flodnak, how much aquavit do you guys drink over there?
Edit: And is it true they have to fly it over the equator twice?
More regional US ones… (Texas)
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Everyone assumes we all drive huge vehicles. This isn’t true- I know rednecky people from Crockett that have Priuses, and lots of people with compact cars.
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Everyone thinks that everyone in Texas loves guns and has several. I’m the only one of my friends who owns a handgun, and only one of my friends owns a rifle and/or a shotgun.
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Everyone assumes that Texas is covered with oil wells. With the exception of a few places, you won’t see many oil wells at all.
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Very few people own horses or cattle in Texas, relative to the population.
Specific to Maine:
Yes, I have indoor plumbing. No, I don’t eat lobster all the time. No, I do not know Stephen King. No, we don’t all talk like we’re in “Murder, She Wrote”.
New Mexico —
Hot, flat, dry and treeless. Huge swaths of the Pecos Wilderness are lush and green and consist of high peaks interspersed with glacial U-shaped valleys, and would make the ideal backdrop for a sci-fi movie set in the Permian or Pennsylvanian period. Oh, and snow can happen anytime at the upper elevations, and even down in civilized town elevations with sidewalks and streets and whatnot, I’ve been snowed on in June.
"Mexican" people A less unified population than outside folks tend to think. There are the old families whose ancestors were well-established in the area before there was either a US or a Mexico. They may regard the Anglo folks who have come to the area in just the last 100 years or so as immigrants, and may not feel much cultural kinship to people whose were born in Mexico, or whose parents were from Mexico. And of course all in between. Not that they don’t have any political interests in common, but they’re far from a homogenous group.
New York —
Big scary threatening city, harsh, chews up innocents from small towns. Oh please. Most of New York is just plain accessible in a way like no other place I’ve ever lived. People are helpful. It’s not a particularly dangerous or violent city. And no hostility to strangers and outsiders: this is as far from ethnocentric as you’re likely to find. And wherever you hail from, you can probably find an expatriate’s social group of folks from the same backdrop.
Loud and frenetic, paved, alien to nature, the antithesis of eco-friendly. Well, frenetic, yeah… lots of people in motion, no doubt about it. But in part it’s because so many folks are walking, not driving cars. It’s a very vertical city, meaning that an incredible amount of it is quite close to wherever you are. You know those sprawling suburban economic zones that pass for cities in most of the US these days? All those lawns are not really very eco-friendly, and neither is the constant vehicular commuting. We take the subway or the bus, and we walk a lot. Meanwhile, although we don’t do the lawns, we do have some nice parks, it’s not all asphalt and concrete.
I always wondered how many he tried before he found one that was unlocked.
And then I wondered why he made a big deal about it because the homeowner was sitting there.
I respect Moore for wanting to get people involved in topics they should know about, but he is one of the world’s biggest jackasses.
hijack This has bothered me for a long time – the notion that somehow, cities are bad for the environment. Cities are very good for the environment. If we have to have several million people, I would much rather have them concentrated in a very small area, so that their waste products stay in one place and they have the concentrated mass necessary to take advantage of such things as recycling, wastewater treatment, public transit/active transport, etc., as well as the market necessary to be able to routinely obtain various eco-friendly alternative products. Sure, your lawn looks pretty, but if that lawn means you need a Ford Conquistador to get around because your area is so spread out that no transit runs there – well then.
As far as fish goes, there are certainly some Norwegian and other Scandinavian fish dishes that are pretty startling to folks from other parts of the world. Lutefisk, for example, is dried codfish soaked in a weak lye solution (and then cleaned by a long soak in plain cold water) to soften it, then poached and served as a special-occasion dinner. It looks like the missing link between fish and Jell-O and has such a strong smell I’ve never been able to get it into my mouth. Then there are things like gravlaks, which is salmon that is salted and seasoned and allowed to “ferment”. (Hákarl and surströmming, on the other hand, are Icelandic and Swedish, respectively, and Norwegians find them rather… odd.) But nobody expects foreigners to eat these things. I’ve been here nearly 17 years and no one has ever insisted I eat any of the “odd fish” things, although my lutefisk-loving in-laws have tried to encourage me to try it, “it’s better than you think!” They also claim it doesn’t smell at all, so I decline - clearly we shall have to agree to disagree on such matters.
“Easygoing and liberal” is such a general statement that it’s hard to give a set answer. I mean, we have our racist idiots here, too. In general, Norwegians and Americans both are trying to have a good life, but they differ on what a good life means. That’s the best way I can think to put it.
Oh, and as far as the aquavit goes, flown over the Equator?!? :eek: No, it’s shipped over the Equator by sea - preferrably to Australia and back again. The long voyage with its temperature changes is supposed to be a good way of aging the stuff. Only Norwegian companies do it; Danish and Swedish aquavit is aged in a more traditional way. If it’s shipped over the Equator it’s labelled linjeakavit. In my experience it’s most likely to come out around Christmas and other major celebrations like somebody’s 50th birthday or something, and it’s drunk with traditional Norwegian foods only. Not something you’d drink just to get plastered, for instance. There are plenty of other drinks for that!
Nothing to add, except: Hooray for aquavit!
Los Angeles/California:
No, there are not movie stars walking up and down every street. In fact, I’ve never seen a movie star just walking around Hollywood, waiting for people to ask for an autograph.
Yes, it does rain.
No, my neighborhood doesn’t look like ‘The OC.’
I did have a taxi driver ask me yesterday if I was used to the earthquakes yet 
Before I left for my semester abroad in Edinburgh I got a long talk from my dentist about how many people in the UK would have bad teeth and I’d just have to get used to it. I really didn’t notice any difference. My next door neighbor was very worried about me because she’d heard Edinburgh was ‘bone-chillingly cold’. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that compared to Southern New England, where I’d been living for the last 2 years, Edinburgh was quite toasty.
South Korea
Dogs are commonly used for meat. The majority of Koreans have never even tried dog. The restaurants that serve dog cater to waay older folks that consider it a health food, good for virility or something like that.
South Korea is a third world country. Technologically and economically, we’re fairly close to Japan. Samsung, LG and several other heavy hitters in the world market that are commonly mistaken for Japanese are in fact Korean.
Koreans are super polite/respectful and generally very docile. Like any other place we have the whole spectrum of types of people, but even in general it’s not true. The whole “yield to save face” deal is more of a Japanese thing. A lot of Koreans are crude, confrontational and heavy drinkers. From personal experience, fist-fights are lot more common here than in the States or Canada, and growing up with corporal punishment at home, in schools and the army may contribute to a far greater acceptance of non-lethal violence.
South Koreans live in perpetual fear of an invasion from the North. Not really. Or that we hate North Koreans. The way I try to explain it is to say that North Korea is like our asshole, mentally unstable, loser brother. Yeah he’s always getting into trouble, trying to start shit with you and borrowing money that he’ll never give back, but in the end he’s still family.
Finally, this isn’t so much a misconception as much as ignorance (and not the malicious kind), but many people don’t know that South Korea has conscription (extra locks in case our brother tries to break in) for all physically capable men. You get paid close to nothing and on a purely objective level, is much much harsher than the American military. Suicide is not uncommon during the mandatory 2 year service. But it’s actually become a rite of passage of sorts. Korean men love to get drunk and tell army stories for hours on end.
We do not live solely on Fish, chips and mushy peas…just most of the time
Oh, it does get cold here (and in Turkey, too) in the winter. But it’s not some land of ice and snow. It’s freaking hot at the moment, in fact. (Fortunately, there’s AC in this computer club.)
I thought of a weird misconception that I recently encountered - you non-USA people can tell me what you think of this, since I had never heard of this before. A couple months ago, I spent a night in a hostel in Sofia en route to Sarajevo. I was chatting with some people in the hostel, where are you from, what are you doing in Sofia, etc., etc. I had this same exchange twice, once with a Briton and once with an Austrian:
Me: Well, I live here in Bulgaria, but it’s my spring break, so I’m taking a trip.
Them: Oh, spring break! Where is that?
The first time, I was really confused because spring break is not a place. It’s…a break. In the spring. But it turns out that, thanks to MTV (?) there is now a belief among Europeans that Americans all gather somewhere for ritual spring break activities? I don’t know? I guess that some college do go the beach for spring break, but I think it’s safe to say that the large majority of American college students spend their spring breaks at their parents’ house, doing laundry and eating real food.
From NZ - I do not own any sheep. The ‘four sheep per capita’ is an interesting statistic, not a literal truth. There is no bridge between Sydney and Auckland. I can’t do the haka and I don’t know any All Blacks.
Ah, but in TV land, all American youths go to Tijuana or Florida and cause havoc, learn life lessons, get into dangerous situations and come back a little wiser. Also maybe star in a Girls Gone Wild video, or embarrass themselves on MTV. This isn’t so?
Yeah, I could see that. You’re right, I think, in that MOST students simply hang around the dorm and enjoy some free time or go back home for a week. But MTV and even local news (via Health Warnings and “Your child will get alcohol poisoning and DIE!” scare stories) likes to promote Spring Break as a rite of passage on beaches filled with debauchery and alcohol. It wouldn’t be strange to ask someone “Are you going to Spring Break?” as if it were a place, rather than an event. In such a case, you’d answer, “Oh, yes, in Miami!” or “Yep, New Orleans for me!” or “No, I’m staying here to catch up on some reading.” or, “No, going home to see the folks.” So it might not all be in one place, but the idea is that Spring Break is a partying booze fest in some sunny clime away from your usual residence. Those going home or staying in the dorm are not “going to Spring Break,” even though they’re enjoying time off.
From watching too much American TV and movies, you could get the impression that all American college students are just out of high school, have all their tuition and room and board paid by well-off parents, belong to fraternities or sororities, live in dorms or fraternity or sorority houses, and go straight through college as full-time students. In fact, the proportion of students who do all of those things must be tiny. No more than 10% of American college students belong to fraternities or sororities. A large proportion of students take several years off before college or in the middle of college. A large proportion of them live off campus. A large proporton are paying for their own tuition. A large proportion are working full-time or part-time jobs (with maybe some financial aid from the college). A large proportion are going to college part-time, often in evening or weekend course. A large proportion flunk out or give up because it’s taking too long, often because they can’t come up with their tuition fast enough.
If we’re going to do separate areas of countries, too, then I’d like to clear up a few things about Saskatchewan.
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It isn’t all endless fields of wheat. The southern part is very hilly, the middle part has a lot of wheat, and the northern part (around Saskatoon and up) is nothing but very beautiful trees and lakes. I really shouldn’t be telling you about northern Saskatchewan, because then you’ll all want to vacation there and ruin it for the rest of us.
Don’t think that what you see out your car window on the #1 is all there is. -
The people aren’t all backwards hicks. Not everyone grew up on a farm, there are college-educated people there, and there is culture and nightlife. The people are pretty nice, though. Maybe “nice” is mistaken for “hick.”
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The people living in Saskatchewan do not all wish they could live in Toronto or anywhere else. People living in Saskatchewan like Saskatchewan; they’re just too polite to tell people making fun of them to go to hell. (People from Saskatchewan also like it, and are too polite to tell people making fun of it to go to hell.)
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The University of Saskatchewan is an agriculture-based school, and Saskatchewan has historically been an agriculture-based province, no doubt about it. Agricultural science is not sexy, sure, but people really need to understand just how important it is for the entire world (and it’s going to become more important as climate change keeps on rolling). You don’t really notice the results of agricultural research (unless it’s scare journalism screeching about “frankenfood”), but you have it all around you, from the disease-resistant new cultivars you plant in your yard to the food you eat daily to the discussions of future bio-fuels, etc.
This reminds me–and don’t worry, featherlou; it’s not about Saskatchewan. But many times, and even on the SDMB, I’ve seen non-Canadians make statements like the following:
– Canada has nationalized health care.
– Canada has government-run liquor stores.
– Canada has a 14% sales tax.
These things may exist in Canada, but for the most part, do not exist across the country because they are provincial responsibilities. Like the United States and Australia, Canada is a collection of smaller political entities, only we call them provinces, not states. Constitutionally, there are differences between Canadian provinces and US states, but for practical everyday purposes, they work much the same way and have many of the same responsibilities. I will say that many Americans and Australians grasp this concept fairly easily, but to many Europeans, it is distinctly unusual. Understandable, but frustrating at times.
Still, the idea that provinces, like states, run certain things is there. We have “nationalized health care” only in the sense that a federal law says that each province must operate a single-payer health insurance plan and that no matter what a Canadian’s home province happens to be, other provinces must provide care should that Canadian find him- or herself in need of health care if he or she is in another province. But how each province chooses to implement its plan (treatments and services covered, the amount of insurance premiums if any, etc.) is up to the province. Not the federal government.
Similarly, when speaking of “government-run” liquor stores and similar issues, one must specify the province. Nova Scotia has government-run liquor stores. So does Ontario, only you buy your beer at a privately-run (owned by the breweries) Beer Store. In Quebec, beer and wine are available at the corner store, but liquor comes from the government’s liquor store. The Alberta government got out of the liquor retail business and so the province has privately-run liquor stores. They also sell beer, which is available only from them. Other provinces have their own rules.
Language used on road signs, drinking ages, liquor licensing and bar closing hours, driver’s licenses and traffic laws, educational institutions, provincial income and sales taxes (it is Ontario’s sales taxes that total 14%; in Alberta we only pay the federal GST at 6% since there is no provincial sales tax), and so many more things–these are all provincial responsibilities, and it is incorrect to make blanket statements like “Canada has ____” without checking to see if all of Canada really has it, or whether it is only in, say, Saskatchewan.
The major difference is criminal law, which is federally-run in Canada, but run at the state level in the United States. Still, because the responsibilities of states and provinces are so similar, then as a general rule (and with the criminal law exception), if you need to specify a state, then you need to specify a province. If the responsibility truly is federal (printing currency, national defense, etc.), then you are correct to say “Canada has ____.”
Canadians: Is there a marked difference in quality between Canadian provinces? Like, are there provinces that are commonly known as bad places to get (regular/primary physician) care, and provinces that are commonly known as good places? I hear a lot of Americans say that “Canada’s health care system” is a terrible failure, it takes months to see your doctor, you can’t get anything covered when you need it, etc. And I’ve heard Canadians give mixed reviews, but never paid much attention as to which province they were from. Can anyone shed some light on this?
Lots of great info. Big question here: is all criminal law handled at the federal level? What about traffic law? For example, between local, county, provincial and federal, what level of government would have beef with you in:
- A parking ticket?
- A labor contract violation?
- A liquor law violation?
- Petty theft?
- Major shoplifting?
- Murder?
- Simple drug crimes (simple possession, selling, etc.)?
Edit: And does this vary by province? This all changed in California several years ago; a lot of traffic offenses and misdemeanors that used to be tried by the city they occurred in, are now tried by the county they occurred in, at the courthouse nearest to the scene of the crime. There used to be such a thing as a “municipal court” that would try offenders locally, and no such thing exists here anymore. But I wouldn’t be surprised if there are municipal courts in other states.