Don't get me started on that great British food.
Posted on 03/10/2012 7:36:57 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Edited on 03/10/2012 7:39:16 AM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
At the outset of this post I would like to make the disclaimer that America is the greatest country on earth. It invented the iPad, after all; it put a man on the moon, not to mention giving voice to the great and noble precepts set down in the Declaration of Independence.
We Europeans tend to scoff slightly at all that lofty US guff about freedom and democracy, particularly when it is used as a cover for invading oil-rich parts of the Middle East – but go and live in China for three years, and you’ll quickly re-discover the point.
But – and I expect you guessed there would be a "but" here – as a new arrival to America I keep stumbling over things that I find gloriously, surprisingly – how to put this? – backward.
If this came from the UK they seem to forget that they would all be speaking German if it were not for this “backwards superpower”.
Good lord this Brit whines. He should put on his wife’s knickers and man up.
Always helps to read the column, first. He’s writing about personal checks, ATM’s, imperial measurements, and cable TV.
Bitching about our use of non-metric systems. Ouch!
Yes, and since turnabout is fair play - the Brits still drive on the wrong side of the road. How quaint!
When he gets back he'll cry about gas prices and tiny cars.
Don't get me started on that great British food.
I was stationed in the UK. I know backward and we ain’t it.
Umm, no. Last routine checks I wrote were installments on a car I bought from a relative. Everything else os on-line.
Checks are for private sales when cash is impractical, or for gifts, or for important transactions for which I want a paper record.
I wish Western Europeans wouldn’t presume to speak for my friends here in Central Europe. Poles, Romanians etc. have a different mind-set from Western Europeans...
They all speak English.
In 1944, we were not backwards in relation to things he discusses in this article.
The comparisons he makes about the state of things elsewhere in the world versus here are all pretty much valid. I would prefer to drive my vehicle on the M4 in South Africa than the I-45 between Dallas and Houston, for example.
Living on past glory is not really an answer to most of the questions, large and small, that we face as a nation.
$450 in ATM fees for one trip? Bad planning. Or the ignorance of foreigners.
Look mummy, I’m a journalist!
Americans like corks in their wine because it’s part of the process of having a glass of wine. You get to practice with the corkscrew and the reward is that you get to smell the cork. I’ve never bothered to try smelling a bottle cap. Corks are just cooler.
I will say that European train stations are nice. But....I hate German toilets. Who wants to stare at your own crap?
Screw top wine bottles? So uncivilized it borders on barbaric...
...as a new arrival to America I keep stumbling over things that I find gloriously, surprisingly -- how to put this? -- backward.Probably he was thrown off by our continued devotion to monarchy.
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