If you were born and raised in the USA like me, you may not realize how many unusual things we experience on a daily basis because we're so used to it. Sometimes, it takes an outside perspective to remind us that the things we may consider totally normal might not be. Like, maybe sandwiches aren't always a foot long. 🤯
My interest was piqued when I saw Reddit user u/draiou post on r/AskReddit to ask our friends from across the pond: "Europeans that visited the States, what was the biggest culture shock you experienced?" I definitely wanted to know what was so American that it led Europeans to experience a reverse Wizard of Oz moment where they thought, "Toto, I have a feeling we are in Kansas." If you're as curious as I was to find out how non-Americans really see us, keep scrolling!
1. "EVERYTHING IS SO BIG. Cars, food portions, tips, roads, people, and attitudes. Always fun, though."
2. "You guys have air conditioning in your house??? I was astonished."
3. "In the supermarket, you have, like, 100,000 different versions of each food, like I had never seen so many different types of Oreos in my life."
4. "The 'work 'til you drop' culture. There have been people who are proud of the fact they don't see their families or miss occasions because they 'have to go work for their company.' I used to work for a grocery store while I was there, and it was close to a cult."
5. "Seeing guns just hanging there like casual groceries in Walmart."
6. "Everyone calling me honey/love/sweetie. Those words and terms of endearment aren’t used that casually over here in the Netherlands."
7. "Severely bike unfriendly roads/urban layouts. Everything is designed for car traffic mostly."
8. "Adverts (commercials). We generally don’t have medical or adversarial (mentioning competitors directly) adverts, at least in the UK. My kids picked up on this when we went to the cinema and there was a Samsung advert directly trashing Apple. They were like, 'What the hell was THAT?'"
9. "Kids on a leash. OMG. I was not ready for that."
10. "Every traffic light left turn had a dedicated 'you can go now' light sequence! I loved that. But also, these 'be polite' four-way stop crossings where you gotta trust that the other cars will abide by the 'you reached this crossing first' rule. Damn, that was WEIRD."
11. "Entering a store in Germany: opening the door to silence or a brief hello. Entering a store in the US: 'Hello! How are you today? What can I do for you?' Aaargh, can't you just ignore me like at home? That was way too much communication."
12. "Everything is loud. All the time. The TV ads, the billboards, the radio, the air conditioning. Everyone is trying to get heard in a country where being #1 is the only acceptable goal. It's a loudness war to get to your brain, and it's exhausting."
13. "I was prepared for taxes not being included in price tags and tipping. I was not prepared for the 'I love Jesus' and 'Jesus loves me' people with megaphones, banners, T-shirts, and flyers walking around everywhere."
14. "Everybody smiling at one another. As a Polish person, I just can't understand that. Everybody is expected to smile at you even if they are sad."
15. "Everything is sweet. The beer was sweet, the bread, the traditional home-cooked meals, and the fucking cheese."
16. "Fifty-six flavors of donuts in a gas station in the middle of nowhere. Fifty-six! I counted!"
17. "Dessert for breakfast — things like pancakes, syrup, fruit, sweet waffles, etc."
18. "The food. I'm from the UK, and I'd never seen refillable drinks before. I couldn't believe you could just have as much soda as you wanted and no one was going to think you were stealing. When we ate dinner, we were given entire loaves of bread and a ramekin of butter and turkey drumsticks the size of a T-rex."
19. "Root beer. I was not prepared to sip on carbonated mouthwash. Why on earth is it called beer?"
20. "Toilets with not enough privacy. What’s with the big gaps around the doors and rest of the cubicle?"
21. "I lived in America for a year when I was around 8, and foolish me didn’t understand the tax system. I remember my mother giving me money to go to the store to get ice cream, and being really confused and upset when the cashier told me my $3 was not enough despite that being its labeled price."
"Silly child. You are supposed to just add 5.12% when you get to the cashier."
22. "Military fetish. I knew it existed but just wasn't prepared for how pervasive it was. At any kind of public event, there were announcements asking veterans to stand up and be applauded, and these weren't special military events. I was in the British Army Reserve and kept joking with my wife that I would stand up, too. People wearing an Army uniform in public. Weird. (I was told I mustn't do that off-duty.)"
23. "My uncle from Ireland while driving around Texas said, 'Is there some sort of national holiday going on that I don't know about? Why does everyone have a flag showing?' I had to explain about the flags."
24. "I hate, with a flaming passion, those fake hot dogs. I believe they're called water dogs. The ones that taste like plastic. When I went to New York City, we got one of those, and it was disgusting. It tastes like nothing. Why not just use pork sausages like the rest of the world? It has a weird chewy outer skin, and then the squishy 'meat' on the inside. And why is it a beige/pink color? Two bucks for a hot dog that tastes like my local landfill. I have eaten Lego bricks more tasty."
25. And finally, 'I know it's popular to dunk on Americans, but honestly, for me, it was how friendly everyone was.'"
What did you think of all of these culture shocks? I, for one, am pleasantly surprised that travelers think we're...nice?! I'm also sad that people are severely missing out on peanut butter Oreos because they are a delicacy. Let us know in the comments if anything on this list surprised you, or if you have a culture shock of your own to share!
Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.