American Reacts to the Weirdest Things About America (according to non-Americans)

As an American I know that we are stuck in our own American bubble. Today I am very interested in learning about some of the weirdest things about America that us Americans don't even realize. If you enjoyed the video feel free to leave a comment, like, or subscribe for more!

[real_lostinthefogofwar]

Putting garbage down your drain is an insane concept, garbage disposals are illegal most places, all that garbage has to be removed from the water at some point, and you have to pay for that.

[davidmalarkey]

Jaywalking, Americans can't be trusted to cross the street or buy a beer. However, they can serve their country and buy a gun.

[t.a.k.palfrey]

We had children of school age when we lived in the US for six yrs, so my top three weird are to do with schools. They are: that kids write using pencils beyond the age of six, that classes pledge to an inanimate piece of cloth each morning, and that showers aren't mandatory after sports periods.

[enemde]

Our food scraps in the UK are put into a small bin that gets collected every week and sent to be made onto electricity.
The JAYWALKING law. The fact that you can't cross the road where YOU want !!

[tatjanameyer]

In Finland we are not allowed to put anything else in the sink than water. Period. No foods, NO oils etc. That is why we have bio di.sposals

[grenniespexify]

Perception of space is really different between the US and UK - yes the UK is smaller but you can't travel to most places in 2 or 3 hours. The roads are smaller and more congested and worse for this the closer to London you are. You can get a lot of places in 2 - 3 hours but the full length of the UK will need at least one overnight stop-over.

[mw-wlhm]

Canada's bigger.. yet we all travel within AND outside our country and make SURE we're exposed to the rest of the world - bad excuse.

[hilarykirkby]

Even in villages there is a proliferation of churches. Is religion obligatory? Car parks everywhere. No pavements. No footpaths. People don't use bicycles and there is no public transport. Traffic lights in a very rural area, on a six lane road, with very few other cars about. Very little evening. social life. No cafe culture, and in many eateries food comes on a paper plate with plastic cutlery. Coffee in paper cups, with tops for children. Adults drinking through straws. Most people dress badly, Too much food badly cooked in any restaurant. And that's before I mention people being shot dead in the street by the police, who obviously have no fire arems training.

[thearmouredpenguin]

The jaywalking thing. Go to National Parks such as the Grand Canyon and there are signs all over the place telling you that your safety is your responsibility; go to cross a road and OMG you can't be trusted to do it safely so we have to tell you where and when you can cross and will punish you if you are caught being "responsible for your own safety."

[ilovefacebookandebay]

Hi Tyler. I live in the north of Ireland in a place called Newry. Has a population of about 45, 000. We have a Starbucks, and I love to treat myself, once a month or so, by going into Starbucks, ordering a large Cappuccino with extra Espresso, and sitting down in one of their lovely, comfy chairs near the window, watching the world go by. It's the whole ambience and experience I enjoy. If I was to have coffee to go, which lots of people do here too, it wouldn't be the same. Starbucks here is quite expensive, so it's a nice treat I allow myself.

[helenwood]

Big trucks are overcompensating for something else being very small.

[TheTimeProphet]

I am from Britain and I have never seen a garbage disposal sink. I thought all Americans were angry, but I learnt about America from Dirty Harry movies and John Wayne LOL.

[stevenbalekic]

The fact Americans are not as well travelled worldwide doesn't have anything to do with the size of the country...in reality it's the amount of vacation days Americans receive from their workplaces.

Australia is a little bigger than the US's lower 48 and has very diverse landscapes across the country but Australians are very well travelled simply because the wages are generally higher for normal basic job workers and we have a month paid leave every year as soon as you start work at a job

[fleuriebottle]

Many Brits stopped using waste disposal units in sinks as they were pretty useless. Always getting blocked etc: we use a food only waste caddy, which generally sits on the worktop/counter by the sink. The bags of waste are them collected weekly from the local authorities.

[simonlitten]

Forgot: just how much religious/political opinions can translate to the availability of books and visual media. Thirty years ago I visited my then American girlfriend and tried and tried to hire Monty Python's Life Of Brian at Blockbuster. Not available because the chain refused to carry it. Spatula needed to get the jaw off the floor.

[IceTea]

You often say you want feedback, so here goes.
1. Garbage Disposals. I can't speak for the rest of the world, but I've yet to encounter one in Norway. Here we scrape our food scraps or bio waste into biodegradable bags and toss them into a specially designated garbage bin to be picked up by the garbage men. In my area we have green bins for paper and cardboard and cartons, brown for bio waste, and black (more of a charcoal grey) for the remainder. And every few weeks we hang out plastic bags with plastic waste. Anything else can be tossed at the recycling center. But i suppose in more rural areas the bio waste which would normally go through the disposal in America might be fed to the pigs or tossed onto a compost heap.
2. Friendly Minnesotans. I've experienced this as well, albeit this was not in a big city. Women in particular... as I'm incredibly average I doubt it was my appearance which provoked kindness. Anyway, the woman working the register at Walmart asked me where I was from (probably not recognizing me and naturally guessing I was visiting) and when she learned I was from Norway she immediately announced she was Norwegian as well (though the next sentences revealed this was several generations back). The girl operating the phone at Applebees managed to remember me by name and my previous order a few days apart and wondered (correctly) if I wanted the same again. In Norway we tend to not stick our noses into other people's business unless we already know them, and it might be the same for much of Europe.
3. News Temperament. News today has to be sensationalist in order to capture the attention and ad revenue from all walks of life, so click bait and over dramatized content unfortunately seem to be the norm. In real life, from my experience with Americans, most are fairly laid back except for in traffic.
4. Open Space. There is a lot of it in the US. I'm fairly sure that the reason there's so much empty space is because the majority of the population gathers in smaller spaces. And aren't there two unofficial States?
5. News Screen Info Overload. I think the issue is the information not only being presented by the news casters, but also the scrolling text on the bottom of the screen. There's a lot of information, I agree, but not enough to be concerned about. If it's important the scrolling text will repeat itself or the news casters will mention something. In Norway in the old days (the 90s) there was the option of Text Television, meaning a button on the remote would open up something similar to a text web page within the television, displaying news in more manageable reading speeds. And if you think American News has a lot of information, try reading Japanese magazines crammed with ads and articles which to the Western eye might merge into one another or overlap.
6. Supersize. That is the reputation; everything's bigger. I'm guessing the trucks are bigger to reduce the number of round trips. The portion sizes might be a holdover from the Depression and war recovery (WWII) when it was important to display to the world that there was no longer a need to conserve food, that food production was abundant, and that the children weren't starving "Like the children in Africa" (which is a warning often uttered at children who do not finish their meal, even here in Europe).
7. Fast Friends. I can't speak to this, as the closest I get to friends in the US would be my brother's wife and kids. From personal observation it seems to me that Americans tend to blur the border between friend and acquaintance, lumping them into one group rather than two. Just like Facebook (when I still had it, might have changed in the dozen years since I deleted my account) only has options for friends and family, not for acquaintances.
8. Custom Menu. In my experience we tend to just accept the options placed before us, but very few restaurants or cafes have objected when asked for substitutions or exclusions or additions to their established menu. I too feel guilty for creating extra work for the kitchen staff, so i tend only to exclude things I truly do not like. Could be part of the Jantelov thing.
9. The American Accent. It has often been remarked in my circles that the American accent tends to be relaxing to speak, the British accent is relaxing to hear. I tend to agree that it's simpler to speak American but easier to understand British. And the entertainment industry is saturated with American, even spoken by people who are not native speakers because it is almost expected.
10. Coffee. This is a Norwegian thing as well, interpreting having a coffee as taking some time to chat and drink, maybe nibble on some biscuits.

[hello.]

Might not be appropriate but i wanted to let you know that my papa would always watch you before he passed away.

I would always hear you speaking when he was watching you on his laptop.

Just wanted to let you know you were one of the two people he was subscribed to. Thank you for keeping him entertained even when he was at his worst. His name was Norman Campbell and passed away at the age of 64.

[steel]

The strange (Webster) version of the English language they use.

[winterknight]

From a Brit, that lived in Italy for many years, that watery stuff you call coffee, and with absolutely no idea how to make a cup of tea, jaywalking, a lack of fresh food in the shops. And the gun culture is stupid and deadly.

[StewedFishProductions]

Commercial 'waste disposal units' are now banned in Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland... a ban on commercial food macerators looks set to come into effect in 2026 in England too! This is likely to then become the same for domestic 'garbage disposal units'. Water UK, the trade body for water companies in the UK, has come out against the use of waste disposal units for various reasons including: More sewer blockages, higher energy use, increased household water use and more costly waste-water treatment required...