Questions for American and other international/non uk mners

[Graphista]

I love learning about other cultures and lifestyles. Lived in Europe myself for a while but a long time ago now. Never been outside Europe though.

Pure curiosity prompted by watching tv shows and films made outside uk.

What's the difference between a condo and an apartment?

Do you have semi detached houses in America? Terraced? I ask because I think they must be called something else there.

What's the equivalent of our going to Spain & similar on package holidays where you are? What type of holidays do ordinary families have?

What about things considered traditionally British? Do other countries do Sunday dinner? On Sunday's or different days?

As someone who was a mature student twice I've also noticed that this isn't something that's portrayed on American tv, or even particularly on Australian or New Zealand output so is that because it's not a "thing" outside the uk or just a weird skewing due to scriptwriters?

What about gap years? Again American shows seem to have youngsters going straight to uni from high school if they're going to go.

Also there's a lot of talk of saving for kids to go to uni but I'm guessing there's support for students from poorer backgrounds? How does that work?

What are bank holidays like where you live? What do people do for them? Are they called public holidays or something else?

Drink driving seems to be very socially acceptable in the states, is that accurate?

Is "soccer mom" slang for sahm?

I got the impression going to summer camp was a thing a lot of American kids did, but then a friend said she'd been a camp counsellor years ago (not American) and that they're quite expensive so it's better off families that do this?

What's childcare like where you are? Again seems to be that in America and also Canada that pretty much anyone can set up a daycare business or be a Daytime "babysitter" (what we'd call a childminder)? Is it not well regulated?

Do American families really tend toward having cooked breakfasts of some description? There seems to be a lot of making pancakes, waffles, eggs & bacon in tv shows (makes me hungry!)

For other mners living in various countries what is the usual breakfast where you are?

When I lived in Europe when I was in hospital the meals were of course based on the norm for where I was living, but for me as a Brit it still felt odd having breads/crackers, cheeses, relishes and pastries for breakfast (I'm veggie, for non veggies there was also deli meats, sausage). I'm fascinated when I read articles on breakfasts around the world and see things like pickled fish, rice dishes even stews!

But then as a Scot I'm reminded of that "highlander" movie script section (a bizarrely cast film where a Frenchman is playing a Scot and a Scot an Egyptian with a Spanish name and a broad Edinburgh accent!) where Connor describes haggis to Juan and Juan is disgusted at the sound of it! So yea I appreciate a glasgow fry which can of course include fried slice of haggis, along with Lorne sausage, tattie scones, black pudding, white pudding, bacon, fried eggs, fried bread, mushrooms, tomatoes and baked beans.

Baked beans - that's another thing. It was one of the few things I bought at the naafi because British baked beans don't taste like baked beans from anywhere else. I Also bought marmite, white sliced (I liked European bread but sometimes our doughy white bread toasted and buttered was needed for the perfect beans on toast or fried egg sandwich)

So...tell me about real life in the rest of the world? I'm sure other mners will also have questions.

we have any older mature students = we have many older mature students.

West Coast Canadian here. I live in a condo, short for condominium. We own it and have a common share in the building and grounds. We have an elected Council and AGMs about bylaws, fees, etc. when I was a student I lived in apartments. The entire building was usually owned by the landlord without individual unit ownership.

Drunk driving is very much frowned on here. There are harsh penalties.

My ancestry is basically 1/2 UK so many of my family traditions include things like Sunday roast dinner. My Mom made a mean Yorkshire Pudding. We usually had mashed potatoes though. My other ancestry is Scandinavia so I have traditions from there too. Canada blends a lot of traditions.

We eat cereal, fruit, yogurt, toast, peanut butter etc for breakfast most days. Pancakes, eggs, bacon etc are for weekends mostly. My husband has muesli and yogurt with blueberries every day.

Terraced houses are called townhouses. We also have duplexes which are like semi detached.

A gap year is not a given, but some students take a year to travel after high school, as our son did.

University is expensive. We have student loans and grants but it is not enough. Professional degrees like law and medicine cost a lot. It is important to save. I left university with student debt that took me more than a decade to pay off.

We have regular paid or statutory holidays like your bank holidays. I think there are 12 a year. If you have to work on one you get extra pay and a different day off.

From where I live, trips to Mexico and Hawaii are common for winter sun. Also Southern US such as Palm Desert etc. Many families have camping holidays in the summer, at lakes or similar. I camped a lot as a child.

I have eaten baked beans my whole life but not at breakfast. We have the same brand here and we buy the vegetarian ones that do not have a chunk of pork fat in them.

I believe day care is regulated. It is also expensive.

The only biscuits I have ever seen at breakfast were like little scones with some sort of thick gravy on the side. This was on a cruise ship. It is a specialty of the American south. Americans and Canadians call the English equivalent of biscuits "cookies".

Here almost nothing is open on Christmas Day. We open gifts in the morning and then have a special breakfast. We have Christmas dinner about 6pm in my family, with turkey and all the trimmings. The rest of the day is family time. Often families go walking together.

Hope that helps!

Agh!

to ba a pickle= to come with an actual pickle.

Obviously Canada is huge and there are regional variations as seen in
tryingtobebetterallthetime's post. In my region, a semi (detached) means two houses that are attached while a duplex is usually one building that looks like a house, that has been divided into two units.

Many towns and cities in the US, including mine, have low-cost community colleges that have programs that cater to mature students. I work with several people who got their degrees in their forties and fifties.

What's the difference between a condo and an apartment?

As others have said, condos are owned and apartments rented. The building the condos are in is owned collectively, with a small (or large) monthly fee paid to take care of common spaces. In fancier condo buildings, the condo association can decide if someone can buy into the building; these can be really cut-throat in upscale neighborhoods in Manhattan, etc.

Do you have semi detached houses in America? Terraced? I ask because I think they must be called something else there.

They do, but mostly in urban areas. They're called townhouses if there are many in a row or (often) duplexes if they're semi-detached. Land is much cheaper here, outside of cities, and in poor rural areas it's very common to have an acre of land with a single mobile home on it. Townhouses can be fancy but duplexes more rarely are (which is ironic in the British imagination).

What's the equivalent of our going to Spain & similar on package holidays where you are? What type of holidays do ordinary families have?

Going to Spain? Probably Florida, or somewhere in the Gulf/Caribbean. A lot of ordinary families either do that or go to rural spaces--the big national parks like Yellowstone or to the shore. Going to the mountains or the shore (Outer Banks in NC or Jersey Shore in NJ or anything similar) is very common. Lots of ordinary families also go to big cities, like NYC or Philadelphia or DC. There are also other, more national (rather than international) amusement parks, for families who like that sort of thing.

You don't get all-inclusive in the US with the exception of a very few places (again in Florida mostly). For that sort of thing it's usually a short-haul to coastal Mexico or the Caribbean.

What about things considered traditionally British? Do other countries do Sunday dinner? On Sunday's or different days?

Nope, not en masse. It's fairly common to go out to breakfast after church on Sundays. Various communities might have special mealslike a shabbat dinner on Friday nightbut nothing like a Sunday dinner. The exception is Thanksgiving, which feels very much like a British Sunday dinner on crack.

It is perfectly common to have brunch on Saturday or Sunday, more so than in Britain.

What about gap years? Again American shows seem to have youngsters going straight to uni from high school if they're going to go.

Gap years far less common than in the UK. Most go straight to university. There isn't something like an A-level (just a general high school diploma), and a BA is usually four-years long. The degrees are general rather than specific. Over four years most students take around 36 classes, only about a third of which have to be in their major. (There are exceptions for some of the STEM degrees.)

Law and medicine are both post-grad rather than undergrad degrees. Some schools allow you to do pre-law/pre-med, but it's no guarantee that you'll get into law school/medical school.

Also there's a lot of talk of saving for kids to go to uni but I'm guessing there's support for students from poorer backgrounds? How does that work?

Not a ton, and it's a huge political issue right now. In-state tuition can be cheap, and kids can start at a community college (kind of like a sixth-form college, I guess, but later) and then transfer to a 4-year for the final two years. The average student graduates with about $30k in debt.

Poorer students can get Pell grants, which are federal, but they don't cover everything. Military families are helped by the military.

The ironic thing is that the fanciest schools with the highest price tags give the most financial aid. So, for example, Yale's estimated cost of attendance (tuition, room, board, books, etc.) is $75k a year. But if a family makes $50k a year and rents their house, their contribution is only supposed to be $1600/year, with the rest covered by scholarship and a small work-study.

What are bank holidays like where you live? What do people do for them? Are they called public holidays or something else?

They're usually called federal holidays. Chronologically:

New Year's Day
Martin Luther King, Jr. Birthday
Washington's Birthday (Presidents Day)
Memorial Day
Independence Day (4th of July)
Labor Day
Columbus Day
Veterans Day
Thanksgiving Day
Christmas Day

A lot of places don't take off for MLK, Presidents Day, Columbus Day, or Veterans Day. Almost all (other than retail/services) give off for New Years, Memorial, 4th of July, Labor Day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas.

Drink driving seems to be very socially acceptable in the states, is that accurate?

Absolutely not. It's just that we need cars more, as we're far more rural. I suppose in very rural places it's shrugged over a bit, but DUIs here can give you a prison sentence and/or big fine and/or revocation of your license.

There is, though, far more casual use of cars. Very few people get formal driving lessons, at least outside of drivers ed in 10th grade. You learn to drive from your parents or your older siblings. In many states, people don't have the kind of check-ups that MOTs require. And people drive everywhere.

Is "soccer mom" slang for sahm?

Nope. It's short for largely middle-class, suburban moms. They tend to be swing voters in elections and the big buyers in households making c. 85k-400k, so they're a coveted demographic. A lot of them are SAHM, but a lot of them aren't.

Soccer here is a preppy sport, not a working class sport, at least in a lot of communities. Working class sports tend to be basketball and (depending where you are) football. Soccer is less preppy than lacrosse but more preppy than any of the four main professional sports.

I got the impression going to summer camp was a thing a lot of American kids did, but then a friend said she'd been a camp counsellor years ago (not American) and that they're quite expensive so it's better off families that do this?

The fanciest sleep away camps are certainly for better-off families. Again, particularly from urban/suburban spaces. So you get people from NYC sending their kids to Maine or Vermont, often to a camp named after an ersatz indigenous term.

But there's also pretty cheap summer camp. You can get day camp, which can be even free. And then you get camps run by people like the YMCA or Scouts or community groups that are very cheap. So, you can get a seven-day residential camp for about $300 (which is £230) through the YMCA, which isn't a huge amount.

What's childcare like where you are? Again seems to be that in America and also Canada that pretty much anyone can set up a daycare business or be a Daytime "babysitter" (what we'd call a childminder)? Is it not well regulated?

Daycare is regulated. Childcare is supposed to be. But illegal child minders are very common.

Do American families really tend toward having cooked breakfasts of some description? There seems to be a lot of making pancakes, waffles, eggs & bacon in tv shows (makes me hungry!)

On weekends, maybe! Weekdays are usually cereal and running out the door. Maybe a frozen waffle in the toaster.

@Camomila No parent and toddler groups here (East coast US). It completely stumped me moving out as a trailing spouse with a 2 year old and trying to entertain him all week without spending megabucks.

Everything else seems to have been answered pretty comprehensively!

I'm an English person in Canada, but I live in a French-speaking city, so my experience might be a little different.

In answer to your questions...

Condo and apartment are used interchangeably here, regardless of whether they are rented or owned, and nobody can explain the difference.

They do have semi-detached and terraced houses. I've heard terraced houses called 'row houses'.

Most people here go to the Caribbean for their cheap sunshine holidays. Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic seems to be quite popular. A lot of people have holiday homes in Florida too.

People go for Sunday brunch rather than Sunday lunch. It's basically a cooked breakfast. The main components are the same but the quality is (to me) inferior. Especially Canadian bacon - it's always hard and overcooked! Where I live, they add things like cretons (a pork spread type thing), which I'm not a fan of.

Food here is generally bland and tasteless - it's like they're afraid of flavour! The local specialities include poutine (which is literally just french fries and gravy and cheese curds - what's so special about that?) and 'meat' pies (the type of meat is never specified but I think it's pork - it looks very dry and there is no other filling or sauce).

You also cannot get a decent Indian or Chinese takeaway anywhere. In fact, any kind of 'ethnic' cuisine is pretty lame. A lot of the restaurants serve what I would call junk food (fries, burgers, nachos, etc.) which is frustrating because when I go out to eat, I want to eat something better, not worse, than I could make for myself at home! But I don't think this is the case in other parts of the country where there are more immigrants bringing in different flavours.

I know of quite a few mature students so they do exist! I don't know any older kids so I can't comment on gap years or student loans or summer camps. I've heard that a university education is quite affordable if you have citizenship though.

Bank holidays are just public holidays. Most of the shops are closed. Many people go camping in one of the national parks or shopping across the border in the US.

Driving standards are generally poor but I don't know about drink driving.

Childcare is super cheap here. Daycare centres subsidized by the government cost $8 a day, private daycare centres cost about $50 a day, but families can reclaim some or most of it through tax credits, depending on income. There are also home-based daycare centre within the same price range - they are regulated but I don't know what qualifications are required to set one up, if any, which is why I'm not sending my kids there!

DD1's boyfriend is from a low income family and is going to college all expenses paid. Most of her friends from low income families have scholarships to help cover the cost of college. One of my best friends is a single mum and has had college paid for, a grant to live on and free healthcare for her 3 years (so far) of college. She's better off at college than she was when she was working full time.

@Nancydrawn

I was born and raised in the US (midwest) and think you gave a very good summary of traditional us customs.

I can confirm that Australians go to Bali. If you have a bit more money there's also Thailand or skiing in Japan. As a Western Australian it's cheaper and less distance to go to Bali than any other city in Australia.

Most people I know don't have Sunday dinner, but pubs will often do a roast on Sundays. We drink tea (you offer guests a choice of tea or coffee) and unlike the US an electric kettle is considered a staple appliance. We have fish and chips, especially at the beach, but putting curry sauce on chips seems crazy to me!

Most people didn't do a gap year when I was at uni, but that was the early 2000s so it might have changed. Unlike the US we mainly go to a uni in our own state. We have to pay for uni, but there's a loan scheme where the debt comes directly out of your earnings once you earn over a certain threshold. The loan is interest free, but indexed with inflation.

We have public holidays. Usually they're on a Monday so we call it a long weekend, and lots of people go on a holiday within driving distance, stereotypically to do outdoorsy things.

We have toast or cereal for breakfast.

-You rent an apartment, you own a condo; condos usually have home owners associations (comparable-ish to share of freehold)

• A terrace is a row house if they’re old, they are common-ish in our neighbourhood which is a historic district of Chicago; we also have townhomes that are also attached but they’re new builds and often have an HOA like a condo
• Equivalent of going to Spain is probably Florida or maybe Cancun
• We brunch at the weekends, great excuse to drink mimosas or bloody Mary’s at 11am
• I have no idea on mature students

-Ditto gap years, our DD is only 2

• Everyone we know saves like mad for their kid’s college; mine are going back to the U.K. when the time comes
• We just call it a ‘holiday’ although I suppose officially they’re federal holidays; we get more days then the UK but far less vacation that you can take when you want, sigh
• No one we know drink drives, many don’t even own cars, we have Uber and public transport so there’s no excuse

-Soccer mom is a suburban thing -No idea on camp, ours is too young but I think my boss sends his kids off somewhere

• Daycare is like a nursery, it’s official and regulated by the state; where we are if you don’t do daycare you do a nanny or nanny share; there are no childminders or equivalent

-We don’t tend to cook breakfast, we go out at the weekend for our pancakes and waffles (and the cocktails because, brunch); weekdays DD eats at daycare and we grab something on our way into work -I buy my Heinz baked beans from Whole Foods and I do love a Wisconsin cheese curd dipped in ranch dressing

The holiday thing depends on which side of North America you live on. Canada is huge.

For us, on the West Coast, Florida and the Caribbean are long haul, and in the winter flights can become very unreliable due to weather as you usually have to fly via some horrible dead of winter location like Toronto. From Vancouver, the west coast of Mexico is more accessible, and Hawaii is about five hours. I love Kauai with a passion that I can only describe by my face to face encounter with a green sea turtle (Honu) one day while minding my own business floating above the colourful fish. We were both shocked, I am sure, and the picture I managed to get has pride of place.

Ok so I went a bit off topic...

Daycare is different in America because maternity leave is so short. So children can start very very young. 3 weeks to 6 months is the norm. I don’t know any American who took/got more than 6 months of leave.

There is a lack of annual leave although there are more ‘bank’ or federal holidays. So summer holidays like in the UK are not a thing. There is a long summer holiday which then needs to be covered for childcare purposes and hence there is camp. You can have cheaper ‘day camps.’ Or residential sleepover camps where kids go for 4-6 weeks at a time and often with no parental visits. These start around 7-8 and go on till 17-18. Some of these camps will be themed or have themed weeks.

When I lived in a big city in the US, yes playgroups are not a thing. There were baby classes but not a lot of playgroups.

I also found that because of short maternity leave lots of American women pump. Pumping is a whole industry.

There is no GP in the UK sense. Kids go to paediatricians. The vaccination schedule is way more intense than in the UK. My kids got the chickenpox vaccine and also annual flu jabs.

Christmas is not a big deal. There was a large Jewish community where I lived who celebrated Hanukkah. But there isn’t this crazy run up to Christmas and this obsession about Christmas lunch. Thanksgiving and the Thanksgiving lunch is a much bigger deal. Thanksgiving is an important holiday because with the lack of annual leave, this is one of the few holidays people can plan for and head out for nearly a year in advance.

aintMissbehaving Thanks!

Yes, I should say townhouse is fancy; row house is not. Townhouse tends to be 4+ bedrooms, at least two reception rooms, etc.; row houses (or row homes) are often equivalent to two--ups, two-downs.

That said, most US houses are much bigger than UK houses. UK new builds average under 1000 sq feet; US new builds average over 2600 sq feet. A lot of that is megamansion nonsense. But even in a city, a lot of row homes will be c. 1200 sq feet, which is still bigger than most UK homes.

1. A condo is owned. AN apartment is rented. Frequently a condo is multi-level and an apartment is single level.

2. A townhouse is closest to terraced. The owner owns only the land under the building. 3. Most Americans vacation within the US. Beaches in Florida, Mississippi, Texas, California, and Hawaii. Also DisneyWorld and Disneyland.

1. Regular church goers usually have Sunday dinner. Not always a home-cooked meal, but at a family restaurant.
2. Gap years are not very common here.
3. Students going to college (uni) can get scholarships and loans from their state, or from the US government. Also many scholarships available for children of law enforcement officers, armed forces, etc. Special scholarships for sports, music, and students majoring in education, medicine, math or science.
4. "Bank holidays" are called National Holidays. They fall on a Monday so we get a three day weekend. They normally honor historical figures or events. President's Day, Martin Luther King Day, Columbus Day, Memorial Day, Veteran's Day, Labor Day.
5. Drunk Driving is not socially acceptable. It is done too often however, and not punished strongly enough.
6. Soccer moms are those very involved with their kids' afterschool activities and spend hours each week driving them to various practices and games. Not always SAHM. Can be working moms too.

10. There are inexpensive summer camps for kids during school holidays. There are also expensive sports and activity camps for those who can afford them. Some of these camps even give the kids school credit - i.e. computer camp, space camp, etc. 11. Friends can "babysit" for other friends and get paid, but if you have more than 4 children not related to you then you are "in-home childcare and have to be inspected and get a license. 12. Hot breakfast is more common in cold weather. In parts of the US where it is hot/warm then cereal with milk, bowl of fruit, juice is a normal breakfast. Oatmeal cooked with raisins, chopped apples and brown sugar and covered with cream is a good breakfast for cold weather. 13. Baked beans are a side dish served with hot dogs or hamburgers. Never even heard of BB on toast until started trying British recipes. Can't bring myself to try them. 14. Holiday dinners (birthdays, Christmas, etc.) in the South US where I live: baked ham, deviled eggs, sweet potato souffle, green bean salad, cranberry sauce, and desserts - apple pie, chocolate pie, Hummingbird cake, and selection of ice creams.

I'm Brazilian. To better situate you, I'm in a major, urban city in the state of São Paulo, but not the city, and it's not commutable. The state of São Paulo has roughly the same size and population as the UK (or is it Great Britain?).

What's the difference between a condo and an apartment?
We don't have a word for condo. In fact, we do have the word "condomínio" for gated communities, the most expensive option of housing. A building is a "prédio", and an apartment, regardless of rented or owned, is an "apartamento".

Do you have semi detached houses? I ask because I think they must be called something else there.
You see quite a few detached houses, especially in the gated communities mentioned above to see espace. Detatched houses, I've only seen in older cities, such as São Paulo and Salvador.

What's the equivalent of our going to Spain & similar on package holidays where you are? What type of holidays do ordinary families have?
There's a massive difference of income in Brazil. I grew up middle-class, in the economic sense, as in I went to independent schools (which we could only afford because I got scholarships every single time), had health insurance. Through a lot of saving my family managed to travel abroad twice during my childhood and teen years.
Anyway, holidays usually mean going to the beach. The most popular beach seems to be in a city called Guarujá, close to the city of São Paulo and with a great structure. Those who can afford plane tickets go the Northeast for carribean-like beaches.
Going abroad is so frigging expensive. With a ticket to a single person from Brazil to Europe, I could buy around eight tickets to the Northeast. Plus paying everything in a currency stronger than your own, in a place people earn more, makes costs even higher.
But there are always the rich, going to Ski Trips and spending New Year in Paris.

What about things considered traditionally British? Do other countries do Sunday dinner? On Sunday's or different days?
There's nothing special on Sunday dinner, or any other dinner of the week.

As someone who was a mature student twice I've also noticed that this isn't something that's portrayed on American tv, or even particularly on Australian or New Zealand output so is that because it's not a "thing" outside the uk or just a weird skewing due to scriptwriters?
Being a mature student is hard in Brazil because you gotta take an entrance exam that is only valid in that year, and admittance is strictly academic basic. So, you essentially would have to remember all you learned in 6th form (and we don't get to pick subjects, either, it's all of them. I had 20 teachers in my year 13) years after not studying it.

What about gap years? Again American shows seem to have youngsters going straight to uni from high school if they're going to go.
Gap years happen, especially among the well-off. My younger brother managed to befriend some really rich people in school and many of them went to gap years in Australia and such. But they're a little different: you usually go to become fluent in the language, and while you might work while you're there, you're mainly subsided by your parents. A friend of my brother's 6 month trip to Australia cost 80.000 reais. That's 80.000 minimum wages, to give you an idea, and it doesn't even cover the accomodation, which he works for.

Also there's a lot of talk of saving for kids to go to uni but I'm guessing there's support for students from poorer backgrounds? How does that work?
There are free, public universities, but there's a number of spots and you gotta be one of the best to get in (remember the entrance exam I told you about?). The entrance method is rather unfair, IMO, because it always ends up being the well off children who had the opportunity to study in the best schools, not worried about money, that get to go there. In recent years affirmative policies "cotas" were introduced for independent school children as well as black and native american, who are super underrepresented. But you can still get through by puting your child in state schools during their High School (3 years) and tutoring them, or paying for them to study at a pre-vestibular for a year.
Pre-vestibulars (vestibulars being the entrance exams) are massing cramming sessions, the same hours as a school day, where you review everything you learned in those 3 years of school to get a better grade. It isn't unusual to see people in their forth or fifth year of pré-vestibular because they want to be doctors, by far the most difficult course to get in.
Anyway, if poorer students get into our free universities, that's the tuitions dealt with. Universities also offer a small amount (half a minimum wage or so) so enable the poorer students to continue studying.
Universities are very much full time here. It isn't unusual to spend some 30 hours a week just watching lectures, so it makes working difficult.
If the poorer students can't get into free universities, there are always the private ones, which are lower quality but easier to get in. There's a federal financial aid project called FIES of student loans that really helps people pay the tuition.

What are bank holidays like where you live? What do people do for them? Are they called public holidays or something else?
Brazil has loads of holidays, and they're often stretched if they fall on a Tuesday or Thursday. Last week was amazing: city's birthday on Wednesday, Corpus Christi on Thursday, and I got Friday off. 5 full days to rest!
Bank holidays are just public holidays, we call them "feriados". Your annual leave from work or school holidays are called "férias", wether you travel or not.

Drink driving seems to be very socially acceptable in the states, is that accurate?
I don't know about in the States, but it happens a lot in Brazil. Usually by young white males who are well off enough to stay out of prison when they inevitably kill someone.

Is "soccer mom" slang for sahm?
No idea, we don't have that expression here. A woman who doesn't work either because of childcare or for any other reason is a "dona de casa", which translates to "home-owner", weirdly enough.

I got the impression going to summer camp was a thing a lot of American kids did, but then a friend said she'd been a camp counsellor years ago (not American) and that they're quite expensive so it's better off families that do this?
The school year in Brazil runs with the year. We have summer holidays in December and January, and Winter holidays in July. No half term or term breaks, though my university gives us a week off in April and another on September. Really wish they'd push the September week to October, when we're already exhausted from the semester.

What's childcare like where you are? Again seems to be that in America and also Canada that pretty much anyone can set up a daycare business or be a Daytime "babysitter" (what we'd call a childminder)? Is it not well regulated?
I don't think we have childminders here. There are nurseries and nannies, and the qualifications for nannies are zero. If you drop out of school, are very poor, etc, you become a cleaner or nanny. It used to be a minimum wage job when I was a child, now cleaners take some 4x the minumum wage due to high demand. I imagine nannies make more.
Children usually start in daycare when they're 4 months old, when a mother's maternity leave ends (it is full pay, though I prefer the british model). It is almost universal that children attend some sort of nursery before starting education at 6, nannies are more for babies. I attended nursery since I was 2, and I had a nanny before that. There are, in theory, state funded nurseries (creches), but there aren't enough spaces and the structure is precarious.
Being a stay-at-home mum here is truly only for the rich. Even if the mum only makes a minimum wage, it is often the difference of having dinner of not.

For other mners living in various countries what is the usual breakfast where you are?
Schools in Brazil have two shifts: one, from 7am to 12pm, and another from 1pm to 6pm, usually with a 20 minute break in between. So for those in the morning shift, and in the teen years, that's almost everyone, there really isn't time to cook breakfast and commute. Breakfast is mainly carbs, or anything you can eat on your way.
I try to add some protein to not feel hungry half an hour later.

When I lived in Europe when I was in hospital the meals were of course based on the norm for where I was living, but for me as a Brit it still felt odd having breads/crackers, cheeses, relishes and pastries for breakfast (I'm veggie, for non veggies there was also deli meats, sausage). I'm fascinated when I read articles on breakfasts around the world and see things like pickled fish, rice dishes even stews!

When there's time to cook, and what you see in hotels, etc, is still lots of carbs (plenty of cake, usually), fruit, ham-and-cheese sandwitches, cereal, fruit juice. Lots of coffee. Oh, and pão-de-queijo, which I really can't describe.

And by the way, beans only belong along with rice during main meals, never for breakfast and never with toast! Ours seem to be rather different than yours.

Anything else you want to know? Tag me if so!

This is such an interesting thread!

I NEVER New the distinction between condo / apartment. So all apartments are rented?

How is the US / North America in terms of home ownership - is it like Europe where renting is very commonplace even for families or the UK where home ownership is more common?

I cooked a proper Sunday lunch for my (then) american boyfriend - he said it was just like thanksgiving! I don't think his family sat and had those lunches at home unless it was a special occasion. When I was growing up we had them every Sunday. Now I do them once a month or so.

Interestingly, the UK lags behind much of Europe for home ownership! I was surprised. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_home_ownership_rate

The US is very similar. Used to be higher but crashed in the crash.

Also very much depends where you are. West Virginia is at about 75% owned while DC is about 40% and New York 50%. Unsurprisingly much lower in urban spaces.

Camomila in Australia , baby and toddler groups are common. Hospitals send you a printout of a dozen or so names of other girls who gave birth at the same time as you - it's up to you to contact each other and organise to meet. Those mother and baby groups often keep meeting for years and both mothers and kids become lifelong friends. There are also local playgroups held in church halls etc .

I'm an Aussie!
Our breakfasts vary, but eggs are definitely most popular, then maybe toast and/or cereal.
With the Sunday Roasts, it is a thing but not something that people follow. We know of it, it's just that we might do it once every couple of months rather than every week!

@Nancydrawn wow - something else learned via this thread!! The “European” thing I was referring to (my incorrect assumption that many more families on the continent rent rather than own) seems to only apply to Germany and Switzerland.

To answer the adult student question from a New Zealand point of view, going back to university after graduating is reasonably common either to do a post-graduate degree or diploma, an individual paper or an undergraduate degree. A lot of people study part time and work full time, others work full time. You can do extramural study too.

Yes to Fantail I'm from NZ, I did my post grad extramurally when I was a SAHM. A lot more convenient than having to go to class every day. Is this common in UK, Europe, USA etc?