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Culture shock

siddhesh.substack.com

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Re: Culture shock

#51

Post by kodah »

NikolaeVarius wrote: post #42
kodah wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Driving to the south and midwest, I mostly just saw immensely massive parking lots for Walmart, Dollar Generals, some liquor store, and other big box markets. If you're just driving through, as you stated, and never actually stopped or lived in any of these towns then I'm not surprised you have that impression. What OP was mentioning is this: > There’s no kiraana stores (i.e. small local stores) that sell grains an…

> What immediately came to my mind was feed stores mixed with a farmers market which there's an abundance of in rural areas. What. Where are you getting any of interpretation this from? The post mentions: > small local stores > that sell grains and rice and vegetables here > small stationery shops > or shops of any kind I can literally walk out my door and in 5 minutes have pictures of all of these on my street. http…

A stationary store sounds like a mom and pop store. Yes, a kiraana from what I read sounds like a neighborhood grocer but pictures also show them looking a lot more like farmers markets. Feed stores can be like that, but it probably depends on what the area offers.

Re: Culture shock

#52

Post by SmartestUnknown »

As an Indian who recently moved to the US, this list captures a lot of things that surprised me. One of the biggest things I was shocked by is the number of choices in US supermarkets - 100s of varieties of chips, 4-5 different sizes of eggs along with a choice of white/brown/cage-free/organic, 4 types of milk (skim/1%/2%/whole), 10s of types of bread etc. Back in India, we have considerably fewer choices in each of the ones I mentioned even in the bigger supermarkets.

Re: Culture shock

#53

Post by the_af »

NikolaeVarius wrote: post #50
the_af wrote: post #44

Is the car respecting pedestrians a thing everywhere in the US, or just where this person has been? My very limited experience in the US (NYC, San Diego and Miami) has been hit or miss regarding traffic, and I wouldn't trust drivers to stop. I know the story in some European cities is different. I was impressed in London, and a Belgian friend of mine often crossed the streets of Brussels without stopping to look at t…

You look up the street because the Driver might be distracted, not because you think he might do something malicious. 99.99999% of the time the car will respect pedestrians (assuming of course the road is marked properly. If not, maybe say a prayer)

Yes, of course. Same in Argentina. The thing is, here the driver will be distracted with 90% probability or will simply think he/she has priority. It's a cultural thing. Of course they are not trying to actively drive over you... mostly.

Re: Culture shock

#54

Post by astura »

Lots of people don't like carpeting but I prefer it in the living areas. Benefits:

Provides dampening of sounds

Not freezing cold on my feet

Comfy, welcoming and homely feeling (subjective)

Spills are very rare and permanent damage can, in most cases, be avoided by cleaning the mess properly right away. Carpeting should be shampooed once in a while too.

Carpeting does not last forever, however.

I can't stand carpeting on stairs though, such a pain to clean!

Re: Culture shock

#55

Post by bobthepanda »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #34
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #27

I worked at a multi-national company that frequently flew people to the United States HQ offices for short visits or sometimes longer stays. For many of the younger developers this was their first direct exposure to the United States. Interestingly, most of them had built up a lot of preconceived notions about the United States from social media sites like Reddit. Many of those sites project an extremely pessimistic…

> Don't get me wrong: Obesity is still a problem and the United States is incrementally worse than most countries. However, the way it's talked about leads a lot of people to believe that the United States is some sort of extreme outlier and nearly everyone they encounter will be obese. I imagine it is that extreme for people from south or east Asia.

Chinese obesity has increased a lot over the past decades, with over half of Chinese now overweight: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-55428530

Largely the same reasons as the West; the cheap street food or fast food is not particularly healthy.

> Wang Dan, a nutritionist in the city of Harbin, told the AFP news agency that many adults in the country now "exercise too little, are under too much pressure, and have an unhealthy work schedule".

Anecdotally, there is also societal concern that the one-child policy now means that four doting grandparents are spoiling the one child with food because they remembered living through less abundant times.

Re: Culture shock

#56

Post by matt_kantor »

varispeed wrote: post #8

> Sugar here is powdered, it doesn’t come in tiny cubes like I’m used to. It’s very easy to confuse salt and sugar (as I have done) because they look exactly the same. Isn't the "powder" actually a bunch of tiny tiny cubes? Certainly tinier than tiny Indian cubes :-) One thing that seems to be smaller in the US.

Sugar is actually tiny hexagons. Salt is cubes.

https://montessorimuddle.org/2011/04/24/salt-and-sugar-under...

Re: Culture shock

#57

Post by Gracana »

latchkey wrote: post #31

> No toilet jet sprays too, because Americans famously use toilet paper for poop stuff. But my roommate installed one even though it’s not allowed. Don’t tell our landlord. The infamous "bum gun" in SE Asia. That's because USA people believe that if they got poop on their hands, wiping it with only paper would clean it off. Why do you bring up hands?! Well, that is what is left on your ass when you wipe it with paper…

Man, I'd be more skeeved out by the post-rinse ring-drying towel than the idea that somebody only wiped their ass with TP. If I can't smell it, you can't smell it, and I use my hands rather than my asshole to touch and grasp objects in my environment, what's the big deal?

Re: Culture shock

#58

Post by [deleted] »

bobthepanda wrote: post #55
lotsofpulp wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Don't get me wrong: Obesity is still a problem and the United States is incrementally worse than most countries. However, the way it's talked about leads a lot of people to believe that the United States is some sort of extreme outlier and nearly everyone they encounter will be obese. I imagine it is that extreme for people from south or east Asia.

Chinese obesity has increased a lot over the past decades, with over half of Chinese now overweight: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-55428530 Largely the same reasons as the West; the cheap street food or fast food is not particularly healthy. > Wang Dan, a nutritionist in the city of Harbin, told the AFP news agency that many adults in the country now "exercise too little, are under too much pressure, and…

[deleted]

Re: Culture shock

#59

Post by strikelaserclaw »

SmartestUnknown wrote: post #52

As an Indian who recently moved to the US, this list captures a lot of things that surprised me. One of the biggest things I was shocked by is the number of choices in US supermarkets - 100s of varieties of chips, 4-5 different sizes of eggs along with a choice of white/brown/cage-free/organic, 4 types of milk (skim/1%/2%/whole), 10s of types of bread etc. Back in India, we have considerably fewer choices in each of…

in terms of materialism and consumer good choices, usa is vastly, and i meanly vastly superior to India and maybe perhaps most nations on earth.

Re: Culture shock

#60

Post by int3 »

the_af wrote: post #44

Is the car respecting pedestrians a thing everywhere in the US, or just where this person has been? My very limited experience in the US (NYC, San Diego and Miami) has been hit or miss regarding traffic, and I wouldn't trust drivers to stop. I know the story in some European cities is different. I was impressed in London, and a Belgian friend of mine often crossed the streets of Brussels without stopping to look at t…

In cities, it's hit or miss. Outside of that drivers tend to be pretty gracious.

> If there's no semaphore, good luck crossing

Do they actually call traffic lights "semaphores" over there?

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