Culture Shock

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

Oh don't get me wrong, there are plenty of foods in the US that I have the same sentiments about, but being in Texas, we have a bit of a higher bar when it comes to flavor and spice. I use black pepper, white pepper, jalapenos, onions, garlic, cumin, thyme, red and green bell peppers and Adobo leaves among many others when cooking. Not smoking meat with mesquite, hickory and pecan wood is sacrilege here. We still use in ground pit cooking and I get my vegetables straight from the farm and they actually taste fresh. I do not eat anything that has been processed, frozen, canned or microwaved and my meat comes straight from the butcher shop from the ranch where the cattle was raised so you can imagine my shock when eating what is served there. Of some of the things I attempted to eat that were the most repulsive that I think I can remember the names of: shepherd's pie, meatballs, cornish pastry, rumplehumps, steak that could break your teeth, even the mashed potatoes were terrible.. Where is the pepper? Where is the spice? Do they ever use pepper on anything? LOL

Interesting. I take it you do not live in or near a city? I grew up in a small village near farms and could frequently smell flowers, plants and other natural fragrances, along with manure and unwashed animals. I prefer those smells to inner city piss stained street corners and pollution. I now live on the edge of a relatively small city, so can experience both within easy walking distance.

Many Brits do prefer fresh meat and veg. Local super markets often have a butchers counter and fresh fruit and veg section within them. My local shop has a very fine bakery as well which produces freshly made bread and pies daily. All this is in the same shop as the frozen, processed stuff with very little flavour. In the rural area I grew up there was a chap with a chilled van who would deliver fresh vegetables called Les the Veg.

I agree about the lack of spices. Most British cooks I have encountered do not use very many. Salt and pepper are the staples, and these are often not added during cooking, but left on the table to be sprinkled on later.

One thing I must disagree with you on is the Cornish Pasty. It is one of the best foods going, both nutritious and tasty, and is a proud cultural export of my area. If you continue your anti pasty crusade I will be forced to beat you within an inch of your life with a tin of corned beef (I joke, but seriously don't dis the pasty).

I live about 30 min from Dallas ( however that is 30 min @ 80mph) No farm animals on my street, just large newly built homes and open land so I have no worries about manure HAHA.

I personally rarely eat any breads at all, so I am not really fond of baked goods or pastries and only usually eat those made with almond flour or corn since I have difficulty digesting any wheat products at all. I eat tortillas, but usually only the very thin ones made from flint corn. I view breads the same as cakes, like a desert you only have a bite of, but for me, they make me ill if I eat them. It is actually very common for many Native Americans to not be able eat wheat or dairy products, so that did make for a difficult time while trying to eat in the UK. While there, I often went with what they recommended, and the Cornish Pasties I had though was not good at all, it was actually really slimy and greasy inside and I wound up throwing it out. I may have just gotten a bad one though since they vary greatly.

 

[Rylot]

but being in Texas, we have a bit of a higher bar when it comes to flavor and spice. I use black pepper, white pepper, jalapenos, onions, garlic, cumin, thyme, red and green bell peppers and Adobo leaves among many others when cooking. Not smoking meat with mesquite, hickory and pecan wood is sacrilege here.

Funny thing is the biggest culture shock I got from moving from Washington State to Austin Texas was the food. In Washington I really liked the American Mexican food. You'd get the meat flavors with different spices and a little bit of heat to make it interesting. Here with the more authentic Mexican food all I get is heat. I've been here four years and am able to eat some fairly spicy dishes but they're all the same to me. Chuy's is one of the only Tex-Mex places I'll bother to go because at least there I might be able to distinguish a few other flavors.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

Evening chaps. As an Englishman, I am wondering what what disastrous morsels of food you have been fed? Are there any specific foods you can't stand or is it the general way food is prepared? It would be wonderful to converse on this issue as I have also heard some horror stories about food from across the pond (meat being pumped full of sugar, visitors almost ending up with scurvy due to lack of vitamins, that sort of thing).

I don't know if they still put a lot of corn syrup in darn near everything in the US, but that was a horror story I was told. In the UK, a lot of the food I came across was just prepared as if by someone who had a near-primitive understanding of cooking and gave next-to-no tosses whatsoever as to the quality of their food. The breakfasts and similar fried food in hotels and service stations were hideous to try and keep down, but the overpowering smell of fats, oils and greases was the worst part.

In Scotland, you have to ask for a roll (doesn't matter what's going in it) not to be buttered, or it's not uncommon to get a knob of the stuff slathered all over the filling. A bit of a shame when it overpowers the taste of everything else in there.

All that being said, though, it's gotten a lot better. My parents have come up with much worse stories in their time, particularly when it comes to shortages.

One of the things that made me most sick about much of Europe, not just the UK though was the smell. It smelled like rotting corpses in oil, rats and sewage to me and made me feel as though I was suffocating just trying to go about town. I could not get home to the clean air of the country fast enough. The rotting old smells made me have to hold my breath or pull a scarf over my mouth and nose and wish I had a gas mask to walk about town. The old buildings and architecture were amazing, however the smell of them was not. Just thinking about it still turns my stomach.

Shit. Is that a joke about the dark ages? I can't say I ever noticed anything that bad in my time here. o_o

The people could make you throw up, too, just by talking. I remember that was really something. Just standing there listening to some unshaven lout in tracksuit bottoms detailing his latest sexual escapade - "phwoar, I was lookin' at f**kin' wall-to-wall minge, c*nt" - was usually enough. Hygiene and a lot of personal habits horrified me.

OHH yes, the people... " I think I have to drop an f bomb every other word so I do not sound posh" when it just makes them sound like idiots with diarrhea spewing out of their mouths. Many people think Americans are sexist, racist and rude.. I have to wonder if they ever listened to Brits at a pub.

Yes. Unfortunately I went to school with many such people. They generally came from quite deprived backgrounds in the inner city. Some of them were quite pleasant once you got to know them, others were just as nasty as their vernacular implied. There were a few fairly nasty racist incidents while I was growing up due to anger over council houses being given to immigrants instead of the people whose homes had been demolished to make way for them. Fortunately I was able to avoid most of it, thanks in part to not understanding it and being fairly oblivious a lot of the time.

Some dicey stuff a little like what you're describing (the racial tension bit) was something I noticed when I visited parts of London in the 90s, though I didn't understand it at the time. I remember not going anywhere without a relative due to some doubts about the safety of the neighbourhoods we were travelling through. As far as language goes, I don't think anyone really knows what "potty mouth" means until they've visited Britain - though I have learnt some hilarious phrases, blue jokes and expletives from a relative who joined the army there.

No, the smell is not a joke, but then again I am extremely sensitive to odors. I can smell the slightest mold or mildew from within my house coming from a towel sitting in a garden bucket in the neighbors yard.. I am actually a super taster as well:
( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supertaster ) so I am sensitive to both tastes and smells. If there have been mice in an area .. I honestly can taste it and it is disgusting and causes a gag reflex. I smell everything rotting in a city from the crap sitting in the storm drains, to the pesticides used in apartments to the roach smell coming from peoples basements and it makes me terribly ill.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

but being in Texas, we have a bit of a higher bar when it comes to flavor and spice. I use black pepper, white pepper, jalapenos, onions, garlic, cumin, thyme, red and green bell peppers and Adobo leaves among many others when cooking. Not smoking meat with mesquite, hickory and pecan wood is sacrilege here.

Funny thing is the biggest culture shock I got from moving from Washington State to Austin Texas was the food. In Washington I really liked the American Mexican food. You'd get the meat flavors with different spices and a little bit of heat to make it interesting. Here with the more authentic Mexican food all I get is heat. I've been here four years and am able to eat some fairly spicy dishes but they're all the same to me. Chuy's is one of the only Tex-Mex places I'll bother to go because at least there I might be able to distinguish a few other flavors.

I taste them all even with the heat, and can taste the different flavors that cause the heat, so I think you have to have a tolerance to the heat to be able to fully appreciate it. I can sit there eating peppers while the guy next to me is crying and sweating eating the same thing and I wonder what on earth is wrong with him. HAHA

 

[Flames66]

The breakfasts and similar fried food in hotels and service stations were hideous to try and keep down, but the overpowering smell of fats, oils and greases was the worst part.

But... but that's the point of a fry-up.

In Scotland, you have to ask for a roll (doesn't matter what's going in it) not to be buttered, or it's not uncommon to get a knob of the stuff slathered all over the filling. A bit of a shame when it overpowers the taste of everything else in there.

I agree with this part. I prefer butter to be an option that I can put on myself.

I live about 30 min from Dallas ( however that is 30 min @ 80mph) No farm animals on my street, just large newly built homes and open land so I have no worries about manure HAHA.

I personally rarely eat any breads at all, so I am not really fond of baked goods or pastries and only usually eat those made with almond flour or corn since I have difficulty digesting any wheat products at all. I eat tortillas, but usually only the very thin ones made from flint corn. I view breads the same as cakes, like a desert you only have a bite of, but for me, they make me ill if I eat them.

Interesting, bread and pastry are a staple of my diet. I eat pies and pasties several times a week and my fry-ups wouldn't feel complete without some toast or fried bread to go along with them.

It is actually very common for many Native Americans to not be able eat wheat or dairy products, so that did make for a difficult time while trying to eat in the UK. While there, I often went with what they recommended, and the Cornish Pasties I had though was not good at all, it was actually really slimy and greasy inside and I wound up throwing it out. I may have just gotten a bad one though since they vary greatly.

Many English pies and pasties are filled with fairly viscous "gravy". This is sometimes from the ingredients themselves or, as my Grandmother taught me to make pasties, achieved by putting a small piece of butter at the top to melt throughout the innards. That's just how we like them.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

The breakfasts and similar fried food in hotels and service stations were hideous to try and keep down, but the overpowering smell of fats, oils and greases was the worst part.

But... but that's the point of a fry-up.

In Scotland, you have to ask for a roll (doesn't matter what's going in it) not to be buttered, or it's not uncommon to get a knob of the stuff slathered all over the filling. A bit of a shame when it overpowers the taste of everything else in there.

I agree with this part. I prefer butter to be an option that I can put on myself.

I live about 30 min from Dallas ( however that is 30 min @ 80mph) No farm animals on my street, just large newly built homes and open land so I have no worries about manure HAHA.

I personally rarely eat any breads at all, so I am not really fond of baked goods or pastries and only usually eat those made with almond flour or corn since I have difficulty digesting any wheat products at all. I eat tortillas, but usually only the very thin ones made from flint corn. I view breads the same as cakes, like a desert you only have a bite of, but for me, they make me ill if I eat them.

Interesting, bread and pastry are a staple of my diet. I eat pies and pasties several times a week and my fry-ups wouldn't feel complete without some toast or fried bread to go along with them.

It is actually very common for many Native Americans to not be able eat wheat or dairy products, so that did make for a difficult time while trying to eat in the UK. While there, I often went with what they recommended, and the Cornish Pasties I had though was not good at all, it was actually really slimy and greasy inside and I wound up throwing it out. I may have just gotten a bad one though since they vary greatly.

Many English pies and pasties are filled with fairly viscous "gravy". This is sometimes from the ingredients themselves or, as my Grandmother taught me to make pasties, achieved by putting a small piece of butter at the top to melt throughout the innards. That's just how we like them.

Are you telling me the slimy stuff was supposed to be in there? D:

 

[Flames66]

Are you telling me the slimy stuff was supposed to be in there? D:

Spoiler: A proper Pasty

This is what a Pasty is supposed to look like. Perfectly soft potato, carrot, swede and onion, cubes of rump steak (mince meat is acceptable but not recommended), lightly seasoned with salt and pepper, a little butter, all encased in beautifully glazed pastry with soft, flaky handles.

 

[Recusant]

The summer I turned seventeen, I went on a trip to Ireland. Up to this point, I'd been all around my native US, and seen chunks of Canada, but that was it. Not being a total clod, I prepared myself by reading up on everywhere I was going, and in general expecting "things will be weird in ways you can't predict". I was ready for the big things, but it's the small ones that trip you up.

At one point, the group I was with decided to go surfing (because when you're deciding where to go surfing, a place that's fifty miles north of MOSCOW is just perfect, right?). Though I enjoyed myself, I wound up drinking at least a quart or two of the Atlantic, as well as working up a good sweat, so I was desperately thirsty when we got back to the car. No one had thought to bring any water, but one of our native friends happened to have a thermos, and offered it to me with a "here ya go". I knew it wasn't water, but liquid was liquid, and I was parched, so I gratefully took down a swallow... of scalding hot tea. I realize that people swimming in fifty-degree water might be rather cold upon leaving it, but 1. we were all wearing wetsuits and 2. I have the body fat levels of a Pacific walrus. I also realize (newly, at the time) that "highest per capita tea consumption in the entire WORLD" is not something taken lightly.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

Huh I don't really get this "British food is bad" thing. Given how fat America is compared to Britain, is this just a case of taste > health?

I don't think so... I am under 50kg so I don't think fat is an issue when it comes to taste. The US is a huge place so the food is not even remotely the same in different regions, think about the varying cuisine from England to Africa and the US is more comparable to that variety. Even in the US,though many in other states cannot tolerate how spicy Texas food is, so of course most food from elsewhere tastes terribly bland in comparison to me. However, do not find Mediterranean, Italian or French food bland like the food in the Uk. Uk food is more comparable to North Eastern US food in spiciness and flavor, but considering the majority of their recipes came from England to begin with it figures they would have similar tastes.

 

[Zykon TheLich_v1legacy]

More likely a case of "My taste > Other taste". I found that guests from western countries absolutely can't stomach our local canteen food (and huge state-owned public canteens are still a big thing here), and therefore have to stick with restaurants and home cooking. Meanwhile I and most of locals find a bowl of borscht from a big canteen pot rather good.

Oh, I dunno, I spent a couple of weeks in Borisov 20 years ago and the food was great. Oh the meatballs... so good. I'm English though, so maybe we just share terrible taste. But don't worry, come the apocalypse, we'll be happily chowing down on delicious fried cockroach while all those prissy fools are dead. Probably eaten by us.

OT Not exactly culture shock, but moving from London to Cornwall. People actually stop and talk to you, it was really odd, in London that's usually a warning sign but people were super friendly in comparison. Took a while to get out of the "what does this fucker want?" mindset. Everyone seemed to know each other and you could bump into someone you know just walking down the street, whereas in London you'll probably never see the same person twice. Plus being a small place most people had done the rounds with each other so as a bit of new blood I was suddenly all the rage, which was nice for a change.

 

[Callate]

Fiji. I have never been in a place that made me feel so much like a colonialist pig-dog in my life.

It's not that the people were resentful, though, or even, largely, looking to take advantage of rich tourists like they are in some places I've visited (there was some of that, sure, but mostly in the margins and avoidable.) It was...

Well, starting at the airport, when we were literally pulled to the head of the crowd because we were fair-skinned (outsiders, tourists, people who would spend money) rather than dark-skinned (locals who could be ignored.)

Then there was the resort area where we were staying, where diesel generators blared to keep the rooms in the seventies, which was always a shock when we went outside into temperatures in the nineties or higher. A short bus ride away, locals lived in houses made of cinder blocks without electricity. The nicer ones had blind-style rotating window panes, but many didn't even have roofs.

In the food stores the locals frequented (there were separate stores for tourists, natch), bags of rice swarmed with insects. The occasional ATMs were guarded by men with assault rifles.

And everywhere you went (because of a local tourism campaign), everyone greeted you with broad smiles and calls of "Bula!" (Not unlike "Aloha" in Hawaii.)

...Did I mention there had been a civil war a few months before we got there...?

It is very, very strange to be in a country where you feel you've somehow become part of a conquering force, that the locals, though still present, are no longer in charge.

Parts of the trip were very beautiful. A brightly painted Hindu temple remains vivid in my mind, possibly in part because we were asked to remove our shoes and show certain courtesies regarding things like talking and photographs. We were asked to be respectful there, where so many other places it felt like people were going out of there way to show that as far as they were concerned, we weren't capable of showing them disrespect. Wear hats in once sacred native areas? Not a problem. Miss an appointment? We'll wait. Spend more on a drink you'll leave half-finished than your server makes in a week? Let me clean that up for you. (I hasten to note that, by and large, we weren't participating in such behaviors, but there were plenty of other tourists who weren't nearly so careful.)

Fiji was a place that was turning itself upside down- and in the case of things like those diesel generators, sometimes literally destroying itself- to make tourists like me happy. It was educational, even illuminating- but I never want to go back there again.

 

[FalloutJack]

I can't say that this has happened to me yet. I get way too interested by different things to be shocked.

 

[Saetha]

Huh I don't really get this "British food is bad" thing. Given how fat America is compared to Britain, is this just a case of taste > health?

I don't think so. My sister's a health nut and she hated eating in the UK because she couldn't find anything healthy. Trying to find food was always a chore because everything she found was too greasy, too fatty, too fried, too much for her.

I think America's health problem stems more from the fact that portion sizes and distances between things are a lot bigger. No one walks because everything's too far, and hey, while you're driving along might as well stop and get a ten piece nugget from McDonalds, right?

Also what Lil Devils said. The only food you'll find consistently throughout all of America is fast food. Besides that, you've got BBQ in Texas, Chinese food in the North West, "British" food in New England, etc. People get culture shock here just by moving between states. Just by moving around in states, really. I live in South-Central Texas, took a trip to East Texas once and my God it was like a different planet. Twangy accents, chewing tobacco, pick-up trucks - it made me realize where the "Texas hick" stereotype came from. Ironically enough, I got a lot less culture shock from visiting Europe.

To OP: Yeah, add me to the "British food is awful" list. French food? French food's great. Italian food? Incredible. German? Well, I'll live. But British? All I could stand to eat in Britain were the fish and chips, and even that was bland as hell. Not much culture shock experienced from Britain itself, except for maybe the tiny cars and tinier parking spaces, but the food? Shoot me.

Hmm... I'll give another, incredibly specific example, and I'm not sure this even really qualifies as culture shock, but... I've been to both Hershey Park in Pennsylvania and Cadbury World in England, and the differences between the two are staggering. Nevermind that Hershey's bigger appeal is the theme park, more than the museum and factory, just the way they treat their customers. I remember at Hershey we just wandered through a museum by ourselves and got a single Hershey kiss at the end. Cadbury World? We just stepped in the door and they practically started pelting us with free candy bars. We got our tickets and stood in line for a guided tour - and got a free candy bar. We finished the tour and got guided through a mock-up factory - and got a free candy bar. We went on some skeevy train ride for kids because we were killing time - and at the end, yep, free candy bar. You can imagine what this was like with a party of five. I think by the end we had something like thirty candy bars, and only paid for five of them (One for each of us). Ain't nothing from Hershey Park, but Cadbury World? We're still finding free candy bars from our trip to Cadbury World. Freakin' weird.

EDIT: Oh, I forgot this one, which probably bugs me the most because it comes up everywhere: The tea.

If you go west of New Mexico or North of the Carolinas, whatever iced tea you find is almost guaranteed to be ass, assuming you even find it at all. It's all stale, packet-brew, bottom-of-the-barrel swill. Even the bottled stuff. That Sweet Leaf crap or whatever it's called is a sin against nature. It's just - half the world drinks hot tea on the regular, yeah? So why, for the love of God, do they all freeze up and short out at the idea of adding ice and chilling it? Iced tea isn't hard! It's regular tea with ice and sugar! Not alchemy, people, get with the program!

 

[Guffe]

Well let's continue on the England road then...
I'm Finnish, my third language is English, I thought I had it all covered as I traveled to Liverpool the first time some 6 years ago to watch my first live LFC football match at Anfield. Then I met the Scouse accent of English... HOLY FUCKING JESUS SHITBALLS!!! I try to go there once a year to watch football, it the Scouse accent never ceases to amaze me xD

Tunisia was another one, that one was a big culture shock. Everything from the marketplace, ways of trade to how to handle traffic!