I thought of another one: personal space
I miss Fish ‘n’ chips, and I’ve spent a grand total of 4 days in England.
The primary things I miss when I’m out the US and Mexico - peppers. All foods are but seconds away from a spicy dash of Tabasco or (preferably) some Habanero based sauce.
Some kind of Mexican food never being more than 3 blocks away.
Knew I forgot something! I can get Mexican, but it’s far away, costs an arm and a leg, and isn’t usually all that good! Best place in London is Pacifico in Langley Street, Covent Garden. But man, does it cost!
Things I missed while I was in India were:
Carseats (I love my child but don’t want him sitting on me for hours on end)
Strollers (most people with kids I saw didn’t use 'em, but they’re more prevalent now; on the positive side, my arms are really ripped now)
My house
My cats
Carpeting
American food, most notably steak (you can watch the cows roaming the streets, but you can’t eat 'em)
The luxury of eating meals early if I want to
US suburbs
Green spaces
Personal space
Soft beds
Sleeping without mosquito netting
When I lived in South America, I missed:
Walls (lived in a tent for some of my stay)
Showers (see above)
Walking down the street without getting cat-called
Exercise (no one did it)
Non-smoking environments
The one thing I miss whenever I travel outside the US:
Cheap high-quality orange juice.
All the orange juice I’ve had in Europe and the middle east has been either:
- good, but insanely expensive or
- thin nasty from-concentrate stuff that tastes more like flat orange soda than the juice from the actual fruit.
In the (few) times I’ve been out of the country, I really missed blueberries. They’re quite rare in many places.
[QUOTE=Bobotheoptimist]
I miss Fish ‘n’ chips, and I’ve spent a grand total of 4 days in England.
The lack of chip shops in the US is a blight on that land, a blight I tells ya.
I mean how can any civilized country not have an English style chippie?.
There is a fortune waiting for some smart operator who takes the chance and opens one up
Things I miss from Canada:
Poutine
Real fish & chips
Hungarian and Polish restaurants
um…
I’ve sat here for awhile, trying to come up with another item, but I can’t think of anything else. Guess I don’t miss much about it. Everything here is infinitely better, and could only be improved by the addition of the three things on my list!
Ohhh, poutine. I add to my list:
Being close enough to Canada to get poutine! (My arteries probably don’t miss it though)
Things I missed when I was in the UK:
*(New) Mexican food. (Going from New Mexico to Ireland is like a slap in the face, food-wise. I’d have settled for Taco Bell.)
*Decent weather
*Good peanut butter and jelly.
*Bagels
*Traffic on the right.
*Reeses peanut butter cups.
Things I miss about the UK (mostly London):
*High-speed trains! Good public transportation, both within and between cities!
*Huge, clean, safe public parks
*Clean, safe cities (I felt infinitely safer walking around London than I ever have in Philly or NYC)
*Free museums
*Electric kettles. Why the hell are these so rare in the US?
*BBC News
*The Internationalism. Europe’s right freaking there, and it seems like everyone’s from somewhere else.
*Pot Noodles. The name makes me giggle and they’re so tasty.
From America: I miss toilets that don’t require a brushing after use. And good tortilla chips and salsa. Those are not related, really. And parking near places of business. And generally low prices (I’m looking at you, Target!) Stores staying open more than an hour or two after work. Homes built in such a way that they can have controllable climate.
Things I’ll miss when I return to the US: Readily available beautiful fruit and vegetables. One-touch window closers in cars. Decent longer-distance train service. Glass doors inside houses (i.e. between the hallway and living room). Smaller major appliances. Convenient ATM’s that don’t charge for use. Coins instead of lower-value paper money. Ceremonial heads of state. Inexpensive newspapers that have naked boobs in them on a daily basis. Booooooooobs!
I missed 7-11. Open seven days a week, 24 hours a day. What a concept.
And American customer service in general. What? You’re not seemingly pissed off I’m shopping in your store and might want to spend money here? Cool!
(Only lived in the US for a short while on business, but I miss)
Serious bookshops
Ice Hockey
Whitey’s ice cream
Quiznos subs
[QUOTE=fishbicycle]
Things I miss from Canada:
Real fish & chips
In Canada?
Surely you jest as the only place on earth where real fish n’ chips can be bought is England
Girl Scout cookies, which I’d not even thought of for years until a recent thread reminded me of them. Now I’m hankerin’ for some.
God, yes. I often have to hold my hands out at arm’s length to push my students away from me. Otherwise they’ll talk to me from a distance of about two inches. TOO CLOSE.
I also miss privacy and the sense that your business is your business and no one else’s. When I’m grading tests at the end of a class, the kids will crowd around me and yell out everyone else’s grade excitedly. “Haha, Stefan got an F!” No matter how many times I tell them to sit down and mind their own business, they inevitably creep back up. They even ask me, “What did Other Kid get on the test?” I’m not telling you, it’s none of your business!
NinjaChick, you can get electric kettles in the US. I don’t know why they’re so rare either (I think they’re great), but they do exist. Try Target.
Spent some time in the Quad Cities, eh?
Well, sir, I haven’t had the pleasure of eating English fish and chips in England yet (that’s a few years off, but definitely on the agenda). But I come from a long line of Englishmen and women, and the fish and chips we could get up there seemed to pass the test. I never heard any of them bemoaning the awful state of fish and chips in Canada. We were too busy eating it, with the salt and vinegar. I do know that I can’t get anything like it here. Catfish and grouper are not whitefish like the massive, beer-battered chunks I used to have.
Damn, now I want some f&c.
Now I need some F 'n C.
Big fuck off chips, and a huge wedge of cod coated in crispy batter, the whole lot adorned with S&V with mushy peas as an extra