Oddities in the US, part 3
The follow up to this post, for some reason this was still in my draft queue. Time to hit publish and amuse/annoy you with more things that struck me as odd during our stay in the US:
- Seeing people go out in their car in the morning to get breakfast and come back with a big bag from McDonald’s.
- no hi, bye. Start talking whenever you feel like it and walk away when the conversation is ‘done’.
- the amount of handicapped parking spots and seeing the fat fucks using it.
- marshmallows=schuimpjes (this will make sense only to dutch people who may have wondered what kind of special awesomeness these marshmallows might be. They’re not. They just use a different word for something we all know)
- Grocery bags, 50 bags instead of 2. 3 items per bag.
- The stupidity. Katelynd watched a woman in front of a machine with 2 buttons. Button 1; press if you have an appointment. Button 2; press if you don’t have an appointment. The woman needed 3 minutes to figure out which button to press.
We needed to get passport pictures taken for our baby. We had to go to 2 different places and needed to have it retaken 6 times. The ‘photographer’ had no idea why her Polaroid took 2 piccies in 1 go and why 1 was always off center.
Likewise trying to get ANY paperwork done anywhere was extremely frustrating because anything that doesn’t fit into the bureaucrats daily routine they have no idea how to handle it. “But these are british papers, we need a stamp on it”. What kind of stamp? “We don’t know, but it needs to be embossed”. What does it need to read? “We don’t know, but it needs to be embossed.” But what if they don’t do embossed stamps over there? “Then we can’t file it, we need an embossed stamp.”
It’s like trying to get help from a chimpansee.
I somehow missed this ‘cultural phenomenon’ first time around, and I doubt I would have found it amusing without ever having been here, but watching it here after 2 months… hilarious. And scary.
Thoughts of Imbalanced Mind
These “Oddities in the US” blog posts are amazing.
Even fun to read again (like I just did with part 2).
Sometimes when during a conversation the US pops-up, and I tell people about your observations…
…they almost don’t believe me and sometimes look at me like: ‘hmmm, prejudiced-US-hater-alert’.
Teh funny.
Still planning a vacation there though, hehe :)
I’m generally embarrassed to say I’m American. When I was in England, they assumed me Canadian. I didn’t object. :p
It’s not that I hate the US it’s just.. it has a bad reputation in many different areas. I kind of feel like a sore thumb when I’m away from my mother country. *hides*
Hmpf, everytime I read something like this, or hear you talk about it, I am still amazed. I don’t understand how you can live like that.
And we dutch are complaining? I guess we don’t have it all that bad over here, to be honest ;)
Heh, I assure you I don’t share those oddities! There is a lot of weird stuff here. It all started when they decided to keep Imperial measurements…
As a clerk at a service station, I see some strange stuff. I’ve come to the conclusion that at least 60% of the population has toilet trouble and can’t read. Here’s one that actually happened with a girl playing a scratch ticket game:
Girl: (shouting from across the store) “How do you play this game?”
Coworker: “There’s directions on the bottom.”
Girl: “I can’t read directions.”
Coworker: “You can’t put words in a sentence together?”
Girl: “No.”
Coworker: “I’m happy for you.”
“- no hi, bye. Start talking whenever you feel like it and walk away when the conversation is ‘done’.”
You know, I’ve lived in the US my whole life and I’ve only had that happen once.
Though the whole story about paperwork…..Ugh. Not fun. I did manage to find a Microwavable TV Dinner that actually looks like the food on the box once you cook it. I remember you talking about that in one of the earlier entries in this series.
-Pb
‘“- no hi, bye. Start talking whenever you feel like it and walk away when the conversation is ‘done’.”
You know, I’ve lived in the US my whole life and I’ve only had that happen once.’
I can say the same. It really depends on where you are, too.
I think that’s a sign X needs to stop associating with assholes :D
still whenever i see (i know it’s fiction) series or movies from the US a phone call almost never ends with a ‘goodbye’ or ‘talk to ya soon’ they just hang up whenever they think the conversation is over…