Shoes in the house
I grew up in a home where we just never thought about wearing, or not wearing, shoes in the house. Like, we obviously didn’t track mud all over the place if our shoes were that dirty, but if we were wearing our shoes inside, nobody said anything or cared, it was just whatever. Married a Kenyan who put her foot down and was like, “Are you crazy?” It’s apparently a big thing elsewhere in the world. In Kenya alot of roads aren’t paved, things get dusty, and it’s just common sense that you don’t walk all over the house with dirty shoes, so I get it from that perspective.
As an American, it drives me crazy. Then there’s those heathens who lay on the bed with shoes on!
I never understood the need to display multiple US flags in your yard. We get it, you live in america. You love America. We get that too. Are you afraid someone will think you no longer wish to be American if you took your flags down?
It took me (an American) going to Ireland and Northern Ireland to realize how odd the excessive flag waving is. Still odd, but those two have the US beat.
Many things. To say some…Billboards with lawyers advertising for things like demands after accidents. Like dozens one after another on the road.
So much sugar in everything. Last time I was there had to throw to the bin a yogurt. Was so sweet It was awful. Prices of “fresh” food.
Tips for everything. Going to a restaurant and have to tip like 20% of the bill, or even more, is crazy.
Wáter consumtion. Like big golf camps completely green in the middle of a desert (Vegas). When asked about It, people there just answered “no problem, we have the Hoover Dam for that”.
Lack of public transport outside four or five big cities. And that just walking on the streets in some places is very strange fot the people living there. I was asked ten years ago in Palo Alto if I was Russian because I was not driving, just walking on the street!!
Family eating at shooters (and the whole hooters/twin peaks concept)
Need to take the car for a 500m trip because there is no sidewalk and a highway to cross
The car thing really blew my mind. My hotel was 400m from the office but 1.6km by car. Colleagues were waiting for a taxi while I walked. I had to cut over a couple of car parks and a bit of grass (zero sidewalks) and was there in a few minutes while they turned up 15min later since they were waiting for a taxi.
The worst part, they all jumped in cars to go 300m down the road for lunch. Yeah, I walked. With looking for a parking space then walking from the space to the restaurant, they got there after me.
I adore Americans; they’ve been nothing except kind and generous to me in every part of the country I’ve visited but damn, the money they’re wasting alone just starting their engines and the wear and tear on the vehicles blows my fucking mind. Build some sidewalks, guys!
Many of us would like this, but it’s dangerous or even illegal to get to some places by walking in large parts of America. And zoning laws make it really difficult to change.
It’s illegal to walk to Costco
It’s illegal to cross the street some places
Sorry to be honest, but this is my view…
Voting between two parties, and then getting whatever the “electors” pick. All the while, thinking they live under the biggest democracy of the world.
Having all sorts of inhuman behaviors, like robbing childs from immigrants.
Child marriage.
Having lots of weapons in the country but all wars outside.
Mmm… What else? Ah, prisoners are slaves.
The god damn warning labels on absolutely fucking everything. Bro, I just wanna eat at a restaurant without wondering why the menu has a god damn “at your own risk” label… Also can’t go 1 step in a water park without seeing a life guard, they’re fucking everywhere. Not to mention on the rare occasion they aren’t there, you just can’t do shit. Land of the free my ass, feels like the optimal way to do anything is to always have a lawyer by side.
The menu one is specifically so restaurants don’t get sued when they accidentally serve you raw products or food you’re allergic to.
I suppose that makes us litigious, which is pretty weird and sad.
America runs off lawsuits
I was gonna say “runs on Dunkin” but I don’t wanna get sued. :(
American flags everywhere. Like EVERYWHERE. I get a bit of national pride but holy crap, every other house in the street is flying a flag, clothing has flag patterns, bumper sticker American flag, it’s everywhere. And no, it wasn’t even close to July 4.
It’s like Americans are afraid they might forget what country they’re in if they aren’t in sight of a flag at all times.
It’s worse now. Israel flags are everywhere now too.
Low effort patriotism
Fragile nationality
Being overly fake nice because you want a tip. Tbh I’d be more inclined to tip you if you left me alone and stopped talking to me.
The whole tipping thing in USA is weird. Everyone wants a tip, it’s entirely random (as a non-American) how much tip to give. Just pay your staff a wage they can actually live on ffs.
There’s actually a loose set of rules to it. Im not sure where the specific numbers came from, but 22% of the bill as a tip is considered “excellent service”, 18% or so is considered “mid” or “acceptable” service, and anything below that is a sliding scale of how bad you think they did. 0% is either you being rude and/or saying “i dont believe in tips”, but giving a $0.01 tip is basically saying “fuck you, you piece of shit,” (because fishing out a penny or writing it in takes more effort than opting out).
Those numbers used to be 12, 15 and 18. They’ve increased, but I’m not sure why, since they’re percentages. They keep up with increased food prices automatically. Not sure why tip growth has outpaced food prices.
It may also be my region. Its always been this way for me for at least the last 15 years or so.
Now, those squarepay terminals that suggest 30% tips or similar can eat rocks.
Your urban planning. Your cities are unwalkable, the scenery makes me depressed af, everything is scaled up for cars, even restaurants are for cars, the highways are huge, all I can see is tar. I don’t know how you can live like that.
To be fair, the national parks are really beautiful. But you need a car to even reach these parks, then drive into a massive parking lot – really depressing.
I took the Empire Builder train, then walked into Glacier National Park. But, then, the only way to get up Going-to-the-Sun Road was by shuttle bus, and we got stuck in a mile-long traffic jam on the side of a mountain. So ridiculous.
WEARING SHOES INDOORS
… and then having carpet everywhere. Sometimes even kitchen and bathroom.
I will defend this to my death. I don’t want to get my feet out at your house. I find it crazy that people want me to strip off an article of of clothing and I’m the rude one for not doing it. Also carpet is an abomination. Wood or laminate flooring is way better and you can put a rug on it if it’s cold.
I find it crazy that people want me to strip off an article of of clothing and I’m the rude one for not doing it.
Get yer muddy, snowy shoes off my fucking floor or I will use castle doctrine to legally force you out
I’ll give you some authorized home flip flops if you feel uncomfortable, aight?
Also carpet is an abomination.
Agreed tho if its everywhere… Wood is good
Socks is feet out? Wouldn’t that also mean t-shirt is shirtless?
The fear of naked (intact) female bodies, i.e. censoring of even the slightest nudity, when at the same time, it’s totally fine to have minors play computer games where they can dissect other humans in great bloody detail.
Oh, and chocolate that tastes like somebody barfed into it during manufacturing.
The chocolate thing is because American chocolate manufacturers use butyric acid to preserve the milk. Basically, using fresh milk in chocolate is expensive, because you need to get it shipped directly and be located near enough to the dairy farm. So they intentionally spoil the milk in a controlled manner. This allows them to preserve the milk (as opposed to having it spoil naturally and go completely rancid,) which allows them a much more relaxed manufacturing process. This controlled spoiling method produces butyric acid in the milk.
The issue is that butyric acid tastes like vomit. Americans are used to the sour taste and don’t even really recognize that it’s not what chocolate is supposed to taste like. To them, that sour note is just part of chocolate. But Europeans come to America (and are used to fresh milk in their chocolate), and they are horribly disgusted when they taste American chocolate for the first time. Because Europeans aren’t used to having that sour note in their chocolate.
This is also why so many Americans fawn over foreign chocolate. It is seen as more luxurious, but most Americans can’t really place why it tastes so much better. The reason is the lack of butyric acid.
Non-stop televangelism channels are quite something. But probably you know that’s weird.
That Americans are actually not Americans, but illegal aliens from Europe?..
OK, I haven’t been in the US.
Most Europeans are also illegal aliens from somewhere else.
I’ll try to avoid stuff you know is weird.
- Adjectives. You can’t just have a thing. It has to have an adjective. For example: Milk. I wanted to buy milk. I get to the milk section, and there’s no such thing. There’s x milk and y milk and about a dozen other variants. Where is the basic milk (it turns out, I wanted “4% milk”) in this damned place?
- Fresh produce. In fairness you’ve gotten loads better on this one after subsequent visits, but beyond some basic staples like potatoes, carrots, corn etc it was really limiting what fruit and vegetables you could get in the supermarket. Also: baby carrots are weird.
- Your cheese is radioactive yellow. Cheese is not supposed to be that colour - but you seem expect it to be for some reason, so your producers add yellow colouring to their cheese.
- Your eggs are weird. I’m not sure what yous guys do to to them, but it’s like you blast away half the shell and are left with a porous super-white textured inner shell. They need to be refrigerated and last a fraction of the time they’d last if you just left them alone and sold them as they are laid.
- Your bread tastes weird. Maybe it’s sugar or preservatives in it, I don’t know. Bread is meant to have a really short ingredients list like flour, water, salt yeast and maybe a touch of oil and sugar. Take a look at the ingredients on your bread and it’s 5 lines long.
- Portions! Your food portions are ludicrous. I’d much rather pay half the price for half as much food as they offer on the menu.
- Money. You have this weird unconscious pecking order thing in your culture where you value people more based on their bank balance. You show a weird unconscious level of respect to someone who is rich. And similarly, unconsciously look down on someone poorer than you. Not in a mean way - just as a “I’m better than this person” way that is hard to quantify. You are aware at some level roughly how rich everyone you deal with is. I see this trait far less in people under 20. I hope there’s a cultural shift on this one, because money on its own is a weird way to measure someone’s worth.
- Your police are run by the local counties. I think your schools also? I know you have state and federal police also, but most places only have police and schools at those levels.
- I’ll mostly stay clear of health, because you know your health system is weird. But I will say that it’s weird that very few of your hospitals are run by government. They’re mostly run for profit. Health is meant to be a government service.
- Outside a few cities, you barely have public transport of any sort. LA is a mega metropolis, and it’s train network is a joke for that level of population - something like 100 stations for 18 million people?
- You have no idea what’s going on. Most of you couldn’t name the UK Prime Minister (this one has been hard to keep track of, in fairness), the German Chancellor or any of the G20 leaders aside from USA and maybe Canada/China. You don’t know about geopolitics beyond whatever you guys are doing. Your world news is literally stuff USA is involved in.
- I’ll finish on a weird one: you guys are lovely. This may because I’m white and have an exotic accent to you guys, but almost everyone I’ve ever encountered from the USA in or out of the country has been wonderful. You don’t seem to think of your fellow countrymen you meet as ‘good’ by default. There’s a lot less connection and respect to each other than other nations I’ve been to.
A problem with this question is that the US is such a big and diverse place, that you could have this same question posed to Americans only, asking about their experience visiting other parts of the US.
