The very iconic picnic table, with a big flat surface and two attached benches, is a fixture of parks all over the USA. While on vacation here in Australia, I noticed (not surprisingly) that they are basically identical.
Which raised the question in my mind… is there any nation on earth which has no picnic tables?
Some possibilities:
-North Korea (I googled around some, couldn’t find a photo)
-Vatican City
-Bhutan/Nepal/Tibet
-One of the really tiny island nations
Not sure if this is the right forum, although I suppose it could be factually answered at least in the positive…
I mean, I’m pretty sure there are no picnic tables in the Republic of Sealand and it would be possible to exhaustively scour Vatican City for picnic tables. It’s almost certain that there exists at least one country in the world without picnic tables.
I have never seen that kind of picnic table in India, IIRC. (Not that I’ve been everywhere or seen everything in India, but I’ve been there a fair bit.) They have various kinds of outdoor seating, but I don’t recall that kind of solid table with two attached benches.
Mostly, IME, if Indians have an outdoor picnic as opposed to ordinary open-air dining, they spread out some kind of cloth and sit on the ground.
There are picnic tables manufactured in India, but I’ve never seen one in use there. I’m ready to be corrected by the better-informed, though.
Over half of the Vatican (23 hectares, 57 acres) is taken up by the Vatican Gardens, a private urban garden for the Pope & workers in Vatican City (though guided public tours are available.) I’d expect there are at least a few picnic tables in all that garden space.
In fact, in this picture, in the section to the upper left (that looks like a vegetable garden), I think I can see a white picnic table near a tree.
They are definitely found in South Africa, Namibia and Zimbabwe. Also ubiquitous is the concrete version with non-attached, but fixed, seats at roadside stops (like this). IIRC they occur in Botswana as well. The wooden ones can be found (at resorts) in Mozambique, Seychelles and Mauritius, so strike two tiny island nations off the list.
From the mouth of a tour guide (in Israel) leading 4-wheel drive jeep tours, as our group stopped for a picnic break at a scenic spot:
While he was crouching on the ground to light a camping stove he said:
“You can always tell which tourists are Americans: they never sit on the ground.”
We’ve got those in the Philippines, too. They tend to be set under the trees, placed in an open hut, or otherwise have some sort of shade incorporated in the design, like so.
I think we’ll find that most nations have picnic tables…but my question is: “where?”.
The OP mentions public parks.
But I’ll bet that in America, there are more picnic tables in private homes.
(In the back yard, that is.)
How many other nations typically have the standard picnic table ( heavy wooden table with wood benches, all in one unit) as a piece of furniture at the family home?
I assume that every single family in Australia has one for their barbie (which is apparently required by law ) .
What about the rest of the planet?
Well, there are countries where most homes simply don’t have the kind of space where you’d place a picnic table. How many homes in Cairo have a garden?
I’ve seen tables akin to picnic tables in rural-décor restaurants and private dining rooms in Spain, but often they’re indoors. Sometimes they’re a single piece, sometimes the benches are separate, some have folding benches so that you can take it all to the side and the guy who sold me my flat had one that could fold up (you folded the benches under the table, then folded half the table over the other half).
“Typical”, nope. “Not unusuall for suburban middle-class and upper income folks”, sure. I don’t have one, but it turns out most of my friends do, and so do our parents. The braai is way more of an institution here than the barbie in Oz - call us when they make a national public holidayout of it.
