I read a lot about people traveling to other countries, regions and [American] states and the general take-away is that people are really nice everywhere.
The people in Russia are great. The people in Syria are great. The people in Brazil are great. The people in Chicago are great. Everyone is great and welcoming (at least to travelers…?)
I have no reason to doubt that the people relating the stories are telling the truth. I’m sure all the people they met are great!
But, surely some populations aren’t nice, or aren’t nice to foreigners. Gotta be!
Have you ever experienced a place where you thought “Gee, these people as a whole sure aren’t very nice…”?
Boston and Philadelphia aren’t especially friendly to outsiders. It isn’t that most people are actively mean but there are a whole lot of assholes and the people as a whole tend to be reserved and cold. The latent racism is just a bonus.
ETA: I live in the Boston area and the stereotypes are accurate in general.
I’m fortunate to have traveled to many countries and all of them have been positively friendly. Even the folks in Egypt were incredibly welcoming to a wayward Yank. I think I even got hit-on by a couple of Egyptian dudes, but that’s not the question you asked.
I must footnote my China comment by saying I’ve only been once. I was on a business trip and mostly in-city the whole time. In reflection, I believe that I was holding the Chinese people to *my own *value system of being overly friendly and helpful, complete with little pleasantries, etc. So I’ve come to think that they’re not being rude or unfriendly, they’re just not going out of their way to BE friendly. At least that’s what I tell myself so I can sleep at night.
Some were nice, but the majority were standoffish and rather cold. The whole area (Krakow) seemed to have a dreary greyness about it at times.
We did see happy couples, happy kids, etc but a lot of people seemed miserable and this was in the middle of summer, not during one of their frigid winters.
The Mountain West is less nice than I’d expect relative to its emptiness. Usually people who aren’t complete hermits are nicer when they are more alone. But that’s relative and there are of course plenty of nice people there.
Ukraine. People are cold and stand-offish outside their immediate circles. There is a pervasive culture of screwing somebody out of a grivna being better than earning a grivna. I see the same thing among the immigrant community here.
Perhaps (let’s be PC ) each culture has comparable numbers of nice and un-nice, but the niceness and unniceness take different forms.
Most people who’ve spent time in Paris (including Parisians!) agree that Parisians are arrogant. This can be seen in a favorable light — they are self-confident and candid — but it is distinctive. I lack the experience to comment on France-XParis. Traveling Americans are also sometimes noted for arrogance but it has a quite different tone from Parisian arrogance. New Yorkers are noted for a certain unniceness but I have no personal experience of that. Thais are noted for friendliness, generosity and maintaining good spirits, but the culture has its share of unniceness as well.
The american mountain west?
My MIL, who lived her whole life in New Jersey, used to complain when she visited that people where SO nice, it made her uncomfortable.
Yes. I’ve met many very friendly and nice people there but Carlsbad NM and somewhere in Wyoming are the only places I’ve been to where I’ve walked into an establishment and they see me and just keep on doing what they were doing without serving me, until I just walk out.
People in big cities (NY, Philly) tend to be less nice than people in small towns. I would say that is a normal adaptation to the increased stress of city life.
Italy has a very high percentage of nice people. IMHO.
I have been in some small local bars that are like that. I learned early on, that the only drink that has absolutely no negative connotations anywhere (beside a lack of taste) is Budweiser. Every bar in America has it, and no one wants to kick your ass just because you ordered it.
International opinion surverys generally indicate that Eastern Europeans in general are quite unhappy / dissatisfied, and in particular are much less happy than one would predict based on their GDP.
To the OP, my friend was an agricultural aid worker in South Sudan and said that people there were generally not very nice to him and to his (African) wife.
That being said, both people’s individual experiences and their definition of ‘nice’ are going to be somewhat variable, and I don’t think most of what we’re talking about are real and significant differences. There are no countries out there that are teeming with sociopaths.
The only place I’ve traveled to where I encountered this was a pre-Katrina New Orleans. The only city I’ve ever been where I felt both not safe and not welcome, and I grew up in the Detroit area.
I lived in Mozambique from 1997 to 1999. The local people there were usually awful. To be fair, they were desperately poor and only just starting to recover from a savage civil war that left many people without limbs, and land mines scattered throughout the country. A lifetime of poverty and violence does bad things to people: I found almost everyone to be greedy and unfriendly.
As that was 20 years ago, I hope things are better now.
I just spoke with a former colleague who now works for a French company. He says France is great, except for the people. They’re arrogant and rude. Personally, I haven’t spent enough time there to form much of an opinion.
) each culture has comparable numbers of nice and un-nice, but the niceness and unniceness take different forms.