American Culture?

“	Originally Posted By: green_tea I heard when you travel to Europe you should not wear jeans and sneakers or else people will know right away you're an American.	”

yeah over here we all look like this:



John100 and FightinFat *allways* wear hats like this:


and Nik doesn't leave home without his Lederhosen...




Chief108

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“	Question Authority. Question Society. Question Reality. Question Yourself. Question your conclusions, your judgments, your answers. Question this. If you question everything thoroughly enough, the truth will eventually hit you upside the head and you will know. But here’s a warning: It won’t be what you imagined. It won’t be even close.	”

all hail Martyr Fakka

If you go to europe, the only colors you are allowed to wear are black, brown or taupe....otherwise you stick out like an american. I found that out when I went to Italy. Europeans arn't into color.

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“	Europeans arn't into color.	”

Yes, here in London we have an ancient tradition of pelting people who wear other colours with rotten tomatoes. There is a bylaw requiring all londoners to carry sufficient rotten tomatoes for the purpose at all times.

“	John100 and FightinFat *allways* wear hats like this:	”

ectually old boy, I always dress like this

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High mountains are a feeling
I don't need to sell my soul, he's already in me

Kay,
I have lived in the UK, the USA, Spain, France, Belgium and (now) Chile, so I have a little experience.

The USA clearly has a 'culture' in the way that the others do. There are some wonderful things about it (for example giving is much more a part of life, both in terms of how charities reclaiming tax and in people doing it), but there are also parts which are not so great Like its relationship with food.

T

“	You have options available for addressing that problem.	”

Absolutely.

And what the hell is a "colour"?

Peace-
Cam

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Rock On!
Cam
"Raise up your mind....."

Dude,
Colour is English for color.


T

OK... never could figure out their compulsion to add a lot of extra and redundant letters to otherwise simple words......

Peace-
Cam

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Rock On!
Cam
"Raise up your mind....."

It makes me sad when people say the US has no culture.

Only last year I was in New York and went to an art gallery where some of the paintings were almost dry....

The thing about American culture is ... there's not just one culture. The U.S. is so big that there are many different cultures. But there are a couple of overriding sensibilities that unify the country. The first is a very strong belief in the idea of contributing to and creating a good place to live. The other is the McDonald's mentality of fast, cheap, and uniform. One is better than the other.

Do we leech off other cultures? IMO we do not leech so much as look for the best parts of the many cultures that we encounter, and incorporate those ideals into our own. A "leech" leaves the other culture weaker than before. Many of our adopted traditions have helped preserve and strengthen cultures of other nations.

As far as traveling -- one of my brothers who lived in Germany for several years found that Americans were "expected" to do things in a certain way. Not so much how they dressed (jeans & t-shirts can be found in outer Mongolia these days) but their actions & words. For example, he frequently had business meetings with people from around Europe, and while many of the European clients had a habit of showing up several minutes late, the American businessmen were always expected to be right on time.

In just about every country I've visited (except certain parts of the Middle East), American dress & speech is not disapproved of at all. American attitude can elicit negative reactions but mainly because the tourist is being loud, insensitive, ignorant, or just commonly rude. So it's much less about the t-shirt as it is about not treating others as you'd like to be treated.

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"Pain can be a great teacher of compassion and humility."~ Unkotare-san

"Whatever the case, it proves that countless disasters can be prevented by simply assuming everyone you're working with is a moron." ~ Adam Brown, 5 Tiny Mistakes...

Cam,
It always strikes me as quaint the way that Americans think that we put letters in words in order to help people read them (like 'car'. The nearest that the USA gets to saying this right is in Boston). I would have thought it obvious that we put letters there to confuse foreigners and punish them for being born in the wrong place.

T

Ugh no, Boston has the strangest accents in the country! Except maybe for certain parts of Maine. Took me a couple years to understand what many people were saying up here.

Plus new words like "trousers" for "pants," "carriage" for "cart," calling almost every kind of bread a "roll," etc.

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"Pain can be a great teacher of compassion and humility."~ Unkotare-san

"Whatever the case, it proves that countless disasters can be prevented by simply assuming everyone you're working with is a moron." ~ Adam Brown, 5 Tiny Mistakes...

“	It always strikes me as quaint the way that Americans think that we put letters in words in order to help people read them	”

Actually I never thought there was a reason for it... I just thought they didn't know any better....

“	(like 'car'. The nearest that the USA gets to saying this right is in Boston).	”

Strange... the first successful gas powered car (the popular modern definition of the word) was invented in the US. Why would the correct pronounciation of it have been invented elsewhere?
Yeah... those Japanese don't really know how to say things right like "krotty" and "sokky" .....

“	Plus new words like "trousers" for "pants," "carriage" for "cart," calling almost every kind of bread a "roll," etc.	”

Yep... and over there they smoke fags and drink until they get pi$$ed.



Peace-
Cam

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Rock On!
Cam
"Raise up your mind....."

“	Originally Posted By: Lugaldamhara the first successful gas powered car (the popular modern definition of the word) was invented in the US.	”

I dunno about that one...

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Wolfgang says:

I could think of a million better things to do in Japan for a month besides jumping off of picnic tables. - x893

“	I dunno about that one...	”

I didn't, either... that's why I made a point to look it up and worded my post specifically as I did before I posted it.

Peace-
Cam

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Rock On!
Cam
"Raise up your mind....."

Well, post a link, 'cause unless the definition of "successful" is clintonianly malleable, I think there were some folks who beat us to it.



http://inventors.about.com/library/w...aacarsgasa.htm

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Wolfgang says:

I could think of a million better things to do in Japan for a month besides jumping off of picnic tables. - x893