61–70 of 161 posts
Interesting read. Are there any good wikis or Internet Communities - guiding Visitors to learn new cultures, behaviors, ethics in different places? It's nice to see a comparison chart on - cost of living, labor costs, a basic meal, hotel rooms(Comparison charts should be - City vs Another-city and Country Level comparisons) And I would definitely pay $$ for such a service.
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Absolutely. In Japanese, for example, you'll sometimes hear conversations littered with なんか (nanka) and かしら (kashira).
Do the Japanese really say "desu"?
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As an Australian any kind of expected tip is odd.
The justification for this 15% is that government assumes that customers give tip to waitress/er, and thus take taxes off the waitress/er pay-check according to this 15% supposition. So basically, when you don't pay the 15% tip, the waitress/er is paying extra taxes because of you. Unless the service is bad, the normal would thus be to pay the 15% tip, unless its a tip-less kind of job. Some jobs are identified by go…
http://cocktaildoll.com/tippingtips.htm
Specifically:
"Each casino and the IRS have an agreement as to how much to allocate each cocktail waitress, and whether to allocate her by the hour or per drink. The agreement is different with every casino, and within each casino, the allocation amount is different for each cocktail waitress depending on her shift and station. I will use the following as an example, and please keep in mind...this is just an example, a hypothetical, a not-for-real made-up FYI.
"Let's say I am allocated 25¢ per drink. If I bring out a hundred drinks that day, the IRS assumes I made $25.00, and that amount is added on to my paycheck as income. Whatever income bracket I fall into at the end of the year determines how much in taxes I will have to pay, or have paid. How does the IRS know how many drinks I take out? Because each time I get an order from the bartender, he swipes my ID badge, or enters my employee number, and he records whatever drinks I take out on the computer. By the way, whether it's a bottled water or a Long Island or a glass of champagne, they are each counted as one drink.
"If I am allocated by the hour, it works the same way, except now it doesn't matter if I take out one drink or a hundred in that hour, I will be allocated the same amount. (The bartender still records my drinks for the casino's records.) Obviously it would be to my advantage financially to take out more drinks. Let's say I get allocated $10.00 an hour and it's really slow, or I'm a lazy-ass and just stand around; if I serve just one drink that hour and I get stiffed, I'm still going to be taxed on $10.00 even though I haven't made it.
"Did I mention that the above is just an example, to be used for reference only? Please do not quote a quarter a drink or $10.00 an hour as fact or an absolute for all cocktail waitresses! I do not know how much each cocktail waitress is allocated, and it is also not my own personal allocation. It is just a clarification.
"Another thing: the IRS agreement is already in place with each casino, but each girl has the option of signing it or not. This is a very private matter, so while I don't know for a fact, I'm going to say that 99% of all cocktail waitresses do sign it. If a waitress does not sign the agreement, she is required to report her own tips."
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As an American who does this in pretty much every conversation I have, this is a difference I would never have thought of. Semi-related: Do other countries have fragments of speech used as filler such as "like" and "you know"?
We sure do. In Danish "ikke?", "ikke også", "du ved" among others. In Bulgarian I hear "бе", "така" and "такова".
Everybody was nice. Nobody was mean about it (I got a lot of hassle over being a vegetarian though) but it was felt odd for two reasons.
First that it came up. I'm from the UK and we just don't get onto the topic of religion that much. Especially with complete strangers from other countries that you've just met.
Second the "brave" thing obviously... I've occasionally found some of the more extreme ends of the religious community over here annoying... but never anywhere close to the extent that I would feel stating my (non)religious views would be any kind of brave or courageous thing...
An odd difference.
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If you're talking about water just lying around, maybe so, but US water standards are if anything ridiculously stringent compared to much of the rest of the world [1]. Read that page carefully, and observe that while the US standards may appear at times to permit things somewhat higher than other standards, the US (along with Europe) strongly enforce them, so it's not that comparable. As for the air, it is generally…
Well, it depends on where you're from. Your link shows that US water standards are lax compared to European standards. But more than water, I'd be concerned about the amount of hormones and antibiotics in meat.
No mention of our odd restaurant tipping practices? I thought they are unusual compared to the rest of the world...
I think the restaurant tipping is the least strange, because at least in Europe you usually tip at restaurants if the service or food is really good, but you don't have to like you do in the US. What gets me every time is all the other places where you are expected to tip, and where I have absolutely no idea of how much I'm expected to tip or that I'm supposed to tip in the first place. Pizza delivery? What? Cab driv…
Now that I'm older and more callous I have simplified the process. I look at the receipt to check if there is a tip already included. If it is, we're done. Sure, I had discussions with waiters who insisted this is the bare minimum and I have to give something extra on top of that but now I simply leave and never go to that place again. If the tip isn't on the receipt, they get 10-20% depending on the quality of service. So far, this works well in every country.
I believe foreigners get a lot of abuse and are sometimes scammed by obnoxious staff who like to take advantage of the cultural insecurities of visitors. In my opinion, a good strategy is to always be friendly, but don't let yourself get bullied.
"food, which they praise for its quality and variety (and portion size) in a tone of near-disbelief" huh, really? Whenever I get back from traveling I feel the opposite. Sure in places like NY you can get any kind of food. But in my mono-cultural hometown there is little besides hamburgers or pizza.
The US has, overall, amazing food. In large cities there is not only immense diversity (after all, the US is more diverse than most Western nations), but also a culture of experimentation at all price ranges. It's possible to eat amazingly in most major cities for anywhere between $5 and $500.
In the country and small towns there is a tremendous variation across the nation. The food of the Northwest vs. the food of the Southwest vs. the food of the South vs. the Northeast.
It's only when you get into strip-mall-landia where things start appearing incredibly boring and monocultural, and just plain not good.
Before coming to the USA for the first time I read the following in a guide: "Americans often communicate via inflected grunts and groans, such as "uh-huh" for yes and "uh-uh" for no.
As an American who does this in pretty much every conversation I have, this is a difference I would never have thought of. Semi-related: Do other countries have fragments of speech used as filler such as "like" and "you know"?
I firmly believe all countries do this.
No mention of our odd restaurant tipping practices? I thought they are unusual compared to the rest of the world...