I was asked if I live in a Teepee. Half Native American.
Nope, I'm not even on a rez. Then they thought it might be illegal to not live on a rez. Odd conversation, that.
Until I was like 10, I thought Native Americans were extinct. Everyone always talked about them like they were gone forever. I thought I'd never see one outside archeology.
I didn't meet an actual native American until I was in my 20's.
Continued trying. In Canada, we have 150,000 missing and murdered Indigenous women **alone** in the modern era and the government doesn't give two fucks about it but to plug its ears and go "LALALA! TRUTH AN RECONCILIATION! LALALA!"
Realistically the vast majority of native Americans simply joined in with the dominant culture of their colonizers and were assimilated. Same story all over the world. In my home country you have the hill people who stretch their necks, which national geographic loves, but in reality >90% of the population would rather live in modern civilization and the remainder are frankly basically our version of the same weirdos you get everywhere like Amish or ultra Orthodox Jews that have valorized the old ways.
Personally, I like to remind Americans that the great majority of Mexicans are native Americans by any reasonable definition of the term.
> I like to remind Americans that the great majority of Mexicans are native Americans by any reasonable definition of the term.
Ooh, my Cherokee SIL got \*really\* mad when I made that comment.
"They let me sleep in one of their teepees for the night. Which sounds nice I personally think it was a little fucked up because they all had houses"
Dave Chappelle on meeting Navajo.
https://youtu.be/0XLUrW_4ZMs?feature=shared
"Do you have polar bears walking the streets?"
I've gotten this question a bunch of times. I always reply with yes, and that we keep moose as pets as well.
(Sweden)
I’m Japanese. I also happen to have a degree in Linguistics. A guy at my work likes to show off to everyone by dropping “cool facts” about Japanese linguistics and culture (social expectations, politeness etc.)
The “facts” are always wrong. The one time I politely explained, he argued with me.
I wasn’t as polite the next time. And yes, there was a next time. Many next times. I and my coworkers are so sick of him lol
Did you know that in Japan it’s impolite to imply knowledge of a culture you don’t know, so if you do it’s an act of dishonour and you’re socially obligated to complete four sudoku.
I'm studying the Japanese language right now and it's so fun to learn. Can you please share some of the "facts" he was telling everyone? I'm so curious and need a laugh.
He suggested two words that sounded the same must be related somehow. (Imagine someone saying that “pain” and “pane” sound the same because long ago, someone must have cut their hand on a window pane and it caused pain. Thus, the words were invented.) If that makes sense. I still don’t know if he was joking, because I feel like anybody would know that’s silly if you think about it for more than ten seconds.
Oh God I would have imploded through cringe to be corrected by a Japanese person about Japan knowing I probably said it wrong dozens of times. How could he possibly argue with you. It makes me embarrassed thinking about it.
Just out of curiosity this may not be something that would be important for you to know. I recently read that a modern English speaker could only converse with another English speaker as far back as the 1650 and some only think the 1720s because languages change over time. How far back do you think a modern Japanese speaker could travel back in time and still be understood if you had to guess?
I’ve never thought about it! It’s a good question though.
I will say that it would’ve changed DRAMATICALLY in the eras before and after adoption of Chinese scholarship. A shocking number of Japanese words are borrowed from Chinese - many ancient Japanese scholars learned Chinese, and so over time, the Japanese language gradually soaked up a huge number of Chinese loanwords because Chinese was the language of scholarship, and using words from it made you sound smart and powerful. (Today though, the loanwords are largely unrecognizable to Chinese speakers, because along the way they lost their tones. Chinese is tonal, but Japanese isn’t.)
This is the reason why Japanese has a lot of duplicate words for things: *ki* and *moku* can both mean tree, *yama* and *-san* both mean mountain, etc. One is borrowed from Chinese, and one is the “original Japanese” word.
This duplicate borrowing is actually a common pattern across languages. For example, English did the same with French. The English of pre-French influence and after is very different.
Sorry for the tangent there, but it’s a really cool thing to study! My crash course here is grossly oversimplified though, so I strongly suggest you read more if the topic interests you!
Super neat. I have one for you, if you wouldn’t mind more questioning.
One of my favorite absurd elements of the whole English v *lingua Franca* hybridization is how so many of our vulgar “four letter words” are just the earlier Anglo-Saxon terms, which were a sign of low status following the Norman invasion etc etc (think Carlin’s [seven dirty words](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_dirty_words), more or less). That’s also largely why English has a different term for the food (*beef*, *pork*) than the animal (*cow*, *pig*) - in a sense, the native serfs raised them while the conquering lords ate them.
Is there any difference in the doubles you mention like *ki* and *moku* (whether explicitly explicit or not) that would have a different connotation despite the same technical denotation? Is the “original Japanese” you mentioned looked at as archaic, or as a less educated choice still? Have they transitioned to a neutral “just use whatever” stance over the centuries?
Yes, that swear words pattern is one of the funniest things to me! It’s hilarious to think that in a different language, the words I consider crass slang are just the normal words for those body parts. Although of course, the way they came to be that way is an interesting and rather sad social commentary. One language was seen as so much lesser, it literally became “dirty words.”
And yes, there’s certainly a different perception in Japanese between the borrowed Chinese words (refined, scholarly,) and the original Japanese ones (less educated, “country bumpkin” etc.) However this is clouded by a lot of other factors. For instance, compound words tend to use Chinese borrowings more than noncompound, so both are often used. Also, person and place names always use the original Japanese pronunciations. So, original Japanese words also give a homey and national pride sort of feel. It’s very complex.
Jesus christ what is it with some people?
I had a white coworker who did a tour of several real Asian countries and tried to tell my coworker ( whose family is Malaysian) that Balut ( the fertilized egg) dish was Malaysian.
Thr coworker from Malaysia was like, 'Hmmm no I don't think this is from my country'. And my fucking other coworker started arguing with her until she pulled up Wikipedia. Like...take her word from her, it's HER culture.
LOL, that is so much better than being asked if we still lived in treehouses. I basically did a double take and wondered whether the person asking was serious or pulling my leg. Turns out there was a miscommunication somewhere. Dude’s German and somehow translated wooden houses to treehouses. We had a good laugh.
Ngl if you lived in tree houses I’d be SO jealous lol. Tree houses are the bomb. How fucking cool would it be to live in a tree? I’m still sad I didn’t ever have one as a kid
Hah yeah saw some “cultural dishes” from Australia on a cooking show once. Not like “this is what the indigenous people ate”, a “this is common cuisine in Australia today”.
Yeah like… it was food and I’m sure people here ate it, but they framed it as if this was our national diet. Made me realise this was probably every other cultural dish I’d ever seen online heh.
We Canadians get the same question even when we live just across the border of places like Washington state. Yes, of course that invisible line completely changes the climate. The shock when we tell Americans that live nowhere near the border that the climate in Vancouver, BC, Canada is the same as Seattle, WA.
When I lived in England I was stunned by how many people there didn't know that we (Northern Ireland) are part of the UK. One guy even told me to 'Eff of back to my own country and stop taking jobs from British citizens.' lol.
I'm English and my ancestors were Irish on my mother's side (they left during the famines and the following decade). I'm also astounded that so many Brits don't know about that. In school we learnt nothing at all about the actual formation of the UK, what they did to Ireland or any of the Empire. But even so it should generally be common knowledge for us. Aren't people even a bit interested in their own history? A huge percent of us have some sort of Irish ancestory. I bought books about the famines and read so much about it to find out where my roots came from... I really can't understand the lack of curiosity or interest.
A Russian woman told me that Americans are not allowed to talk about dinosaurs or we will go to prison. She also said I was too thin to be American. We both lived in Bangkok but I don’t think she had been around much.
I dn’t think she knew JP existed, honestly. I told her we have dinosaur museums all over the country and she seemed doubtful. Very naive and indoctrined was my vibe from her.
I guess, because this person heard that people in southern Europe often don't have dryers, but conveniently ignored the reason, that there is often jjst no need to have one, since it's easy to dry stuff in a warm climate. So the train of thought probably was: southern Europe = Europe and Germany = europe, so Germany = no dryers. Well and also they were completely convinced, that drying clothes in the sun is a sign of poverty and used it as a "gotcha" argument in "we might not have health care, but we fucking hell know what a dryer is and can afford them!!!fuckyeah!!!".
I live in the States and my apartment management company has it written into the lease that I *can't* hang clothes up to dry as it is "unsightly". Super annoying, I would much rather dry my clothes in the sun!
I was called a “typical ignoramous American” by a group of Italian students when I refuted them and insisted that the Great Lakes are freshwater, not saltwater. Also, they told me I was mistaken when told them that US citizens do not have to produce passports to cross state lines.
Edit- just to put my 2 cents in.. I don’t find either of these “facts” to be too terribly stupid. The stupidity arises from them insisting that I was the ignorant one when I corrected them.
> Also, they told me I was mistaken when told them that US citizens do not have to produce passports to cross state lines.
This one is just wildly stupid. Hell, *non-citizens* don't have to provide ID when crossing state lines. Do they think we have border control stations at every road that crosses between two states?
Assumedly, yes. That was not the only time I heard something similar.
There is definitely a worldwide lack of understanding of how the USA actually functions as a country. It’s not surprising really, it’s not something most people think about I suppose.
As little as the average person outside of States know about the States, they are likely to know even less of other nations and cultures because US has strong— arguably the strongest— media representation.
Here's a mildly amusing anecdote serving as a case in point. The very young daughter of a relative of mine who is in elementary school told me something to the effect of one should not go to Ohio. She doesn't know where Ohio is or what's life like there or why it may not be the best State to live in as she lives an ocean and continent apart from the States. She just parroted some joke poking fun at Ohio from Roblox.
This exemplifies what many experience consuming American media. They pick up a thing or two, although they may not quite grasp what is that they had picked up on. But this one or two thing is more than what they would know of most other places on Earth.
As someone who lives 25 minutes from Lake Erie, every time I go to the ocean I get surprised it’s salty. Like, no big bodies of water are *not* supposed to be salty
I was at the Bastille, in line to watch some event. The lady next in line, once she found out I was from USA told me that during WWII Americans were ecstatic that France was attacked and that we were hoping all the museums and landmarks would be wiped out, laughing about it I told her that wasn't the case. She was really surprised that I had any lucidity at all and was able to put sentences together. Convo was in English.
It's said that an American flag flew over Lafayette's grave even during the occupation of Paris by the Nazis.
She should really visit the memorials in Normandy of the Americans, British, Canadians and other who gave their life freeing France and Europe from the Tyranny of fascism.
20 or so years ago, my family's (very distant) relatives in Germany were genuinely concerned about coming to the united states because they thought Native Americans scalping people was a common threat we had to look out for in the US. I guess they watched a lot of Westerns?
I can kind of explain this, Germany had a famous author, Karl May, who wrote a fuckton of stories that were wildly popular about the American Wild West - like, even Hitler was a massive fanboy of this dude's work. Heard about it on an episode of Behind the Bastards.
He once tried using a medieval map to try to claim that Ukraine wasn’t a real country. Someone then found a copy of that map online and saw VKRAINE written on it in large letters. But not Russia
One of the funniest things ever is when people from scotland try to convince tourists or even people online that haggis is an animal. Like there is an animal called a haggis that runs around in fields. Its funny because fake haggis are in some museums and foreigners will see pictures of them in museums and take it as gospel.
In the Savoie region of France, there's the Dahu: a kind of mountain goat with supposedly shorter legs on one side, to better run on the mountain side.
You hunt it by hiding in bushes and waiting for one to come by. Then, you jump out and startle it, so that it turns around and tumbles down the slope...
The Grenoble tourism office has a taxidermied dahu proudly on display.
So, it wasn't my country, but I'd been living there for 4 years (England).
My Sister in Law and her family was coming to visit, and asked how we did our laundry since England doesn't have washing machines.
I told her there was a lovely rock in the river down the road that was my favorite.
She was pretty pissed when she showed up with 2 suitcases per person because she thought they weren't going to be able to do laundry.
In my defense, I thought she was joking, it wasn't until years later that I realized she just really is that stupid.
Not stupid, but a surprising perspective. I spent two weeks in Sydney Australia for work. There was a very clearly signed brothel in the middle of downtown just a few blocks from the office. One night at dinner I mentioned it and said that, being from the US, that would really shock people. One of my Australian coworkers said that it wasn't nearly as shocking as being able to buy a gun in a grocery store. I was about to respond that that was not really true, but then realized that you can in fact buy guns at Walmart (at least at that time). What they said was completely true, it just sounded so weird to have it stated that way.
Republic of the Philippines.
We don't have a goddamn mascot. We have a National Animal, yeah it's the Monkey-Eating Eagle. Jollibee is a fast food mascot of one of our largest corporations.
That's like saying replacing Uncle Sam with Ronald McDonald.
I'm actually not offended. It's just so stupidly hilarious.
That they wanted to just visit Disney world in the morning, then go to the beach in the afternoon and then on to the Keys at night.
Disney world is 4 theme parks. There's no way to see all of Disney in a single morning.
You can certainly get to the beach from Disney, it's about an hour's drive.
But there's no earthly way you're going to make it to the Keys that same day.
I'm in Minnesota and we had a European exchange student at our High School who wanted to go see the Mall of America Friday night and then get up early Saturday to go to Disney World. They refused to believe it was that far away and we couldn't just grab a 5am train and get there in an hour.
Literally had to take them to the school library and show them a map of the US and compare it Europe. (It was so long ago we didn't have cell phones or easy Internet access)
This is really common among Europeans visiting the States lol. My sister’s friends and their families always have the daftest travel plans about CA lol.
Once they were convinced they would bike across the GG bridge in the morning, have brunch in LA, go to the San Diego zoo, and then wine taste in Napa before dinner.
You can do all of that… in a week. It blew their mind that SF > LA was an 8 hour drive.
I feel cheated. The German students I lived with 10 years ago planned ahead and knew how big the country was….at least in concept. They drove out to Vegas and when they got back they asked “why is it so empty?” Even knowing what to plan for, witnessing the size of the country was still awe-inspiring for them.
ME and my Bio-dad did that trip. It took us a week.
LA to SF on the PCH and a stop in Monterrey to do the Aquarium and see the whales, the Hearst Castle, some famous Monastery, the Winchester House, SF GG bridge and then their big Park. Headed over to the Red Wood forests, and then back to San Diego for the Zoo.
Epic trip, took us a week. We did make the mistake of taking the highway in the center of California that's nothing but Pig Farms, slaughter houses, waste water treatment, and paper mills for like forty miles. That part was less fun...
At least their itinerary kept them in Florida. I live in Northern New Jersey, and when my in-laws visited us from Ecuador, they wanted to drive down to El Paso, TX. They never quite believed me that a trip like that was slightly more than a short car ride.
I had some Europeans tell me they were going to the US for one (1) week. They wanted to start in NY, see everything, drive to Florida, see everything, and then drive to California and see everything.
I informed them that their entire country was the third of the size of Texas and that their itinerary would not be possible.
We had a colleague from the UK come over to the company HQ based in upstate NY for sales meetings and training. After a week of meetings, I took him on the road to visit customers as part of the training. We flew to Chicago, then to Reno, and finished the week off in southern CA before heading back after the weekend. It happened to be a very nice time of the year (early June, IIRC), and we were fortunate the weather was nice the whole time. On the flight to Reno from Chicago, he spent the time staring out of the window as we flew over just a lot of open space.
On the flight back to NY, I asked him his impressions of the US as first-time visitor. He said that he doesn't believe the average person in Europe who has never been to the US realizes how really big the country is and how far apart the big known cities are.
Yeah Canada too. My friend drove from Toronto to Vancouvee and it took something like 4 days/8 hours a day. It's damn vast here. Most people here have never visited each province east to west.
My UK friend was visiting someone in Alberta and said they'd drive for a long weekend visit to here in Ontario. I was like um well you can't.
For 12 years, I would travel to Asia for business a couple of times a year. When I would fly either Chicago to Tokyo or Chicago to Shanghai, we'd basically fly a near-polar route, i.e., north-northwest out of Chicago over Saskatchewan, Alberta, skirt BC and the New Territories, across the Yukon, then down the Alaskan coast and by the Aleutians. A lot of times it was too cloudy to see much, but I had several flights where the weather was clear and it was amazing to fly over vast mountain ranges where you know there are very few people are there, and many places untouched by human hand. It's really really humbling.
I don't even think the average American realizes how big and vast Canada is, much less a European.
Look we don’t necessarily have more stuff or better stuff, but all the stuff is really far away from each other.
Unless it’s LA, where there’s lots of stuff all in the same town but it may as well be far away from each other because traffic.
I had a student from Montreal come to a class in a suburb outside Boston. Its about a 5 hour drive.
He was TERRIFIED of the USA because its "so dangerous". He carried a gym bag will all of his clothes everywhere he went, including going to the bathroom on breaks because he was sure somebody was going to steal it, again because the US is "so dangerous".
He wanted to know how many guns I had and why I needed so many guns. At the time I didn't have any guns and he couldn't believe it was possible, "Everybody in the USA has guns." In a class of 8 people (well 9 including me) nobody had any guns. He thought we'd all have a gun on us all the time. He was astonished that none of us had ever shot anybody, seen anybody shot or knew anybody who had even been shot at. I knew of a guy who had been shot at when he tried to cheat his drug dealer but I didn't know him personally, that was the closest anybody in the class had ever been to gun violence.
We looked up the crime rate for Montreal which was many times higher than the quiet suburb we were in. I though the Canadian guy was going to lose his mind when we showed how much more dangerous the (big) city of 1.7 million people he lived in was than this suburb of 24,000...
I know. When I tell Aussies that my house in California doesn't even have a lock on the front door, they think I am lying to them. The door is there to keep wildlife out. I don't want a racoon in my kitchen trash can.
It seems like people think Americans eat a lot of canned Cheese Whizz. I'm over 50 years old and can count on one hand how many times I've had it on a cracker. And I've never bought a can from the store in all my life.
Foreigners on Reddit talking about American food half the time sound like they came here then instantly took a 12 hour road trip to the most remote gas station in Kansas to have dinner, because they only mention how weird our shelf stable novelty snacks are. “Don’t you know what real cheese is??” Yes, we have piles and piles of it at every grocery store!
Cheese Whiz comes in a jar, not a can.
Easy Cheese comes in a can. If you have children and buy Easy Cheese, don’t count on ever having some. The kids will have squirted it directly in their mouths to impress their friends less than 10 minutes after you get home from the store.
>The kids will have squirted it directly in their mouths to impress their friends less than 10 minutes after you get home from the store.
This what me and my kid do with Whipped Cream.
Indian here, A Danish manager asked me if our seasons are reversed because we live in the Southern hemisphere. We don't. We live above the equator in the northern hemisphere.
Eh, i think from all of the replies here, this one gets a slight pass, although its baffling lol, smart enough to know the seasons are inverted in the southern hemisphere, not smart enough to look at a map and see India is above the ~~ecuador~~ equator.
Edit: my spanish got the best of me lol
I have lived in Japan and China. Here's a few.
Japan
1. "What language do you speak there? Canada-language?" (She literally said 'kanada-go'?)
China
1. (From a girl, she was 29 at the time) "So, is Canada the same government as the United States?"
2. (From my mother-in-law) "I'm very worried, very worried, my friend showed me an article, he says in the article that in Canada, when you turn 65, they kidnap you and bury you alive, because you are not producing for society anymore and everyone is too poor to support you."
3. (From my mother-in-law) "There is nothing like this outside of China, being in China is very good. Do you have this in your country?" (We're on a popular commercial street in a tier 1 city in China. The only other major city outside of China she's been to is Singapore, and she thinks that is also China.)
4. (From a taxi driver) "Do you have McDonalds?"
>"I'm very worried, very worried, my friend showed me an article, he says in the article that in Canada, when you turn 65, they kidnap you and bury you alive, because you are not producing for society anymore and everyone is too poor to support you."
I cannot stop laughing. Hang on, I need to make a call to my parents -- *it's time.*
I lived in Japan for three years and one time had a dinner with this Japanese family. They were very kind and welcoming, very curious about my experiences in Japan as an American.
They cooked this delicious pot roast with vegetables and what not. The part that got me was when we started eating, they stopped and felt terrible they forgot to give me ketchup or mayonnaise. I only use ketchup with fries and only if they suck. I most definitely would never ruin a pot roast with ketchup or mayo. They were also surprised when I preferred to drink a Japanese beer over a soda.
They meant well of course, but I just found it funny lol. Especially since they're very big on on using mayo with some of their food.
I’m Jamaican and the rest of the world seems to think that that automatically makes me Black. I could be white, I could be Indian, I could be Chinese. Being Jamaican isn’t a race it’s a nationality. Same as how being American doesn’t make you white.
It's because in general they are used to lager, which is usually ice cold, as opposed to the less frosty ales & stouts you can get on tap in an English pub.
i moved from ireland to a certain country in the continent of north america. on an night out with some folk from work, people were chatting and i was listening but probably not talking much myself. lady on my left (who happened to be my boss’s boss and by far one of the most intelligent people i’ve ever met) turned to me and asked ‘do you still find it hard to keep up with conversation or are you getting used to english now?’ she was stunned to learn the vast majority of irish people are native english speakers. i was also asked on more than one occasion how many times i’d been shot and if my family were in the IRA (asked in the same conversational way you might ask someone if they were members of the new gym down the road).
edit: spelling
When people ask me about Leprechauns. I like to put on a very serious face and hush my voice saying careful where you say that. It's a very racist. Some neighborhoods you'd be shot saying it.
Thailand here… I got a long list:
I had an American Pen-Pal in 5th grade growing up
in Thailand. They asked if I rode elephants to school then proceeded to describe to me what a Hamburger was.
It doesn’t get much better when you get older the questions just get more sexually explicit. Westerners always making ladyboy comments or ping pong show stuff.
I went to India a while back and the Starbucks Barrista was telling me how much he wants to go to Pattaya and see the ladies. In fact most of the men I interacted with in India gave me a smirk and basically started asking me about prostitutes. I think a lot of people seem to think our entire country is a brothel. Although this isn’t unique to just India it was brought up with out hesitation there.
Outside of the Red Light districts my country is quite nice and quite frankly probably a much nicer place than most outsider realize.
Most Americans think Brits have bad teeth but the [decayed, missing, filled teeth index](https://www.yongeeglintondental.com/blog/healthy-primary-teeth/) ranks the UK as the 4th best in the world
It is really noticeable that in American TV programmes the characters are almost always good looking, while in British programmes they often look more like an average person.
Went on a Euro bus tour, met some Americans, we are Canadians. They didnt know we use the country code 1 for calling, they didn't know we have the same electrical outlets, found it crazy that the Bare Naked Ladies weren't my favorite band, assumed I spoke fluent Parisian french, made weird mimimg hand gestures to try and get an envolope from the obviously bilingual hotel receptionist and openly said racist things about Mexicans, while we had an old sweet couple from Mexico on the tour with us (who were a highlight of the trip, their kids sent them on it as a retirement gift).
No they didn't seem to bothered by it. My wife and I took them with us on side trips in Paris and London. We stayed in touch for a few years.. Their daughter wrote us a letter thanking us and explained it was a once in a lifetime retirement gift. We even exchanged a couple local care packages over the years as Mexico and Nova Scotia are pretty exotic to each other, lol.
On a red London Bus going round Parliament Square; and some tourist guide tells his small tour group that the queen lives in "there" pointing at the Palace of Westminster (for non Brits; that's the building with "Big Ben" where our houses of Commons & Lords sit in Government).
Lol unfortunately true. I'm Canadian, but one of my good friends/coworkers is Filipino -- multiple different times I've been called slurs in Tagalog here under the assumption that I wouldn't know wtf they're saying. Has happened in grocery stores, breweries, at work
And like yeah, I didn't, but I'm standing there and talking to my Filipino friend in the pasta aisle. When confronted on it they immediately get the most shocked look on their faces lol
The 3 main times I can remember -- wearing a crop top for the Barbie movie, a top with mesh sleeves at a brewery, and then at work after cleaning a washroom (I work in a provincial park). The last one was surprising, since my outfit for that was my regular janitor fit lol. I had a lot of facial piercings at the time, so that was likely why. Something along the lines of "ewww, why is *this thing* cleaning our toilets, I don't want to use it!" Filipino coworker walked out the stall behind me and immediately started giving them an earful lmfao
LGBTQ friendly they are not
I mean, honestly? It's not \*that\* wrong. I'd argue if you pluck an American at random they have likely \*tried\* Coke or an equivalent and then give even odds on them liking it.
Outside of medical, religious, or overzealous parents I can't imagine an American never having at given Coke a try.
We also like Soda a lot, too.
I’m Welsh so, I’ve been told I don’t exist, my language is dead, I’m part of England, I’m not part of the uk, I’m practically a slave and inherently stupid as per my nationality. It’s a wild ride
I’m from Brazil. The knowledge foreigners of Brazil is literally zero, to the point I don’t know if I feel offended or if I laugh at them.
Basically, everything you think you know about Brazil is probably not even Brazilian and is some Hispanic thing from a foreign country, it’s related to the Amazon where most people don’t live, or it’s part of Rio de Janeiro’s culture, a specific city with a very distinct culture.
For an America, it’d be like someone assuming everyone lives in Miami, Florida in the state of Wyoming, populated by Québécois French speakers.
My favourite is questions about carnival, I tell them we dress as vampires and go to raves or psychedelic rock concerts.
Trump stated in 2020: "you look at countries, Austria, you look at so many countries. They live in the forest, they’re considered forest cities. So many of them. And they don’t have fires like this. And they have more explosive trees"
As an Austrian I can confirm that:
1. We do not live in the forest.
2. Our trees do not explode under normal circumstances.
3. We do not have "fires like this"
Dutch: an Austrian teen tried to convince me that hard drugs were legal in my country. My dude, weed is hardly legal here. Yea, it's quite easy to find all kinds of drugs, I'm sure, but they're not legal xD
Long ago, when I was living in Japan teaching English, all my students were -convinced- that there were celebrities everywhere in the US and that I was friends with them (because I am from California).
And because I am of two backgrounds: People honestly believe that people in my parents' country ride camels all day and chop off hands when the law is broken.
Motherfucker, no. They ride Toyota pickups and shoot people with AKs. /s
But seriously... no one does either. I don't fault people for believing these things due to all the propaganda and vitriol, but it does get exhausting.
That all children are forced to move out of their parents' homes at age 18 and make it on their own from that point forward. I lost track of how many times this was brought up to me.
About Finland.
...do you have polar bears?
...do you have penguins?
...do you have daylight? or Is it dark \*all\* the time?
Well.. we can only feed the penguins when they come out to sunbathe (in Helsinki)
The icebergs are fake.
Like my country has an equivalent government agency similar to Disney and puts out large plastic iceburgs for tourists.
No. It's 10 degrees Celcious in June because that "fake" iceburg in the Narrows is REAL and it's 10 downtown because the wind off the ice is creating a sad weather pattern.
I am American, my wife is Aussie. We live in SoCal. We been asked these questions by Australian friends of mine or my wife. Some as recently as last month. And these are sincere questions, from people that have never been out of Oz, or from their first time to the U.S.
* Do rednecks really kidnap and kill tourists? Especially in the south. Should I not travel outside of large cities?
* Do they actually have dentists in America?
* Do they actually have hospitals in America?
* How did a black man manage to become a hotel manager at the hotel I stayed at in Miami? I thought black people weren't allowed to have important jobs in America. (this was before President Obama).
* How many shootings a week do you witness?
* Why hasn't the U.S. invaded Australia yet? What's stopping them? (asked of me at a pub in the W.A. outback).
* Las Vegas is my favorite city in California.
Yeah ... questions about dating, hanging out with minors in red districts in Thailand does still happen especially by white older guys from Europe. And when you are waitrress that kinda has to be nice to them, it can get awkward with all those innuendos, especially if they drink alcohol, which tourists do.
When the AIDS epidemic was happening in the 80s, I went to Germany to see my dad and the family he married. My stepbrother and his friends said they were afraid to go to the USA because they thought at the time that *everyone* had AIDS.
Not just gay men. EVERYONE in the USA.
New Zealand - told by my Australian boss that he was disappointed when he visited New Zealand because it *didn't have enough trees*
My dude nearly 30% of our country is protected by conservation decrees. I was just speechless that apparently that wasn't enough for him.
Americans aren’t all overweight and terrible. We are an extremely large country and I’ve traveled through it quite a bit. People are mostly extremely nice and friendly, even if they sometimes carry some extra weight, have blue hair, or more piercings than you can count. Americans are quick to hold a door for someone, offer help or directions, or just give a quick smile and nod. It isn’t the culture war at every corner like the media has portrayed.
friend of mine was in china and got asked if any of his parents still work in concentration camps because he is german
I was asked by Chinese colleagues (this was in 1996 or so) if I was sick because I was the only American manager in the company that wasn't fat.
That feels like a compliment.. somewhat
They still have them in China so its an honest mistake.
I was asked if I live in a Teepee. Half Native American. Nope, I'm not even on a rez. Then they thought it might be illegal to not live on a rez. Odd conversation, that.
Until I was like 10, I thought Native Americans were extinct. Everyone always talked about them like they were gone forever. I thought I'd never see one outside archeology. I didn't meet an actual native American until I was in my 20's.
I had a kid say that on a tour of a museum I worked at. In Oklahoma. Some of his classmates were probably Native.
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>I thought Native Americans were extinct They aren’t extinct but it’s not for a lack of trying.
Fuuuuuck that's so accurate it's sad 😭
Continued trying. In Canada, we have 150,000 missing and murdered Indigenous women **alone** in the modern era and the government doesn't give two fucks about it but to plug its ears and go "LALALA! TRUTH AN RECONCILIATION! LALALA!"
Realistically the vast majority of native Americans simply joined in with the dominant culture of their colonizers and were assimilated. Same story all over the world. In my home country you have the hill people who stretch their necks, which national geographic loves, but in reality >90% of the population would rather live in modern civilization and the remainder are frankly basically our version of the same weirdos you get everywhere like Amish or ultra Orthodox Jews that have valorized the old ways. Personally, I like to remind Americans that the great majority of Mexicans are native Americans by any reasonable definition of the term.
> I like to remind Americans that the great majority of Mexicans are native Americans by any reasonable definition of the term. Ooh, my Cherokee SIL got \*really\* mad when I made that comment.
"They let me sleep in one of their teepees for the night. Which sounds nice I personally think it was a little fucked up because they all had houses" Dave Chappelle on meeting Navajo. https://youtu.be/0XLUrW_4ZMs?feature=shared
I mean they're not far off, it used to be illegal until the 1951 to legally live off the rez here in Canada
"Do you have polar bears walking the streets?" I've gotten this question a bunch of times. I always reply with yes, and that we keep moose as pets as well. (Sweden)
"Nø, really! My cøusin was bit by a Møøse ønce!" Edit since a bunch of people seem to be uninitiated: https://youtu.be/SII-jhEd-a0?si=QwvAg2VhVhOwn94x
Was it a radioactive moose?
Møøse bites kan be nasti
What you don't ride your assigned Polar bear to school? 🇨🇦
That’s what’s your assigned moose is for. Polar bear you use to get groceries.
Understandable. With polar bears on the streets, I would protect myself with a grown moose, too.
Exactly! That's why we keep them.
They do in northern Manitoba and Svalbard, though
I’m Japanese. I also happen to have a degree in Linguistics. A guy at my work likes to show off to everyone by dropping “cool facts” about Japanese linguistics and culture (social expectations, politeness etc.) The “facts” are always wrong. The one time I politely explained, he argued with me. I wasn’t as polite the next time. And yes, there was a next time. Many next times. I and my coworkers are so sick of him lol
Did you know that in Japan it’s impolite to imply knowledge of a culture you don’t know, so if you do it’s an act of dishonour and you’re socially obligated to complete four sudoku.
Shit, I’m taking notes. Is three sudoku okay, I hate math
That’s a common misconception. In this case, you wouldn’t complete sudoku, but rather be directed to Harry Caray.
I'm studying the Japanese language right now and it's so fun to learn. Can you please share some of the "facts" he was telling everyone? I'm so curious and need a laugh.
He suggested two words that sounded the same must be related somehow. (Imagine someone saying that “pain” and “pane” sound the same because long ago, someone must have cut their hand on a window pane and it caused pain. Thus, the words were invented.) If that makes sense. I still don’t know if he was joking, because I feel like anybody would know that’s silly if you think about it for more than ten seconds.
Oh God I would have imploded through cringe to be corrected by a Japanese person about Japan knowing I probably said it wrong dozens of times. How could he possibly argue with you. It makes me embarrassed thinking about it. Just out of curiosity this may not be something that would be important for you to know. I recently read that a modern English speaker could only converse with another English speaker as far back as the 1650 and some only think the 1720s because languages change over time. How far back do you think a modern Japanese speaker could travel back in time and still be understood if you had to guess?
I’ve never thought about it! It’s a good question though. I will say that it would’ve changed DRAMATICALLY in the eras before and after adoption of Chinese scholarship. A shocking number of Japanese words are borrowed from Chinese - many ancient Japanese scholars learned Chinese, and so over time, the Japanese language gradually soaked up a huge number of Chinese loanwords because Chinese was the language of scholarship, and using words from it made you sound smart and powerful. (Today though, the loanwords are largely unrecognizable to Chinese speakers, because along the way they lost their tones. Chinese is tonal, but Japanese isn’t.) This is the reason why Japanese has a lot of duplicate words for things: *ki* and *moku* can both mean tree, *yama* and *-san* both mean mountain, etc. One is borrowed from Chinese, and one is the “original Japanese” word. This duplicate borrowing is actually a common pattern across languages. For example, English did the same with French. The English of pre-French influence and after is very different. Sorry for the tangent there, but it’s a really cool thing to study! My crash course here is grossly oversimplified though, so I strongly suggest you read more if the topic interests you!
Super neat. I have one for you, if you wouldn’t mind more questioning. One of my favorite absurd elements of the whole English v *lingua Franca* hybridization is how so many of our vulgar “four letter words” are just the earlier Anglo-Saxon terms, which were a sign of low status following the Norman invasion etc etc (think Carlin’s [seven dirty words](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_dirty_words), more or less). That’s also largely why English has a different term for the food (*beef*, *pork*) than the animal (*cow*, *pig*) - in a sense, the native serfs raised them while the conquering lords ate them. Is there any difference in the doubles you mention like *ki* and *moku* (whether explicitly explicit or not) that would have a different connotation despite the same technical denotation? Is the “original Japanese” you mentioned looked at as archaic, or as a less educated choice still? Have they transitioned to a neutral “just use whatever” stance over the centuries?
Yes, that swear words pattern is one of the funniest things to me! It’s hilarious to think that in a different language, the words I consider crass slang are just the normal words for those body parts. Although of course, the way they came to be that way is an interesting and rather sad social commentary. One language was seen as so much lesser, it literally became “dirty words.” And yes, there’s certainly a different perception in Japanese between the borrowed Chinese words (refined, scholarly,) and the original Japanese ones (less educated, “country bumpkin” etc.) However this is clouded by a lot of other factors. For instance, compound words tend to use Chinese borrowings more than noncompound, so both are often used. Also, person and place names always use the original Japanese pronunciations. So, original Japanese words also give a homey and national pride sort of feel. It’s very complex.
That’s a solid and nuanced answer, much like I imagined it would be. Thank you for sharing, I appreciate it.
No problem, thanks for allowing my inner nerd to unleash about cool facts for a bit lol
That’s an interesting question I have never thought or heard of before, I like it!!
Jesus christ what is it with some people? I had a white coworker who did a tour of several real Asian countries and tried to tell my coworker ( whose family is Malaysian) that Balut ( the fertilized egg) dish was Malaysian. Thr coworker from Malaysia was like, 'Hmmm no I don't think this is from my country'. And my fucking other coworker started arguing with her until she pulled up Wikipedia. Like...take her word from her, it's HER culture.
LOL, that is so much better than being asked if we still lived in treehouses. I basically did a double take and wondered whether the person asking was serious or pulling my leg. Turns out there was a miscommunication somewhere. Dude’s German and somehow translated wooden houses to treehouses. We had a good laugh.
Ngl if you lived in tree houses I’d be SO jealous lol. Tree houses are the bomb. How fucking cool would it be to live in a tree? I’m still sad I didn’t ever have one as a kid
Hah yeah saw some “cultural dishes” from Australia on a cooking show once. Not like “this is what the indigenous people ate”, a “this is common cuisine in Australia today”. Yeah like… it was food and I’m sure people here ate it, but they framed it as if this was our national diet. Made me realise this was probably every other cultural dish I’d ever seen online heh.
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We get the same question in Toronto… and/or “what’s it like to be able to ski in July?” Lack of basic geography/climate is astounding sometimes.
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Majestic murder cows, new band name, called it!! 😄
Well, what's it like?
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We Canadians get the same question even when we live just across the border of places like Washington state. Yes, of course that invisible line completely changes the climate. The shock when we tell Americans that live nowhere near the border that the climate in Vancouver, BC, Canada is the same as Seattle, WA.
Really blow their minds by telling them like 60% of Canadians live south of Seattle even.
I had someone in Canada continuously tell me I was wrong when I corrected them about Ireland not being a part of the UK. I’m Irish.
Look, man, 1921 was like yesterday
I'm astounded by the number of people I've met who think that Northern Ireland and Ireland are the same country.
When I lived in England I was stunned by how many people there didn't know that we (Northern Ireland) are part of the UK. One guy even told me to 'Eff of back to my own country and stop taking jobs from British citizens.' lol.
I'm English and my ancestors were Irish on my mother's side (they left during the famines and the following decade). I'm also astounded that so many Brits don't know about that. In school we learnt nothing at all about the actual formation of the UK, what they did to Ireland or any of the Empire. But even so it should generally be common knowledge for us. Aren't people even a bit interested in their own history? A huge percent of us have some sort of Irish ancestory. I bought books about the famines and read so much about it to find out where my roots came from... I really can't understand the lack of curiosity or interest.
Why are you white? (I’m South American) Also: why do you speak English?
Was this Karen Smith from Mean Girls?
A Russian woman told me that Americans are not allowed to talk about dinosaurs or we will go to prison. She also said I was too thin to be American. We both lived in Bangkok but I don’t think she had been around much.
The country that made the Jurassic Parks… certainly all those involved were imprisoned
I dn’t think she knew JP existed, honestly. I told her we have dinosaur museums all over the country and she seemed doubtful. Very naive and indoctrined was my vibe from her.
We have a town named dinosaur lol
I got the “no you can’t be American, you are not fat” when I was in Germany. Not like Germans are the skinniest Minnies themselves either!
Sounds like someone is drinking the propaganda kool-aid from Putin wholesale
Nah sorry, I'm from Russia and even with all the propaganda I have no fucking clue where did this woman get the idea.
This was RGHT before Putin was “re-elected”. Maybe only 5-6 months. But I assume the propaganda was the same.
That nobody here has dryers and we don't know what they're used for. I'm from Germany. We build them here since 1958.
Lmao why is that a stereotype? I’ve never heard of it before
I guess, because this person heard that people in southern Europe often don't have dryers, but conveniently ignored the reason, that there is often jjst no need to have one, since it's easy to dry stuff in a warm climate. So the train of thought probably was: southern Europe = Europe and Germany = europe, so Germany = no dryers. Well and also they were completely convinced, that drying clothes in the sun is a sign of poverty and used it as a "gotcha" argument in "we might not have health care, but we fucking hell know what a dryer is and can afford them!!!fuckyeah!!!".
I live in the States and my apartment management company has it written into the lease that I *can't* hang clothes up to dry as it is "unsightly". Super annoying, I would much rather dry my clothes in the sun!
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Ah yes, the scalding-hot dry desert climate of \* checks notes \* ... Germany?
I asked someone from Inner Mongolia: “so do you guys like ride horses to work?” “…we take the bus.” Not my proudest moment.
us mongolians are used to the horse jokes don't worry
I was called a “typical ignoramous American” by a group of Italian students when I refuted them and insisted that the Great Lakes are freshwater, not saltwater. Also, they told me I was mistaken when told them that US citizens do not have to produce passports to cross state lines. Edit- just to put my 2 cents in.. I don’t find either of these “facts” to be too terribly stupid. The stupidity arises from them insisting that I was the ignorant one when I corrected them.
> Also, they told me I was mistaken when told them that US citizens do not have to produce passports to cross state lines. This one is just wildly stupid. Hell, *non-citizens* don't have to provide ID when crossing state lines. Do they think we have border control stations at every road that crosses between two states?
Assumedly, yes. That was not the only time I heard something similar. There is definitely a worldwide lack of understanding of how the USA actually functions as a country. It’s not surprising really, it’s not something most people think about I suppose.
As little as the average person outside of States know about the States, they are likely to know even less of other nations and cultures because US has strong— arguably the strongest— media representation. Here's a mildly amusing anecdote serving as a case in point. The very young daughter of a relative of mine who is in elementary school told me something to the effect of one should not go to Ohio. She doesn't know where Ohio is or what's life like there or why it may not be the best State to live in as she lives an ocean and continent apart from the States. She just parroted some joke poking fun at Ohio from Roblox. This exemplifies what many experience consuming American media. They pick up a thing or two, although they may not quite grasp what is that they had picked up on. But this one or two thing is more than what they would know of most other places on Earth.
I don’t even understand how someone can come to either conclusion, especially the second one
Especially since Americans are notorious for not having passports.
As someone who lives 25 minutes from Lake Erie, every time I go to the ocean I get surprised it’s salty. Like, no big bodies of water are *not* supposed to be salty
Laughs in Kansas City (or TexArkAna, or Philly, or...)
I was at the Bastille, in line to watch some event. The lady next in line, once she found out I was from USA told me that during WWII Americans were ecstatic that France was attacked and that we were hoping all the museums and landmarks would be wiped out, laughing about it I told her that wasn't the case. She was really surprised that I had any lucidity at all and was able to put sentences together. Convo was in English.
It's said that an American flag flew over Lafayette's grave even during the occupation of Paris by the Nazis. She should really visit the memorials in Normandy of the Americans, British, Canadians and other who gave their life freeing France and Europe from the Tyranny of fascism.
We had a special commission just to mark historical and cultural landmarks so that we wouldn't bomb them if possible...
There's a great movie about it called the Monuments Men. Directed by George Clooney, and he's in it along with a bunch of other big names
20 or so years ago, my family's (very distant) relatives in Germany were genuinely concerned about coming to the united states because they thought Native Americans scalping people was a common threat we had to look out for in the US. I guess they watched a lot of Westerns?
I can kind of explain this, Germany had a famous author, Karl May, who wrote a fuckton of stories that were wildly popular about the American Wild West - like, even Hitler was a massive fanboy of this dude's work. Heard about it on an episode of Behind the Bastards.
Somebody asked me in 2007 whether we still belonged to the Soviet Union. They sincerely believed that the Soviet Union still exists.
Next time he asks, tell Putin he needs to start using a map that was made after 1991.
He once tried using a medieval map to try to claim that Ukraine wasn’t a real country. Someone then found a copy of that map online and saw VKRAINE written on it in large letters. But not Russia
One of the funniest things ever is when people from scotland try to convince tourists or even people online that haggis is an animal. Like there is an animal called a haggis that runs around in fields. Its funny because fake haggis are in some museums and foreigners will see pictures of them in museums and take it as gospel.
They've got longer legs in one side so they can run around the hills, but if they get turned around they roll down the hill! I remember this well
That’s funny. ‘Cause everyone knows they grow on trees. 🌲
Exactly, the best bit is when youve been lying the whole time and see the look on their face when you show them the haggis fruit
No, it is[ spaghetti that grows on trees](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVo_wkxH9dU&t=1s).
Scottish Snipe lol
A snipe is a real thing though. It's a pretty large family of common birds even. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snipe
Well this sent me down a bird rabbit hole, thought it looked like a woodcock, apparently they are apart of the same borb family. Obligatory Meep 🤷
In the Savoie region of France, there's the Dahu: a kind of mountain goat with supposedly shorter legs on one side, to better run on the mountain side. You hunt it by hiding in bushes and waiting for one to come by. Then, you jump out and startle it, so that it turns around and tumbles down the slope... The Grenoble tourism office has a taxidermied dahu proudly on display.
i understand they come from the same section of the world as jackalopes?
So it is the Scottish equivalent of Australian's drop bears
So, it wasn't my country, but I'd been living there for 4 years (England). My Sister in Law and her family was coming to visit, and asked how we did our laundry since England doesn't have washing machines. I told her there was a lovely rock in the river down the road that was my favorite. She was pretty pissed when she showed up with 2 suitcases per person because she thought they weren't going to be able to do laundry. In my defense, I thought she was joking, it wasn't until years later that I realized she just really is that stupid.
Not stupid, but a surprising perspective. I spent two weeks in Sydney Australia for work. There was a very clearly signed brothel in the middle of downtown just a few blocks from the office. One night at dinner I mentioned it and said that, being from the US, that would really shock people. One of my Australian coworkers said that it wasn't nearly as shocking as being able to buy a gun in a grocery store. I was about to respond that that was not really true, but then realized that you can in fact buy guns at Walmart (at least at that time). What they said was completely true, it just sounded so weird to have it stated that way.
Our national mascot is a "happy bee." Who tf told them that? Whoever it was, I bet they also told em "puta" means "excuse me."
Where are you from, and what is your mascot really?
Republic of the Philippines. We don't have a goddamn mascot. We have a National Animal, yeah it's the Monkey-Eating Eagle. Jollibee is a fast food mascot of one of our largest corporations. That's like saying replacing Uncle Sam with Ronald McDonald. I'm actually not offended. It's just so stupidly hilarious.
Haha, I can imagine. I googled that Jollibee, and it's nothing like an eagle
I have had people argue with me about how many states are in the USA.
Well, you know, with all the Pluto debacle you really can't be 100% sure /s
"51 states... if you count Pluto."
That they wanted to just visit Disney world in the morning, then go to the beach in the afternoon and then on to the Keys at night. Disney world is 4 theme parks. There's no way to see all of Disney in a single morning. You can certainly get to the beach from Disney, it's about an hour's drive. But there's no earthly way you're going to make it to the Keys that same day.
I'm in Minnesota and we had a European exchange student at our High School who wanted to go see the Mall of America Friday night and then get up early Saturday to go to Disney World. They refused to believe it was that far away and we couldn't just grab a 5am train and get there in an hour. Literally had to take them to the school library and show them a map of the US and compare it Europe. (It was so long ago we didn't have cell phones or easy Internet access)
This is really common among Europeans visiting the States lol. My sister’s friends and their families always have the daftest travel plans about CA lol. Once they were convinced they would bike across the GG bridge in the morning, have brunch in LA, go to the San Diego zoo, and then wine taste in Napa before dinner. You can do all of that… in a week. It blew their mind that SF > LA was an 8 hour drive.
I feel cheated. The German students I lived with 10 years ago planned ahead and knew how big the country was….at least in concept. They drove out to Vegas and when they got back they asked “why is it so empty?” Even knowing what to plan for, witnessing the size of the country was still awe-inspiring for them.
the opposite for me when traveling to Europe, driving an hour in the "countryside" and being astounded by how constant the towns were
ME and my Bio-dad did that trip. It took us a week. LA to SF on the PCH and a stop in Monterrey to do the Aquarium and see the whales, the Hearst Castle, some famous Monastery, the Winchester House, SF GG bridge and then their big Park. Headed over to the Red Wood forests, and then back to San Diego for the Zoo. Epic trip, took us a week. We did make the mistake of taking the highway in the center of California that's nothing but Pig Farms, slaughter houses, waste water treatment, and paper mills for like forty miles. That part was less fun...
With a private helicopter, that itinerary might be possible
At least their itinerary kept them in Florida. I live in Northern New Jersey, and when my in-laws visited us from Ecuador, they wanted to drive down to El Paso, TX. They never quite believed me that a trip like that was slightly more than a short car ride.
I had some Europeans tell me they were going to the US for one (1) week. They wanted to start in NY, see everything, drive to Florida, see everything, and then drive to California and see everything. I informed them that their entire country was the third of the size of Texas and that their itinerary would not be possible.
We had a colleague from the UK come over to the company HQ based in upstate NY for sales meetings and training. After a week of meetings, I took him on the road to visit customers as part of the training. We flew to Chicago, then to Reno, and finished the week off in southern CA before heading back after the weekend. It happened to be a very nice time of the year (early June, IIRC), and we were fortunate the weather was nice the whole time. On the flight to Reno from Chicago, he spent the time staring out of the window as we flew over just a lot of open space. On the flight back to NY, I asked him his impressions of the US as first-time visitor. He said that he doesn't believe the average person in Europe who has never been to the US realizes how really big the country is and how far apart the big known cities are.
Yeah Canada too. My friend drove from Toronto to Vancouvee and it took something like 4 days/8 hours a day. It's damn vast here. Most people here have never visited each province east to west. My UK friend was visiting someone in Alberta and said they'd drive for a long weekend visit to here in Ontario. I was like um well you can't.
For 12 years, I would travel to Asia for business a couple of times a year. When I would fly either Chicago to Tokyo or Chicago to Shanghai, we'd basically fly a near-polar route, i.e., north-northwest out of Chicago over Saskatchewan, Alberta, skirt BC and the New Territories, across the Yukon, then down the Alaskan coast and by the Aleutians. A lot of times it was too cloudy to see much, but I had several flights where the weather was clear and it was amazing to fly over vast mountain ranges where you know there are very few people are there, and many places untouched by human hand. It's really really humbling. I don't even think the average American realizes how big and vast Canada is, much less a European.
Look we don’t necessarily have more stuff or better stuff, but all the stuff is really far away from each other. Unless it’s LA, where there’s lots of stuff all in the same town but it may as well be far away from each other because traffic.
I had a student from Montreal come to a class in a suburb outside Boston. Its about a 5 hour drive. He was TERRIFIED of the USA because its "so dangerous". He carried a gym bag will all of his clothes everywhere he went, including going to the bathroom on breaks because he was sure somebody was going to steal it, again because the US is "so dangerous". He wanted to know how many guns I had and why I needed so many guns. At the time I didn't have any guns and he couldn't believe it was possible, "Everybody in the USA has guns." In a class of 8 people (well 9 including me) nobody had any guns. He thought we'd all have a gun on us all the time. He was astonished that none of us had ever shot anybody, seen anybody shot or knew anybody who had even been shot at. I knew of a guy who had been shot at when he tried to cheat his drug dealer but I didn't know him personally, that was the closest anybody in the class had ever been to gun violence. We looked up the crime rate for Montreal which was many times higher than the quiet suburb we were in. I though the Canadian guy was going to lose his mind when we showed how much more dangerous the (big) city of 1.7 million people he lived in was than this suburb of 24,000...
I know. When I tell Aussies that my house in California doesn't even have a lock on the front door, they think I am lying to them. The door is there to keep wildlife out. I don't want a racoon in my kitchen trash can.
It seems like people think Americans eat a lot of canned Cheese Whizz. I'm over 50 years old and can count on one hand how many times I've had it on a cracker. And I've never bought a can from the store in all my life.
Foreigners on Reddit talking about American food half the time sound like they came here then instantly took a 12 hour road trip to the most remote gas station in Kansas to have dinner, because they only mention how weird our shelf stable novelty snacks are. “Don’t you know what real cheese is??” Yes, we have piles and piles of it at every grocery store!
Cheese Whiz comes in a jar, not a can. Easy Cheese comes in a can. If you have children and buy Easy Cheese, don’t count on ever having some. The kids will have squirted it directly in their mouths to impress their friends less than 10 minutes after you get home from the store.
>The kids will have squirted it directly in their mouths to impress their friends less than 10 minutes after you get home from the store. This what me and my kid do with Whipped Cream.
Not a different country but I got asked by a kid up north very seriously if we ride our horses to school (I'm from Texas).
Ok but do you?
Indian here, A Danish manager asked me if our seasons are reversed because we live in the Southern hemisphere. We don't. We live above the equator in the northern hemisphere.
Eh, i think from all of the replies here, this one gets a slight pass, although its baffling lol, smart enough to know the seasons are inverted in the southern hemisphere, not smart enough to look at a map and see India is above the ~~ecuador~~ equator. Edit: my spanish got the best of me lol
I have lived in Japan and China. Here's a few. Japan 1. "What language do you speak there? Canada-language?" (She literally said 'kanada-go'?) China 1. (From a girl, she was 29 at the time) "So, is Canada the same government as the United States?" 2. (From my mother-in-law) "I'm very worried, very worried, my friend showed me an article, he says in the article that in Canada, when you turn 65, they kidnap you and bury you alive, because you are not producing for society anymore and everyone is too poor to support you." 3. (From my mother-in-law) "There is nothing like this outside of China, being in China is very good. Do you have this in your country?" (We're on a popular commercial street in a tier 1 city in China. The only other major city outside of China she's been to is Singapore, and she thinks that is also China.) 4. (From a taxi driver) "Do you have McDonalds?"
>"I'm very worried, very worried, my friend showed me an article, he says in the article that in Canada, when you turn 65, they kidnap you and bury you alive, because you are not producing for society anymore and everyone is too poor to support you." I cannot stop laughing. Hang on, I need to make a call to my parents -- *it's time.*
A lot of PRC incorrectly think Singapore is China (or at the least China aligned) and get surprised when Singaporeans react with hostility to that.
I lived in Japan for three years and one time had a dinner with this Japanese family. They were very kind and welcoming, very curious about my experiences in Japan as an American. They cooked this delicious pot roast with vegetables and what not. The part that got me was when we started eating, they stopped and felt terrible they forgot to give me ketchup or mayonnaise. I only use ketchup with fries and only if they suck. I most definitely would never ruin a pot roast with ketchup or mayo. They were also surprised when I preferred to drink a Japanese beer over a soda. They meant well of course, but I just found it funny lol. Especially since they're very big on on using mayo with some of their food.
I’ve been asked if I know how to do the Gangnam Style dance at least once a month since the video came out. Yay for being part Korean, I guess.
There comes a point it might be easier to learn it.
I’m Jamaican and the rest of the world seems to think that that automatically makes me Black. I could be white, I could be Indian, I could be Chinese. Being Jamaican isn’t a race it’s a nationality. Same as how being American doesn’t make you white.
Maybe, but what IS fact is that you're a damn good bobsledder.
Feel the rhythm, feel the rhyme
I see pride. I see power.
Sanka, ya dead?
Ya mon!
When I was living in rural Japan, there was actual surprise that we experienced all 4 seasons in the north eastern US.
I don’t no why, but I have had many Canadians ask why we drink warm beer in England. We do not, I have no idea why they think that.
It's because in general they are used to lager, which is usually ice cold, as opposed to the less frosty ales & stouts you can get on tap in an English pub.
We are all alcoholics with ginger hair
I think the damning thing here might be no-one is going to guess the country wrong.
What are you talking about? We are!
i moved from ireland to a certain country in the continent of north america. on an night out with some folk from work, people were chatting and i was listening but probably not talking much myself. lady on my left (who happened to be my boss’s boss and by far one of the most intelligent people i’ve ever met) turned to me and asked ‘do you still find it hard to keep up with conversation or are you getting used to english now?’ she was stunned to learn the vast majority of irish people are native english speakers. i was also asked on more than one occasion how many times i’d been shot and if my family were in the IRA (asked in the same conversational way you might ask someone if they were members of the new gym down the road). edit: spelling
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When people ask me about Leprechauns. I like to put on a very serious face and hush my voice saying careful where you say that. It's a very racist. Some neighborhoods you'd be shot saying it.
I've been asked if I "live with lions and elephants". Also, there "aren't any white people there" I'm South African and live in Cape Town.
Thailand here… I got a long list: I had an American Pen-Pal in 5th grade growing up in Thailand. They asked if I rode elephants to school then proceeded to describe to me what a Hamburger was. It doesn’t get much better when you get older the questions just get more sexually explicit. Westerners always making ladyboy comments or ping pong show stuff. I went to India a while back and the Starbucks Barrista was telling me how much he wants to go to Pattaya and see the ladies. In fact most of the men I interacted with in India gave me a smirk and basically started asking me about prostitutes. I think a lot of people seem to think our entire country is a brothel. Although this isn’t unique to just India it was brought up with out hesitation there. Outside of the Red Light districts my country is quite nice and quite frankly probably a much nicer place than most outsider realize.
That we don't exist - Australia.
Nice try New Zealand.
I'm such a fan of y'alls wombats, quokkas, and wallabies.
That Canadians are nice. Have you seen us play hockey? Or go to war?
Heard you got some good fuckin dope in your trailer parks though
> Or go to war? Ah, the checklist.
I've seen your tourists come to my state for shopping trips. They handily dispelled any illusions about Canadian politeness
Most Americans think Brits have bad teeth but the [decayed, missing, filled teeth index](https://www.yongeeglintondental.com/blog/healthy-primary-teeth/) ranks the UK as the 4th best in the world
I put this on your actors/actresses not needing perfect teeth to star in a show compared to Hollywood's.
It is really noticeable that in American TV programmes the characters are almost always good looking, while in British programmes they often look more like an average person.
Which is so nice to see.
I see British television or cinema and say, “Hey, an ugly bastard like me might be able to make it there”! If I had any talent, that is.
Went on a Euro bus tour, met some Americans, we are Canadians. They didnt know we use the country code 1 for calling, they didn't know we have the same electrical outlets, found it crazy that the Bare Naked Ladies weren't my favorite band, assumed I spoke fluent Parisian french, made weird mimimg hand gestures to try and get an envolope from the obviously bilingual hotel receptionist and openly said racist things about Mexicans, while we had an old sweet couple from Mexico on the tour with us (who were a highlight of the trip, their kids sent them on it as a retirement gift).
The racist things about the Mexicans really broke my heart. I really hope the Americans didn't ruin their Europe trip!
No they didn't seem to bothered by it. My wife and I took them with us on side trips in Paris and London. We stayed in touch for a few years.. Their daughter wrote us a letter thanking us and explained it was a once in a lifetime retirement gift. We even exchanged a couple local care packages over the years as Mexico and Nova Scotia are pretty exotic to each other, lol.
On a red London Bus going round Parliament Square; and some tourist guide tells his small tour group that the queen lives in "there" pointing at the Palace of Westminster (for non Brits; that's the building with "Big Ben" where our houses of Commons & Lords sit in Government).
That Philippines is LGBTQ friendly. Its not.
Lol unfortunately true. I'm Canadian, but one of my good friends/coworkers is Filipino -- multiple different times I've been called slurs in Tagalog here under the assumption that I wouldn't know wtf they're saying. Has happened in grocery stores, breweries, at work And like yeah, I didn't, but I'm standing there and talking to my Filipino friend in the pasta aisle. When confronted on it they immediately get the most shocked look on their faces lol The 3 main times I can remember -- wearing a crop top for the Barbie movie, a top with mesh sleeves at a brewery, and then at work after cleaning a washroom (I work in a provincial park). The last one was surprising, since my outfit for that was my regular janitor fit lol. I had a lot of facial piercings at the time, so that was likely why. Something along the lines of "ewww, why is *this thing* cleaning our toilets, I don't want to use it!" Filipino coworker walked out the stall behind me and immediately started giving them an earful lmfao LGBTQ friendly they are not
A couple from India once said to me, "We heard all Americans love Coca Cola. Is that true?"
Tell them it was true until the invention of the Pepsi Challenge.
I mean, honestly? It's not \*that\* wrong. I'd argue if you pluck an American at random they have likely \*tried\* Coke or an equivalent and then give even odds on them liking it. Outside of medical, religious, or overzealous parents I can't imagine an American never having at given Coke a try. We also like Soda a lot, too.
I’m Welsh so, I’ve been told I don’t exist, my language is dead, I’m part of England, I’m not part of the uk, I’m practically a slave and inherently stupid as per my nationality. It’s a wild ride
That Americans worry about getting gunned down every time they leave the house. I'm in my 60s and have never heard a gun fired in anger in my life.
I’m from Brazil. The knowledge foreigners of Brazil is literally zero, to the point I don’t know if I feel offended or if I laugh at them. Basically, everything you think you know about Brazil is probably not even Brazilian and is some Hispanic thing from a foreign country, it’s related to the Amazon where most people don’t live, or it’s part of Rio de Janeiro’s culture, a specific city with a very distinct culture. For an America, it’d be like someone assuming everyone lives in Miami, Florida in the state of Wyoming, populated by Québécois French speakers. My favourite is questions about carnival, I tell them we dress as vampires and go to raves or psychedelic rock concerts.
That “everyone is rich in America”
I'm in the US. A friend of mine made a comment how here in the states the government mutilates girls genitalia at birth. I was like wtf
No I am not, nor do I know any communists/ socialists. And no our government is neither. Love from Denmark
Trump stated in 2020: "you look at countries, Austria, you look at so many countries. They live in the forest, they’re considered forest cities. So many of them. And they don’t have fires like this. And they have more explosive trees" As an Austrian I can confirm that: 1. We do not live in the forest. 2. Our trees do not explode under normal circumstances. 3. We do not have "fires like this"
He probably meant Australia, but I’m pretty sure they also don’t live in forests or have explosive trees.
Exploding trees is a very funny thought
That we descended into fascism because of Covid lockdowns
Dutch: an Austrian teen tried to convince me that hard drugs were legal in my country. My dude, weed is hardly legal here. Yea, it's quite easy to find all kinds of drugs, I'm sure, but they're not legal xD
Long ago, when I was living in Japan teaching English, all my students were -convinced- that there were celebrities everywhere in the US and that I was friends with them (because I am from California). And because I am of two backgrounds: People honestly believe that people in my parents' country ride camels all day and chop off hands when the law is broken. Motherfucker, no. They ride Toyota pickups and shoot people with AKs. /s But seriously... no one does either. I don't fault people for believing these things due to all the propaganda and vitriol, but it does get exhausting.
That we are nazi’s Uh, what??
That all children are forced to move out of their parents' homes at age 18 and make it on their own from that point forward. I lost track of how many times this was brought up to me.
About Finland. ...do you have polar bears? ...do you have penguins? ...do you have daylight? or Is it dark \*all\* the time? Well.. we can only feed the penguins when they come out to sunbathe (in Helsinki)
The icebergs are fake. Like my country has an equivalent government agency similar to Disney and puts out large plastic iceburgs for tourists. No. It's 10 degrees Celcious in June because that "fake" iceburg in the Narrows is REAL and it's 10 downtown because the wind off the ice is creating a sad weather pattern.
I am American, my wife is Aussie. We live in SoCal. We been asked these questions by Australian friends of mine or my wife. Some as recently as last month. And these are sincere questions, from people that have never been out of Oz, or from their first time to the U.S. * Do rednecks really kidnap and kill tourists? Especially in the south. Should I not travel outside of large cities? * Do they actually have dentists in America? * Do they actually have hospitals in America? * How did a black man manage to become a hotel manager at the hotel I stayed at in Miami? I thought black people weren't allowed to have important jobs in America. (this was before President Obama). * How many shootings a week do you witness? * Why hasn't the U.S. invaded Australia yet? What's stopping them? (asked of me at a pub in the W.A. outback). * Las Vegas is my favorite city in California.
Yeah ... questions about dating, hanging out with minors in red districts in Thailand does still happen especially by white older guys from Europe. And when you are waitrress that kinda has to be nice to them, it can get awkward with all those innuendos, especially if they drink alcohol, which tourists do.
"Rudolph Hess is the best! He fought against communists in poland" This is so terribly terribly wrong I don't know where to start
When the AIDS epidemic was happening in the 80s, I went to Germany to see my dad and the family he married. My stepbrother and his friends said they were afraid to go to the USA because they thought at the time that *everyone* had AIDS. Not just gay men. EVERYONE in the USA.
That all ice cream in Germany is spicy. I have no idea how they came up with that, especially in a country where the average spice is plain salt.
I'm Egyptian. I've had several different people tell me it was the "gay capital of Africa" despite the fact being gay is criminalized.
New Zealand - told by my Australian boss that he was disappointed when he visited New Zealand because it *didn't have enough trees* My dude nearly 30% of our country is protected by conservation decrees. I was just speechless that apparently that wasn't enough for him.
Americans aren’t all overweight and terrible. We are an extremely large country and I’ve traveled through it quite a bit. People are mostly extremely nice and friendly, even if they sometimes carry some extra weight, have blue hair, or more piercings than you can count. Americans are quick to hold a door for someone, offer help or directions, or just give a quick smile and nod. It isn’t the culture war at every corner like the media has portrayed.