Foreigners cannot believe how vast the United States is. I am from the West Coast of the U.S. and my Italian relatives come here thinking they can visit me in Seattle, plus also see New York City, Miami, the Grand Canyon and Hollywood all in a week–by car. I can’t get them to understand that it’s 3,000 miles from the Pacific to the Atlantic coasts.
They are amazed when I tell them that it takes five hours to drive east from my home in Seattle to my mom’s house in Spokane–and she lives in the same state. Washington, only the 16th largest of 50 states.
The most impressive thing I LOVE LOVE LOVE about the USA is that, despite what’s being said in media by a few people, this is the country where you can practice your religion 100% FREELY without any opposition anywhere, as long as your practices do not violate the law or other people’s freedoms. Some minor limited exceptions might apply here or there.
1. People don’t believe that you can literally just drink water out of the tap in the bathroom. There is a reason why the glasses are kept in the Bathrooms of all American hotels & motels.
2. Nobody believes that their pharmacies and retail outlets are big way way way bigger than you could imagine. CVS & Walgreens, which are both essentially pharmacies are probably even larger than small malls in India. Also, they just don’t keep medicines, they keep EVERYTHING.
3. People don’t have any clue about the extent of diversity in America. I used to feel proud about being from a diverse nation. Then, I went to America. You see people from every race, races you probably didn’t even know existed, every religion, every gender and every form and somehow, they all just blend together.
4. People don’t believe that America is a beautiful nation. Many Indians think of it as a culture-less nation. They often ask me whether there is anything to see in America. They have this image that it’s a nation with big buildings and wide roads. No. You cannot be more wrong. There is so much to see and so much to do other than big buildings.
5. In Washington DC, all the Smithsonian Museums are free! It is very very hard to believe and also very very hard to resist going to all of them.
Everybody isn’t fat. There are a lot of people who care about their health and fitness. I have seen people walking and running on busy streets of big cities.
The thing that pinches the most, you have to pay for trollies at Airports. Also, you need to pay for luggage in flights which pinches because when you convert it into your native currency, it is very very expensive.
6. If you think the portion size in American is big, think again. It isn’t big, it’s HUGE. Cookies, candies, chocolates, bags of chips etc are enough to feed a lot of people. (For example- this is a pizza we cluelessly ordered in Chicago. This was around twice the size of a large pizza in Dubai.)
7. Love for marathons. I was surprised to find out how many marathons take place during summer and how serious many people are about them. They pay $100+ in enrollment fees (usually goes to charity) and train themselves all year long.
8. Homelessness: This is directly related to above. I’ve been to San Francisco and Chicago. The prevalence of homelessness struck me. When I walked in downtown SF, I saw 5-10 homeless people at each block. I could barely see more than 15-20 homeless people when I walked 2-3 hours in downtown Shanghai. Here, they seem to be forgotton when they are among the people who need social support and care the most.
9. If you come from a tropical country like me, American Summer is NOTHING like summer. It is usually comparatively cold, even in June & July.
10. Again, if you are from Thailand, there are no motorbikes on the roads. Absolutely none. It’s very very weird because in Thailand, it’s very common to see bikers riding motorbikes as if they own the road.
11. Majority of families in America have lunch around 11 am or 12 pm. This isn’t the case in my country because Lunch gets postponed to 2 pm or 3 pm.
12. Contrary to popular culture, the life of a regular American Teenager is nothing like what you see in movies and tv shows. Their life doesn’t revolve around parties, drinking and sex, they are probably only a tad bit less stressed than us.
13. I don’t drink coke but my friend pointed out that if you buy a cup of coke, you can get infinite refills.
14. Vegetarain or Vegan options are very very limited. If you are willing to survive on fries, then you’ll love it.
15. Almost everybody uses GPS. The fear of getting lost is negligible.
16. This is a funny one. In cold Northern States, when it snows and gets ridiculously chilly, people go to big stores like Walmart & Costco to walk. You can imagine how large these stores really are.
17. People are extremely patriotic. They have the American national flags everywhere like outside hotels, spas, homes, schools etc. We don’t enjoy flexibility when it comes to national flags in Brazil.
18. It’s very common for people in stores or in museums or in public places to chat with you. This is very pleasant. People aren’t cold and reserved.
19. Flying by airplane is cheaper than taking a train. It’s the other way round in China.
20. This is weird, correct me if I am wrong, almost everybody has an iPhone. It may be the latest one or an older one but everybody has an iPhone. Even our Taxi driver had an iPhone.
21. People are also very obvious about the political party they support. I saw people wearing Clinton T shirts, Bernie Sanders jackets, Donald Trump hats etc. I haven’t seen such craze anywhere else though.
22. Houses don’t have ceiling fans. This is hard to believe because life without a fan is impossible in Vietnam. All of them have centralised heating/cooling.
23. Houses aren’t made of concrete and bricks like in India, they are made of wood. My parents jokingly said that these houses aren’t “majboot” (“strong” in English) enough.
24. There is McDonald’s everywhere. Even in the middle of nowhere, there will be a lone McDonald’s joint. I am not kidding.
25. They don’t home deliver McDonald’s in America. They do it in India though. India -1 USA- 0.
26. People LOVE coffee. Obviously not more than Indian’s love for masala chai. (but their coffee is very mild/diluted many opting to use decaffeinated versions)
27. Big family vacations : People is US spend vacations with their parents, uncles, aunts, Grand parents. They hire vacation houses in cities like Orlando. Yet to see thing like this in India. And caravan holidays are awesome.
28. No one walks or uses public transport: I really thought that public transport should be ubiquitous and the most basic thing in the US (I blame this on Captain Planet). Worse, there is no option of public transport outside of big metropolitan areas. Apart from the really big cities, the public transport system is basically a pointless mess of buses and trains, which are sparsely used and not punctual at all. Coming from a city in India where I was used to getting a train every 5 minutes, this came as a shock. I initially thought this was only in Atlanta (where I went to grad school), but I saw this in more and more cities as I traveled more. My ignorance about public transport to be blamed for this.
29. There is a lot of poverty in the US: More shockingly, good young Americans are completely ignorant about it. There’s way too much economic segregation in terms of neighborhoods and school districts.
30. School districts: WTF is this? I came from a background where I anyone can go to any school (at least middle and high school) as long as it was based on merit (and you had the money if it was a private school). This led me to interact with people richer than the last 10 generations of my family as well as with people who lived on 0 a month. The school was tax subsidized and there was no school district segregation.
31. Unlike most countries, corruption can legally take place (lobbying): Isn’t this a no brainer? I know lobbying is good for a lot of good reasons, but hey, it’s an easy way for the rich/corporations to get their point across and legally get things done.
32. Obsession with Tanning – I am adding this one late, as I had forgotten previously. In India, we have an obsession with “fair skin”. Skin lightening, skin whitening, anti-tan…so on. In US, it was the oppostie. Every block has a tanning salon and drugstores have tanning creams and sprays instead of anti-tan ones available here. I thought it was fairly screwed up that in every part of the world, the cosmetics industry makes a way to make money off of people’s insecurity.
33. EMIs for everything – It’s like the people there live on EMIs. Cars, phones, everything. And even the lower middle class can afford this stuff. It’s like everyone has an iPhone. Which also reminds me of the extremely bad coverage that AT&T provided. I’m used to better coverage in India. Almost forgot! Worst part was being charged for incoming. Calls and messages! It’s like a nightmare for Indians.
34. Large car engines. At home I drove a 1.25L stick-shift Mazda2, which was perfect for the city and quite fuel-efficient. Here if you ask for the car with 1.6L engine in the dealership, you get surprised a look. 2.0L, or even 2.3L is considered a regular American engine, while in Europe this will be more on the larger side. Stick-shifts are not that common, too. Many people can’t drive it.
35. Medical/Education costs: After food, clothing and shelter, I thought medicine and education would be the most important basic needs for man. These should be cheap and readily available. How wrong was I?
Bonus
How most state capitals are not the same as the most populous/largest city in the state. i bet most foreigners dont know that the capital of Illinois is not Chicago but Springfield. The most surprising one is the capital of the state of New York is not New York city but Albany!
How swift and effective law enforcement is!
How heavily people depend on debit/credit cards to pay. I survived for 4 straight months without a single penny in my wallet. This would be unthinkable perhaphs any where else in the world.
The level to which retail has reached here is just unbelievable. All things from electronics to frozen food is available under one roof! Just visit any Target or WalMart and you will be bowled over with the variety of things on sale!
The reliance on cheques, the metric system (really people the rest of the world has caught up), driving (I don’t have a license so probably couldn’t survive in most cities where taking the bus is only for the poor), and tax being added after the fact. That last one is because taxes differ by state, but I don’t get why companies can’t just include sales tax in the price on the shelf.
The seemingly opposite scheme of things. Air travel is preferred and is cheaper than a train journey. Automatic transmission is the default on most cars. The manual transmission, referred to as the “stick shift” here is a premium and a car with a “stick shift” is more expensive than automatic transmission! In fact I am willing to bet that most americans will not be able to drive if given a stick shift car.
All in all, it’s an amazing place to visit. :)