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Culture shock

siddhesh.substack.com

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Re: Culture shock

#71

Post by woodruffw »

yalogin wrote: post #38
bnralt wrote: post #28

> There’s no kiraana stores (i.e. small local stores) that sell grains and rice and vegetables here, it seems. (Or small stationery shops, or shops of any kind.) Almost all shopping has to be done at a big chain retail store like Lidl or Megamart or Target or any of the other big-names. I wonder where in the D.C. area he is. Many areas around D.C. have an enormous variety of places to go grocery shopping, and there a…

The scale is still no where comparable to India. There they have one on every street corner literally.

I think it varies heavily by region. NYC has bodegas that sell basic groceries and household goods, and their defining feature (other than cats[1]) is that they're on every corner. The street I grew up on had 3 of them: one on each end, and one right in the middle.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodega_cat

Re: Culture shock

#72

Post by alexashka »

I immigrated to Canada with my family when I was a child, from Russia.

I remember my parents and other recent immigrant parents getting together for lively, fun evenings of drinks and talks fairly regularly. It lasted for years - everyone was in such culture shock mode and wanted to both experience the good old vodka + pickles among comrades and share their crazy ass stories of oh my god, these people will constantly say 'how are you' but look at you like you're crazy when you go on to tell them. They think I'm crazy, they're the one asking me questions they don't want to hear the answer to - that's crazy! :D

Re: Culture shock

#73

Post by BugWatch »

Macha wrote: post #45
losvedir wrote: post #5

What a fun read! I've never been to India but it's fun to infer what the reverse culture shock would be for me from the points here. Like, can you not sit on the grass at a university there?

As someone from Europe, who's visited the states many times, the idea that the US is comparatively pedestrian friendly to India to a level worth commenting on is surprising. I think I'd definitely be run over if I ever went to India now

Yes, that is one comment that really stuck out for me, too, since I have read, listened to, and seen (YouTube) pretty much the opposite. Might be a (highly?) localized "phenomenon", due to university campus closeness and local drivers' awareness.

Re: Culture shock

#74

Post by stavros »

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…

> Obesity is just one example of how the internet, especially sites like Reddit, tend to exaggerate the problems of the United States while downplaying the positives of the country

I don't think the rate of obesity paints the whole picture here. The first time I visited the USA, I wasn't so much surprised by how many people were obese (they weren't that common), but by exactly how obese the outliers were. In my country, you'd ~never see someone so obese that they needed a cart to move around, whereas in the USA that wasn't uncommon.

I think the saliency of that is what surprises people more than the actual frequency of obesity.

Re: Culture shock

#75

Post by hiyer »

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…

What you get in any country will depend on the local tastes. You will get hundreds of varieties of namkeens and sweets in India that you won't get in the US.

You get several types of ready to eat breads in India too, but they're more "localized". For example, from Britannia, apart from the usual milk, white, brown, whole wheat, multigrain, etc, you also have Kulcha, missi bread, pav, fruit bun, etc. In the US you would probably see rye bread, sourdough, etc.

Having said that, where I really envy US and Europe is the variety of cheeses. You get most of them in India too these days but they're prohibitively expensive.

Re: Culture shock

#76

Post by fellellor »

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 some regions of the Midwest, like Missouri for example, the range of choices is comparable to what you would see in India. The wealth difference between places like California or Washington and India is staggering. It stands to reason that there would be a lot more companies fighting and thriving in such a larger economy.

Re: Culture shock

#77

Post by Swizec »

> What makes things worse is that American coins are really, really complicated. I can’t for the life of me identify what a coin is from its look (is it just me?), and I also can’t seem to ever remember the difference between a dime and a nickel and a penny.

American cash is just impossible. I gave up after 2 years living here and if a merchant doesn’t accept cards or apple pay, fuck it I’ll go somewhere else. It’s just not worth the bother.

Re: Culture shock

#78

Post by lotsofpulp »

fellellor wrote: post #70
ameen wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an Indian in the states - my observation was that obesity in the US seems like a class issue. Most well-off folks are fit and working out is woven into their lifestyles. Others can't as they're probably working 2-3 jobs to make ends meet.

Are there no wealthy people, over there, who just don’t want to work out?

There are, but it is seen as a moral failing or lack of discipline in the circles I am familiar with (on the coasts).

Re: Culture shock

#79

Post by akomtu »

"I’ve seen shirtless guys walking, jogging, and cycling in broad daylight."

It's unfortunate that the fight against biases hasn't reached this point yet, but it's certainly a cause I could support and donate to political campaigns who also support equality of rights as much as I do!

Re: Culture shock

#80

Post by throwawaygh »

kodah wrote: post #4

> 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. Made me snort. I grew up here and I've still mindlessly done this. > There’s no kiraana stores (i.e. small local stores) that sell grains and rice and vegetables here, it seems. (Or small stationery shops, or shops of any kind.) Almost all shopping has…

> There are, just not in big coastal cities.

My experience is exactly the opposite.

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