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.

Hibbledobble a very remote village with a dirty track going to it it is not the whole of Poland!

Oh I forgot another great set of New England accents is in Manchester By Sea.

Some examples of positive culture shock:

in Australia (Queensland), lots of beaches have barbecues which you can use to cook your own food for completely free. They often have a public toilet with free showers, too.

There are a lot of complaints on here about foreign toilets, but one great thing I noticed about public toilets in India was that there was usually a queue for the gents and not the ladies, unlike every public toilet in the UK. It made a nice change me waiting outside for DP, and asking him why men always take so long in the loo?

Also in India, if you admire someone's baby, they will usually hand them to you for a cuddle

Europe is a big place!

So is the US. And there are as many cultural differences among different regions as there are among countries in Europe. It is folly to generalize too much.

Right. I have lived for quite a few years in the sort of environment you all describe

Ive lived in the environment for 40 years and in its own way your post was as bad as Chavelitas.

I don't see the big deal really - yes I would try to think of a distraction.

Personally I don't give presents to the non- birthday child as I think it's good for them to learn a bit of forbearance and delayed gratification.

However, I'm another who finds the attitude that the birthday child must be allowed to jealously guard 'their special day' against all encroachment a bit

It's their birthday regardless - a little generosity of spirit never hurt anyone. And it is also just a birthday...

Totally wrong thread!

One thing I noticed in Poland recently was the lack of non white people.
DH and I were sat in a cafe in Krakow when we noticed a man come in who had been in the cafe we had lunch in. We both realised that we noticed him because he was the only non white person we had seen or could see in a huge cafe overlooking the park.

The same was true in Tokyo. On a train in rush hour and we realised that we were the only non Japanese people on the train. Imagine a train in London and the different races/cultures you would see there.

I love this thread, it's fascinating, can we get it moved to Living Overseas before it's zapped?

My biggest shock by far was moving to Singapore, viewing apartments to rent and I'll never forget the first maid's room I ever saw because my jaw literally dropped. It was off the side of the kitchen, wasn't big enough for an adult size single bed, had no window, stunk of damp and mould and looked like a store cupboard. Next to it was a tiny toilet you could hardly squeeze into with a shower attachment for her to use directly above it with no hot water. The maid could then be conveniently 'shut away' from the family with doors sealing off the kitchen from the rest of the apartment. This is absolutely the norm over there and no local would bat an eyelid.

I got used to the fact that this is how people expected maids to live and there are a whole host of cultural issues at play here - however I never employed a maid despite the expat peer pressure to conform.

I'll never forget that initial shock though, ever.

Not particularly widely travelled...but I did have a degree of culture shock in the US:

1. Not being able to get a drink anywhere, even when I did remember to take my passport with me. Bar staff would squint at it in horror as if I'd handed them a fresh dog turd and ask "haven't you got a Mass State Drivers License?" I'm from Wales! Why the hell would I?

1. On the other hand, locals thought nothing of going out for 3 or 4 beers and then driving home 😯

1. TV ad campaigns promoting sexual abstinence outside marriage.

1. Daytime TV! OMFG! I thought it was bad here but the constant infomercials and Jeremy Kyle type crap...and the channel that showed "the best of British Comedy" was a continuous loop of Hyacinth bloody Bucket.

I love this thread, it's fascinating, can we get it moved to Living Overseas before it's zapped?

Or better still, classics?

I've rarely read a more educational thread

I spent 7 months in Australia and felt thoroughly depressed by the end of it because of the racism there.

I experienced a different kind of culture shock recently. I have used my local swimming pool for years but a recent significant birthday means that I am now eligible to attend the over 50s swimming sessions.

The women in the changing rooms are lovely. They are very trusting. Despite it being a public session, they don't bother putting their clothes in the lockers. Instead they fold them neatly and leave them on the bench and hang their coat on the peg above them. The also chat to friends and strangers alike whilst getting changed not a bald fanjo in sight.

I found the elderly men's behaviour less appealing. There is lane swimming and I choose the "fast" lane as I am a pretty competent swimmer. More than once I have noticed that men deliberately act to stop me overtaking them. Today two men seemed to work together in such a way as to block me overtaking them at the end of the lane instead of giving way.

Its only just occurred to me reading this thread that it may be that men of their age (late 60s early 70s) perhaps can't contemplate the idea of being less good at a sport than a woman

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

I imagine that no-one drives to work in London. I work on the outskirts of Sheffield, and nearly everyone drives to work so no-one drinks at lunchtime. You would have to drive to get to a pub in the first place.

Speaking of racism, in my first year living in Finland (ten years ago) my parents came over for Christmas and we were spending it up in Lapland with family and I invited a friend from Uni who was otherwise going to be alone at Christmas. She was a Lebanese-American and she came up separately on the train and told me that as she arrived in Lapland she found people would stare at her, like they'd never seen someone like her before.
It was only a few decades ago that a black person walking the streets of Helsinki made it into the newspapers!

Driving through rural Laos and seeing whole communities crowded round one tap to shower. I felt awful for looking, just so desperately unfair.

In Indonesia, I saw a boy no older than 9 carrying his baby sister on his back, she was wrapped up in a black bin bag. They were walking between the cars in the pouring rain, knocking on card windows begging for money.

The whole families on motorbikes thing in SE Asia shocked me too, especially seeing the parents wearing helmets and the children going without.

Street pissoirs in 70s Paris. So incongruous with the beautifully dressed people.

Harlem in the 1990s, I thought I'd seen everything in London.

Squat toilets in Asia. I genuinely cannot make myself do a poo standing up. Also opening a train toilet door in Thailand and it being a bit dirty but had a toilet so truing the next door and it was just a hole in the floor to do your business through.

Oh and also in Malaysia telling a taxi driver where we wanted to go and he turned to my husband and said is she correct? Then ignored all conversation I made after and only spoke to my husband. I guess I am not meant to speak to men as a women in Malaysia but all the hotel staff and tour guides and people in China town had been fine.

Oh yes, I can cope with a squat toilet, but using a squat toilet on a moving train is a tricky one!

How sexist men in the UK are, and the disgusting manner in which some of them will speak to you. I'm from an English speaking country and I'd never heard the word 'manageress' to refer to a woman manager. Also, I'd never had grotty young men asking me to lift my top up, or pull it down or to suck their dicks when I should happen to pass them in the street. I thought the men were pretty coarse where I come from but they're models of couth and culture compared to some men here.

The class system in the UK, with its snobbery and reverse snobbery.
Seriously, it took me about 10 years to get it as it was so improbable to me that I never thought it could even exist....

Iamastonished the vast majority of people don't drive to work in Dublin either. It's just a very different culture

I'm from an English speaking country and I'd never heard the word 'manageress' to refer to a woman manager.

To be fair, I think I vaguely remember my nan using this word over 20 years ago. I certainly have not heard it used since then in any setting and I imagine most people under the age of 30 would have never heard that word.