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How is the political climate currently in the state and city that you live in? Here in Seattle, Washington, the prevailing mood is fairly liberal and slightly tense. Washington, like (almost?) all the "liberal" states, has a liberal urban core and then a wasteland of people who think Trump is the niftiest thing since they discovered online message boards where they can say the n-word. Seattle itself has a lot of divisions against itself, we like to think of ourselves as being super progressive and next-generation, but we're also heavily segregated in a fairly literal manner and hideously unbalanced financially. A lot of Seattle's boom has to do with tech, and techies make a lot of money, which means gentrification and higher housing prices, and of course nobody wants to build affordable housing because we're NIMBY central so people who work in the service economy keep getting pushed further and further out of the city. We also have a massive homeless problem that nobody wants to do anything about. It leads to a really weird clashing of ideologies - if you go to the Queen Anne neighborhood (which literally had "no blacks" leases into the middle of the last century), the only non-white person you'll see is an "acceptable" minority or a homeless person who took the wrong bus, but everyone there is proudly liberal. It's really the worst aspect of the progressive side, and it reminds me of Mike Judge's parodies of liberals in King of the Hill - they'll drink kale juice and vote for Hillary, but they'll also hold their purse extra tight if someone darker than Cary Grant stands behind them at Starbucks. We're basically Tiny San Francisco - loads of people with hundred-dollar haircuts drinking fifteen-dollar smoothies stepping over homeless people while talking about human rights and retro furniture. What kind of food culture does your local area have? if you're into cooking, or simply know of some local delicacy, please share a specific dish, with a recipe if you have one, of something that you enjoy making or buying yourself that would be representative of your local food culture. Lots of Asian food, since we have a significant Asian population, both due to historical immigration (we have a "Chinatown" neighborhood) and the University of Washington, which takes in a lot of Asian students. Coming from central California, I'd never had bibimbap, pho, or bahn mi, and now I can't live without them. We also have the requisite local fast food place, Dick's, which makes greasy, okay hamburgers and is open until the bars clamp shut. I think a "real" Seattle meal would be a pork bao eaten on the waterfront. How is religious life and worship for you in the states? As an outsider, it appears as if religious life might vary pretty wildly from state to state, with some US areas having markedly different religious demographics than others. I'd be especially interested in whether people experience any prejudice or bias against their religious practice, or lack thereof, in their home states, or from US society at large. I was raised totally without religion, and thankfully it's not a big thing here. Religion is weird to me, particularly the big-top three-circus American religion, which was a whole thing where I grew up (I could never live in the south). Seattle's pretty good about accepting all types, and I regularly see lots of Muslim people and Hindu people on the bus and even, sometimes, Mormons riding tandem bikes. edit: w/r/t being atheist, I don't get much reaction here but I got a lot of "what do you mean you don't go to church?" growing up. I was always the odd one out at a friend's dinner table when everyone would bow their head and do some kind of grace thing, and more than once I got the "how do you know not to commit murder?" argument. A few times I got roped into a religious thing without even realizing it, my friend would be like, "hey I'm going to a party, wanna come along?" and it'd start out normally but then an adult would bring out a bible and everyone would get all pod-people and hush up to listen to a sermon in the middle of eating pizza, and then I'd get pamphlets pushed on me and people would be weirdly aggressive about "joining". If you belong to a minority group, do you experience harassment? If you do and you are willing to share personal anecdotes, and thoughts about how your state or city might differ from other areas in the US, then please do. Not of color, but as a gay guy it was a huge relief leaving central California and moving here. I'd say we're probably second/third to San Francisco in terms of American LGBT meccas, and I spent my first couple months here housesitting on Capitol Hill, which is our Castro District. It still warms my heart to see gay couples holding hands in public, and I haven't experienced any harassment since I've moved here. I think the biggest issue is gentrification, which is turning our gay neighborhoods into hipster bistros and barcades, and now and then there's an incident with a drunk college student saying something lovely or beating up a trans person. How familiar are you with other US states than the one you live in? Like, how many different ones have you lived in, or visited for a shorter or longer period of time. Are some states essentially as foreign to you, or even more, than some foreign countries might be? Do you feel as if there is animosity between your home state and other states? I'm familiar with most of the West coast, I lived in central California for most of my life and did a lot of travelling to our neighboring states, but the entire Eastern seaboard is totally, utterly foreign to me. What's funny is almost every Christmas and holiday film is set in the East, so even as a kid I was like, what is this? Where is Christmas like this? The south is particularly foreign to me, and I'd like to visit it some time just to see what it's all about, even if they do stand entirely against my existence as a person. The recent election really underlined that, but it's not really news that a significant portion of the country hates me and everyone like me and wishes violent harm on everyone who isn't them, and telling a certain type of person that you're from, say, California, or Seattle, provokes this "ugh" response. The feeling is mutual. Have you experienced any stereotypes against your nationality or state when travelling? Not necessarily against, but it's funny how many people I've met who think California is just an 800-mile strip of beachfront property populated by movie stars and gay people. I lived square in the middle of the state, so I was two and a half hours from a beach, experienced some of the worst air pollution in the country, and had nothing to do because central California is, at its worst, nothing but agriculture, dust, heat, and Republicans. My high school had a regular prayer circle on the front lawn, and our county voted to undo gay marriage. It's a miserable shithole and it's great when someone lights up and says "Oh, California!" and I can see little palm trees in their pupils. If someone was to visit the US for the first time, or your state or city in particular, what sights would you recommend? IDK about the US in general, that's like saying "if someone was visiting Europe, what should they do" because it's so huge, but if they were to visit Seattle I'd suggest the usual touristy stuff, plus taking a peek at our awesome pinball scene and then renting a car and driving around the Olympic peninsula. It's a stunning trip, especially if you like rain (I do). When we did it, we made it through the last leg down to Ocean Shores towards nightfall, so we got these endless misty forests that slowly grew darker and darker, and then we got to our hotel and when we woke up we were on a sunny beach. It was like a magic trick. Magic Hate Ball fucked around with this message at 19:10 on Feb 11, 2017 |
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Feb 11, 2017 19:00
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System Metternich posted:But other friends who have been there told me that Americans basically take the car for every distance that's longer than the car itself. That's hyperbole, of course, but which distance would you be ready to walk instead of drive? Every Wednesday I walk to choir practice and back which Google Maps tells me is 1km (~0,6 miles) or about 12 minutes of walking each. Would you take the car for that? And would it even be feasible to walk in your average American town? It definitely depends on the area but like others have said, in a lot of places sidewalks and other means of foot traffic are either nonexistent or essentially ornamental. In one place I lived, the walk to the grocery store was "only" half a mile, but it was half a mile down a six-lane road with a 50mph speed limit, and at one point the sidewalk ended for a stretch and you'd just walk along in the dirt next to the big barrier wall that protected the suburb from road noise. I've known people whose backyards bordered a shopping center, but because of the way the neighborhood was laid out it was a two mile drive from their garage to get there. In the really big shopping center we used to drive from one store to another because it was preferable to trekking across a quarter mile of busy, boiling blacktop. A lot of American public infrastructure is essentially anti-walking.
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Feb 19, 2017 20:23
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The shoes-in-houses thing is more of a family thing, and I think it harks back to the early 20th century when it was considered inappropriate to be indoors without shoes on, which I don't think changed until the 60s. I still hear people refer to having your guests take off their shoes as "Japanese style", which is a phrase that comes up in King of the Hill and Mad Men.MightyJoe36 posted:There are as many answers to this question as there are states. Counties, even.
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Feb 21, 2017 01:59
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It's literally family-by-family and subregional.
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Feb 21, 2017 23:17
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joebuddah posted:People in the south are generally nicer. Please , thank you and excuse me are everyday words. Aw, bless your heart.
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Feb 22, 2017 20:03
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