The best one is when two people were talking in a foreign language in a store and a Karen said SPEAK ENGLISH this is America. The person replied were speaking Navajo if you want to speak English go to England.
Yeah that one gets me too "YoU'rE iN aMeRiCa, SpEaK eNgLiSh", bitch you're in the stolen lands of the North American continent, speak the native language and stop butchering ours!
Had a similar Experience in Wales 🏴 two American ladies commented to me about you got immigrants everywhere too. She was Talking about the girls behind the counter talking to each other in Welsh wich I pointed out to these lovely people. To my surprise they carried on wittering on about how these people should be talking English as Wales was part of England 🏴. I left it there as it was becoming an uphill struggle for me. By the way the girls spoke English to the customers
Don’t privatize Education too much. America’s investments should be higher quality of Education in Public schools a d affordable education. No student loans like in Europe.
@@marierocher4422 . You think the costly loans US students take out to go to college, are any better. Some European countries have no charge for higher education and even in the UK where students do have loans, they only pay according to income and the loan is written off after a certain number of years.
Could of agreed but after hearing a lot of stuff going back to the 1700s their governments just don't tell them the truth and never have, it's only when they go on holiday/ vacation / university abroad/ work abroad or join the forces that they hear that someone has been telling them fibs , but now the internet is the big leveling up in education . I assume you know about their health organisations do a little research about how many people actually get holidays / vacations it's shocking
Years ago, on my first visit to the States, the first people we spoke to asked where we were from. I said Manchester, England. They said they were from Manchester, New Hampshire. As they walked away I heard the woman say, "why do the English copy our place names?" I couldn't be arsed running up to her and putting her straight!
When you're abroad and someone asks you where you're from, it's usually implied that they are asking about the country. If I, an Italian, responded to an American asking that question with "I'm from Friuli Venezia Giulia/Basilicata/Marche" or any of the 20 regions that make up Italy instead of just saying "I'm from Italy" I would sound pretentious and they would probably have no clue about what I said anyway. So for Americans to expect everyone else in the world to know all of their states, when many of those same Americans can't even locate Europe or Africa on a world map, it just looks like you think you're more important than others. This is not meant as criticism by the way, just trying to explain how it looks like to someone from outside the US
To be fair most US States are larger than all European countries (maybe excepting European Russia). I know the UK is smaller than 30 odd States. Saying you come from Friulli or Lombardy would be equivalent to an American telling you which county they lived in rather than which State.
@@bfcmik To be fair and please forgive me if this comes out as an insult, but nearly no-one of the rest of the world cares how many, how big or what the names of your states are... just a friendly reminder about arrogance. Thank you...
@@bfcmik To be fair, most Australian States and territories are bigger than all American ones (perhaps excluding Alaska) and since there are only 8, there aren't a lot to remember...... but it would be a rare thing for an Australian abroad to answer with the name of their state when asked where they are from, even though Western Australia is bigger than 20 East Coast US states put together!
@@bfcmik To be fair also, the region of France where I live has more population than 30 of US States … Am I supposed to answer I come from Nouvelle Aquitaine when asked ?
@@rammsteinrulz16 I doubt he was being self-deprecating or even ironic. Assumptions like this,and there are many,are dangerous in the long run. Ignorance is the enemy’s weapon.
@@Trebor74 Ypu also can't be a Leader of the Free world who's supporting Dictatorships across the globe, Unjustified Invasions, US Led Coup'd Etats, Mass War crimes against Humanity, etc
I remember that my father was in the army for six years in WWII and it was out of the country for four years in the Middle East. He actually left whilst the USA still had more than half a year left at peace and he returned in 1945 a month or two after VE Day. He therefore missed the entire spread of years in which the Americans were “rescuing” us. It is unnecessary for any US reader to remind me that the USA still had heavy and hard fighting left in the Pacific; I do come from a generation that learnt about the war which ended not too long before I was born.
I lived in the US for a while, my eldest son attended school over there... He hated it, he was well ahead of every one and was bored, until it came to English. His English teacher kept downgrading him for his spelling. (He was previously schooled in England). I went in and she gave me such attitude, the American way of spelling is proper English, I told her to go to England and try that... His history lessons he started to have trouble with as in the USA school he was taught a completely different version of the history books he previously had. In the end I gave him the option, US or England, we left back to England, never been back and never want to. I just found living there myself was hard, there wasn't the friendliness, caring and be good to each other attitude. So much discrimination, so much racism and the health care insurance scam is shocking...
@@MugenHeadNinja I work in the NHS (UK National Health Service) and an American friend of mine is the nurse in charge of foreign recruitment for our operating theatres and she said the applications from American nurses has jumped by 700% in the past 8 years. A huge jump occurred after the Roe Vs Wade reversal.
15:31 I agree that it is, not selfish but perhaps very self-centered. When you are among people from other countries, and somebody asks where you are from, just mention the country. It is enough. Not everyone in the world know the names of states in the US. When they ask further questions, like where in the US are you from, then you can go to details.
@@MugenHeadNinja oh your not a career victim are you! Ffs her comment is her experience nobody alive today had anything to do with whatever went on all over the planet! Get over it and move on! It’s so old now and pathetic!
Back in 2018 I had an American 'internet friend' come and stop over for a visit where I live in England, prior to commencing an around Europe trip. Whilst showing her around my home city of Lincoln she was amazed to see so many George Cross' (the flag of England for those that might not know) flying everywhere during what was the then World Cup. After seemingly pondering this for some minutes whilst we were walking about she turned to me and said.. ''I'm surprised, there are all these flags flying here and not one of them is the stars and stripes, that's not right, you see them all the time back home''. The next stop for us was the pub, because I very much needed a drink.
@@Em-ih5du Of course I explained it, but that would somewhat kill the anecdote. Needless to say it was all resolved with humour, however, I confess it momentarily boggled my mind.
I seriously had it out with a woman on Twitter who was pissed that I told her the rest of the world laughs when they hear Americans call the president "the leader of the free world". She was insistent that they do and demanded to know if I've ever actually been to any other countries. "Ummm, yeah Karen, a lot of them."
|I once started a massive melt down on the chat in a online game, because an American told some one they needed to "go back to school and learn to spell, there is no U in armor" . I said that the British authorities were getting pretty sick and tired of the American abuse of our language, and the way they thought they could remove letters from words, like armour and colour and worse yet make letters silent that had no business being silent like the H in herb. After I allowed them to rant about that (joined by other Americans) I dropped in that the British were seriously considering revoking the Americans license to use English. It was incredible how many people thought I was serious!
I can't help thinking that the guy who was confused by European history continuing after the establishment of the US, hadn't quite grasped that history. In saying, 'when we rescued them in WW2' he clearly has a prejudice view of his own countries history, and such a phrase suggests he still has something of the same mindset as when he was ten years old.
@@andyt8216 Especially as they joined in Dec 1941 a full two years after Europe had been struggling against Nazi Germany. The US had profited very well in those two years, selling arms and equipment.
I was writing the exact same thing then thought why bother the American view of WWII is based on the Hollywood versions, it’s tiresome hearing it from Americans
anyway, i am pretty sure they were paid to turn up so they were mercs. and it was of strategic benefit to fight a war on someone else's soil, especially if you are going to get paid to do it. its was a win-win for the US
If you don't think it's odd for Americans to say, "I'm from Indiana" and expect everyone to know it's in the United States, imagine meeting someone who says, "I'm from Maniema" and expects you to know what country it's in.
I get why that part was dismissed, she did make it sound like it had been established beforehand that the people were American. But I’ve been through several of those conversations and know the majority answer with the state name before ever it being clear they are Americans. And god help you if you’re chatting by text, they will send you the abbreviation of the state with no clue of what country they are from. (Well, the clue is usually two capital letters in answer to « where are you from » Americans are pretty much the only people to assume that is a normal response when getting to know people internationally)
When an American asked a Syrian friend who was Christian if they converted when they came to America. And my friend said no they were always Christian. Oh, your parents converted. The American asked "No" my friend replied "My family was always Christian" "Really, for how long?" he was asked "Two thousand years" he replied My friend asked me later if Americans didn't know what region Christianity originated. I could only reply "I think many of them assume it was in America"
I used to work at a big tourist place here in Germany. I'm a state-certified translator for English so I guess my command of English is pretty decent. An American couple (super friendly, really) asked me where I was from. I said "oh, I'm actually from around here, born and raised", the lady goes "But where did you learn to speak English so well?" I say "well they teach it at school here and later i studied at university" and she says "oh, i thought they'd teach German in schools here" And I've not figured out her thought process to this day. It's baffled me for 6 years so far.
I “think” I understand what she was thinking. We teach “English” courses in school which are grammar and writing centric. She was more than likely thinking along those lines instead of learning a foreign language which is generally taught in our high school systems.
@@thewhiskyscout1238 well, we have German classes, too, for grammar, writing, essays and so on... it still felt like she got something really wrong there It felt like she thought that maybe I didn't speak German, hehe
@@thewhiskyscout1238 The American woman asked where Budgies learned to speak English... which means learned as in a foreign language. So it does imply that when she went on to refer to teaching German she meant teaching it as another language rather than teaching grammar. A bit like the stories we hear about US tourists being amazed that dogs in Germany understand commands in German, as though all dogs are born understanding English but have to be taught another language. Actually the first time I went to Germany as an exchange student I do remember being asked, when I got back to the UK, if I had had any problems with the language. I replied that I didn't dare because there were all these small German children wandering around and they spoke German all the time so if a two-year-old could do it I didn't like to admit that I couldn't. Fortunately I'm British so everyone knew I was just poking fun at myself. 🙃
@@colinp2238 No, they teach English. They must, why else would so many Americans compliment Brits on their excellent English and ask, where they learned it....
When I was Turkey, we went to a local, traditional pottery craftsman and his shop. There were maybe ten of us, from multiple different countries, and the potter asked us where we came from. So everybody is answering, Canada, France, Germany, etc, until one american girl names her State. We all collectively rolled our eyes and the potter looked at her straight in the eyes and said ''American!'' I've travelled around the world, and Americans almost always answer with their States. Listen, I don't know your states and I don't care to learn them either, you are not the center of the world!
@@Finnec123 Acquiring knowledge is a good thing, of course; but the expectation many Americans have that people from other countries ought to know their states when said Americans could not hope to reciprocate that knowledge demonstrates a lack of awareness that is, frankly, bizarre. I've never met an Australian, Canadian or South African abroad who identifies by state/province, expecting people from other countries to know which country it's in!
@@Finnec123 Would an american know what I mean if I say I'm from Newfoundland or Yukon? Do americans know every single province/state of all European countries? Why should they expect the world to bow down to them?
I’m British. Visiting America I was asked “Do you have a 4th of July in England?” The only answer I could give was “No. we skip from the third of July to the fifth.”
HAAAAAAAA fkin belter good on ye , they probably didn't get the sarcastic joke tho. What part of Britain because Britain is an algimation of 4 separate individual countries Scotland northern Ireland Wales and England, me I'm British aye but I'm Scottish a scotsman from the country of Scotland
We heard an American lady in a shop in Cologne Germany say to her husband - there are so many foreigners around here, she was shocked when my wife pointed out that she was the foreigner - much to the amusement of a few other nationals near by...
And still she was correct... as tourists bringing money and people living in a country without learning the language properly and adhering to local customs are completely different.
While living in the US I was asked the question about what we (UK) did for Thanksgiving. I explained that while we didn’t celebrate it, we were nonetheless very grateful for the reasons behind it. The other memorable question I was asked was “In England, do you have black people?”. I explained that it was made illegal to be black in public in 1896 but that in these more enlightened times if you bought an annual licence you were allowed to be black. Saying these things deadpan produced thoughtful nods on both occasions.
We’re from Scotland. My teenage daughter was in Alabama she went into a school. The kids asked her so many dumb questions but one of the dumbest was - have you got TV in Scotland. Imagine their reaction when she said “Scotland invented television “ 😂
@willswomble7274 that's interesting on the ATM and PIN. New Zealand had that facility way before the UK...or at least I saw chip & PIN in NZ before I saw it here in the UK.
In the early days of internet chat (late 1990's), I often encountered incredible ignorance from Americans regarding Scotland. Many held the perception that the UK and England are the same thing, and Scotland is a hilly area in England. I was once asked whether we had seasons. I also know of a guy who was asked whether we had cars. No, we still get around on horseback. 🙄
Well, for Europeans, the thing is, when you ask someone "where are you from?" you are generally expected to say the country, not the state! Not everyone knows the American states, if you said something like, I dunno "I'm from Virginia" a few years ago to me, I'd literally not know where that was? as in, where *that country* is and god forbid an American says "I'm from Georgia" to a European, considering the *actual country of Georgia*
Yeah, literally every1 not American, not just Europeans, when asking "where are u from?" means which country! If we give a damn about their state/city, we will ask a follow-up. On the positive side, its a pretty good way to weed out, which Americans are worth ur time, with a few follow-up questions u can find out pretty quick, if theyre the clueless, selfabsorbed sort, that will sooner or later (usually sooner) stop being funny in their ignorance and selfcenteredness and become just plain insulting. In which case u might as well find a polite excuse and move on!
You might be shocked at how many Europeans think I mean the US state of Georgia when I tell them I live in Georgia (I actually live in Tbilisi). The crazy thing is, I meet them online, and I'm one or two hours away from them by time zone, and they STILL think Georgia in the United States.
@@theskintexpat-themightygreegor georgia isnt a country a lot of people are familiar with, not sure why but the only times i hear it mentioned is conversations like this or jokes about people with the same name as the country
we dont say "im european" we say "im german" or whatever. they should say their state. america is a continent spaning nation, so we should know from where on the continent they come from. ritgh now, we are dissrespecting their history, not accknowlaging the american states, as the nations they where meant to be ( thats americas fault for not maing them nations, but still)
@@eirikarnesen9691 ... Sigh, so... have you heard about Russia, Canada, and China? I wonder what states people say they are from in those countries, I wonder indeed... The point here is, America is "big" sure, but China is larger, and has way more people, but they still say they are from China, not any specific region
On my first trip to America, I was sitting with a group of friends from the UK in a conference. At the beginning of the session, everyone stood up, hand on heart and sang "oh say can you see... etc." We stopped speaking as a matter of respect, but stayed seated. After they finished singing, two ladies rounded on us and asked if we were some kind of communists for not pledging allegiance. We tried to explain that the USA was not our country and that we didn't even know the words. Eventually someone intervened and told them that they needed to start the session. They still didn't get it though.
@@annettewalter2273 Okay. And this makes you stand up WHENEVER somebody sings a national anthem, even if you don't understand the language, meaning or don't know the country?
@@annettewalter2273 Diffrence is: People from other countries doesnt care about the national anthem nearly as much usa care about thiers... I dont even know the words nor do i remember the last time i heard it (not even on our national day)
A few years ago I was hired by an American guy (I'm in Australia) as a camera operator, to help him do a vlog" expose" about how rude Australians are. We tend to call it like we see it. I followed the guy around, filming. He would do things like hire a convertible, race through school zones (where the speed limit is 40km/hr when children are arriving or leaving) at 180km/hr, calling random people fat, stupid etc, cussing out homeless people, all sorts of things. He had no clue that when people called him a d*ckhead they were reacting to his bad attitude. He thought that since he came from America, the greatest country in the world, that the world owed him respect. Dear reader, he did not get any.
For the woman who thought it was selfish to be told Indiana and not the United States, I think what she means is it's selfish to assume by mentioning a state, people outside the US are automatically going to know the states of the US and therefore know the person who said Indiana, is from the US. Whereas how many people in the US would know the different states or provinces of other countries. For example, if someone said they were from Noord-Brabant instead of just saying, I'm from the Netherlands : D
As someone from northern England, i used to deal with a lot of post from people in London area in southern England. It forever made me think how arrogant they were because they would nearly always provide minimum addresses that consisted of just a street name like 'bridge street' and part of the postal sector like 'N2' . They just assumed we'd know where that was because it was London. Sure enough we did, because no one else in the country would be that lazy or arrogant to assume their address was that unique.
I am born and bred English, I can trace my family back at least 400 years and when I have visited America I have often been asked where I am from. I of course said I was from England and I have been accused of lying on multiple occasions because I didn't sound English (many Americans seem to think we sound posh like Stephen Fry or have a thick cockney accent like Danny Dyer). I have showed my passport on many occasions and been told again I'm a liar because my passport says "United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland". I have even had several girls accuse me of putting on a bad English accent to pick them up! I must say this was mostly in the big cities, the more rural areas were polite and in my experience didn't live up to the stereotype of of being full of ignorant people. The south of the country was especially polite.
I've noticed 5he same thing too as truck, or I guess lorry for you, driver. The coasts are the worst, and the more you go towards the center of the country the people are nicer and things, generally are better. The south is also nice , in stark contrast to the stereotype, and the southwest is truly unique. Long story short, if you wish to see the remnants of what America used to be avoid the coasts and most of the major cities.
Not an American, but when I studied in Japan(I’m Norwegian), my Russian friend came to me after 3 months of university and asked me to teach her world history because she noticed she had been taught a very bias worldview. I respect her to this day.
I second that. History class in Russia (both 'Russian History' and 'World's History') is very saturated with information, that in fact, people are given so much of it, that they can't see a bit of lies and bias here and there. But, I feel like this problem is very common in a lot of countries. I graduated school in Ukraine and had the same problem with history there. I know so much about history of France and UK, but can't trust half of the history of my own country. It's bizzare...
50-70% of Russian History curriculum is USSR curriculum. What I remember distinctly is that studying history you became proud of Empire, USSR and RF, despite them being very very different. (Empire was good, but then revolution happened civil var killed a lot of people, bolsheviks won and that was good)
From one American to all the Americans traveling abroad, stop looking for the American flag in other countries and stop carrying the attitude of American superiority with you everywhere you go. The rest of the world does not have to bend a knee to America or you. The secondhand embarrassment I've felt from hearing stories of other Americans acting up in other countries, behaving like entitled trash just makes me so disappointed in my fellow countrymen. Our education system is partly to blame for the ignorance, we only learn one way and it's the way our government approves of and social media like tik tok has only been making the population here dumber and more irrational than they were just ten short years ago.
My two favourite anecdotes were when my friend went to the states for the first time. A woman asked him if Australia has American dollars for currency. My most favourite one of all was when I was travelling in former Yugoslavia and a couple of people from the states behind me on the bus said “do you know why it’s so beautiful here? They’ve never had any wars here“ the funniest shit I’ve ever heard
"No wars here". LMAO. The wars kinda shaped the modern balkans, and it goes back a millenia. My grandfather was even stationed as a national guardsman just prior to WW2 there.
I once was in a group chat where some girl posted "Is there really such a place as Nigeria? That sounds racist." I replied, gee if only there was some way to find that out if it is a real place. Like some amazing system you could type in "Nigeria" and see what happens. That would be awesome. Why doesnt someone invent such a magical system. Silence after that.
I remember seeing an interview with a college student whose college was hosting the World Double Dutch championship . She was hugely excited and told the interviewer how proud they were and what an honour it was to be hosting this event !!. After all , she said , " These are the WORLD Championships and we have teams here today from as far away as Ohio " . I kid you not . I was SO dumbstruck it is still clear in my mind after almost 40 years .
The best one I have heard is when an American found out that Germany were 6 hours ahead of New York Time wise. The American said and I quote "Why didn't Germany tell us that 9/11 was gonna happen if they are 6 hours ahead of us. All I can say is WOW
I had a summer job working in a hotel in Germany back in the 80's. An American guest complimented me on my English, I smiled and said that I was from the U.K. just working at the hotel for the summer. They replied that not withstanding, my English was very good, almost fluent!
My dad was American, mum was British. After retiring they moved to England. Once when visiting the Potteries my parents were mixed in with a group of Americans going through the Wedgwood factory tour. My dad was so appalled at their behaviour that he wouldn't speak in their presence! He didn't want to be associated with them!
What's your point? That Americans can be badly behaved? Apart from the fact that that's not what this video is about, have you ever seen the behavior of Brits abroad?
@@mikelheron20 Americans definitely take the cake for being the most arrogant and worst behaved when they go overseas. Not all of them but a very high majority.
As a Brit (Scottish), something that really annoys me is websites that only offer the translation option "US English". If you don't want to offer 'UK' or 'British' English, fine but at least give us the option of 'Proper English' with the correct spelling and grammar. Just saying 🤣
Years ago, a friend of mine had the opportunity to go on a Student Teacher Exchange to America. She told me, on the wall of her classroom hung a huge map, showing America in all her glory. Above the map, in beautiful cursive writing it said ... Map of the World :)
It was a bit arrogant for them to assume that someone would know they were American just from talking to them. Most Americans can't tell the difference between a US and a Canadian accent. They usually can't even tell the difference between a British and Australian accent, which is far easier - or recognise anything other than RP as being British at all. What makes you think that someone who doesn't even have English as a first language (and that girl, whilst able to make herself understood, clearly did not speak English fluently - let alone as a first language) would be able to identify accents? Your American arrogance was showing there. If a foreigner, whist in a foreign country, asks where you're from they mean WHAT COUNTRY. If they already know you're American then they'll say 'where in America are you from'.
Thought the same. If I meet someone in let's say Italy and they asked where I was from I wouldn't answer with North Rhine-Westphalia, which is the German state I currently live in. I would simply answer Germany as that is someone a lot more people know and allows one to askfor more precise Info without having to feel stupid because they just might not know the state you named. Hell I knew Washington DC was a city but it was only called Washington in school and I was super confused when I first heard someone talk about the state of Washington. I was like "wait you have a whole state as your capital?" yeah not my brightest moment sure but I was like 12 or so and US geography was not something I was taught at that age, it came a few years later... You shouldn't just assume that everyone knows the States of your country even IF they can recognise you are from a certain country.
@@iriscollins7583 as someone born and raised in germany who never even visited america I can't answer your question. Maybe ask any American in the comments ;)
Most Americans cant even hear the difference between German and Dutch ... That girl you talk about could tone down a little bit of the sass she is having there, eventhough im European, Belgian, it's a common thing world wide to say where you from in the form of country or state ( in case of America that is ) Imagin us saying " yeah im from europe " well woopty fucking do, there is 44 countries in Europe, go figure out wich one im from ... no, i say " yeah im from Belgium " there, easy and normal. Same goes for America, yeah 50 states, enjoy figuring out where im from ... The only " easy " english accents over here that you can recognise is due to films and shit, you got the posh british accent, the thick german accent, the singing italian accent, good luck figuring out if someone is from Belgium or The Netherlands when both speak the same language but different accent/dialects. She KNEW they were American, go figure why it's a common thing to say which state they were from when asked.
Most Americans will be more accustomed to traveling within their own country since it is so massive and so isolated geographically from other countries. To give them the benefit of the doubt, it might just be a force of habit. There are also lots of people who would be offended that the word "American" is being used in the context of a nationality to begin with. If I say my state, many foreigners would go "how dare you!" and if I said my nationality in English, many foreigners would also say "how dare you!" (I would usually ask them what they mean, but sometimes I just say "New York" out of habit. I haven't come across anyone internationally who is offended by this answer, but they could just be seething with rage on the inside and not letting their deep-seated hatred for my countrymen show) To be honest, it's quite tiring, which is counterproductive to traveling while on vacation. I am an American of Chinese descent. I already get some hate inside my country, I'd rather not get hate outside of it, too.
Back in the 80s, my wife and I from Australia visited Hawaii and met a lovely US couple from one of the southern states. We were gobsmacked when they said that we spoke "real good American" as they thought Australians spoke French!
I know someone who’s first job was guiding tourists around Lincoln Cathedral in England. She was asked by an American visitor if Lincoln Cathedral was named after Abraham Lincoln😂
I'm English and have visited the US. I found it hilarious when my American friend was irritated one day by Mexicans speaking Spanish. She said "why can't they speak American instead of Mexican?" Lol. I just smiled.
I was on a Mediterranean cruise and the first stop was in Italy. We were having a meal in a restaurant when an argument broke out. It was an American couple complaining to the owners that they didn't take Dollars in payment!! It was funny watching everyone in the restaurant pissing themselves laughing apart from the two Americans.
My 1st time in Rome i got my Coloseum tour's ticket refunded cause an American went on a loooooong rant against the guide for saying how old the Coloseum was and he would not drop it. Acording to him nothing could be older than some town (i dont remember the name) in the US.
@@VRDejaVu - oh gawd...LOL! I wish I could have been there! I could have completely broken his entire world view in only a few mins, lol! Where did he think Americans came from TO BEGIN WITH??? Or did they just spring magically into being one day? :P That must have been a double face palm moment :P
Some years ago an American girl who was working in the company i was contracting at asked me - "Don't you think that you foreigners have been in Britain long enough?". To say that this was an AMAZINGLY stupid and racist question was an understatement, but, i played along. I replied - "What exactly do you mean, by long enough". Feeling confident she got into her stride - "Well, from what I've read you foreigners have be n here since the 1950s". I smiled as i was about to give her a 'wog' history lesson and it went thus - (1) Asians and Africans were trading with Britain many centuries before the Romans invaded Britain in 126AD. (2) Asians and Blacks settled in Britain long before the Romans invaded - Emperor Hadrians chronicler wrote - "There are Asiatic and African people who have settled in this land as traders". (3) In the Domesday Book the Mayor of Yorkshire is named Bhutt and his racial origin is stated as Indian and the Domesday Book was compiled in 1085. When you add Hadrians Chroniclers details and the Domesday Book then Asians and Blacks have been over here for over 2000 years. (4) You so-called Americans have only been in America for 350 years and you've accounted for the extermination of 25m Native Americans - the Asians and Blacks of Britain have been here for over 2000 years and in ALL that time we haven't exterminated ANYONE!!. We may have played a lot of cricket and opened many Curry Houses in the 2000 plus years we've been here, but, we DEFINITELY haven't exterminated ANYONE!!. For some strange reason she went quiet and got on with her work - it's nice to teach an idiot the facts.
Years ago I was playing world of warcraft with friends, also english, we needed an extra player for a raid. The guy who we invited turned out to be American, he joined our chat server and was asking where we are from, naturally we all answered England, what followed was this guy ranting about how much he hates England because we stole all of our cities names from America and gave the example of new york. At that point we gave him a history lesson, informing him that most cities in England are older than America. He wasn't very happy about that and ended up rage quitting. On another note, even in primary school between ages of 4-11 I was learning about the ancient Egyptians, Romans and Greeks. It baffles me that the US don't teach much apart from American history.
Not enough time to tell him then where the "new" came from in New York/New Amsterdam, New Jersey or New Brunswick (the city, not the Canadian province …) I've heard in one video about some american not knowing where New Mexico belongs to.
@@Cau_No I live in a city called Lancaster - in the UK... it baffles a lot of people in the US that the bridge I walk across into town is only 1 year younger than when the US was first recognised as a country (and the castle is a few centuries older than that... and the roman ruins are a good 1.5k years older). Still I think the US has 5 places called Lancaster? Can't hold a candle to the original :)
@@warailawildrunner5300 Yeah, when people visit my hometown, I like to show them the oldest street we have, next to the station chapel. It was laid out by the Romans. That city is Cologne, about 2K years old, not counting the earlier germanic villages of that area we have relics of in the musem right next to that street. And with 'station chapel' I mean the Cathedral that is next to the main station and that museum. There's also an old Roman gate in front of it, that is, what's left of it. The whole city centre is full of Roman artifacts. And then I went visiting a site in Ireland once that is double that old - Newgrange.
@@Cau_No have walked along that road in Köln, looks like a very nice city to live lots of history everywhere. Unfortunately only had the chance to look around for a day, but took a fair amount of photos of the place, the outside of the cathedral is impressive but no offence the inside of trier cathedral was better than inside Köln. Got the day courtesy of ryanair for cancelling our flight and the next flight being the morning after so they put us in the maritim hotel which was rather nice of them.
English is definitely the most spoken language in the world. It does not have the most native speakers, but that is a different question - it is still the most widely spoken. Around 1.13 billion with Mandarin very close at around 1.11 billion. Spanish is 0.53 billion.
I love the story about the one who did not want to be among foreigners when traveling outside the US, and the young lady's "advice" back to go to Florida. As for the immigration thing... when I was younger I spent a month in California and Arizona. I loved the trip, but I had one embarrassing moment, when I realized that an otherwise nice couple from LA, had in their mind (I don't know why) the idea that I was interested in staying there, even offered to help me find a job, and I had to make it clear that I was in the US as a tourist only, and that I didn't have the slightest intention to immigrate. Sorry, we Euuropeans usually are perfectly happy on our side of the ocean, even if we like visiting other parts of the world.
Another funny thing to consider with the 'don't want to be around foreigners' is that they themselves would be the foreigner. So I guess have them in a nice rural area full of locals where the other foreign tourists don't go. ;)
The last time I was in LA, I was in the company American and Canadian citizens who had permanently moved to my country, and they had it easy convincing other rich Americans to buy properties and move there too... The possibility that my boyfriend and I might be interested in moving to the US wasn't even mentioned: it was the opposite way around. And we were staying in a huge mansion in Beverly Hills... LOL
I was sitting at a poker table in Vegas. To my left two guys where having a conversation. After a while an American across the table asked "What language are you guys speaking". "English?" they said. The American looked puzzled and asked "but what country are you from?". I really had to focus hard not to start laughing, the guys looked at him in total confusion before saying "err England".
I was in Salina Oklahoma visiting my Mum and a teenager in the store serving me heard our accents and asked "can you guys understand us?" I replied "yes, im from England and we invented English so I speak it just like you do." she didn't understand the point I was making hahaha. 😂
Haha, I visited the US a few years ago when I was still a teenager, and I remember the trauma of trying to order a glass of water. Ended up having to use "h20". We're definitely divided by our common language :p
Thats really funny tho, becuase im from Sweden and they never asked why i was so good at english. They allways asked where im from first because of accent ofc. I wonder why it happens to UK and Australians so much but not to Nordic people. Hahahahaha
There're two videos here that I want to touch on: 1) "I'm educated now" and then proceeds to claim that "we rescued Europe in WW2" (the he.. you did!) 2) The couple who was asked where they're from and answering with the state rather than country. That's like me, a European, going to Australia, answering that I'm from Jutland and expecting them to know in which specific country this is a region. 🤦♀️ The common thread in these two statements is arrogance. The suggestion of the US as the almighty savior and the assumption that everyone knows the location of different parts of a country that isn't theirs, that's what is giving *US citizens* the reputation of being arrogant (and the use of "America" and "American" about a specific nationality when that litterally applies to every other country in the American continents as well). Through my work with Red Cross Youth I've met people from India, Nepal, Zambia, South Africa, Iran, USA, Mexico, Brazil and many more and I can honestly say that only the ones from the US displayed this kind of "superiority" so I'm saying this based on personal experience as opposed to just prejudice. 🤷♀️
This thing about Americans saying their state for the question "where are you from" is a real weird thing, and even though, Eclectic Beard, you are clearly a very smart guy, this is a normalized part of who you are because after all you're American. That's why you might not agree or empathize much with the criticism. The problem is everybody knows that when one is abroad and someone asks where they're from, they mean to ask the country. Everybody answers from which country they come from. Americans are the only ones who say their state. And that is exactly where the trick is. Americans are so used to the idea that they are the best country, that everybody knows their History and of its greatness, that they comand the world, and all this ideas make them feel comfortable about being more specif than only saying the country. it's like, "of course I'm an American, everybody knows that! Look at me! if someone asks where I'm from they must be asking where I'm from IN America", as if America was the world. I'm not saying that everybody who does that thinks like that. But many people end up internalizing these social cultural behaviors.
I was part of one of the biggest online worlds some years ago and we had several Americans in the group i was in. Often i had to listen to how USA invented everything. I had to one day tell a man in his 30´s, that Americans did not invent the car and the train and he literally broke down and had to take a few days break before he came back...When he did come back he told me he could not believe it at the time, and had to look it up to make sure i did not mess around with him. Points i guess for him to look it up afterwards..You should have seen/heard him later on when he also realized how young America is compared to the rest of the world....it was both kind of funny and sad at the same time and that´s usually how many conversations have gone...
@@JH-fv1gq lol i should have, but his breakdown and shock was quite real which in a way was a bit shocking for me at the time...but i guess it´s all down to how people are tought...
@@JH-fv1gq America invented the internet. A Brit invented the address system to easily access it and even then it was an accidental byproduct of connecting colleagues in the Large Hadron Collider project at CERN
@@0utcastAussie But he came up with WWW, enabling the use of the internet. He could have patented it, but didn't, gave it to the World for free. Edison must have been crying, wherever he was. Sir, Berners-Lee, by the way.British.
I want to share a small story to this topic, which I found very funny (and sad): A met a guy a couple of years before, who lived in the US his whole life. His mother was german and he never got american citizenship. He married, got kids, got divorced and went bankrupt. He tried to rob a gas station, got caught and sentenced to 8 years in prison. After seven years he came out and the Obama- Administration set up a law during that time, that immigrants, which got criminal had to be deported to their home country. The day, he got out, he got deported to germany and his german mother in her late 80s followed him and he had to start a new life in Germany and is still here. Now the funny part: One day his kids visited him and were dumbstruck, when they realised that almost every church and many building were far older than the United States. He told afterwards that they couldnt wrap their head around this for whole time they were on visit and felt kind of intimidated of almost every piece of german history they learned during their time there. :)
I was in Atlanta, Georgia visiting my friend when she said she would take me down Governors Road as there were some really old house there, I am a UK citizen. I expect the paint is still wet on the Governors house.
I may have made this comment before, but your European style education has equipped you with a curiosity and desire to keep learning. Education should not be about testing and forgetting, rather learning how to learn (it should be regarded as a life skill). You are a credit to yourself, your parents and your country. Keep up the good work.
@@silviamunoz6863 apologies. Have been watching too much U.S.based content and fell into the USA=America trap. I am normally so pedantic on such matters. I need to take a break, perhaps. Thank you for pulling me up on this.
@bubba842 What a pity. No curiosity leads to ignorance. Ignorance makes people easy to believe in every lie diffused to control them. Like the well-known "country of freedom" 😅
I lived in Kentucky for nearly a year when I was a teenager, my first day at school and one of the teachers asked me where I was from, I said the UK...I shit you not the guy asked me "oh...would you like to tell everyone how to say hello in English". Also, with reference to the bit in the vid about being told the location inside the US when being asked where you are from. How confused would an American get when I told them I was from Norfolk rather than the UK? there are a lot of places in the US that are named after places in other countries so it could get a little confusing for you guys.
LOL, some friends of mine live in Norfolk and once said that to an American online, who thought they meant Norfolk, Virginia and promptly fired endless questions at them about the US Naval base about which they knew absolutely nothing and he began to get quite irate at what he thought was deliberate BS on their part. At this point, I jumped into the conversation and said that my nephew was stationed at one of the Strategic NATO bases in Norfolk and the American began to calm down... until I said that my nephew was in the Royal Navy and was seconded there to teach the US Navy about some specialist topics. That naturally made him go ballistic as he was the sort of American who believes that no one else can teach them anything. We never got round to telling him that Norfolk, Va, takes its name from Norfolk, UK... the top of his skull might have blown off.
I live in a town called Hillsdale. In my travels as a truck driver I've encountered several different cities, all in different states, with the same name and spelling. The fact that some, not all, but some Americans just assume you know exactly what they're referring to is mind blowing .
I know there's a Richmond in Virginia, I know there's also one in the UK, but I was born in one of the three, yes three, Richmond's in Australia - Tasmania, New South Wales and Victoria all have places named Richmond. And I'm aware there's a Victoria in Canada, New South Wales is clearly derivative. If you're travelling outside of your own country and you're asked where you're from the questioner wants your country.
Oh come on, he was being sarcastic - pointing out how he used to think! Like our history ended when the US was founded and then the next thing he heard about European history was how they 'saved our asses' in WWII. Many Americans still think that and he's clearly pointing out how ignorant it was 😳😅 come on man.
@@iemand2612 It's always funny when people completely fail to understand something and then make out like someone else is stupid lol and at least 27 other people also didn't understand and liked his comment 😅🤦♀️
When I go overseas, I don't go telling everyone I'm from New South Wales, unless I want them to get confused as to why I have an Aussie accent instead of a Welsh accent😅
I went to school in Japan at a military base, public school in America, boarding school, and a Christian private school. The best education I received was boarding school. It had a self study program. I still had to learn the basics of what all American school requires, but I was able to go beyond that and choose what I learned. I learned American history, but I got to learn world history in depth. I loved it. When I went to private school, no one knew who Nelson Mendela was or what the apartheid was when I mentioned it in cards against humanity. It was a card I played. I was born in the 90's.
Yeah I used to work in a call center years ago. Ended up telling a customer to "Fuck right off, you absolute bellend". In my defense he was an absolute bellend. Surprisingly I didn't get fired but I left shortly afterwards because, as you can probably guess, I am not built for customer service.
For a short time, a long time ago, I worked in a call center and our client was a big U.S cell phone provider. This chick called in because she explicitly refused insurance on her new phone and 3 months later she dropped it in a lake. She wanted an immediate replacement... of the next generation of Iphone, with more storage to make up for her "trauma". I stayed on the phone with her for 3 hours (and didn't get to take my break or lunch). She let out a sob and said "You don't know how it feels to see your entire life sink to the bottom of a lake" So I let out a sob and said "My entire family drowned in a boating accident. I was the only survivor". It wasn't true, but it got her to hang up immediately. I didn't even get a goodbye!
Hello Ben, I'm another call centre veteran, used to work for the national rail information service, boy did we get some real pearlers, and not all were American. I remember speaking to an American lady who explained she was only in london for 24 hours, and could I recommend anywhere interesting to visit, I directed her to Hampton Court Palace. One of my colleagues had an irate american who was not happy that it took so long to travel to Ireland via Holyhead, they were even less impressed when told there were no direct services, and they needed to change at Holyhead, to which she replied what happens when I get to Holyhead. My colleague had a black belt in sarcasm, and he replied, well you run out of land at Holyhead, and if you don't change you'll get wet feet.
@@firstsurname7099 Sorry. I worked for another U.S employer for a decade and old habits die hard. For about the first year I was sending cheques out to Americans, and now I've spent the last year sending checks to Canadians.
It is actually really common for American to answer their states instead of their country when they are aboard. I live in Thailand and we do notice that a lot of American do not response that they are from the America or US but rather the state. It like people from Japan went to the US and said we are from Sendai.
I've been asked what they do in England on the 4th July. They looked confused when I said "go to work." Same for Thanksgiving. Then it was "so do they celebrate Christmas in England?" Lol
In the second clip, usually the opposite is true. Usually website translations have the USA flag for English. Brazilian flag for Portuguese, and Mexican flag for Spanish are also used but less common. Annoys the hell out of everyone in UK/Portugal/Spain.
During the Costa Rica one, I was thinking, "You don't have to worry about being around foreigners, because when you're in Costa Rica, you'll be the foreigner." Also I loved taking AP European History in high school. That's where I learned my favorite word in the English language: defenestration.
@@melissacourchesne2121 fenetre is French. Defenestration is English. Try using the word in France, like the word encore at the end of a concert, not used in France.
@@handlesarefeckinstupid Encore is used in France, not in that specific way anymore. Défenestration is absolutely used, just not in your everyday conversation, unless you work at Carglass.
I wish it was compulsory in schools that they had to watch David Attenborough. At least they'd see that there's not only a different world out there but amazing animals and birds and sea creatures too. It would, at least, be a start.
In my own view, David Attenborough paired with Carl Sagan's Cosmos series. I'm pretty sure there was a healthy respect between the two for the other's work.
@@liamfitzgerald7217 Ha ha! Well, I'm pretty sure a degree of respect between scientific specialists would be there! An entertaining transferral of smart comments anyway.
I met a US marine in Helsinki a few years back, he was on shore leave. He told me in no uncertain terms that the US would crush Finland in a war. (Great to know buddy, you’re the best) No idea why he said it but there you go 😅😅😅 He proceeded to insult my Kenyan friend but that’s a separate story…
As an African, it often amazes me that most Americans think that Africa is one country. Africa is a huge continent with over 50 countries! That level of ignorance is appalling, which makes me wonder what they actually teach in American schools because by age 7, I already knew all the countries in the world along with their capital cities. Then the most annoying one is most of the time when you speak to Americans the first thing they say is, "Oh your English is so good" Then I tell them, "But, we also speak english in our country." I think the average American mind can't fathom the fact that English is spoken in other countries outside America or the fact that the average African speaks more than 2 or 3 languages fluently.
On the subject of English…English and American…English. In a Hotel Lobby in Prague my mum and I encountered a group of septics blocking the way to the lift and stairs. The group was babbling away in American English….catching on to this I spoke in a load voice using English English “ excuse me please… we’d like to get to the lift please …thank you “ the group look at me in a slightly disconcerting way but did not move, I repeated the request but alas…no go! Loosing my Savoir-fair just a little I said “thank you!!! just so you can stay standing here like a colony of Emperor penguins… we’ll go outside, round the back and use the fire escape to get to our rooms “ the Czech receptionist got their tour guide to move them outside thus preventing an international incident. Love from UK(no need to mention I live in Suffolk…..me thinks…)
I am quite liking these videos, brings back memories. I use to work in England for a US Air Force base about ten years back. I remember one time a plane came in and we had to go out and retrieve one of the crew to come back in and sign some paperwork. When I managed to find one, they refused to get off the plane because they thought there was a realistic risk of them catching small pox. I had to stand on a plane and explain to this young American that the UN world health organisation did a global vaccine in the 1970s and by 1980 it became officially extinct. She kind of just gave this embarrassed giggle.
@@MrDunkycraig I was at Lakenheath from 1984 to 1987. When I was outprocessing to leave, the guy behind me in line asked where I was going next. I told him Cannon, AFB, New Mexico. He responded with, "Oh... a consecutive overseas tour, huh?" I'm originally from Ohio, and even I knew that NM was between Texas and Arizona.
When you ask someone where they are from, in an international setting, they answer with the country, because that's what the question is referring to. The only people who don't say which country they are from (and this is from personal experience, having lived in over 5 different countries and having met so many different people from all over) are: 1. People that were born in capital cities. 2. People from the USA, who will usually say "city, State". Not everyone in the world knows the states of another completely different country, from the other side of the world. People tend to know because they are educated, but people from the USA aren't able to do the same for them... Once, a guy from the USA answered this question with Georgia. We literally didn't bat an eye. We thought he was from Georgia, the country. After all, everybody HAD ANSWERED with their countries. In most international working spaces people can have very good English, so his accent wasn't even considered odd. It was only after he called a Polish person a Scandinavian that we heard alarm bells ringing in our heads and asked him "Wait, you're not Georgian, you're from the US?" to which the guy insisted he was from Georgia... The state.
I remember I was on holiday in Florida with my family and when on a boat trip the guide asked each person where they came from and every one before me were from the USA when I spoke I said from Jersey, his immediate reply was” you don’t sound like you come from Jersey” and dismissed anything else I had to say not giving me the opportunity to say Jersey in the Channel Islands UK.
The one that always makes me giggle is when US Tech people call imperial measurements 'Freedom Units'. I mean they’re literally a remnant from your former colonial history, that even your former Colonial rulers have abandoned 🤦
I’m English and was with an English friend in Vegas. We were in an elevator talking and a girl asked us what language we were just talking to each other. We just looked at each other and started laughing. We have strong accents and when we talk at a regular speed to each other, Americans find it difficult to understand us so I do kind of understand why she asked.
I'm from the UK. My boyfriend's mum is American; his dad is British. They've lived here for several decades, and my boyf and his brother were born here. About 6 months into our currently 5 year relationship, my boyfriend said that when I meet his American fam, I will have to slow down my very fast speech with the majority of them. Also, I'll have to rein in my very, very, very sarcastic sense of humour because only about 20% of them will understand it (those that naturally have that sense of humour and those that have travelled abroad).
^ I've got a little place in spain, nice quiet place nearish the coast, about 30min walk to the beaches. The atmosphere in Spain is on another level, its relaxing an chill, the idea of, work to live not live to work. I'm heading back out there for another three weeks to do some work on the house an I love our neighbours, they've been teaching me how to speak spanish, since she's a teacher in the local high school. I'd much rather live in Spain than in the US, one, the people actually give a crap about their area and two.. it costs like nothing to live out there. My bills in total are like 240 Euro's.. WTF! I can go out to eat every day at nice places and spend barely 10 euro's for a really nice meal. Then you have the bulveard, I've gotten lost like a dozen times in that place. This is Alicante, though our place is further away from the touresty areas an in the more spanish areas. Why would someone from spain wanna green card for the US? when living in the US is beyond expensive compared to Spain.
Given the fact that the spanish passport is the third powerfull in the world giving you visa free access to 190 countries while the us passport is number 7 with 186 counties. (Although those 4 countries are properbly countries you dont want to visit anyway 😂)
Not to mention the amount of people that asked me some of the most stupid questions about the UK and EU when I last went to the US. I legit had a woman ask me how I became so fluent in English.. and I had previously told her I come from England. Her fiancé was facepalming.. Then he faired no better saying dear, they were tribes 300 years ago. I froze up in abject astonishment. How could I meet two of the typical stereotypical sorts? They didn't even know where the UK was. I've also had an American think the UK was a tropical island.. that made me depressed, I friggen wish.
The problem with just giving your state, is that they may NOT realize you're from the United States. It would be the equivalent of someone from the UK saying they were from Essex. Say Indiana, USA and they for certain won't be confused. People also get confused because America names places things like Columbia, which is another country's name or famous cities like Athens, Rome and Paris, so it's not unreasonable for them to ask us to say we're from America, because we would prefer for them to name their Country.
If not 'selfish' it's at least weird. Ask a Russian where he's from, he'll immediately say Russia. He won't give out city or town names like Ufa, Perm, Samara or Krasnodar and expect you to get from those that he's from Russia. Same thing with Germans, Czechs, Australians etc.
When travelling overseas, if anyone is asked where they are from, you have to understand that every single person is going to say Australia, or France, or Italy, or Sweden. No one is going to say Broken Hill, or Bordeaux, or Stockholm etc. Only Americans skip over “America” and narrow it down to a state, or even a city. It’s the same in Facebook groups etc. Someone might post a “Where are we all from?” Question, and every single person is go*ng to name a country, or maybe a city “and” a country, but 90% os Americans will just put “IL”, or”AZ”, or “DE”, or “HI” etc. They have absolutely no understanding that nobody outside the US has a single clue what the US state abbreviations are. They just expect that everyone around the entire globe instinctively knows them all. The fact that you, as an American, don’t understand this just proves her point.
I think it's kind of logical. If they just said USA We would be asking 'wich state'. If they aks us where we're from and we just said Europe, Afrika, ect. They would want you to narrow that down. At least to the country.
@@ilonkagootjes858 Did you read your own comment? USA is a Nation, but Europe and Africa are Conintens. If someone said he came from North America. I would like to know if from Mexico, USA or Canada. But if you told me already the Nation you are from? Why would i ask for the state or City with a Citizen from the USA but not from for example Canada?
@@eduardmierau2733 exactly.. I remember when I was like 12-13 and someone online told me they were from Georgia and I asked if they meant in Europe or The USA. They had no clue what I was talking about. Fair enough I guess, but yeah we don’t know all the abbrevations or even for the cities in the US. Please write the full state name or just write The US. I would never write the name of my city if I were to write which country Im from. I don’t think it’s selfish to give more context by writing the state, but just dont assume all of the world know your exact location by abbrevations. If I were to write country «NO», I don’t think everyone would have gotten the abrevation.
@@davidking9222 Australia IS a continent, and we don’t say we are from Adelaide. We say Australia, just like the entire rest of the world states a country.
I had an American ask me if we could play some baseball or basketball instead of "soccer" in the bar I was working in. This was in France, during Euro 2016, the nerves on that guy haha, the Irish lads watching the match gave him a lot of shit for it.
I live in England, Lancashire to be exact, and in my humble opinion the best county (better than those Yorkshire wankers anyway). I majorly digress, I used to travel every year (since 1987) to the US to visit my family. As I got older, into my teens, I realised how little my cousins knew or understood about the rest of the world. As in they knew next to nothing. They were ignorant about basic global geography, international history, geopolitics, different cultures and religions etc the basics just weren't there. It still boggles my mind that the focus of the US education system is just on the US, to the exclusion of the rest of the world. Hell, even when global history is covered, it's only about what the US did to "save" everyone; which is factually wrong and just pure self-serving propaganda.
We're not Yorkshire wankers ya southern fairy lol. But I can understand what your saying as I have family in America too. A few friends who play destiny as well. I think the problem is the vast majority don't care about anything not of the U. S. A. There own government are ruining them.
This is a result of needing to delude themselves about the basic foundation of their country. It was built on genocide and slavery, but that would make them face some uncomfortable truths so they whitewash everything. Hell up until the last few decades history books in the south made out the blacks we're grateful to their "masters" for giving them work, feeding and housing them. And now as America is regressing back to to golden age of the 50's they want to replace the word slavery with the phrase "forced relocation" 🤦
I am a gamer in europe and I play a lot of games with people all over the world. It is. .so odd to me how often Americans gets shocked it is not "american time" in other places in the world. They happily want me to START to game with them 5 am my time. Tell them what time it would be for me they are always surprised! (they still somehow. .want me to do it at 5 am.. takes about 3 hours for them to forget it, like a slow goldfish!. And so it repeats. .lol. Ask them to start anything 5 am their time and they faint! It is like they don't really believe it is five am here.
You wouldn't believe how many get confused, or simply don't believe me when I tell them it's Saturday and Winter in Australia when it's Friday in the Summer in the US!
Just because I'm boring and I want to kill your comparison, the memory of a goldfish is pretty good, lasting for at least a couple of weeks. So we can turn it around and say that your friends have *worse* memories than goldfish!
I found it even more surprising than the OP here - I ran an Everquest 1 international guild and found that the only people who wouldn't automatically reference time zones were the Americans despite them being the only people in the guild whose country has 4 mainland time zones - so you'd assume they are used to this. When I pointed this out to one of them he argued they only had three time zones. He'd forgotten mountain time even existed.
I've worked in a Call Center and I grew up in a City located right by the border we are basically separated by a Bridge so I have a lot of stories. The things I've heard Americans say about Mexicans or the rest of the world it astonishes me. For example, I answered a call in English and this person automatically said "I don't speak taco", once in a US Website I was trying to locate México on their map and it was under SOUTH AMERICA! , also one guy once asked me if we had Google/RU-vid or AC over here. And when trying to arrange a meeting this pero said "I don't want to get in trouble with the Police if you cross the border" I asked what does that mean? And answered "well, do you have papers?" 😒🙄.... Hahaha the idea that we are all after the green card and we are undocumented hahaha
Haha, I'm from the UK (England), and was dating an American. One if the first things one if her friends said, was I after a green card. As if we're a third world country and that everyone wants to move to the US.
The whole "I'm from Indiana" thing. Think of it this way. If I told you I'm from Pohjois-Savo. Would you know what country I'm from? That would be the equivalent of someone telling the state they are from to someone that has no idea about US geography. They just presume that we all know the states. I personally understand that you are from US if you say the state, but I couldn't list all 50 from the top of my head. Some people have no idea what the state names are
I could name a fair few, but would a Yank be able to name the 17 autonomous regions of Spain? The counties of England? Of course not. Most of them don't even understand that Scotland and Wales are countries in their own right. My father once got asked in Edinburgh 'Dude, what is that Blue flag we keep seeing everywhere?' Imagine if I went to America and asked 'What is that stripey thing with the stars on it?' So it is arrogance.
@@hogwashmcturnip8930 I'm wondering how many Americans could name _any_ of the States and Territories of Australia or the Provinces of South Africa or Canada? If I introduce myself to a Yank as being from Victoria, how many would even have a clue which hemisphere to look for it in?
I was in the British army and based at a joint site with US marines I won a ten pound bet (10 dollars) that England had once controlled over 50% of the world. I showed him the small islands in the pacific with little Union Jacks flags next to them. It was only a officer from West Point in the officers mess pointed out I was telling the truth. Made my day 😂😂
@@TheAmericanCatholic actually it was 60% check out videos on you tube. And also nuked America twice on two separate occasion when it was put to the test back in the sixties but was kept a secret by America.
Some years ago, I worked in a travel agency, and had many lovely U. S., Australian, Asian clients,and then the US students would come... Straight from their transatlantic flight, half asleep and stinking of booze.... Seriously, dude - take a shower and a coffee... They'd arrive in gangs of five or more... Sit in the waiting area and just leave their McDonald's shit everywhere... I'd call them over to be served, and they'd ignore us completely because they were so absorbed talking amongst themselves.... You work out their whole trip...and they're amazed to hear there's somewhere in France that's not Paris... . And say, "Ok that's £xxx please..." and the reply, "How much is that is dollars....? "?!! 😠 Followed by, "When we go to Monte Carlo, will they speak English there?"??!!! WTF??!!!
Love when people say I hope there isn't loads of foreigners!! Don't they realise when they go to another country, you're the foreigner. Also saved us 🇬🇧 , educated mmmmmm not to sure !!
I graduated from a rural high school in Nebraska in 1983. I got an excellent education and I cringe at the ignorance and want to cry at the sad level of ignorance of our country.
Being from the UK tends to prompt Americans to ask "Oh hey, I know someone from Britain! His name's Mike and he lives [100 miles from my location]. Do you know him?"
Don't forget the constant piss poor attempts at our accents, then saying we don't speak proper english because, [insert some weird ass reason] Ah yes, I totally know that guy that lives on the otherside of our obviously one mile long island! yea, every brit knows eachother! yep! its not like 80million people live here! nah, its only a dozen people and two dogs.
I had that happen once when living in Minnesota. Got told I spoke really good English. Suppose I'm not too bad at speaking English considering i'm a British citizen from the UK. Pat on the back indeed.
To me something stranger once happened: After a talk where I said a German music title correctly, being a native speaker, later someone came to me and congratulated me on my German pronunciation. I thought is was funny so I asked "Was it better than my English?" to which I only got a puzzled look. Still I am not sure what their thoughts were, my accent could not have been that faint, could it?
@@Cau_No accents can be interesting. I had two Americans in Missouri argue with me that I was not Irish as I don’t sound “Irish”. I’m from Northern Ireland so we have a northern Irish accent as opposed to the stereotypical “southern” Irish accent. I had to explain that Minnesota had a different accent then Texas so forth and they still didn’t believe me. Also completely blows their mind that the UK is not England alone but actually four nations combined. Some argued I was Australian for some weird reason.
@@northernsegageorge6510 I've read or heard often that US Americans try to 'correct' the Irish on their accents … either because they are 'part Irish themselves' or they've heard it in the movies … Slán agat.
@@Cau_No When I first moved to the US it confused me so much why people kept saying they were Irish when they had not been born there and had no connection to Ireland let alone having been there either. My ancestry is Scottish and Greek but I don't go around claiming to be either of those. One guy once heard my accent and said hey I love your accent where are you from? I said Ireland and he said oh I'm Irish too. I was like yeah you're so Irish you don't even know the accent. Just be proud to be American. I met many many ignorant people there but I also met some truly wonderful people. There is good and bad people in every country around the world.
I was living in Thailand for a while, and I loved it over there: wonderful, hospitable people, beautiful country and, of course, food. One day, I took a local ferry to get around the canal, and the ticket controller lady was saying " prepare your toll/tickets" in Thai language. There was one American boomer dude who looked very angry. When a lady approached him, he said :" why can't you learn fuc...ing English?!!! It is not hard, we bring money to your rookie economy!!" Bruh...some people should never travel further than their state line, I swear....
It allways boggles my mind when I hear how little history is taught in the US. Here in Germany we start with little bits of history in elementry school in "Sachkunde" which translates as general knowledge and is basicly a very low level blend of history geography and social studies. In middle school (5th to 10th grade) we go basically through all of human history form ancient egypt to the 90s and early 2000s. There is a clear focus on german/european history, but most major events around the world are at least mentioned. And depending on what 2nd language you have (english being mandatory since 3rd grade), you also delve deeper into the history of those langauges countries. So with english beeing mandatory I feel like I know almost as much about US history as the average American. (The areas of US history I learned in school are the war for independance, the civil war, segregation of black people and the role of the US in the cold war) As for what topics are covered in our highschool equivalent I cant say since I took politics as a subject rather than history.
The trouble with history is that there is so much of it and its still being made.. At school in my last year we studied Magellan and his voyages, but we could have been doing the Mongols, the Romans, the Tudors or the Elizabethans or the Egyptians or the Russians. But we stuck to Magellan and his voyages.
@@peterdurnien9084 all of that and much more is covered in our history lessons, mandatory needing to learn at least 2 other languages with 1 beeing english and most often picked french is another. we even had to learn about the american capital city's and states too. im in the netherlands by the way...
really, well then it seems to have changed then, cause i remember when i went to school in germany in the 80's it was ancient history a bit of medieval europe, french revolution and then WW2... lot of lots of WW2... it feels like 75% of it was just WW2...
I was in Kazakhstan and there was a group of people from the USA they had a bunch of maps in Russian and asked me for info about nearbye countries. They asked about Uzbekistan first pointing out Ukraine or Poland I show them where Uzbekistan is and after few minutes I realize it is better for them if I just wrote the nearbye country names in English they said it will be great. I started writing all nearbye countries names on to the map they asked me if I can wrote down more including EU countries, far east countries and so on. They were surprised and asked me Where I learned Russian so well? I told I don't know Russian they were surprised and wanted to learn how I managed to translate country names. I told that it is simple knowledge to know about world map and that we learn world map at primary school that was a real shock for them. But the real shock for them was later when I started talking about Holland, France etc with French, Dutch people. That was a bit frustrating as you can imagine trying to explain why I know about other countries to a bunch of good hearted ill educated professors from USA. But my favorite encounter was an old man from England who happened to visit one of my businesses as a tourist in a nontouristic area and asked me why I speak good English and how did I learn English. He was trying to question me in my own country in my own business as a customer in a hostile way. I think it is not just Americans sometimes many Europeans can react to simple knowledge cause they are biased.
Dude the American arrogance is... just insane. At the time the US join the war, the UK, France Poland and Eastern europe were fighting for three years. At the time the US joined the war in Europe, the axis powers already were being defeated in North Africa and mediterranean isles. Yeah yeah, the guns and ammo where needed... At the time the US joined the war, China were fightin Japan for 6 YEARS ALREADY. The same shit about Australia, New Zealand and other Asian nations. The US did great things in WWII... But "rescue"? no dude, they didnt...
I'll just repeat what I wrote some time ago: It's always funny to see the Americans pointing out how "they had saved the day", when the French and British had fought with teeth and nails to protect whatever they coud from Nazi-Germany, when the most conservative estimate of the Russian casualties of only combatants alone is around 9.000.000, as opposed to the United States 417.000. The US sure as hell played a role, but they only started to intervene when they noticed that Stalin wasn't stopping in Russia and was on his way to conquer all of Europe, it being depleted by any feasable defense. But hey, they get told that they are the heroes, the ethos, infused by propaganda after the cold war arose, is still strong to this day. The one thing one can not deny, however, is that the US kickstarted the European economy after WWII. Not entirely out of pure altruism, mind you, as this was meant to dissuade any country, any population under their influence from byuing into communism (no pun inteded), which, at the time, looked like a viable option for many.
Some years ago I went on a tour of the Gettysburg Battle Field. Our tour leader gave us a detailed explanation of the 3 day battle. The Anerican tourist next to me (an Englishman) and asked which side George Washington fought on during the Civil War. Talk about face palm! I thought, how ironic - here is an Englishman having to explain American history to an American.
Yeah, Ive tried that many times too. Honestly, I didnt feel, we learned that much in history class in school here in Denmark, it was mostly the most important happenings in our countrys history and around us and a short introduction to world history. Like a baseline and hopefully giving us a desire to learn more on our own, which I definitely did. But still Im flabbergasted, whenever I make the mistake of talking history with an American, even US history, coz they are mindbogglingly ignorant of the history of their own country, even as short as it is. Nevermind non US history, seems most of them think, the world came into existence, when the US did. Just consider, how exhausting it can be to try to explain, that no, pizza wasnt invented in New York. And no, WWII didnt start in 1941. And so on. But that George Washington story, thats a new 1 for me!
Shout out to the US woman who recently complained to an Australian news channel that the Western Standard Time the host gave out was incorrect by a couple of hours.....because she thought only the US has a west coast and timezones 💀
The most spoken languages in the world English (1,132 million speakers) Native speakers: 379 million. ... Mandarin (1,117 million speakers) ... Hindi (615 million speakers) ... Spanish (534 million speakers) ... French (280 million speakers) ... Arabic (274 million speakers) ... Bengali (265 million speakers) ... Russian (258 million speakers)
I was in a coffee shop in Windsor UK, near the castle. Some American tourists were talking Bout the castle and saying how cute it was etc. Then one said out loud "cute castle but why did they build it so close to the airport".
I came from elementary school to high school (5th grade). My history teacher began with Mesopotania, the "Mesopotamia". Approximately 11K - 4K years BC. A culture/civilization that exemplifies the principle "An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth" for the first time in their jurisdiction. And every lesson in every year we went through human history. Sparta and Athens, foundation and fall of Rome, French Revolution, First World War, Weimar Republic, and Second World War with the corresponding sanctions/aid, such as the Marshall Plan, etc. In eight years of high school history, we've discussed 6,000 years of human development and culture. What is the history of a nation that is only 250 plus/minus years old? What are your priorities? Is now not meant to be mean, but genuine interest. I'm 50 years old, never had anything to do with history again, I am a police officer, but I could say off the top of my head when the Peloponnesian War was, Rome was founded and explain the difference between aristocracy, timocracy and democracy and how it came about of democracy in ancient Greece. What is taught in history classes to US students? I don't know the curriculum of our history teachers and I don't know what they are supposed to teach us as students. But I think a very clever head once decided that the development of the western world as we know it is based on guidelines that are thousands of years old. As said; "An eye for an eye" long before the birth of Christ. Something like this needs to be communicated! All Americans are also part of this old story - I can only hope that history lessons in the USA don't begin with the "founding fathers" - but I just don't know.
America "rescued" the UK? In alliance with Japan, Germany declared war on America on the 11th of December 1941. The UK thoughtfully helped America, by providing airfields etc. It just so happened that we had a mutual enemy.
Yes the Americans didn’t give us anything, the UK paid through the nose for it and cost a fortune in interest. My father, who fought in the Second World War, was very bitter about it and with the fact the Americans were quite happy to sit and watch the conflict,until the Japanese bombed the US Navy at Pearl Harbour.
I'm not an American but one of my closest friends is an American and I once dated someone American (two of the most intelligent people I have ever known) but..I can't say the same about the other Americans I have known. An American friend of mine (an amazing human being) genuinely thought that English was an American language, that people around the world celebrated Thanksgiving, the 4th of July and Halloween and that pizzas and sandwiches were made by Americans. I mean... 😐😐😐
4:48 how the hell did America save us in Britain. I mean after the battle of Britain in the air Hitler gave up on invading Britain. So after that he was bombing the shit out of us but we were laughing at him. "Who do you think you are kidding Mr Hitler, if you think old England's done." Dads army!
