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.

Fifthkey, good point about narrowing it down. I'm amazed at how insular people can be with regard to not being able to decide accents.

As an explanation (rather than defence), to American ears I'm guessing that the "er" part might be a sticking point too. If you're middle class or from London or have an estuary accent, the er is not sounded as strongly as Americans are used to (bad impressions of Americans involving over-speaking the r's). So it it may sound like "watah" to them.

But I still have no idea why they don't make the leap. I taught Japanese students English and many of them had been taught by Japanese speakers, who would Japonify a lot of words. They would teach them to say "kamingu" for camping, for example. So if I said "camping" they could not jump the chasm from "kampingu" that they'd been taught, to "camping". I found that really odd, but I live in a very multicultural society so I'm very used to accents of all sorts.
Maybe some of these Americans had never heard a non-American? I know they're amazed by our Canadian accents on the rare occasion we've ventured south.

Lalegue, that seems a bit of a leap to say "what does it say about a culture/race of people" with regard to how they treat animals.

Firstly, China is a big place (obvs). People there hold a wide variety of opinions on a wide variety of things. I've had quite a few Chinese students as a teacher and as a host family, and some of them have been vegetarian (they try to match veggie w veggie host where possible). So it's not like it's all animal abuse across the large landscape/population 24/7.

Secondly, as a vegetarian I find it appalling that people eat animals at all. I remind myself it's a cultural norm, but it hasn't been my norm for over 30 years and the longer I'm not eating meat the more agog I am at the practice. In North America it seems like there's constant reports of abusive practices in slaughterhouses and dairies. Most of those places are not abusive (beyond the meat is murder thing), but enough are.

Thirdly, it's been said before and people mostly have highlighted the treatment rather than the species, but for those of you who are bothered about eating cats and dogs - this is an artificial distinction in our culture. Pigs are smarter than dogs, for example, and make very loving pets. Cows have strong, loving family ties and all mammals feel pain and fear. This is one of the reasons I stopped eating meat - I thought "well, I wouldn't eat my cat ... ohhhhhh".

I think, to me, it's a matter of degrees of not seeing animals as having rights.

Agree with you Lizzie.

Moving to the uk as an Irish person, first time ever to know what racism felt like, it's only a small minority's of people but makes me really wanna go home 😥

well fightingirish yuo might enjoy this - justice for stupid english muppets

As an explanation (rather than defence), to American ears I'm guessing that the "er" part might be a sticking point too. If you're middle class or from London or have an estuary accent, the er is not sounded as strongly as Americans are used to (bad impressions of Americans involving over-speaking the r's). So it it may sound like "watah" to them.

No, I failed to order water in Boston even when speaking slowly with my Dorset accent which tends to sound sound the R on the -er. After about the 5th attempt, I asked for a Coke.

Cantseethewoods
Everyone in the world is born equal, the only difference is money and guns.

This thread is a fascinating read

Well, that's bizarre then. I lived close to Dorset and would have thought that pronunciation should be intelligible. And context, as said below, ought to be a clue. That is ... odd. I hope your thirst got quenched.

Has anyone mentioned snow in equatorial Africa? I've never been but I did some work in a chimp refuge years ago as a student and became a big fan of Jane Goodall and all things Chimp related. When I saw pictures of Mount Kilimanjaro, I was

When I went to Jamaica and all the houses had burglar bars. I just thought 'how unsafe is this place if they have to put the houses in cages?!'. Apparently they are common in a lot of other places but I'd never heard of them before.

Athrawes, LadyRoseate, Brasty,

Rather late to this thread, but I'm going to defend NZ against your charge of racism.

NZ has been dealing with race issues for a helluva lot longer than the UK and accordingly has nothing to learn from the UK. On most measures, e.g. ethnic minority representation in parliament, the professions, business and so on, NZ leaves the UK in the dust.

It is true that NZ's indigenous population is overrepresented in prison, unemployment and so on. This is a legacy of British colonialism, for which Britain is responsible, and huge efforts have, and are, being made to put things right.

NZ, along with Australia has happily absorbed immigration in proportions that would make Nigel Farage burst a bloodvessel and Enoch Powell rise from the grave.

There are no race riots here.

NZ is many degrees less racist than the UK and the fact that NZers might use derogatory terms is misleading. NZ is not stuck in the 50s. In fact, it is the UK that is 60 years behind NZ :in the UK, hoity toity attitudes about rude names is considered sufficient.

'NZ has been deaing with race issues for longer than the UK'.

NZ in its current form hasn't even existed for as long as the UK has had race issues.

Yes it has. You really don't know what you're talking about. This is like watching English people opine in Scotland. They just think they know it wall.

Race issues began in NZ i the late eighteenth century when British colonists began turning up and then took over the place later on. As Britain dumped a big turd on NZ, it's not for British Mumsnetters to complain about the smell.

Meanwhile, Britain wasn't dealing with such race issues as it had at all. It was all suppression, and that didn't begin to change until the 1960s, and even then not very. British attitudes to race relations really need to catch up. When they do, terrorism will be much less of a problem, if at all. The first thing to realise, however, is that anti-racism is far more than just getting huffy about rude names.

I suggest you read The Letters of the Late Ignatius Sancho, An African - (written in the -hey- 18th century in the UK) and the surrounding chatter, and then get back to me.

Also, I'm Scottish. Probably not the best to suggest I'm acting like an English.

And I suggest you read some New Zealand history. Perhaps then you will not opine like an English person.

It is ridiculous to state that the UK didn't deal race issues til the 60s. I've just given you a concrete example that that is not the case.

Perhaps it is you who needs to read up on history so that you don't opine like a silly person.

Moving to London from Surrey. Very white area, maybe only 2 or 3 EM children/English SL children in a class.

Went to a college in London and the ratios were vastly different.

fightingirish: It's still the case out in the 'colonies' too. The whole GWOT collaboration has everyone scared again. Very disheartening and frightening. They want to create this 'perfect' society where most of us are dead!!!

What's GWOT?

NZ has been deaing with race issues for longer than the UK

Neither of the polarized position expressed above is correct.

On the one hand, it is obviously wrong that NZ has been dealing with race issues for longer than the UK. The slave trade was abolished in the UK in 1807. That didn't come out of thin air one day in 1807! The Merchant of Venice was written in the 1590s - I'm no social history expert - but there is a fair chance it featured themes that were going to be understood and related to by the audience - ie. anti -Semitic feeling. Racism isn't something that is new in the UK.

On the other hand, both Australia and New Zealand have a huge amount of cultural guilt arising out of issues concerning race and the indigenous population. Maoris were given equal citizen rights much MUCH earlier than aborigines so there is a perception that they were treated better. BUT those sorts of issues (white people turn up, take the land, kill the indigenous population with disease and war) are far more culturally deep rooted than the sort of racism that is present in the UK. It is steeped into everything and appears everywhere - museums, art galleries, politics, history - are deeply imbued with racism and historic racist issues - which is not the same in the UK.

Polarized positions are not right very often!

Greece - when eating a meal outside and being besieged by about 20 wasps which descended onto our food, the restaurant owner shooed the wasps off with a cloth and then gestured for us to continue our meal AFTER the wasps had been guzzling our food for 10 minutes!
Yet when we fed a starving looking cat with titbits the same owner got very cross and said "no feed cats".
USA - driving across Nevada to get to Las Vegas airport, we didn't realise about time zone changes and lost an hour going along the Hoover dam. This meant we only just got to the airport in time for our plane. The check in clerk obviously thought we were stupid for not knowing the clock went back an hour.
Also in a lift in San Francisco a man recognised our accents as British and asked us if we knew a friend of his called John Carter who lived in London! Yes everybody knows each other in London !

Jaja101 that reminds me of a joke, not sure if it's a true story but I heard from a friend, a couple of Americans arrive in Dover from Calais. One says to the other "you wait here with the bags, I'm just going to have a quick walk around the island".

Elderly women working on digging and repairing roads in Hong Kong

How incredibly seedy feeling Amsterdam was.

Well, you just didn't go to the right places! OMG, I can't believe you didn't check out Amsterdam.... did you not go past the usual tourist crap? Even the RLD has the most amazing architecture if you care to look up and around. It's from way before the 1600's - and you have all the amazing art museums. How about Anne Frank House... a history lesson right there!

Next time, rent a bike or hop on a tram and wander around the parks. They have concerts all summer.

I guess what people think they are going to get the universe will deliver

I remember the first time I went to a South East Asian country and saw people repairing flip-flops and sandals - huge wake-up call about how much we throw away.

Or going to Guangzhou and seeing the restaurants where your dinner (not in my case as I couldn't face it) is alive in a cage/tank outside for you to choose - not just fish but birds, small mammals etc.