ADAPTED FROM THE ARCHIVES
26 MAY 2017

So I did a five-and-a-half month stint in Orlando, Florida at Walt Disney World, where I recorded a few things I noticed or found interesting about America*. Here they are:

*Note that I've primarily lived in Singapore and Australia and can only offer up my opinions in that context.

Getting around
Driving/walking on the right side instead of the left. This is an obvious one. I found myself walking on the right even after I returned to Australia, which confused myself and the pedestrians around me.

Walking around by myself. Hmm. Not sure what I meant by this, but perhaps I noticed it a lot more that I was travelling around by myself more frequently, instead of with family or friends.

Traffic/road rules. One rule I can recall faintly is that vehicles could turn on a red signal in some cases. The first few times it happened, I was quite taken aback.

In Singapore and in Australia, all cars are legally required to have car plates at the front and back of the car. Most, if not all, cars in Orlando only had car plates at the back. The first couple of cars I saw that did not have car plates at the front, and I thought, "Wow, people must really like stealing car plates here".

Communication style
It is inevitable in the process of communication that you learn about the other person. However, what I noticed in my conversations with Americans while working in Walt Disney World (Americans came from all over the country to work there), is that communication was not so much a mutual exchange of information, but it was where two parties sequentially offered information about a topic, bouncing their ideas/thoughts off of each other, but without direct acknowledgement that the other had said anything relevant at all.

As a result, I had to learn to be a little narcissistic, and to talk about myself more. I noticed that this type of conversation occurred in Australia too (as compared to Singapore, where conversations occur by asking the other questions, then an acknowledgement and a little commentary is offered). In America, though, I found that 90% of the time, not much "conversation" occurred unless I started talking about myself to the other person.

We learn at a young age that when someone says "Thank you", you should say "You're welcome". However, I think that people in Singapore and Australia generally do not practice this way of speaking. We usually say "No problem" or "All good". Imagine to my surprise when I thanked my colleagues/friends in America, and they actually said "You're welcome" to me! I think we generally associate "You're welcome" with sarcasm, insincerity and sometimes when we do say it, we mean it as a joke. But these Americans were certainly saying it straight-faced, without an ounce of insincerity or sarcasm.

Money
An aspect of American culture widely portrayed in popular media and culture is tipping. I was under the impression that I had to tip everywhere I went, but found out that tipping was only applicable for restaurant-type services (i.e. not fast food chains), or personal service (e.g. taxis). The 'market rate' while I was America was 18% if you thought the service was average, and around 20% if you really liked the way they served you. Anything less than 18% meant you thought the service was bad, though you would still tip regardless. I was also pleasantly surprised to find that, if you were paying with card, you could specify the % amount of the bill you'd like to give as tip, thus saving you any tricky mental calculation business.

As with quite a few other countries, e.g. Japan, the amount you see on the tag is not necessarily the amount you will end up paying at the counter as there is still to be tax added on. I found this annoying, especially when paying with cash, as I would always be fumbling with my money, instead of coolly giving them the right amount.

Food
Ah, food, always an interesting topic.

I'd never seen white eggs before, and I mean white. I thought they were bleached, but it turns out America has a type of chicken that produces white eggs. In fact, the light brown eggs I was so used to seeing were rarer and more expensive in America.

This one I knew of beforehand, but I was still boggled by the fact that there was so much sugar in everything! Particularly in bread, one of the things I would've thought did not need sugar. I would have to pick up each loaf of bread, read the ingredients for sugar and all its variants (brown sugar, maple syrup, molasses etc.), then after repeating 3-4 times, I would finally find a wholegrain variety that did not have any sugar. What a weird world we live in.

I'm a little sad I can't remember this fully. But I noted down in 2017 that America has great fast food. I'm used to soggy bread and lukewarm meat, but both the bread and meat are tasty in American fast food.

Another thing I noted down was that "it's not American if it doesn't come in small packaging in large packaging". What an environmentalist's nightmare!

And so 2.5 years later, thus ends my list of observations while living in America!