# What are some things about your own culture you understand "foreigners" would find weird? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 25, 2009, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906 "2009-06-25T03:21:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Arachne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Arachne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Arachne)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/41 "2009-06-25T20:10:15Z")
In the same vein as \*\* > [@](#): > > **Things about Wisconsin culture those in large parts of the US would find weird** \*\* **Things about Massachusets culture those in large parts of the US would find weird** \* “Staties” Clam bakes and boils “Down the Cape” Redsox fever, even for non-baseball fans Linked to above, irrational hatred for New York (though they do clog up our roads in the summa’) P-town (Provencetown) = Gay Mecca; I think the closest equivalent to it would be San Francisco, but correct me if I’m wrong. Western MA may as well be a whole 'nother state… Boston accent - we’re fast talkers, too, so keep up! ---
**Author:** ![overlyverbose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9dc877/32.png) [@overlyverbose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/overlyverbose)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/42 "2009-06-25T20:53:14Z")
Toilet paper. And if you think about it, it makes sense. Why waste good paper to smear your feces around on your butt when you could be washing it until it’s squeaky clean? The “sit” toilet vs. the “squat” toilet. If you use a squat toilet, you don’t have to touch the seat and you’re much more likely to hit your target while hovering if you squat vs. try to hover in a seated position. Hand washing. We usually use utensils to eat our food, so we probably don’t wash our hands as frequently as a culture who eats with their hands. ---
**Author:** ![SanibelMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e4f/32.png) [@SanibelMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SanibelMan)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/43 "2009-06-25T21:00:36Z")
> [@Sitnam](#): > > Hell, I can do you one better, **Things about Wisconsin culture those in large parts of the US would find weird** > > -Ice fishing An aside: My wife got a job here as a bank teller, and in chatting with one of her customers, she told him she’d just moved here from Kansas City. “Oh, Missouri, my in-laws are from there,” he said. “Man, they’re weird. We were visiting them last December, and when I told them I was gonna go ice-fishing on the lake, they looked at me like I was crazy!” ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/44 "2009-06-25T21:15:14Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > Except in the technical sense…::::running very fast::: Oh god, I apologize, I thought that big brouhaha of a thread several years back was famous enough that everyone would get the callback…carry on (And I dont want to search for it for fear someone will continue before my five minutes are up :)) ---
**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/45 "2009-06-25T21:16:53Z")
One I got from my old anthropology head: chairs. Sitting in a chair seems like the most natural thing in the world to us, but watch someone who has never even seen a chair before try to get comfortable in one. ---
**Author:** ![ShibbOleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@ShibbOleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShibbOleth)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/46 "2009-06-25T21:32:15Z")
> [@Mahaloth](#): > > I’ll go first. I’m an American from Michigan, though I have lived overseas. > > 1. **Ice cold beer**. No, our beer is not so bad that is has to be ice cold, but I do get that it seems that way to others. Hey, we like it cold. Actually, much of American beer _is_ so bad that it has to be ice cold. There are a few exceptions. Getting beer ice cold masks the bad flavor or lack of taste. We’ve been programmed by Miller, Anheuser Busch, et al. Fortunately there are now a lot of better alternatives available to the bad mass produced crap. ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/47 "2009-06-25T21:43:08Z")
Not mentioned above, about the U.S.: (Primarily from the perspective of Europeans) –Huge portions served at fast-food places –(related) Wide-spread obesity –(except beer and wine) Drinks always served with ice –Illegal to drink on the sidewalk (in front of a restaurant or club) –U.S. currency: All bills the same size and color, with monotonous designs; coins have no numbers on them to show their value –Store-front Evangelical churches –Laws changing from state to state –Musical theater –High rate of homelessness (particularly in urban areas) –“Excessively” courteous driving –Jaywalking laws (heavily enforced in many cities) –Students addressing professors by first name (grad school) and so on… –(From the perspective of Japanese and Koreans) Driver’s license cheap and easy to get, to the point where many high schools provide driving classes for free. ---
**Author:** ![Frodo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/frodo/32/302_2.png) [@Frodo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frodo)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/48 "2009-06-25T22:20:59Z")
I’ll say Peronism, but we also dont really understand it ---
**Author:** ![Cyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a88e4f/32.png) [@Cyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cyn)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/49 "2009-06-25T23:11:05Z")
I was born and raised in California and lots of things we do here are considered weird. Menudo, breakfast of champions, hangover cure and all around home remedy, is made of hominy, beef tripe and pig’s feet. Menudo is served in restaurants, at church gatherings and at someone’s grandma’s house. Sunglasses. 24/7 365 Highlighted hair on young children all the way up through the grandma making menudo Use of the word “like” as in “Like, OMG, I need some menudo; my head is, like killing me!” Making a family of friends and animals–most of the world seems to see family as people they share bloodlines with. and so on… ---
**Author:** ![Mississippienne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d2c977/32.png) [@Mississippienne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mississippienne)\ **Post date:** [June 25, 2009, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/50 "2009-06-25T23:52:51Z")
The ‘flag-waving’ stereotype makes me go :dubious: I keep seeing it all over this board, but when I was in Turkey and Greece I saw Turkish and Greek flags EVERYWHERE. Shops sold shirts with their flags on it. People hung flags on their houses. I saw at least as many flags in Athens and Istanbul as I would see in the US. Not so many on their bumper stickers, but that’s about it. Is it just Northern and Western Europeans who don’t fly their own flags? Or is it just American flags that shouldn’t be flown? And once again, as far as homelessness goes, I saw plenty of beggars and cripples (Istanbul) and drug addicts (Athens) and hookers (both). And as far as prudery on TV, I don’t know how hot and heavy the Greeks got (didn’t watch Greek TV) but the Turks don’t even have kissing on their soap operas, and certainly no nekkid people. Our TV is apparently pretty violent though – my friends were all convinced from watching Law & Order that you would be raped and murdered if you ever went to New York City. ---
**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 26, 2009, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/51 "2009-06-26T00:15:04Z")
Menudo is served in restaurants? The Puerto Rican boy band? 😕 ---
**Author:** ![Animastryfe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8797f3/32.png) [@Animastryfe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Animastryfe)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2009, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/52 "2009-06-26T00:27:03Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > On a related note, and I realize it’s not my country, one thing foreigners find strange about the US is the usage of “how are you?” to mean “hello.” In many other countries, people don’t ask “how are you?” or “how was your weekend?” unless they’re willing to hear everything about your chilblains, your children or the movie you went to. > **[Small Talk](https://xkcd.com/222/)** I’m rather like the guy on the right. I’m from Canada, and although I’ve grown up with this common usage I still find it puzzling. ---
**Author:** ![Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eyebrows_0f_doom/32/3119_2.png) [@Eyebrows\_0f\_Doom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eyebrows_0f_Doom)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2009, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/53 "2009-06-26T02:56:49Z")
> [@Foxy40](#): > > I grew up on Long Island and we called them lightening bugs as well. Same here. ---
**Author:** ![Pyper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Pyper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pyper)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2009, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/54 "2009-06-26T03:04:46Z")
I lived in Spain, and what people found weird about America/Americans, was not exactly what I expected. At the top of the list of things I was quizzed about was our strange holidays and holiday traditions, such as Thanksgiving, Christmas, and especially Halloween. “Do kids really dress up and go around asking for candy?” Spaniards asked. “REALLY?” It was so bizarre to them as to be unbelievable. My eating habits were strange to them as well. Why did I not consume a loaf of bread per day? Why did I eat so many desserts such as yogurt and fruit? Why on _earth_ was I eating raw vegetables? Didn’t I know that that was dangerous? Also, peanut butter. My roommates could not understand how I could eat something that looked like “baby shit.” Baby shit combined with rabbit food (raw celery and carrots) was just pushing it too far. After many months, I convinced one roommate to have a taste of peanut butter. “It tastes…like peanuts,” she said, incredulously. “Yes, of course it does!” I said. She explained that to her, peanuts were a food you munched on at a bar, not something found on a sandwich. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2009, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/55 "2009-06-26T03:47:49Z")
Witchetty Grubs ---
**Author:** ![TheMadEngineer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cc9497/32.png) [@TheMadEngineer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TheMadEngineer)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2009, 6:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/56 "2009-06-26T06:25:18Z")
I know this one for a fact: our wastefulness with water. Long showers, specifically. The French at least in the area I visited had a tendency to follow a pattern of wet, lather, rinse. The lather portion of showering involving no water and the wetting and rinsing portions being very short (also very cold). ---
**Author:** ![ruadh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/d2c977/32.png) [@ruadh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ruadh)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2009, 8:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/57 "2009-06-26T08:40:58Z")
I suppose I’ll do Ireland since no one else has. The weirdest thing I find here is the education system. Here is a scenario taken from real life (I am not making this up): You are a parent. Your children are of an age to start primary school. However, all the **public** schools in your area are run by the Catholic Church, and your family is not Catholic. Furthermore, because of bad planning these schools are all over-subscribed and therefore the schools are exercising their statutory right to only admit Catholic children. Your options are: [ol] [li]have your children baptised, into a religion you don’t believe in, so the local \*\*public \*\*school will take them[/li][li]find enough like-minded parents to start your own school and apply for recognition from the Department of Education (the first time I heard someone say “why don’t these parents start their own school” I thought they were taking the piss but no, that is really what parents are expected to do in this situation)[/li]or [li]move.[/ol][/li] And this is accepted as normal. It completely boggles my mind. ---
**Author:** ![Wallenstein](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/b5a626/32.png) [@Wallenstein](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wallenstein)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2009, 9:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/58 "2009-06-26T09:02:40Z")
German students tap their desks with their knuckles to indicate approval for the lecture. I still find the concept of arranged marriages odd, especially when otherwise 100% secular English friends follow their parents’ wishes and pop back to India / Pakistan to meet a potential spouse. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2009, 10:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/59 "2009-06-26T10:18:05Z")
> [@FalconFinder](#): > > No, they’re not. > > They live between France and Spain and claim neither heritage. > > I have done some research due to there being some Basque in my ancestry. They’re a fascinating people… > > [Center for Basque Studies | University of Nevada, Reno](http://basque.unr.edu/16/16.1t/16.1.1.faqs1.htm) Ehm, you seem to confuse “heritage” with some other concept; neither Spain nor France would be what they are without their Basque, same as they wouldn’t be what they are without people of other ancestries. Some of us have this strange notion that you can be Basque, Navarrese, a Spaniard and European without exploding or anything. And I don’t just mean us half-breeds. The “live mostly in both France and Spain,” true. I know Basque of Spanish, French, American, Colombian and Costa Rican nationalities. > [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Menudo is served in restaurants? The Puerto Rican boy band? 😕 Menudo or menudillo, as a dish, means guts. As in, the thin intestine. Menudo also happens to mean “small one,” which is where the music group got its name. ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2009, 10:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906/60 "2009-06-26T10:43:17Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > The multiple languages can be extremely confusing, specially to people who find themselves in Catalonia or Galicia wondering how come they don’t understand what people say, without having bothered to find out that those two regions have two Romance languages (Basque is actually less of a problem, as everybody realizes very fast “that ain’t Spanish!”). > [@Ludovic](#): > > Except in the technical sense…::::running very fast::: > [@Sitnam](#): > > Perhaps because ‘technically’ they’re Spanish. > [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Yes they are. They’re Spanish (or to a lesser extent, French) citizens, regardless of what they claim. Allow me to rephrase, for those people with comprehension problems. Catalan, Galego and Spanish (that is, “the language commonly known as Spanish by those who speak the other language known as English”) are similar enough to be mutually quite understandable by those who speak them at native-like levels, but different enough to confuse those whose kowledge of any of them isn’t so high. Often, foreigners with low-to-medium knowledge of the language commonly known as Spanish by those who speak the other language known as English hear someone speaking either Galego or Catalan and are confused because they do not understand the speaker but believe that they should, mistakenly thinking that he is speaking the language commonly known as Spanish by those who speak the other language known as English. The language commonly known as Basque by those who speak that aforementioned language known as English, on the other hand, is different enough to be evidently a different language from that one commonly known as Spanish by those who speak the other language known as English, therefore the simultaneous existence of the language commonly known as Spanish by those who speak the other language known as English and of this other language which those who are speaking English refer to as Basque does not lead people with some knowledge of one of the language commonly known as Spanish by those who speak the other language known as English by those who speak it to mistakenly believe that they are hearing this language called Spanish in the other language called English and not understanding it: they realize it is a different language. Was that clear, if convoluted, enough for you? Now give me a tree analysis 😛 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-some-things-about-your-own-culture-you-understand-foreigners-would-find-weird/500906.md?page=4)