Biggest cultural shock you have come across?

[hibbledobble]

What have you encountered while travelling that was your biggest cultural shock?

I'll go first: in Poland I saw families/extended families living 10+ in a 2 bedroom home. The concept of having a bedroom or even a bed to oneself is seemingly unheard of. Everyone sleeps in different beds each night, and beds are often shared. Having visitors in this set up is no problem either: everyone just rearranges. Water also came from Wells, lots of homes had no bathrooms. Ovens were these metal beasts that were plugged into the mains.

Iamastonished.

Northern Ireland is different too. The Sunday trading hours here for bigger shops are 1-6.

You know that there are many parts of the UK without mains gas?

My parents have oil fired central heating. Costs a bloody fortune.

MIL's village doesn't have mains gas. Everyone has oil fired central heating or LPG.

I'm UK born and bred and 44 and have never heard of ANYONE putting their kids to bed at 6pm. Is this a recent thing?

I used to live in a village without mains gas. This was a while back though.

Shanty towns by the sides of the railway in India. Entire families on motorbikes with no helmets. Children begging. The roads were a free for all too. I don't think there is such a thing as right of way.

You can't drink in public places like parks, beaches the street in Northern Ireland either.

Ilovepixie, I'm a lecturer, and lots of the student loos at my university, which has sought out a lot of overseas students from China and India, have those picture signs of someone squatting on top of the loo, with a firm red cross drawn through it, and an approving green tick next to someone sitting nicely.

There are many asians who think that putting your bum where others have is totally unhygenic. Also that the squat position is the best one for your body when it wants to poo. Dont know if thats actually true. But thats why asians stand on loo seats. Ive seen it in the uk in areas where its heavily populated with folk from that part of the world.

Constant sleazy chatting up in France.
Adverts for a charity providing sight tests and glasses for children in New York.
That not much is different from the UK in Australia but apparently no aborigines live there at all according to their presence on TV and popular media
The silence in Sweden. And 100% no shoes inside ever.
The lack of signs of the sex trade in Thailand.
The lack of women in Egypt.
The public sullenness in Moscow- everyone seemed recently bereaved.
The public jolliness in China.
The public order and cleanliness in Germany- a cliché, I know!

the children living on the streets in India. Although has anyone noticed a dramatic improvement over the last few years?

My own culture shock was visiting a German Lido as a young teen and people simply did not bother with changing rooms. It was quite, er, educational (because what else do you do as a 13 year old unexpectedly surrounded by freely hanging willies?!)

Chavelita

Northern Ireland has a big Chinese community and I've never heard of that before! But I suppose it's different actually living in a country for a couple of generations , as apposed to coming just for study.

This one is more of an amusing culture clash than shock: when we lived in Singapore, I used to have a bike trailer, and used it to take DS to pre-school. This particular pre-school had a few Western expats but mainly upper class Singaporean families. I would arrive at the pre-school, panting and sweaty from cycling half a mile in the heat and humidity with DS in the trailer, to amused and slightly shocked looks from the Singaporean yummy mummies, who would get out of their glistening black or silver 4x4 in their high-fashion clothes and heels, and say to me, oh wow, you bring him by bike, you're so brave. They would never have dreamt of bringing their child by bike; in Singapore, although some young men get into cycling as a sport, most people who ride bikes are poor labourers. And Singaporeans absolutely hate getting sweaty. Middle class Singaporeans spend their lives moving from air-conditioned car or underground train to air-conditioned shopping mall or air-conditioned office.

Not being able to flush loo roll down the toilets in the middle east, even in the luxurious mansions... I soon got used to opening the bin and seeing the last persons shit
Being treated like royalty because I'm English
Having kids following me everywhere I went taking photos and giving me flowers because they thought I was a famous actress- it was a small snapshot of how it is for celebrities and it was sweet for about 5 minutes and then claustrophobic.

True about school groups on the underground. You can tell I've never lived in London

Curly I think a lot of people begin the bedtime routine at 6, certainly for the under 5s it's very common. I think DS went to bed at 7 until he was about 6...

I thought of another German one - the brothels. I'm sure it's worse in other places but I was shocked at how it is here. There is a red light district in most decent sized towns - we live in really what is a very small university city, I hadn't even heard of it before we moved, and there is a very clear red light district including two strip clubs and a porn cinema which open directly onto the main road by the tram stop for the biggest university. The brothels also advertise at the supermarket on the little panels in the trolleys and on large billboards by main roads. They advertise the scale of their business and that they have women available 24/7 and how cheap they are. I think it's really shocking. There are also prostitutes who stand on the streets. If you drive through certain roads at night they will literally run into the road to try and flag down the car, particularly if it's a man driving alone or if you're in a car with tinted windows. I'm a bit worried actually for when DS gets older at how normalised it is here.

Oh and smoking in restaurants felt really strange!

Another few I've just thought of -

lack of advertising in cuba. The only bilboards have political slogans on, and there's no coke except in western style hotels. And going down the only motorway there, there were no other cars and we trundled along trying at about 25mph trying to avoid the potholes

Men test driving camels - at great speed! - before buying them in western china

The level of corruption in so many countries. Eg fines being made up for non existent traffic violations in central america, all sorted with a note to a policeman

Speaking of willies ... a French exchange student later invited us to stay with her family at their beach place in Aquitaine

So there I was, fiddling about with towels on the beach, when I looked up to find her dad's colossal todger swinging about right next to me at eye level. I know the French are much more relaxed about nudity, but confess that was a bit much. Her mum was just the same too, prancing around with not so much a bush as a forest - and that's without the couple very clearly shagging further along the (admittedly fairly deserted) beach

What I was most shocked by in Asia was the obsession with skin whitening products. Adverts are everywhere. My Japanese friend told me that in Japan, there are special long gloves that mothers wear when they push buggies in the summer, so that they don't get their arms tanned. Apparently in Japan it's considered low-class to be tanned (like in Victorian Britain I suppose) and everyone wants their skin to be as pale as possible.

When I first arrived in Singapore I was chatting to an Irish woman who had also just arrived. She was very fair skinned and she was lamenting that she had to go to a black tie event in an evening dress and needed to get some fake tan, but couldn't find it in any shop. It took me a few months to understand why! It's so curious, that Europeans are obsessed with getting a tan, and Asians are obsessed with getting pale.

I don't think it's that surprising that people used to squat toilets would stand on the toilet seat. Many people in the UK have never encountered a squat toilet or even know they exist, or there was a point in your life when you wouldn't have. I don't think it's so inconceivable that people from a part of the world where squatting is the norm might not have ever heard of the idea of sitting down to use the toilet, and hence might literally not know that sitting was intended.

9 years ago in Switzerland with my mixed-race then-fiancé. Being stared at when we held hands in public, not in a hostile way but it was clearly very unusual to see a mixed race couple.

10 years ago visiting friends in the US, being shocked at how comfortable everyone seemed with talking about how much they earned, how much their jewellery cost and money in general.

Living in Italy 10 years ago, again being shocked at how the women would run around seeing to their male family members' every need while they watched the football. And the TVs in every restaurant showing football, even the upmarket ones.

Poznan in Poland last year: how beautiful the architecture was. I was expecting grey Soviet concrete but it was stunning, especially in the city centre. I'd gladly go back to explore a bit more.

Shanghai 3 years ago: how awesome (in the original sense of the word) everything was. The sheer scale of the buildings, the crowds, everything was just staggering. I spent a wonderful day packing in as many of the sights as I could and know I barely scratched the surface. I was also vaguely surprised at how different things were: bamboo scaffolding, all the street signs in Mandarin... It sounds ridiculous but it made me feel how incredibly privileged and arrogant I was as a western traveller to have everything handed to me on a plate in most places. I got very lost trying to find a hotel and ended up having a police escort Everyone was so friendly and welcoming.

Living in Sweden 11 years ago: the communal showers after swimming I never really got used to that but then got back to the UK and thought nothing of wandering around naked in the gym changing rooms so it must have rubbed off after all.

Reverse: walking into an Afro-Caribbean barber's to get my son's hair cut and being refused service. I'd never experienced racism before that.

"Apparently in Japan it's considered low-class to be tanned"

Whenever I have seen a group of Japanese tourists anywhere hot and sunny they have always had umbrellas up to protect them from the sun. We saw loads ofJjapanese with brollies walking around Pompeii.

We get a lot of Japanese tourists in our area and the women, especially the older ones, often have parasols up and wide brimmed hats. Seens very sensible to me and they look very elegant.

WetsTheFinger Mon 08-May-17 19:05:22

Moving to England from Tel Aviv was a massive culture shock. I first lived in Cambridge for university and now in Northumberland and the rigidness that rules and social niceties had to be followed with was really stifling for a while. I would do things like shout or whistle across the street to stop a bus, and be stared at like an alien! Everyone is so quiet and introverted here. If you spoke to someone they would eye you suspiciously. I've learnt now!

_

Move down to Co. Durham - it's almost rude not to have a conversation across the street, where I live.