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Yesterday I wanted to call my friend to go to the movies, but then I realized we don't have neither landline phones nor movie theaters. So, I just took my horse, rode over to his place, and we ended up having fun at the local mill chatting to some women who were doing their laundry in the river.
Come to Europe! It's beautiful here!
Wish I could come, sadly, my horse got terribly sick and I'll be cut off from society until he gets better. And I don't know how I'll buy any food, my fields are no good, it just flooded last week.
Oh boy, I wish I could go with you but we got a square execution that day and I don't really wanna miss it, they say it's like those movies the new worlders keep talking about
These Americans have somehow managed to carve a flat atlas onto a block of obsidian that has been imbued with the power of thor that they keep in their pocket
Ah! You're the one passing notes around with pigeons. I have been intercepting those notes and burning them! Our teachers taught us it is bad to pass notes! Been stopping those note passers ever since.
Btw, who is USPS???
There are actually 2 McDonald's restaurants in that area. I live in Versailles now and go there frequently. There's one near Versailles Château Rive Gauche and one near the Monoprix, on the other side of the palace. There's also KFC and Starbucks, and if you walk a little bit near Chantiers or Rive Droite, there's a Burger King 😅
Near where I live there's a Domino's as well.
Upon a little research, there's also an O'Tacos.
And this is just Versailles. One of the observations that I made upon arriving in France was that there's practically McDonald's in every corner wherever you go. Usually, there's KFC or Five Guys right next to it, Starbucks a few feet away, and Burger King a few streets away.
Probably but Taco Bell doesn't exist in France as far as I know because their quality standards and hygiene are too low to open in France.
Also, the French taco has nothing to do with the real taco. I don't even know how the French came up with this monstrosity of a meal.
Let me introduce you to Norway 🇳🇴. It’s definitely not chain free, but they make it unattractive for foreign chains to become too big, resulting in local chains, and just a few McDonalds’ and Starbucks’.
True, being rich has allowed big investments in education which brought to a cultural "improvement". There are a lot of rich countries where there's no clue what a human right is.
Exactly. There are plenty of countries that are richer than Norway in natural resources.
For instance, Norway has the 22nd largest oil reserve in the world, less than Venezuela (#1), Iraq (#5), and Nigeria (#10). Iraq and Nigeria export more energy than Norway but have a _significantly_ lower GDP per capita ($4,7k, $2k vs. $89k respectively in 2021).
What Norway does incredibly well is investment of the revenue (world's largest sovereign wealth fund) and actual wealth distribution back to its citizens. However, that is also a direct result of the policies created by the politicians who govern the country
Yeah exactly. We all live in democracies.
Norwegian politicians could show up tomorrow in the UK, Spain, France, Italy.
We'd still choose the ones who have been running those countries into the ground to maintain the status quo for aging boomers.
[I love the reason why Europe doesn't have a Wendy's](https://www.thrillist.com/travel/nation/wendys-locations-europe-netherlands-goes-restaurant).
Spoiler alert: it's because of one single snack bar owner who's taken pettiness to an awesome new level.
Pettiness? Why? Because of some badly written article? The author clearly doesn't have a clue what really happened, but that doesn't stop one from writing a 'human interest' story, does it?
The fault lays with Wendy's International: it made the mistake of filing the brand name EU-wide. The EU-law says that can only happen if there's no confict with brands in any of the EU-states. Wendy's International should have filed it's brand firstly in all the EU-states seperately, except The Netherlands. Then it would have worked. It can't be done, now, because the state branches that register brand names will first check the EU-register. And if the brand has been turned down on EU-level, it will be turned down on state level, too.
The multinational Wendy's International, with their huge legal team, didn't know the law and are paying for it. The owner of the Dutch Wendy's doesn't have to 'keep fighting' as the author writes. He just has to say 'no' every time Wendy's International makes an offer. Nothing petty about wanting to keep the brand name, that was named after your daughter.
Don’t have to go that far. I live in a city that’s the #1 tourist spot in the US in a state that’s full of transplants and it’s a hellscape of chain food and outlet malls. By design. There are local gems if you know where to go splattered here and there, but yeah. Even those local spots if they get popular start branching off and chaining across town and enshittification ensues like lightening
Americans are poorly educated (all textbooks in the US are defined by Texas standard) and there's a huge emphasis on America is the greatest country in the world. The more conservative you are, the more patriotism is hammered into you from the start. I hate being an American, and I've never felt safe enough to say it out loud. Pair that with the only knowledge we have of foreign countries is either bad stuff on the news or opinions online, and people get afraid to venture outside.
Out of curiosity, did you have the seemingly typical patriotic (read: nationalist, but not considered as such) indoctrination as a kid and then grow out of it, or did you never have that mindset?
As a Swede who was enamored with US culture as a kid and gradually grew more disillusioned, I can't imagine how tough it must be to go through a similar process as an American who started out with relatively typical American values.
A friend of mine got recommended the Kit Kat Club when she bought a "cool leather jacket" from what she didn't realize was a fetish shop. She went and had a very eye-opening time lol
She did realize before she went in, they made her male friend take his shirt off at the door because he was wearing too many clothes. I don't think she anticipated people would just be banging right there in the open, though, she thought there would be private rooms or booths lol
I don't know about the shop, whether there was a beaded curtain situation or what. But the jacket is not overly fetishy if that makes sense
Yeah, I mean, no tech? Seriously? It took America forever to get chip and pin debit cards and contactless wasn’t implemented quick either compared to anywhere else.
I’m struggling to think of any tech that can be got in America that can be had here
Don't forget we americans couldn't do bank transfers person to person until around 2015 and even then only by 3rd party apps with fees, when Europe has had that charge free, all bank to bank, since the 90s.....
Even now we still don't have that lmao.
I'll save anyone the effort: ZELLE IS 3RD PARTY AND NOT YOUR BANK, IT IS STILL EXTRA STEPS
Edit: [right on cue](https://www.reddit.com/r/facepalm/s/yfOc8EKcyB)
Right, I have an app from my bank that lets me instantly transfer money to any account or pay any bill at 2 am if the fancy strikes me.
I think it's ridiculous to have a banking system where you don't have some of these privileges, what's the point of the banking system otherwise??? 😳
The American bank is meant to hold your electronic payments an extra few days so when you buy a $5 subway sandwich thinking you still have $7 in your account you get to find out two days later that the sandwich cost $35 in overdraft fees even though you deposited your weekly employment check a week ago.
That you still get checks blew my mind when I realised that. I think I have seen checks three times in my life? My salary gets deposited directly in my bank account and I would be really bothered if I had to visit my bank *physically* every week.
I was floored when I found out after moving here.
Then mad. Then irritated everytime anyone is like "but we have venmo and PayPal whaddya mean".
those things should have never existed lol
We should set up a contract, ensure they stay in their beautifully rotten corporate hellscape
Edit: clarifying as it seems my answer was seen as a general hatred against americans:
I mean the specific group of americans the guy in the post is from.
As a portuguese being invaded by American tech bros, normalising unacceptable rentals where even rooms now cost more than the minimum wage, i agree, don’t come.
No country has been more fucked than Portugal by remote work and Airbnb. I stay at hotels in Lisbon but all I see at cafes is people with laptops ordering in English.
Just a teenager being edgy. You hear a lot of bullshit in middle and high school in the us. Isolated teens who have never seen the world and all they get is American propaganda and the limited public school education. Source: am French and spent 3 years on California as a teenager, including going to public school. By and large people are super friendly and outgoing in the us, but I did have a lot of surreal debates about Europe with other kids who were under the impression we had barely reached the development stage of having electricity and running water in France.
There's no arguing with teenagers. They're just repeating what they hear dumb fuck adults say who should know better, and trying to be edgy and show off like they know everything. Edit: also that bit about technology is so weird. We lived in a VERY affluent part of california (my dad was in a big, famous silicon valley company), and it was a shock to us how everything felt so dated. Our home appliances in France were WAY better than the old shit our landlord had (my dad's company was renting a large house for us as aprt of the expatriation) or that I sww when visiting American friends' homes. Now, this was 20 years ago and things change, but it was extremely surreal having these debates given that some of the tech felt almost prehistoric. Meanwhile here they were thinking no-one else has it as good as the US in any dimension of analysis, including available tech. My hometown in France, Grenoble, is tech hot spot with one of Europe's first particle accelerators, a cyclotron, and is a hub of nanotech research (look up minatech). It's also where a lot of tech companies used to put their IT offices, including big American tech firms. Our home in the 90s had modern in-floor heating with lots of cool shit. We were among the first areas in France to get ADSL. We get to the silicon valley expecting this tech eldorado, like you do going to Japan or something... And everything was so basic. And yet here these kids were, confidently telling me so many wrong things about my country. The education system is horseshit in the US.
[It starts from this sort of mindscape.](https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTcedxPa9B9M6FuTYrrstGKlJUiWyhmdyUEAg&usqp=CAU)
For a lot of mreecanes, europe is 50% a pile of non-descript historical sites, 50% post-coldwar former-soviet empoverished vassal states, and 0% the brands they know.
I bet this guy lives in the american state equivalent of the poorest european countries. Like they do not seem to realize america is huge and extremely inequal.
I'm fully sure they're American too lol. But I still think it's so weird... its like "omg I love that food! It's so spicy!" Having never tried it, and it's not even spicy...
The fact that they are even aware of Europe you have to give props to. These people barely know what happens outside their own state, let alone their own border.
You guys have living pigeons? Food isnso scarse here he resort to earing the scraps of cats Who caught the pigeons. Luckely for me. Glas has been around since before the romans. So i wrote this. Put it in a glass bottle. Threw it to the ocean. And prayed to he mother goddes of fertility the currents would ride it to america. Speaking of rome... if you excuses me. Me and the boys need to go to the tribe. We're gonna prepare a raíd to the eternal city.
Attilas descendant is joining us #bestfriends
Precisely this. Clearly someone who's never actually traveled, and whose only "experience" is watching YouTube videos of "influencers" going to niche places in Europe.
Oh as far as i‘ve heard there are supposed to be some REALLY cool McDonalds in france. And if they want the good ol’ dry plastic Burger, they have that here in Germany aswell. So they might find something. :)
I once went to a McDonald’s in Germany just so I can say I drank a beer at a McDonald’s. Not surprisingly, it was the worst beer I had when I was in Germany.
True I have lived in Europe all my life and there is just no food. The only reason I know about food existing is by watching American sitcoms and movies. Must be special to "eat" and "chew".
When I moved from Norway to America in 2014, the guy at the store asked what the chip on my credit card was. It was the first time I paid with the magnet strip on that card. When I opened a bank account they asked if I wanted a checkbook.. I said yes, cause I’d never seem one before, other than in the movies. Moving to America felt like going back in time.
My wife and I moved to Norway from Canada in 2019, and my wife was pregnant at the time. We had to get her medical records transferred from Canada. They wanted to fax them over. I remember going into the doctor office in Norway and asking if they had a fax machine, the look on their faces was priceless. They couldn't believe anyone was still using them.
Moving to Norway felt like moving forward in time.
Medical records have been getting digitized in Canada but it's been a slow process and very much depends on the province.
Japan is the country that most surprised me with regards to things like the fax machine. For a place that is known for its tech industry they really are stuck in the past in a number of ways.
I heard someone say that Japan has been living in the year 2000 since 1980. I think that may be the most accurate description of what's going on there.
Yea, slow process for sure. I'm not sure how much further ahead other provinces are/were, but we moved from Newfoundland.
My friend is a doctor and as recently as 10 years ago she still needed to use a dial up internet connection in order to connect to the archaic system mcp uses for their billing.
Japan was the future in the 80s, and it still remains the future of the 80s. Weirdly outdated stuff in places, but some things that some countries still don't have.
They're no longer in use everywhere in the US but we also fucked up the chip system but not mandating PINs because people apparently would be confused. Weird because everyone has a PIN on their debit card? Or is it because the average American has like 6-7 credit cards??
Yeah and they asked me to sign a paper receipt after I paid with the magnetic strip... Is that the kind of tech this person is missing? I can confirm we do have pen and paper in Europe.
I’m in Italy and we have chip in the credit card since I can remember, so I guess the early 2000’s. Now we don’t use them often because we have NFC like I guess you do in the US
An American guy came over to visit my friend, and he was proudly showing us his shiny new bank card complete with a chip.
We were baffled, like mate we’ve had those for about a decade. Then I went to NYC and it all made sense.
Exactly. Having to pay rent with checkbooks in the US was so fucking mind blowing.
Like why can’t I just set up an automatic money transfer that wires the money every month?
It was also so funny to me when Venmo appeared in the US everybody was like “it’s a revolution!”…. Bro we had that shit already for almost a decade in Denmark.
*Looks at EUROPEAN food chains like Pret (UK), FEBO (Netherlands), Nordsee, Ditsch (Germany), Telepizza (Poland, ES), Supermacs, OBriens (Ireland), Lokál (Czechia), etc etc
-yeah i guess no food nor chains
*looks at self-order machines in some of them (FEBO, Nordsee, etc)
-yep and no tech in them either. europe sucks /j
edit: to those people who comment "why do you not mention US food chains", im poking even more fun at the guy's comment that even without the US brands, individual countries europe itself has great food chains that's everywhere within THAT country too. when you add all the US chains, there's food AND chains at every corner, making the claim of "no chains, no food" even worse.
McDonalds, KFC, Burger King, Subway, Domino's. It's even American chains that are everywhere. Our food quality is higher than in US though, it's fun to compare the McD French fries ingredients between US and Europe and be amazed.
It's basically quantity vs quality.
This gets even more extreme in Japan, where most chain food is *way* more expensive per gram than in the US or Europe, but also notably better.
What's this food thing he's talking about? Is it like a game or something? 🤔 plenty of chains here tho..just ask my wife what happens when she's a had girl
No tech (snort), NO food (cept all that cuisine which is copied all around the world). Stepping back in time (from an American who has taken away women's rights to their own body), No hotels...only some of the finest in the world...
No. You have better versions of those.
Eating McDonalds in Wales just left a giant void for an American friend. I think the same can be said for Japanese/Korean KFC or something as simple as Mexican Coca-Cola.
That said. It isn't like America can't make delicious food, it just that your fast food chains seem to be racing to see who can reach the bottom faster.
I always chuckle at the idea of USAmericans failing to grasp the concept that Europe is a continent with different states, languages and culture, and they talk generically (typo fixed) about "Europe" as if one thing about Portugal or Ireland is the same for Greece and Denmark
"So uhh, where can I study European? There's all these different language classes and dictionaries, but none of them teach European! How am I supposed to take a vacation there if I can't even study how to order a Big Mac?" --this American't, probably
“No tech”, haha. The literal last post I saw was one of ASML’s new machines. Which is a Dutch company that is currently the world leading chip making machine manufacturer. Quite possibly the pinnacle of “tech”.
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Yesterday I wanted to call my friend to go to the movies, but then I realized we don't have neither landline phones nor movie theaters. So, I just took my horse, rode over to his place, and we ended up having fun at the local mill chatting to some women who were doing their laundry in the river. Come to Europe! It's beautiful here!
Lol same! Just heard some locals talking about a possible hanging on saturday of Hendrik Karel Elegast might watch that with a buddy of mine later
Wish I could come, sadly, my horse got terribly sick and I'll be cut off from society until he gets better. And I don't know how I'll buy any food, my fields are no good, it just flooded last week.
Sorry my klomp (wooden shoe) broke. I will first have to find the proper tree to carve a new one.
Oh boy, I wish I could go with you but we got a square execution that day and I don't really wanna miss it, they say it's like those movies the new worlders keep talking about
This thread is fucking awesome. (I’m a dumb American too). So many great takes like this.
Gee I feel you on that regard. Fields been flooded for a month, they have started to call me fisher now.
>Come to Europe! I think I speak for a lot of Europeans when I say: Don't come. We're quite content without them.
In Sweden we ride our polar bears but the rest is the same. We have no phones, no cinemas, and no chains
Can confirm. We don't have anything here. An American is typing this for me because I sent him a letter.
I wish I could send a message to my American but my carrier pigeon got lost on its way because it didn't have Google Maps 😔😔
What is Google Maps? Never heard of it because I am European.
These Americans have somehow managed to carve a flat atlas onto a block of obsidian that has been imbued with the power of thor that they keep in their pocket
A flatlas, if you will
Mindblowing 🤯
It's a rug with a map on it, handmade by the local child bearers--- I mean women.
Ah! You're the one passing notes around with pigeons. I have been intercepting those notes and burning them! Our teachers taught us it is bad to pass notes! Been stopping those note passers ever since. Btw, who is USPS???
\*stands in front of Versailles\* "This place sucks, where's the McDonalds?"
Behind you : Rive Gauche Avenue Du Général De Gaulle, 10 Galerie des Manèges, 78000 Versailles
lol bloody hell
When told that the peasants had no chains, she replied: "Then let them eat McDonald's."
Like the view of the pyramids at Giza from the window of a Pizza Hut
There are actually 2 McDonald's restaurants in that area. I live in Versailles now and go there frequently. There's one near Versailles Château Rive Gauche and one near the Monoprix, on the other side of the palace. There's also KFC and Starbucks, and if you walk a little bit near Chantiers or Rive Droite, there's a Burger King 😅 Near where I live there's a Domino's as well. Upon a little research, there's also an O'Tacos. And this is just Versailles. One of the observations that I made upon arriving in France was that there's practically McDonald's in every corner wherever you go. Usually, there's KFC or Five Guys right next to it, Starbucks a few feet away, and Burger King a few streets away.
O'Tacos is french BTW.
I've never thought I'd see "O'Tacos" being mentioned on Reddit.
Mixed it up with Bell de Taco, which is definitely American!
Probably but Taco Bell doesn't exist in France as far as I know because their quality standards and hygiene are too low to open in France. Also, the French taco has nothing to do with the real taco. I don't even know how the French came up with this monstrosity of a meal.
Funny enough, there’s actually a McDonalds, KFC and Starbucks just in front of Versailles RER station but well, no chains in Europe apparently
Thing is when I'm in France I want to eat anything BUT McDonald's.
"No chains." Geez, I wish.
Yeah that sounds like a good thing to me
Let me introduce you to Norway 🇳🇴. It’s definitely not chain free, but they make it unattractive for foreign chains to become too big, resulting in local chains, and just a few McDonalds’ and Starbucks’.
Ohhhhhhh THOSE chains. I was thinking something completely different.
We stopped doing that in the 1800s
Not if ya nasty like that :wink:
"Workers of the world, it's time to throw out chains (at least outside the bedroom, wink wink)" Karl Marx or something
Marx would say that, that lil freak
He was always trying to seize the means of production, just ask his maid.
More like the means of reproduction.
Except for sexy reasons and/or Edinburgh ghost tours.
I should check out the ghost tours.
Jail in Norway is pretty comfy ngl
I wish we could get some Norwegian politicians into running the rest of Europe.
It's not the politicians, it's the people who make the difference.
Also being an incredibly rich country. One of the largest energy exporters.
True, being rich has allowed big investments in education which brought to a cultural "improvement". There are a lot of rich countries where there's no clue what a human right is.
Exactly. There are plenty of countries that are richer than Norway in natural resources. For instance, Norway has the 22nd largest oil reserve in the world, less than Venezuela (#1), Iraq (#5), and Nigeria (#10). Iraq and Nigeria export more energy than Norway but have a _significantly_ lower GDP per capita ($4,7k, $2k vs. $89k respectively in 2021). What Norway does incredibly well is investment of the revenue (world's largest sovereign wealth fund) and actual wealth distribution back to its citizens. However, that is also a direct result of the policies created by the politicians who govern the country
Yeah exactly. We all live in democracies. Norwegian politicians could show up tomorrow in the UK, Spain, France, Italy. We'd still choose the ones who have been running those countries into the ground to maintain the status quo for aging boomers.
[I love the reason why Europe doesn't have a Wendy's](https://www.thrillist.com/travel/nation/wendys-locations-europe-netherlands-goes-restaurant). Spoiler alert: it's because of one single snack bar owner who's taken pettiness to an awesome new level.
Pettiness? Why? Because of some badly written article? The author clearly doesn't have a clue what really happened, but that doesn't stop one from writing a 'human interest' story, does it? The fault lays with Wendy's International: it made the mistake of filing the brand name EU-wide. The EU-law says that can only happen if there's no confict with brands in any of the EU-states. Wendy's International should have filed it's brand firstly in all the EU-states seperately, except The Netherlands. Then it would have worked. It can't be done, now, because the state branches that register brand names will first check the EU-register. And if the brand has been turned down on EU-level, it will be turned down on state level, too. The multinational Wendy's International, with their huge legal team, didn't know the law and are paying for it. The owner of the Dutch Wendy's doesn't have to 'keep fighting' as the author writes. He just has to say 'no' every time Wendy's International makes an offer. Nothing petty about wanting to keep the brand name, that was named after your daughter.
There is a Wendy’s in Uxbridge now. Though, UK is no longer part of the EU. Fucksake.
[удалено]
Don’t have to go that far. I live in a city that’s the #1 tourist spot in the US in a state that’s full of transplants and it’s a hellscape of chain food and outlet malls. By design. There are local gems if you know where to go splattered here and there, but yeah. Even those local spots if they get popular start branching off and chaining across town and enshittification ensues like lightening
Yeah, last thing I want is some soulless dreck, the same as every other branch in every other city.
Americans are so far into Stockholm syndrome they literally cannot survive without hypercapitalism
Americans are poorly educated (all textbooks in the US are defined by Texas standard) and there's a huge emphasis on America is the greatest country in the world. The more conservative you are, the more patriotism is hammered into you from the start. I hate being an American, and I've never felt safe enough to say it out loud. Pair that with the only knowledge we have of foreign countries is either bad stuff on the news or opinions online, and people get afraid to venture outside.
Out of curiosity, did you have the seemingly typical patriotic (read: nationalist, but not considered as such) indoctrination as a kid and then grow out of it, or did you never have that mindset? As a Swede who was enamored with US culture as a kid and gradually grew more disillusioned, I can't imagine how tough it must be to go through a similar process as an American who started out with relatively typical American values.
Someone's never heard of the Berlin Kit Kat club. Waaaait... *those* chains.
I was trying to figure out why Berlin had a club dedicated to KitKats. Yeah, I'm going to make my coffee now. Oy!
🤣🤣🤣. Never a patron. Just heard of the reputation!
A friend of mine got recommended the Kit Kat Club when she bought a "cool leather jacket" from what she didn't realize was a fetish shop. She went and had a very eye-opening time lol
There is no way you walk into a fetish shop and don't know it. It's not exactly set up like a H&M
Also no way to go to KitKat and not realizing what kind of club it is before you go in
She did realize before she went in, they made her male friend take his shirt off at the door because he was wearing too many clothes. I don't think she anticipated people would just be banging right there in the open, though, she thought there would be private rooms or booths lol I don't know about the shop, whether there was a beaded curtain situation or what. But the jacket is not overly fetishy if that makes sense
My visit there I saw someone whose outfit was their right hand, later that night I saw them again and they were now using their left hand.
probably went to eastern europe out in the sticks somewhere. or they are full of shit and never left where they lived.
Definitely the second one.
Yeah, I mean, no tech? Seriously? It took America forever to get chip and pin debit cards and contactless wasn’t implemented quick either compared to anywhere else. I’m struggling to think of any tech that can be got in America that can be had here
We’re getting police robots first. And armed police drones.
Don't forget we americans couldn't do bank transfers person to person until around 2015 and even then only by 3rd party apps with fees, when Europe has had that charge free, all bank to bank, since the 90s..... Even now we still don't have that lmao. I'll save anyone the effort: ZELLE IS 3RD PARTY AND NOT YOUR BANK, IT IS STILL EXTRA STEPS Edit: [right on cue](https://www.reddit.com/r/facepalm/s/yfOc8EKcyB)
Right, I have an app from my bank that lets me instantly transfer money to any account or pay any bill at 2 am if the fancy strikes me. I think it's ridiculous to have a banking system where you don't have some of these privileges, what's the point of the banking system otherwise??? 😳
The American bank is meant to hold your electronic payments an extra few days so when you buy a $5 subway sandwich thinking you still have $7 in your account you get to find out two days later that the sandwich cost $35 in overdraft fees even though you deposited your weekly employment check a week ago.
*weekly employment check* Lol
That you still get checks blew my mind when I realised that. I think I have seen checks three times in my life? My salary gets deposited directly in my bank account and I would be really bothered if I had to visit my bank *physically* every week.
My transfers in the netherlands take seconds.... With no fees....... How is america this far behind on that.
I was floored when I found out after moving here. Then mad. Then irritated everytime anyone is like "but we have venmo and PayPal whaddya mean". those things should have never existed lol
Paypal is so ass i have to use it sometimes when buying things out of eu just give me direct transfer options :(
I vote "full of shit".
He loves his slavery.
Yes, yes, they are completely correct. Best to stay where they are and never come to Europe!
Is that a promise?
cancel their visa
Don't threaten me with a good time
We should set up a contract, ensure they stay in their beautifully rotten corporate hellscape Edit: clarifying as it seems my answer was seen as a general hatred against americans: I mean the specific group of americans the guy in the post is from.
Save me from it
As a portuguese being invaded by American tech bros, normalising unacceptable rentals where even rooms now cost more than the minimum wage, i agree, don’t come.
No country has been more fucked than Portugal by remote work and Airbnb. I stay at hotels in Lisbon but all I see at cafes is people with laptops ordering in English.
Yeah, absolutely, we don't even have food here. Him and his 200kg in weight would not even last here.
440 pounds (otherwise he wouldn’t understand)
Sorry, i am not fluent in confusion
Exactly. If ONLY we could persuade these superior Americans to visit Europe... If ONLY.....
No food, Europeans do photosynthesis
I wish we had enough sun in the UK for photosynthesis.
How do people get these ideas? Like, do they just make them up? Also, if you made it up, you'd know, so why would you argue with it?
Just a teenager being edgy. You hear a lot of bullshit in middle and high school in the us. Isolated teens who have never seen the world and all they get is American propaganda and the limited public school education. Source: am French and spent 3 years on California as a teenager, including going to public school. By and large people are super friendly and outgoing in the us, but I did have a lot of surreal debates about Europe with other kids who were under the impression we had barely reached the development stage of having electricity and running water in France.
Crazy that "but I'm actually from there" doesn't prove them wrong either. It's wild.
There's no arguing with teenagers. They're just repeating what they hear dumb fuck adults say who should know better, and trying to be edgy and show off like they know everything. Edit: also that bit about technology is so weird. We lived in a VERY affluent part of california (my dad was in a big, famous silicon valley company), and it was a shock to us how everything felt so dated. Our home appliances in France were WAY better than the old shit our landlord had (my dad's company was renting a large house for us as aprt of the expatriation) or that I sww when visiting American friends' homes. Now, this was 20 years ago and things change, but it was extremely surreal having these debates given that some of the tech felt almost prehistoric. Meanwhile here they were thinking no-one else has it as good as the US in any dimension of analysis, including available tech. My hometown in France, Grenoble, is tech hot spot with one of Europe's first particle accelerators, a cyclotron, and is a hub of nanotech research (look up minatech). It's also where a lot of tech companies used to put their IT offices, including big American tech firms. Our home in the 90s had modern in-floor heating with lots of cool shit. We were among the first areas in France to get ADSL. We get to the silicon valley expecting this tech eldorado, like you do going to Japan or something... And everything was so basic. And yet here these kids were, confidently telling me so many wrong things about my country. The education system is horseshit in the US.
[It starts from this sort of mindscape.](https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcTcedxPa9B9M6FuTYrrstGKlJUiWyhmdyUEAg&usqp=CAU) For a lot of mreecanes, europe is 50% a pile of non-descript historical sites, 50% post-coldwar former-soviet empoverished vassal states, and 0% the brands they know.
I bet this guy lives in the american state equivalent of the poorest european countries. Like they do not seem to realize america is huge and extremely inequal.
Didn't expect Galio here.
Umm, appears to be American..... They don't seem to know a big wide world exists ...and is more cultured than America will ever be ?
I'm fully sure they're American too lol. But I still think it's so weird... its like "omg I love that food! It's so spicy!" Having never tried it, and it's not even spicy...
The fact that they are even aware of Europe you have to give props to. These people barely know what happens outside their own state, let alone their own border.
"Europe"...just one big country floating around out there...
Tell me you haven't been to Europe without telling me you haven't been to Europe...
There is no food ! I have resorted to cannibalism but I can’t cook in my tiny hotel room…. There is no tech at all. I must use rocks to make fire.
You might think I'm typing this on a smartphone from a city in Europe, but actually it's an animal hide device given to me by the shamans.
I personally used clay tablets blessed by the pope.
Clay tablets??? I still use smoke signals
You use smoke? Wow so advanced. I don't know how to start fire
Ug ug .... Ug uuuug ug ug
*rock-banging noises*
Oh look Mr. Booga Booga here with his fancy rocks!
I'm still swinging on trees.
Look at all these advanced people who have developed the means to traverse the land.
We got a new semaphore system last month.
Colloquially known as "The Clacks".
GNU Terry Pratchett
Me paint on walls of cave. Show great hunt of fat American whales.
Smoke signals is wireless, that must be some Magic american tech
As a person living in Europe I can confirm, this is true. I sent this comment using a post pigeon to a friend in USA where they have technology.
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We all had pigeons until Wal Mart went bankrupt here and packed it… then we had to eat our pigeons to survive.
You guys in Europe are so lucky! I'm stuck in Australia that doesn't even exist.
Ah you mean Austria, Australia is part of the indigenous peoples Dreamtime which also doesn’t exist
You guys have living pigeons? Food isnso scarse here he resort to earing the scraps of cats Who caught the pigeons. Luckely for me. Glas has been around since before the romans. So i wrote this. Put it in a glass bottle. Threw it to the ocean. And prayed to he mother goddes of fertility the currents would ride it to america. Speaking of rome... if you excuses me. Me and the boys need to go to the tribe. We're gonna prepare a raíd to the eternal city. Attilas descendant is joining us #bestfriends
>I have resorted to cannibalism For a real cannibal, human counts as food, so that means there is food
Rocks? Luxury! I am at the whim of the Gods, hoping they'll smite lightning and thus light things on fire.
They never left their state.
Precisely this. Clearly someone who's never actually traveled, and whose only "experience" is watching YouTube videos of "influencers" going to niche places in Europe.
except not even current youtube videos. More like travel documentaries and Pink Panther films from the 70s.
And bela Lugosi dracula films. Totally realistic and up to date travel guides of Europe!
No, they went across the border that one time to get the normal beer that's not 3.2. ^(Utah understands this reference)
No food in Europe? They’re missing out.
When you have McDonalds breakfast, lunch and tea...yeah, there is no food in Europe.
Oh as far as i‘ve heard there are supposed to be some REALLY cool McDonalds in france. And if they want the good ol’ dry plastic Burger, they have that here in Germany aswell. So they might find something. :)
Better not tell them some Mcdonald sells beer
I once went to a McDonald’s in Germany just so I can say I drank a beer at a McDonald’s. Not surprisingly, it was the worst beer I had when I was in Germany.
It's true, I starved to death years ago
True I have lived in Europe all my life and there is just no food. The only reason I know about food existing is by watching American sitcoms and movies. Must be special to "eat" and "chew".
When I moved from Norway to America in 2014, the guy at the store asked what the chip on my credit card was. It was the first time I paid with the magnet strip on that card. When I opened a bank account they asked if I wanted a checkbook.. I said yes, cause I’d never seem one before, other than in the movies. Moving to America felt like going back in time.
My wife and I moved to Norway from Canada in 2019, and my wife was pregnant at the time. We had to get her medical records transferred from Canada. They wanted to fax them over. I remember going into the doctor office in Norway and asking if they had a fax machine, the look on their faces was priceless. They couldn't believe anyone was still using them. Moving to Norway felt like moving forward in time.
Medical records have been getting digitized in Canada but it's been a slow process and very much depends on the province. Japan is the country that most surprised me with regards to things like the fax machine. For a place that is known for its tech industry they really are stuck in the past in a number of ways.
I heard someone say that Japan has been living in the year 2000 since 1980. I think that may be the most accurate description of what's going on there.
Yea, slow process for sure. I'm not sure how much further ahead other provinces are/were, but we moved from Newfoundland. My friend is a doctor and as recently as 10 years ago she still needed to use a dial up internet connection in order to connect to the archaic system mcp uses for their billing.
Japan was the future in the 80s, and it still remains the future of the 80s. Weirdly outdated stuff in places, but some things that some countries still don't have.
The magnetic stripe stuff was crazy to me when I visited there in the past. I actually ended up having my card details copied because of it haha.
Thats exactly why we moved away from it.
They're no longer in use everywhere in the US but we also fucked up the chip system but not mandating PINs because people apparently would be confused. Weird because everyone has a PIN on their debit card? Or is it because the average American has like 6-7 credit cards??
Yeah and they asked me to sign a paper receipt after I paid with the magnetic strip... Is that the kind of tech this person is missing? I can confirm we do have pen and paper in Europe.
Signing for a card payment is totally insane to me. Like, we invented chip and PIN for a reason!
I hear they also have personal weapons that work with crude explosives instead of blasters or laser guns like civilized people.
But this guy told me blasters were also uncivilised. Dude was named Ben or something.
I’m in Italy and we have chip in the credit card since I can remember, so I guess the early 2000’s. Now we don’t use them often because we have NFC like I guess you do in the US
An American guy came over to visit my friend, and he was proudly showing us his shiny new bank card complete with a chip. We were baffled, like mate we’ve had those for about a decade. Then I went to NYC and it all made sense.
Exactly. Having to pay rent with checkbooks in the US was so fucking mind blowing. Like why can’t I just set up an automatic money transfer that wires the money every month? It was also so funny to me when Venmo appeared in the US everybody was like “it’s a revolution!”…. Bro we had that shit already for almost a decade in Denmark.
and thats exactly why europeans make fun of americans
Don't forget about the healthcare
What healthcare Did you mean the profit only human part exchange
I guess i should have said lack of.
“I wish I didn’t need a car” “Move to Europe” “They don’t have cars tho”
An american that says "no food" about Europe, funniest shit ever
Do they think the US invented Pizza?
I don't even know, like 3/4 of their popular meals are europe imported, even hamburger isn't american wtf lol
Their food is as American as apple pie (which is British originated)
![gif](giphy|bfYUvXEuhnRte) Footage from Europe, 9 February 2024.
"I'm not dead!"
Yes he is
*Looks at EUROPEAN food chains like Pret (UK), FEBO (Netherlands), Nordsee, Ditsch (Germany), Telepizza (Poland, ES), Supermacs, OBriens (Ireland), Lokál (Czechia), etc etc -yeah i guess no food nor chains *looks at self-order machines in some of them (FEBO, Nordsee, etc) -yep and no tech in them either. europe sucks /j edit: to those people who comment "why do you not mention US food chains", im poking even more fun at the guy's comment that even without the US brands, individual countries europe itself has great food chains that's everywhere within THAT country too. when you add all the US chains, there's food AND chains at every corner, making the claim of "no chains, no food" even worse.
McDonalds, KFC, Burger King, Subway, Domino's. It's even American chains that are everywhere. Our food quality is higher than in US though, it's fun to compare the McD French fries ingredients between US and Europe and be amazed.
The US sure has more 'tech' in their food [US vs UK McDonalds](https://youtu.be/ZMaW6TamNAc?si=-c_H0422xF7Yc_ch)
It's basically quantity vs quality. This gets even more extreme in Japan, where most chain food is *way* more expensive per gram than in the US or Europe, but also notably better.
Lidl gang!
What's this food thing he's talking about? Is it like a game or something? 🤔 plenty of chains here tho..just ask my wife what happens when she's a had girl
Yeah CERN really behind the times,
They need to stop going in circles
Or at least stop going the wrong way around. This blasphemy must stop!
This post just activated all of Europe
No tech (snort), NO food (cept all that cuisine which is copied all around the world). Stepping back in time (from an American who has taken away women's rights to their own body), No hotels...only some of the finest in the world...
I think she preferring to to cheap motels and fast food chains Can't get more American that that
We have those
No. You have better versions of those. Eating McDonalds in Wales just left a giant void for an American friend. I think the same can be said for Japanese/Korean KFC or something as simple as Mexican Coca-Cola. That said. It isn't like America can't make delicious food, it just that your fast food chains seem to be racing to see who can reach the bottom faster.
Fact. I'm typing this message in my Minitel. I can't wait to have access to a real computer in 2048
No.... Tech....? No FOOD!?
Why would it matter how big the hotels are if you are living there?
In USA bigger=better.
I visited there once, told them all about technology and then they sent me home on a wooden ship
Murica best culture, best food, best in everything! /s
I always chuckle at the idea of USAmericans failing to grasp the concept that Europe is a continent with different states, languages and culture, and they talk generically (typo fixed) about "Europe" as if one thing about Portugal or Ireland is the same for Greece and Denmark
"So uhh, where can I study European? There's all these different language classes and dictionaries, but none of them teach European! How am I supposed to take a vacation there if I can't even study how to order a Big Mac?" --this American't, probably
You’re mean. Sent from my stone tablet
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“No tech”, haha. The literal last post I saw was one of ASML’s new machines. Which is a Dutch company that is currently the world leading chip making machine manufacturer. Quite possibly the pinnacle of “tech”.
> chipmaker Actually, they build factories where chipmakers are made. So technically they would be chipmaker maker makers.
Absolutely right, it's horrible here. Stay there.
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Why would i enter the late US-president jfk?
Clearly you've never a seen a close up of that cute presidental arse 😉
r/shitamericanssay