I’ve done a bit of traveling in my day, but I’ve never been anywhere really exotic.
But I’ve had friends who have traveled to China and India and they’ve told me that those countries in particular really felt DIFFERENT. And that they experienced legitimate culture shock there.
But one of the best parts of traveling is being exposed to things that you’d never see where you live, right?
AskReddit users talked about what is normal in their countries but considered weird everywhere else. Let’s take a look.
1. Interesting.
“Touching the feet of our elders is very common in India.
I doubt if it’s practiced anywhere else.”
2. Coming and going.
“In the UK, it’s normal for cats to be able to come and go from the house as they please, outside of dense city centers.
Generally, we’d feel sorry for a cat that was always kept inside for being trapped and unable to roam like cats naturally do.
There have been TV shows about domestic cats’ habits and they regularly have a mile wide territory in the suburbs, and five miles or more in the countryside.
This is changing a bit with time and ‘indoor cats’ are slowly becoming more common, particularly with apartment living in densely urban areas, but when I was a kid, an indoor cat was virtually unheard of.”
3. On May 1.
“May the 1st, the young lads will carry a birch tree, that’s adorned with colorful paper and the name of the girl they want to woe, through the city with their friends and put it up at said girls window, and have to defend the tree the night over, for other suitors or opportunists might take it down, otherwise.
The tree stays up for one month. When the guys show up again, to take the tree with them (sadly, nowadays many guys seem to forget this part of the tradition), if the girls likes them, they are repaid with an invitation to dinner and a crate of beer.
The beer is usually seen as a “payment” for friends of the suitor, who helped carrying and defending the tree.”
4. Sounds fun.
“Breaking plates and glasses when someone is dancing or when they’re dr**k and full of joy.
Throwing flowers at singers.”
5. Name the country!
“If you want it not to rain stab the dirt and leave the knife there.
Not in all our country but theres a state where once a year we take out our dead relatives from the grave to clean the bones.
If you make a petition to a saint you can put if upside down for it to be done.
We do not celebrate easter with eggs and bunnies, our grandmas and moms would scold us because “christ is suffering you should be praying” (great grandma used to turn off everything) and if it gets cloudy they’d say something like “by this time Christ d**d” and keep on praying.
We have people at gas stations that fill our tanks for us.
Theres always people on the red lights either making a show or cleaning your windshield.
Our “candy” are actually spicy.”
6. No thanks.
“Leaving the head on a roast chicken.
I live in Vietnam, and the first time I was served roast chicken I had to stare at the half-open eyes on the actual FACE of a chicken while eating its flesh.
Yikes!”
7. Sugar overload.
“In America eating extremely sugary deserts for breakfast.
Doughnuts, most cereals, pop tarts, all contain huge amounts of sugar and often little nutrition.
There is literally Oreo cookie cereal kids eat for breakfast.”
8. Time for pork.
“Sacrificing a pig in December to have fresh pork meat for Christmas.
Lots of Romanians from countryside do this, they grow the pig half a year for this.
Authorities implemented some legal interdictions, but the tradition is dying hard.
I remember my grandparents doing this and yes, the meat was excellent, nothing to compare with the one from today stores.”
9. Lights out.
“Having your electricity just gone. Nowhere in thee world do they just shut down electricity for literally no reason, except in Serbia.
I have 2 things that cant go an hour without electricity and every day the turn it off for just about that much. And those are not any machines, nonono, those keep the chickens warm, breeder wet, and pigs warm too.
Last time 3 chickens d**d, this time 5, and if this keeps going I dont think I will be able to continue.”
10. Kneecapped.
“In Northern Ireland, renowned drug dealers will get s**t in both knees by organized criminal groups.”
11. Take it outside.
“My Indian/Hindu friend told me that I can’t clip nails inside the house.
It had to be done outside so I had go out onto the balcony.”
12. Ugh.
“In China, a lot of bathrooms don’t have toilet paper because they don’t want people to steal it.
You have to bring your own.
A lot of toilets are also squatting toilets (no actual seat).”
13. Pakistan.
“Women almost always move in with their in laws after marriage.
60% of the population engages is cousin marriages
Having guards, maids and chefs is something a lot of people have especially middle class households.”
How about where you live?
Fill us in, por favor!
Do it in the comments! Thanks!
