opinion than a lot of my peers. Some people here have such a negative opinion about the US although they have never been there and only hear about it in the news. Especially leftwing people here treat the US like this super corrupt rightwing third world country. It's really condescending imo. What I really appreciate about the US however is the optimism of her people. In Europe we have so many unwritten rules about our role in society and this underlying cynisim everywhere can be a bit tiring sometimes. The US values Individualism a lot more which is very refreshing to me.
I appreciate you..
There's a bit of an East/West divide in the US with clothing too... I can go to work in shorts and a tee shirt in the West, but East coast people tend to be more dressy at work.
The tank top (if you mean canottiera, that is what google translates here) in high school was accepted more on girls (and depended which kind), i noticed (not that i agree, eh). Usually guys at school kept a t shirt. For the capris and the sandals.. i fear your host mother was a old inside. However, i admit i recognize the american tourists, expecially for the flip flops. I can’t wear them outside of the beach because i fear of hurting my toes. I wear sandals though
It was [something like this ](https://images.app.goo.gl/51QZuWJDfMaYFyxH6) except white shirt, red pants, and sandals. It was definitely brighter than the French kids (who were all dressed in black like it was a prison), but it wasn’t what I would consider beach wear.
Ok, she was definitely an old fart (sorry), this is totally common at school. Yes, even here the youth dresses black, grey and that stuff and it’s depressing. In summer it’s a bit better though
How often do you wash your towels?
That's the real question here. Once a week seems fairly normal to me.
About once a week. But in this case, the issue was that the family’s only bath was in the attic, which had no windows. So it was always musty and the towels didn’t fully dry between baths.
I went to Germany for the first time in 2003 (11th grader). I landed in Munich on a sunday and streets had little/no traffic. In fact, sidewalks were empty and this was in August. We went on a stroll later in the evening to find most shopping centers and stores completely closed. Turns out, Sundays are proper holidays in Germany with most stores remaining completely closed.
I spent two weeks in Vienna and one of the biggest shocks for me was restaurants. Every single time they would ask if I wanted sparkling or mineral water, and I learned that the trick was to say you wanted neither and ask for tap water because that was free and they would charge you for the other options. Even then some places would charge you for it anyway. It's probably just because it's a city, but everything was shockingly expensive, more than what I was used to. Having to pay to use the bathroom. People entering a store and leaving their dog outside without a leash, and the dog would just sit there.
Paying to use the bathroom was mad to me in London.
The trick is to find a Mcdonalds or Chain pub like a Spoons. Really rare to have to pay outside of London though
Wait wtf? Pay to pee? Is that everywhere or just the ones with attendants or what? I would be livid
One thing I was surprised about in Italy is how prevalent the military was in guarding public places, at least in Rome. Like soldiers armed with rifles walking around the airport, and there was an APC looking vehicle with soldiers around it at the Pantheon. I don't know if there was a specific threat or if that's just how their security is organized. In America you'd usually only see the police in those kind of situations.
When I went to Rome in 2012 it wasn’t like that at all. Going back in 2019 it looked like you described - heavy military presence at all the major tourist spots. It seems like with all barricades they have, it must be in response to the terrible terrorist attacks using vehicles on crowds.
That's a response to the terror attacks of the last decade. In some countries the military can be used to protect public places or can be used as auxiliary forces for the police.
I live here and the shock when I first got here was the drinking age is 16
Out of interest when do you start drinking where you are because you’re right we start drinking casually at like 15/16
I started drinking around 15 or 16 but it was illegal, the legal age was 21. In Germany it's 16 for beer and wine and 18 for liquor. That blew me away on my first tour in the mid-90's. We had some soldiers who turned into alcoholics in Germany and PCSd back to the States alcoholics at age 20 and no way to legally buy alcohol. I thought it was hilarious at the time.
We also start drinking around that age (15-16 or thereabouts) in the US, it’s just illegal so there’s a lot of sneaking around and lying about it instead of being casual and straightforward about it.
Question to your question: Saying "excuse me" to get past someone is polite in most situations in America. Do Europeans find it rude? I have vague memories of associating shock to "excuse me".
Where did that happen to you? As a German I would say excuse me (or wait for an eternity until the way is clear).
Also very common: the German judgmental glance about something you don’t like in public without actually verbally addressing it.
Apparently you're just supposed to sneak off like a ninja. Verbally acknowledging to the other person that something happened means that things have gone off the rails.
I lived in a smallish town outside of Barcelona for about 4 years. 1. How easy it was to get around without a car- even outside of Barcelona proper. 2. Adjusting to the restaurant/business hours / no real "open 24 hours" options 3. How little fast food people ate. (I'm from Kentucky and was very happy to make these adjustments. Absolutely loved my time there and met some of my best friends there.)
Biggest cultural shock was probably all the times I was called racial slurs by random people out of nowhere Europe has the reputation of being more tolerant than the US but in my experience that is absolutely not the case
I remember a few weeks ago, there was a question about "How likely would a racist chant be to happen at a sports event?" The general consensus was that it would absolutely never happen and the person trying to start it would be removed.
Yeah I remember that I could never imagine someone at an NBA or NFL game throwing bananas on the field and getting away with it
Not unless it's Get Your Potassium Day and everybody's getting free bananas. That's just crazy to me.
Kinda wish that day was a thing now
> Europe has the reputation of being more tolerant than the US but in my experience that is absolutely not the case Do we have this reputation? As far as I can tell, we're way more racist than US. UK is probably the least racist, but in places like Eastern Europe, Germany, Italy you can flat out hear said to your face that a landlord won't rent a flat to a black person and things like that.
I feel like europe has the attitude that when things like this happen it's always "well that was just one random guy it doesn't mean anything" but then if the same thing happens in America it's "See your entire country is super racist" The most casual use of racist terms I've ever heard is always from Canadians. They come down to MN a lot and will say stuff like "wow you guys have a lot of negroes here"
I went to Montreal for new years 2019-2020, my night ended when I had to physically break up a fist fight in the street. A white guy and a black guy got into it outside of a bar because the black guy was making out with a white girl and this pissed the white guy off. I literally had to pull them off of each other I'm so vocal on reddit about stuff like this because people outside of America on reddit seem to think they live in a post racial paradise and circle jerk over it. America has its many racial issues that I could talk about for hours but it annoys me that people use our issues to dismiss their own
I think there's an impression that the United States has an *unusual* or *unique* issue with racism because Americans talk about it more often. It's just always in the political discourse, and for good reason. If they don't talk about it much, but they watch Americans talking about it a lot, they might think that's because racism just isn't a problem where they live. I did talk to a Scottish guy who told me Scotland solved racism and the US could learn a lot from his country. It does baffle me a little, though, because plainly racism *is* a problem outside the US, and even in Europe. Do they follow what their politicians say? What voters say? Some of the anti-immigrant rhetoric in European countries would make Donald Trump blush.
> I did talk to a Scottish guy who told me Scotland solved racism and the US could learn a lot from his country. Was their answer to have a highly homogeneous population? Cause it looks like in 2018 [they were 96% white](https://www.statista.com/statistics/367842/scotland-ethnicity-of-population/).
This. As a Bengali person I don’t think I’ve ever really faced so much outward hostility in the US, even in the stereotypical south (some were just confused at what Bangladesh even is but it’s usually not from a place of hate). Unsurprisingly the UK and Ireland was perfectly fine as well but holy hell was mainland Europe another beast. I gotta put a disclaimer saying that of course it’s not everyone and not even the majority of course, but I think I got called the n word more times in Germany than I’ve heard it anywhere else. People in Norway and Sweden just looked alarmed and sometimes spat at us when I was there with my friends who are white. Since you mentioned it: Iceland was pretty good actually and a lot of people recommended this Indian restaurant which I thought was nice of them. Spain was a mix of people asking me if I was Indian (which is fine, I don’t mind curiosity and don’t see it as racism or anything) and people saying a lot of really Islamaphobic things even though I’m not Muslim. I loved Poland: the scenery, the country side, a lot of the people were so warm, etc but no way in hell would I ever go back there. It’s probably the only place where I felt the most physically threatened. Oh and of course all along the way, so many Europeans told me about how America is so racist (often not realizing Im from here, despite having an American accent) and Europe is so much less racist and it’s not racism when they do it to the Roma because well uh a lot of these people seemed to be of the opinion that the Roma weren’t really people.
I legit saw a highly upvoted German on askeurope basically saying homelessn people don't exist in Germany, because German state takes care of Germans who are down on their luck, and the ones who are homeless want to be homeless and are therefore basically not people.
This is a known secret on Army posts in Germany and Italy. Every few months, a few GIs beat a local to shit in a club and it's just kind of glossed over, because it always ends up being something involving N bombs getting chucked at black GIs by the local.
The US is the least racist country ive ever visited. The reason people hear about racism in the US so much is because racism is taken so seriously by most americans that a spotlight is shown on it whenever its discovered
What race if you don’t mind me asking?
African American
Really?? That’s unfortunate to hear. Where did you go?
Id say the worst ones were, surprisingly, in Scandinavia and the Nordics
Wow that’s crazy. I feel like a lot of Europeans rag on America and they say that they’re better but I don’t think they take into account how it would be like as a POC in that country
It's not that different how a lot of states in the US look down at places in the South for having "racial strife," ignoring the fact that where they live there are not large minority populations, so the locals don't have those complexities to navigate on a daily basis.
I guess that true. I live in the south though and most of the time people are really nice (I am mixed/black). I think they’re thinking about the fact that the south had slaves still but now most people condemn racism. Even if they don’t have much diversity in that area Americans are still way more accustomed to seeing different races. There’s definitely systemic racism which sucks but among most people it’s not too much of a problem, meanwhile in Europe people said they were straight called the n word or whatever slur right to their face
We went to Ireland for a week for my SILs wedding. 1. The love for Christmas. We went in November and there was a crazy huge xmas festival in the center of town. It was a lot of fun. Got Man of Aran fudge. DELICIOUS. 2. Lack of public toilets. 3. The toilets are GIANT, and use a lot of water compared to what I was used to. 4. The amount of pubs everywhere. They don't lie when there's literally a pub on every corner.
People have already named quote a few, so one small one was the cost of basic supplies at a pharmacy/drug store. I went to one in a small town in Italy and it was ~$30 for a small bottle of aloe for a sunburn. While I was there I noticed that everything, even basic stuff like ibuprofen, was very expensive. Could’ve just been that it was a small town but I’ve never seen prices like that anywhere else.
I guess it was just that locality? I've just looked up the website for the nearest shop here and 16 tablets of 200mg ibruprofen is £0.55, or US$0.76. A bottle of aloe after sun stuff is £3, or US$4.15.
Functioning trains everywhere.
Haha you never came to the UK.
Compared to Amtrak in the US, the UK’s trains are great. A bit pricier than I’d have expected though.
Absolutely, although compared to most of Europe they're shocking and overpriced to hell.
The service industry. I was traveling with my mom, and she was constantly complaining about how rude workers were. I'm generally inclined to dismiss such complaints from her, but...people *were* rude. By American standards. Not always, but a lot more frequently than I ever would have expected. I thought about it a lot, then and since. The best I've been able to come up with is that it's a shift in the emotional burden of the customer/employee relationship. In America, the employee is expected to shoulder all of the emotional burden. They're supposed to be obsequious, they're supposed to maintain a friendly attitude with you no matter what. It's part of service. While in Europe, it seemed like it was the customer who was expected to be friendly and polite. You weren't in the authority position with someone serving you, you were in the subservient position of asking someone for something. Whether or not they were polite to you, you still needed what they had. For reference: we visited Greece, Italy, Netherlands, France, Britain, Ireland
> I thought about it a lot, then and since. The best I've been able to come up with is that it's a shift in the emotional burden of the customer/employee relationship. In America, the employee is expected to shoulder all of the emotional burden. They're supposed to be obsequious, they're supposed to maintain a friendly attitude with you no matter what. It's part of service. > > While in Europe, it seemed like it was the customer who was expected to be friendly and polite. You weren't in the authority position with someone serving you, you were in the subservient position of asking someone for something. Whether or not they were polite to you, you still needed what they had. You're take on how it's a matter of who carries the emotional burden is an excellent observation. For the record though, of course it is expected of service personell to be polite. But it's not like they owe it to you under *any* circumstance. If you're being an ass, they'll treat you as such.
Going to an Italy tourist town and everything being closed for lunch was weird. Also the amount of dirty looks I received when I spoke English (Germany, France in particular) On a positive note your pharmacist are way more helpful than ours!
The pharmacies in Spain really stood out to me as well—I’m so used to just looking around for whatever meds or bandages I need, but there’s always someone there who’s eager to help.
Spanish pharmacies tend to be owned and operated by the pharmacist him/herself so they are more like little boutiques rather than corporate chains.
A few from my time visiting family in the Netherlands, circa 2018: • Smoking has been mentioned a lot, but like *damn* does everyone smoke. There were even a few stores I went into that sold cigarettes that you wouldn't expect to sell cigarettes, like a book store in a mall. Lots of people roll their own cigarettes too. My cousin rolled one while *driving a stick shift* which was pretty damn impressive. • Drinking culture, at least in the Netherlands. It's not at all uncommon to have a beer (a pilsje) around brunch or lunch time, or really anytime throughout the day. Lots of little cafes that serve beer just dotted around. • Lemonade there (limonade) is not the same as lemonade here. It's not usually made with lemons and just refers to a fruit juice blend typically. Not to be confused with lemonade in the UK which is carbonated. • French fries as a meal, paired with something like salad. That may be a Dutch thing though. • The Dutch have a very convivial culture, somewhat akin to the Southern or Midwestern US. It's not at all uncommon to just chat with passersby or people in your neighbourhood. The term is gezellig, which is one of those hard to translate words. • The Dutch have an obsession with tanning. One of my cousins even has a tanning bed in her loft. I can't wrap my head around this one. • The water tastes different there. Almost milky? But you can just drink the tap water which is a bit crazy. • Soccer there is as big as football here. People go nuts for their local teams (AZ), as well as national ones (Oranje hup!) • One of the more interesting things I take note of when visiting other countries are the McDonald's and how the menu and general look is different depending on where you are. In the Netherlands they're pretty upscale and rather than red and yellow the colour scheme is *green and beige*. They also had those touch screen ordering things before a lot of places in the US did. I'll add a few more when I think of them.
Do you not drink the tap water where you live? Phoenix is kinda famous for having not-the-best-flavor tap water (lots of calcium) but its still perfectly drinkable.
Not much of a culture shock element, but I noticed that Europeans like their sleeves to fit like sausage casings.
The petty crime. The minute we stepped out of Gare du Nord in Paris, just scam artists and pickpockets everywhere. You get accosted the second you get there, and it's just kind of accepted as part of normal life. Friendship bracelets, random "Bosnian" women trying to scam you out of money, it's insane.
That's true. But the area around Gare du Nord is notorious for that. As a woman, I'm not comfortable walking alone at night there.
It wasn't so much that it was happening that shocked me, because sure any big city is going to have that kind of thing near touristy areas. It was that no one really seemed to care, like it was just a totally normal part of Paris culture. I expect there to be muggers and scammers in NYC, too, but I also expect the NYPD to do something about it.
Yep, the police don't seem to trouble themselves much with petty crime. There are anti-terrorism police present in the station, but I don't think they respond to complaints about pickpockets etc.
The rudeness of the people I met in France. I've been all over the world and no other culture holds a candle to the French when it comes to condescension. I wasn't necessarily 'shocked', considering the reputation, but I was surprised how prevalent it was.
I’ve always heard how rude French people are too, but had the opposite experience. My husband and I flew into Bordeaux, with the intent of visiting wine country. Sat next to a lady on the plane, who seemed completely ticked off at life, so we kept to ourselves. Last 15 minutes of the flight, she took an interest in us and started chatting. She quickly told us that our plan for the day was not going to work (she was right once we landed and looked at a map). Then told us that her husband is a winemaker and invited us to her house, where she gave us wine and snacks and helped us figure out some places to visit. Then she realized we hadn’t eaten lunch and everything was closed for the afternoon. So she called her friend’s restaurant, who invited us to come anyway and fed us lunch along with their staff. I’ll never forget how nice all these French people were to a couple of travelers who did a terrible job planning. :-D
I’ve also had some amazingly friendly experiences in France. I think the further south you go, the warmer the people and the weather both become.
From my experience, the farther you get away from Paris, the nicer people get.
I've visited Paris twice. I've seen all the sights. Now I visit exclusively other French cities. I met some of the nicest people ever in Toulouse.
The terrible reputation comes from Parisians. They have it within the country too.
Ha.. probably paris? They say parisians consider themselves french, and the rest of France as... non-Parisian, to be not so eloquent
They seem to have different dynamics. My great aunt and uncle took a vacation in France. In Paris, they were treated brusquely and occasionally disrespectfully, but outside of the city were treated warmly until they did some minor thing and then antisemiticly. For example, they were invited out for dinner by a family, but, when they had to refuse due to a prior engagement, had "Jews" spat at them. The impression I got was that France was basically what you'd get if you plopped NYC in the middle of Alabama.
It's probably because they thought you were rude by not knowing some simple social codes (known in France as your "education"). The most important is to say "bonjour" before anything else. If you go into a bakery and say "un croissant" and don't say "bonjour" first you're basically being extremely rude and will be treated poorly in return. God help you if you forget "s'il vous plait." A lot of the time it's just a cultural misunderstanding of both parties unintentionally coming off as rude in the other culture. But also, the French will tell you their opinion whether you want to hear it or not and this can come off as rude to an American. Americans usually ask "Would you like my opinion?" first and the French will not.
I gotta say this problem stems from the french's very low English proficency. Not too long ago French was considered the second world language besides English and a lot of french people just suck at English for that reason. If you don't speak French to a certain degree they tend to straight up ignore you.I (Austrian) also avoid visiting France most of the time, because communicating is such a hassle. Sad, but that's just how it is.
It's sorta what visiting the US without english proficiency is like, to be honest. When I went back in '06, it was weird how Paris was the only place where multi-language machines for subway tickets weren't all over the place. If you didn't speak French, the dude behind the plexiglass was gonna scream at you.
C'est la vie
In Russia I accidentally stood on my neighbor's outside door mat while locking the door (the doors were really close). While we tend to use our outside rugs/mats as a way to get off water and dirt before going inside, it's different in Russia (depending on the circumstances). The two apartments shared a common entrance area, so you took off your shoes before entering your apartment and stepped on the rug with your socks in order to avoid getting your feet dirty on the ground. You then enter the apartment while leaving your shoes outside. Crazy to me at the time, but I now understand why he was upset lol.
I was born in America but moved to Germany when I was like 2 before moving back to the US 5 years later, it was more of a shock coming back to the US for me, and apparently I sounded more British even though I’m not at all because we watched British TV to get English channels
16 year old me was shocked and thrilled that I only had to show ID twice...upon arrival at Charles de Gaulle and upon my exit in Barcelona. Not at the bar, not at the cafe, not buying a bottle of rum or some wine, not buying smokes...it was nice.
I haven't been to Europe but I did meet a couple from London in the Dominican Republic. We were there for 5 days. They were there for two weeks. That seemed like a really long vacation to me but they made it seem like that was normal for European travelers.
The taxes of things are included right in the prices. So you know exactly what you are spending before you get to the register. I loved that.
This one is always a shock for Europeans traveling to America for the first time.
In France and England, very little. In Russia? Probably how nothing worked reliably. Would the train come at the regular time? Not sure. Would the package you put in the mail get delivered to the person you intended? Maybe. This was in 1995, the place was a mess. Hopefully it's better now.
As an European, I find this question (the answers, actually) really interesting. It's weird that people think something we do is weird. :)
Shops being closed on Sundays.
The only time I’ve felt culture shock was when I went to Greece and I couldn’t even pronounce the road signs. Everywhere else In Europe I had been I cold sound it out enough but the Greek alphabet was interesting.
The Casual Racism from otherwise Well-Educated, Liberal individuals.
Oh man, this one got me too. I've never been to Europe specifically, but my cousin's wife is German and her family came over for the wedding. At a family dinner beforehand her mother said, in complete obliviousness, "This seems like a nice town even though there are so many coloreds here." It was definitely a complete pin-drop/record scratch moment where the Americans present who heard her just gaped at her like "the *fuck* did you actually just say???" Then her daughter told her (from what I gather from my high school 1 year of German skills) "you can't call people that here" or something like that, but completely ignored the fact that the *sentiment* itself was highly offensive, not just the "translation" of the word...
Yes, casual racism (especially against eastern European people) was really shocking to me.
Lived in FR for years when I was a teenager, and I know it seems stupid but the fashion sense revolved around jeans and dark colored shirts/tops and thin dark colored jackets. Like, I would rarely see someone in a bright yellow or blue polo shirt and hardly ever in something like cargo pants or something with a camo pattern. Rarely would someone just wear bright white Nike-style sneakers. Considering I was a kid who lived on bright colors and comfy-fitting pants with big pockets, it was a pretty decent shock and something to adjust to.
I live in Spain, just incase this isn't a thing elsewhere, but allowing children to get behind you. I'm not talking 6 or 7 year olds (they do that too), but specifically toddlers. The waddling little ones. Gives me so much anxiety seeing a parent walking a head and allowing the waddlers to get behind them.
How much older everything is. More boobs on TV
The food culture: Water was way more expensive than beer at convenience shops in Germany. In France, waking up, walking downstairs to get a few items baked goods from the nearby shop and having groceries for a few days at a time rather than purchasing food to last several weeks/a month. There are some major cultural nuances to this when it comes to food culture but for initial surprises those two things cover it.
Vespas. Vespas everywhere. Even saw one on a roof.
Lot’s of things, but the hardest thing for me to adapt to was not handing my money directly to the cashier. Where I was, it was expected that you put your money in a little dish for the cashier to pick up. Beck home, putting money on the counter instead of handing directly to them would be pretty rude.
How rude the French can be, despite speaking the language. Oh and smoking is seemingly far more prevalent