# Are any parts of Europe considered "flyover country"? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 10, 2009, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349 "2009-06-10T16:54:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2009, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/41 "2009-06-13T01:55:48Z")
I took a train through Croatia and it was the spitting image of central Wisconsin. If Americans feel Wisconsin is fly-over then so is Croatia. ---
**Author:** ![Dag\_Otto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@Dag\_Otto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dag_Otto)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2009, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/42 "2009-06-13T02:17:03Z")
If you went to Croatia and missed the coast, you missed some of the best parts of Croatia. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2009, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/43 "2009-06-13T04:36:57Z")
> [@Kimmy\_Gibbler](#): > > Fixed it! OK, so that’s our flyover country… which I already said in my first post! “Flyover country” is those places the locals may think of visiting and would be extremely surprised to hear a foreigner say “I want to go there.” Heck, many people from other continents mean “I want to visit (the holy triumvirate of London, Paris and Rome)” when saying “I want to go to Europe;” for those people, the whole continent is flyover country. Navarra gets about half a million foreign visitors each year, but once you substract the French (who are all over the place) and the people going to Sanfermines in Pamplona, you have… what, a dozen left? There is a British couple who retired to Ejea instead of going to the Southeast coast where all the British enclaves are - and they got interviewed for the newspaper! Every other British living in the area came to play football or following someone they were in love with. ---
**Author:** ![Teacake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Teacake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Teacake)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2009, 11:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/44 "2009-06-13T11:57:38Z")
> [@Kimmy\_Gibbler](#): > > This is different from Bavaria how exactly? And if I lived in the cradle of the Third Reich, I might be a little more abashed in throwing around accusations of genocide. I’m not going to touch the “accusations of genocide” which I haven’t seen **Constanze** make, so what the hell? And you’re blaming _current residents_ of a place for something that happened there 70 years ago? But it’s none of my business. To answer the less weird part of your post, this is different from Bavaria _completely_. Bavaria is a very individual place. When you’re there, you really couldn’t be anywhere else. The culture, the food, the beer, the people, the art, the architecture, the music, the landscape… If we’re talking about places being different and various, and I thought we were, just try getting a picture of Bavaria (any part of it, you choose) and comparing it to a picture of, say, the Luneburger Heide. Yeah, Germany’s flyover country because it’s so boring and has no variety. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2009, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/45 "2009-06-13T12:51:10Z")
> [@Kimmy\_Gibbler](#): > > Fixed it! [Moderator Admonition]No you didn’t-you deliberately misquoted, and _that_ is against the rules. Don’t do it again.[/Moderator Admonition] ---
**Author:** ![astorian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ad7895/32.png) [@astorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astorian)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2009, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/46 "2009-06-13T13:04:22Z")
> [@installLSC](#): > > People must have heard different uses of “flyover country” than me. Everytime I’ve heard the term “flyover country” it’s by the hipster/indie contingent and has nothing to do with scenery or tourist interest. It’s more of a NYC/LA/SF attitude that they’re much more sophisticated culturally and politically than the rest of the country. You would be hard pressed to name any country where the social/cultural elite in the big cities don’t look down on rural residents or suburbanites to some degree. Exactly right. “Flyover country” has nothing to do with boring scenery, or tacky strip malls, or chain restaurants. The term reflects a state of mind, an attitude that only a few big, hip, coastal cities are important, while the rest of the country might as well not exist. And while that phrase doesn’t exist in other languages or countries, it’s a safe bet that attitude pervades in most of them. A London stockbroker probably never even THINKS about Yorkshire, and if he does, it’s may well be with a vague disdain. A Parisian fashion designer probably regards every part of France outside Paris as the boondocks. In any big city, there are hipsters who look at the rural or suburban parts of their county and shudder (“Ugh, who’d ever live in such a boring place by choice? The people there must be morons or rubes”). That’s as true in Europe as it is in New York or Los Angeles. ---
**Author:** ![DMark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@DMark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMark)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2009, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/47 "2009-06-13T14:21:14Z")
> [@Mississippienne](#): > > History does not begin when the white people show up. The American continents have been inhabited for thousands of years, and have as much history as anyone. Whether you find the history, cultures, cuisines, etc. appealing is a matter of personal taste. Let me just say that, growing up in the Midwest, you can drive 100’s of miles and find one crappy little town after another, separated by one corn field after another, with absolutely nothing of any interest whatsoever; it has nothing to do with white people vs Native Americans. Try driving back and forth from Southern Illinois University to the Chicago area about 60 times and we will talk. ---
**Author:** ![WormTheRed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/bbe5ce/32.png) [@WormTheRed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WormTheRed)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2009, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/48 "2009-06-13T18:07:22Z")
> [@constanze](#): > > Only if you want to get from point A to point B, or consider only cities several hundred years old worth seeing. Just like hundreds of people visit the mountains every year to go hiking, many people travel to Scandinavia to walk in the woods (with or without elks). You also have the option of visiting the Sami people who have adapted their way of life to modernity (althoug the global warming is harming them, too - the snow melts too early during their treks to support the weight of the animals, and rivers become unfrozen). There ain’t nothing to see in the highlands of Småland but loads of trees. And nope, people sure don’t go hiking in them either. Way further up north, yes. But not there 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Ximenean](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/aca169/32.png) [@Ximenean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ximenean)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2009, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/49 "2009-06-13T19:03:32Z")
> [@astorian](#): > > Exactly right. “Flyover country” has nothing to do with boring scenery, or tacky strip malls, or chain restaurants. The term reflects a state of mind, an attitude that only a few big, hip, coastal cities are important, while the rest of the country might as well not exist. > > And while that phrase doesn’t exist in other languages or countries, it’s a safe bet that attitude pervades in most of them. > > A London stockbroker probably never even THINKS about Yorkshire, and if he does, it’s may well be with a vague disdain. > > A Parisian fashion designer probably regards every part of France outside Paris as the boondocks. > > In any big city, there are hipsters who look at the rural or suburban parts of their county and shudder (“Ugh, who’d ever live in such a boring place by choice? The people there must be morons or rubes”). That’s as true in Europe as it is in New York or Los Angeles. True enough. I think the reason why you use the term “flyover country” for what metropolitan Europeans would call “the provinces” is that in the USA it is geographically contiguous. Our flyover country is spread around in little pockets. ---
**Author:** ![constanze](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f9ae1b/32.png) [@constanze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/constanze)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2009, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/50 "2009-06-13T20:30:14Z")
> [@Kimmy\_Gibbler](#): > > This is different from Bavaria how exactly? There is a certain redneck attitude in rural Bavaria, as in many rural areas, yes. But there are no identical villages with McDonalds and chain malls. If you travel for two hours, there will be lots of small old cities with interesting architecture, and scenery. > [@](#): > > And if I lived in the cradle of the Third Reich, I might be a little more abashed in throwing around accusations of genocide. I didn’t throw around accusation of genocide, unless you deny that what the white settlers and the US Army and US govt. did to the Native Americans was purposeful destruction both of life and of culture? I see however a difference between Germany admitting that the Holocaust was wrong and trying our best to learn from it what to never do again, and in the way the US deals with it by … gloryfing the whites, still not helping the Native Americans or apologizing etc. And we certainly see that the Holocaust also was a terrible destruction of the rich jiddish culture, but that’s not visible in Bavarian countryside, but in the cities and in Eastern Europe. ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2009, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/51 "2009-06-13T20:45:05Z")
> [@constanze](#): > > But lack of modern tourist infrastructure is a very different aspect than the monotony of the flyover country. For many other tourists, the lack of infrastructure until the Eastern European /Balkan regions catch up means lower prices and far less crowding than in Italy or similar. Sure, many (dumb) average tourists want to go Ballermann 6 in Mallorca where everybody understands German, and you go the beach during the day and dancing at night while getting stinking drunk. Yes, there are enough jingoistic idiots who go to Italy because it’s sunny, but insist on eating their Wiener Schnitzel and speaking German like at home (and the Italians comply because so many tourists come). But that’s not all tourists. Well, obviously not, and I never said this was the case. (I am, in fact, not that kind of tourist myself. My last vacation was to Colombia, for heaven’s sake.) Just that pretty much no one I knew was interested in coming to visit me when I lived in Bulgaria. Which is actually a beautiful country with lots of good food and beaches and interesting and cute villages and pretty old cities, and it’s very cheap. I must admit that my anecdotes of my life in a village in the rural Balkans were probably not a major enticement, though. I love Bulgaria. I did not love living in a town of 3,000 people in a country where the language doesn’t have a word for “privacy”. Oh, and **Eva Luna** , what was that about a week long vacation that takes four days to get to and from? Are you not the same person who went to Turkey just recently? Guess what Turkey is right next to, hmmm? P.S. I’m not actually bitter that you didn’t visit me, I swear! I’m long over the _pain_ and _deep sadness_ that everyone I knew was like “um, have fun on your wacky Eastern European adventure. See you in two years.” ---
**Author:** ![manx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/65b543/32.png) [@manx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/manx)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2009, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/52 "2009-06-13T21:18:56Z")
> [@Kyla](#): > > P.S. I’m not actually bitter that you didn’t visit me, I swear! I’m long over the _pain_ and _deep sadness_ that everyone I knew was like “um, have fun on your wacky Eastern European adventure. See you in two years.” I’m in London, and, over the past year and a half I’ve had what amounts to six months of family, friends, friends-of-friends and siblings-of-friends-of-friends staying on my couch. I don’t mind, really, but sometimes I think my life would be easier if I’d done my Big OE in Bulgaria, rather than Brixton. ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2009, 6:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/53 "2009-06-14T06:57:04Z")
I think it’s funny that some people who won’t go to Eastern Europe because of what they perceive as lack of infrastructure will happily visit Ireland, which must have the worst infrastructure of any country in _Western_ Europe and in some respects compares unfavourably to a number of the Eastern European countries I’ve visited. ---
**Author:** ![Eva\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e495f1/32.png) [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2009, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/54 "2009-06-14T13:29:38Z")
> [@Kyla](#): > > Oh, and **Eva Luna** , what was that about a week long vacation that takes four days to get to and from? Are you not the same person who went to Turkey just recently? Guess what Turkey is right next to, hmmm? > > P.S. I’m not actually bitter that you didn’t visit me, I swear! I’m long over the _pain_ and _deep sadness_ that everyone I knew was like “um, have fun on your wacky Eastern European adventure. See you in two years.” We actually had a nonstop Chicago-Istanbul flight and were there in 11 hours. Getting to where you were in Bulgaria would have meant AT LEAST two flights, with a layover in between, and then a bus ride. If it makes you feel any better, I didn’t visit my friend in Croatia while he was there for the same reason, and he was living on a lovely Adriatic island which is chock-full of European tourists in the summer. (It would have meant, in its least complicated version, a plane to Frankfurt or 2 planes to Split, then a train or multiple buses, then a ferry.) ---
**Author:** ![Eva\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e495f1/32.png) [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2009, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/55 "2009-06-14T13:36:59Z")
P.S. I once spent the summer in _Siberia,_ for chrissakes. But then I don’t mind needing 2 flights with a long layover and a bus ride to get somewhere if I’m going to spend 10 weeks there. ---
**Author:** ![Leiko](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Leiko](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leiko)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2009, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/56 "2009-06-14T22:35:55Z")
> [@Athena](#): > > Have you ever been to the middle of the US? > > I give you: > > - the Rocky Mountains (Colorado/Wyoming/etc) > - Utah’s red canyons > - New Mexico/Arizona desert. And the food. > - the Great Lakes > > (snip) Those are all lovely, but the actual geographical middle is Kansas. And while I’m sure there are lovely places in Kansas- one of my online friends lives in a small town I would love to visit for its arts focus, f’r instance- what you see flying over is mostly corn and other crops. Much as I love farmland, that gets boring. (And if I’m going to keep quibbling, I wouldn’t call Utah the middle anymore than I would Kentucky or Tennessee. In my loose geographic classification, Utah is in-between Southwest and Inner-mountain west.) ---
**Author:** ![Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freddy_the_Pig)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2009, 2:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/57 "2009-06-15T14:10:37Z")
> [@Ximenean](#): > > True enough. I think the reason why you use the term “flyover country” for what metropolitan Europeans would call “the provinces” is that in the USA it is geographically contiguous. Our flyover country is spread around in little pockets. That is correct. Europe has nothing analogous to the bicoastal orientation of elites in the United States. Flyover country has little to do with where you vacation, and everything to do with where you conduct business. In the United States, if you are in show business, New York is the live theater capital, Hollywood the movie capital. If you are in business, Wall Street is the financial capital, whereas the most dynamic IT companies are headquartered on the West Coast. In academics, the foremost research universities and think tanks are clustered on the East Coast or in California. If you work in any of these elite high-visibility fields, you commute between the coasts and fly over everything in between. In Europe, because of the multinational history, the elites are scattered in London and throughout the continent, at least as far east as the former Iron Curtain. “Flyover country” is the provinces in each country. ---
**Author:** ![Kimmy\_Gibbler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Kimmy\_Gibbler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimmy_Gibbler)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2009, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/58 "2009-06-15T15:15:52Z")
> [@Freddy\_the\_Pig](#): > > In Europe, because of the multinational history, the elites are scattered in London and throughout the continent, at least as far east as the former Iron Curtain. “Flyover country” is the provinces in each country. This isn’t precisely correct. You have London, and maybe at an order of magnitude less, you have Paris. Everything else–Berlin, Milan, Moscow, Barcelona–may be lovely cities, but they are the continental equivalents of Denver and Atlanta. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2009, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/59 "2009-06-15T16:27:39Z")
> [@Mississippienne](#): > > History does not begin when the white people show up. The American continents have been inhabited for thousands of years, and have as much history as anyone. Whether you find the history, cultures, cuisines, etc. appealing is a matter of personal taste. Actually, in America history did begin when the white people showed up, almost by definition, since nearly all (all?) of the Native American tribes had no written language. ---
**Author:** ![Kimmy\_Gibbler](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Kimmy\_Gibbler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimmy_Gibbler)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2009, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349/60 "2009-06-15T16:44:19Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Actually, in America history did begin when the white people showed up, almost by definition, since nearly all (all?) of the Native American tribes had no written language. Without endorsing the conflation of historiography and history, I give you [Maya script - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_script). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-any-parts-of-europe-considered-flyover-country/499349.md?page=4)