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.

Rwandan border with Congo. Children trying to wipe the "white paint" off my arm.

"here in Yorkshire most people are chatty and like to pass the time of day with each other, it's really nice! Barely spoke to another person when I was in London though despite being surrounded."

I live in a South Yorkshire village. Whenever we go out for a walk people always say good morning or hello, even complete strangers.

I don't know if this is cultural or that these men were just being rude, but when DD was tiny I was waiting for a lift at a local shopping mall when a group of Japanese business men rudely barged in front of me and took the lift. Do Japanese men think that women are inferior or is this a cultural thing?

It's absolutely not legal to sell your kidneys in the U.K. You can receive "expenses" for sperm and egg donation but it's not a significant sum of money. "egg-sharing" where young women with fertility problems get free IVF treatment in return for donated eggs is the closest we have to selling body parts.

The Vatican. I left that place with such a dislike for organised religion. All that money, all that art and history locked away where only the very few can afford to pay to see some of it. It absolutely sickened me. It's wrong.

And yes, Rome was filthy. The graffiti!

That the DC are growing up in a region awash with guns, and DS1 thinks nothing of high fiving soldiers and policemen who are armed to the teeth. He was scooped up by a guard a few weeks ago who rested DS1 on the butt of his gun. Not cool with that being the new normal.

I'm completely cool with it. It's an awful shame it needs to be normal these days, but it does, and it's for the benefit and safety of all of us. I am particularly reassured to see it in airports and other areas that are a high security risk.

We all say "good morning" in Hampshire too, we're only 90 miles from London but we're very friendly!

My biggest culture shock was going to America and seeing the lack of health service/social help for poor people. My dd was at a very liberal uni in a middle class area yet the town's Main Street was lined with people begging. The heavily pregnant mum was the worst for me she was there every day for the two weeks I was there. Also stories from my dd's friends of students not calling an ambulance when we would eithout hesitation in U.K., because they are scared of the bills.

We are so so lucky in the uk to have a society which, on the whole, helps you if you need it.
I found America very brutal, with being the richest country in the world but treating it's poorest people like they do. I cannot get my head round it's philosophy.

How prevalent legalised prostitution is in Australia. I always thought it was a lovely sunny, wholesome kind of place.

It's no more "prevalent" in Australia than anywhere else, and being legal makes it much easier to regulate and much safer on the whole.

In the same way that safe injection sites don't make drug use more "prevalent", they make drug use safer.

My DH thinks every culture that isn't Scandinavian (he's Norwegian) wraps their children in cotton wool.

Having to choose between a squat toilet and a cubicle with a normal loo - but occupied by a massive dog. That was at a restaurant in Macau.

Drinking during the working day in London, I worked there early to mid 90s. A friend tells me it's still done

When I used to pick OH's little sister up from a different school occasionally no one questioned me when she went home with me, even though they had no idea who I was

That's hilarious. MIL works in a nursery near to my office and I pop in every once in a while and it's like getting into Fort Knox.

Regarding prostitution, I take the view that it is going to happen anyway, so legalising it makes it safer for the women (and male prostitutes obvs) involved, so a good thing. Same for drugs - no-one who doesn't already do drugs is going to get wind of a clean and safe drug taking facility and think 'do you know what, I'll give that a go at the weekend'.

In the UK I believe that it is legal to offer paid sexual services from one's own home as long as only one person does it. However, it is not legal for two women who share a flat or whatever, to both do it and look out for each other while they do. Because that counts as running a brothel, which is illegal .

LaLegue Training of armed police where we are is nowhere near the standard of the UK (I'd like to think no firearms unit officer in the UK would use their weapon as a handy hip seat for a toddler!)

I'm also not convinced that if it came to it, armed guards here would stand their ground. So we have all the dangers of a society with guns, with little of the security. It's a complete illusion.

DartmoorDoughnut
Not so much cultural but I was in Antigua for the cricket World Cup and they'd only just finished the stadium, there were absolutely massive rocks all over the place but they wouldn't let you keep the lid to your bottle of water in case you threw it!

We're not allowed bottle lids in football stadiums in Spain either (La Liga teams, I don't know about others).

I arrived in the U.K. as a student just after the death of Princess Diana, and I remember watching all the hysterical grief and flower-laying on the news during my first few days and thinking 'That's nuts', and then looking out the window onto a city centre bus stop and seeing a long queue of people ranged exactly one foot behind one another deep in newspapers, and thought 'That's nuts'.

As someone else has said, how very Deep South Florida is away from the Disneyfied bit.

People followed around Fort Worth by Texans who had never heard British accents in real life. I was only about 16 and started to find it a bit unsettling after a while. Though have to say, found Texans really lovely, there must be unpleasant ones but I didn't meet one in the couple of months I was there.

It's no more "prevalent" in Australia than anywhere else, and being legal makes it much easier to regulate and much safer on the whole.
Really superbeagle? Do you live in Australia then?

My DH thinks every culture that isn't Scandinavian (he's Norwegian) wraps their children in cotton wool

Erm, has your DH travelled outside of Europe?

Maybe I should have said 'obvious' or 'easy to find', then, because I don't remember seeing pages of large colour adverts for escorts in the classified section of your average UK daily paper.

The shanty town on the main road outside Durban airport. It hit me like a battering ram.

@Nellyphants def still done. It's almost a requirement in my dh office!

Having to choose between a squat toilet and a cubicle with a normal loo - but occupied by a massive dog. That made me laugh.

Interesting about the Deep South/ North Florida. I've never been, but I've watched too many horror films, and I'd feel sure I'd be kidnapped and murdered at a gas station or Motel if I went to the Deep South.... Bill Bryson said similar in his books. I would really like to visit there though.

Whilst living in London experiencing racism first hand - it was Asian on Black and it shocked me to the core. Wasn't violent, just words but I was incredibly upset by it. I genuinely had no idea this was a thing - I moved from Ireland to London. Several years later at my dd's nursery seeing a large white man, there to collect his child, speak in a demeaning and racist way to two young girls wearing a veil on their heads. I felt threatened, heaven knows what those young girls felt. That angered me and I reported it.

Polly Yes, I do.

Experiencing blatant sexism in Switzerland - yes still very much accepted there....

also, going to certain parts of Scotland and feeling unwelcome because of an English accent (my husband's family are all from Scotland .... going back many generations, but my husband's father moved to London for a job - hence my husband has an English accent....)