Cultural diferences...

Regarding the alcohol. I have been in country in which alcohol is not allowed, because of religion. But do not thing that all citizens do not drink alcohol, because that's not truth. In USA it's forbidden to drink or buy alcohol if you are not 21 years old. If you look younger then you have to prove your age with ID. But as I was an european country, I wouldn't mention it . I saw 15 -16 years old boys and girls drinking beer stright from the bottle. 1,5 litter bottle. That's only an example.
During the Ramadan in arabic countries it's not allowed to eat during the day until it's said so. You cannot eat, drink ,chew the chewing gum on the street. It's forbidden. It's whole month. Even if you are foreigner you are not excused. Restaurants are not working during the day time.
As I look about the cultural diferences I just remember that americans eat sandwiches for lunch comparison with french people who turned whole lunch as a ritual with a bottle of wine, nice food and nice converation with a friend.
May be there is something called globalization the culture, but I think about the unique of the places and people.

Alcohol abuse is a major problem in the UK, guys.....mostly by people 18 to 25 or so, and on a "bingeing" basis for the most part. I reckon you know that already.

Weekend nights in many towns and cities regularly see young people pouring out of the pubs and clubs, many of them nissed as pewts and making the local constabularies really work for their dosh.

Here in the UK the legal drinking age is 18 everywhere, but it's far from unknown for off licenses (as we call stores/shops which sell alcohol for consumption off the premises, unlike our pubs, inns, hotel bars, etc) to sell booze to people who are clearly under 18, very much against the law, but Britkids are mostly very streetwise and always find ways and means of getting their hands on booze.

Shopkeepers who are found to sell alcohol to underagers are prosecuted, and have their licenses withdrawn, as do publicans (people running pubs) who knowingly sell booze at the bar to people who are clearly blootered, but practice and theory often conflict with each other, and British pubs are generally very crowded and hectically busy especially at weekends, and bar staff don't have much time to weigh up the possible ages of people standing there at the bar clutching a tenner in their hands eager to be served.

British pubs are not just places where people go to drink, to either get blootered for the sake of it or to seek out a possible lay for the night - they are very social places in all sorts of ways, and the hub of conviviality for the most part, not only for social discourse, but also to go to have full scale meals or just a snack.

Brits on the Continent don't have too much of a problem in this respect as European bars come at least a wee bit close to the British pub scene -but still not with anything like the same atmosphere as back in Blighty (as Brits refer to the UK when abroad). In America it's a different situation altogether, and it seems that that's one of the reasons Brits in the USA feel so homesick - they really miss the British pub scene, be it a crowded city centre theme pub, or the convivial, cosy village pub with cosy bars, cosy chats and cosy laughs with the locals, cosy chats with mates discussing cosy business deals or cosy love trysts, cosy bar meals, cosy dart boards, cosy giant plasma screens showing cosy football games, cosy roaring log fires, cosy outdoor gardens with cosy well trimmed lawns covered with cosy sunshaded tables and benches overlooking a cosy duck pond and a cosy village green complete with cosy cricket pitch, and cosy roses and cosy ivy covering the 17th century cosy front walls of the cosy Dog and Duck or the cosy Slug and Lettuce (yes, there are loads of Slugs and Lettuces across the land - in England mainly). Here in Scotland we are more like to have a cosy Duke of Sutherland or a cosy Hole in the Wall or a cosy Poosie Nancies or a cosy Muscular Arms or even (in Glasgow) a cosy Rubiyat of Omar Khayyam

Some bar staff in pubs are very vigilant over the minimum age issue (18 here, remember) and although I am now 26 it was only last year, in London, that I was challenged over my age by the barman when I gave him my order at the bar of a pub in Putney High Street. I didn't know whether to kiss him or lamp him! That's when student cards (which I still possess) or student rail cards, complete with DOB come in useful (which I still have but which becomes invalid when I hit 27 next April).

The UK does not have official ID cards at the present time, unlike most other EU countries, but they will be foisted on us soon complete with all the latest recognition technology.....another EU directive. I have no problem with that at all.

Americans seem to have a problem with drinks at lunchtime....deeply frowned on by all accounts. They should see the crowded wine and bistro bars in places like the City of London (the financial district) or the area around Canary Wharf, also in London (largest commercial area in Europe where I have worked twice), or all along Rose Street, here in Edinburgh, in the city centre. ;-) But restraint and common sense are the key words here - there is absolutely no doubt at all that here in the UK if it's evident that alcohol in any way interferes with your work you are in dead trouble, big time. Employers will not tolerate it, so for the most part a glass of wine or a half pint of lager with your bar meal at lunchtime is the absolute limit for most people.

What you do after work, when you and your work colleagues drop into the Gordon Highlander or the Quill and Pen or the Cheshire Cheese on your way home is your business alone! As long as you're clear headed for work the next morning.

<<Americans seem to have a problem with drinks at lunchtime....deeply frowned on by all accounts.>>

Of course, to some extent this is due to our innate Puritanism about drink, but it's also to a large extent due to our medical set-up: if someone who's been drinking gets hurt on the job, the employer--in one guise or another--is responsible for the medical bills. And if a customer somehow gets hurt by something a drunk employee does, the company is subject to litigation.

At my workplace--and presumably most others--even the smell of alcohol on the breath is subject to an immediate alcohol test; guilty parties are subject to immediate dismissal. There seems to be no leeway on the issue at all.

LAURA: " I dropped my wallet at the same bus. I just got lost all my documents ID, Driver licence. With trembling voice I went and I asked if he had found my wallet. He had found it ... not only that but he gave it to lost and found place where I can find it all...

For example if you go to Paris and you visit Notr Dam de Pari (or howerver frenchmen called it) you will read in front of the door . Be aware that there are pickpockets. OK. I went there trying to concentrate and to pray but instead of that I thought only about if someone is not going to steal my wallet"

Very interesting observation, Laura. It might set to rest some stereotypes about the US being a crime-infested hellhole. Thank you for sharing it with us.

By the way, your observations in this thread are absorbing. I do hope you continue with them.

This one who is faithfull in small things is faithfull in big things. So it doesn't matter culture, language, religious, education.The question is 'how do you react if you find something on the street'. There shouldn't be compromise at all. If you are faitfhfull in small thing you will be faithfull in big things. It's not a matter of 'you have ' or 'not have'. It's a matter of culture, education, moral values. I do not talk about Les Miserable. Jasper , I could share my experiance being here and there. I have met good people everywhere.

I just laugh at myself, because of controversal post which I have made.

It's high summer time in Scotland although from the weather we have been having in the UK this past season you wouldn't think so, but never mind.

Summertime in Scotland, far more so than in any other part of the UK, we suffer badly from tiny wee insects called midges. They are found in their millions in rural areas in particular, especially close to lying water - and believe me, nowhere in Scotland is far from lying water.

However, these tiny we creatures can also be found in parks and open space areas in cities, such as this one, Edinburgh, and if it is warm and still and humid thay are a nightmare if you have lots of exposed skin. They are no bigger than a pinhead but they are so irritating you feel you want to jump right into the nearest Loch to escape the wee bastids.

My question is this - are they the equivalent of the American chiggers? Scottish midges pose no threat to health whatsoever - it's just that they do bite and attempt to guzzle up some of your blood and in a swarm they could drive you crazy.

http://www.wyrdology.com/edinburgh/midges/index.html

:-) Damian. I cannot believe that you know about chiggers; there are many Americans that don't know about them, being confined for the most part to the Southern States.

They're tiny little red bugs that get under your skin and itch like Hell; they're associated with meadows, however, not still water, so I would doubt that they're the same critter.

Damian, you ought to come out here to Reno for one summer. We have 29-30 days of sun each month and almost no bug problem at all. Although it does get quite hot during the day, at night it cools down into the 50s. To coin a cliche, this is "God's country" in the summer. ;-)

***you ought to come out here to Reno for one summer. We have 29-30 days of sun each month***

What bliss. We have 29-30 days of sun each of the four seasons ;-)
Bit of an exaggeration but it's virtually impossible for anywhere in the UK to have a Nevada amount of sunshine in any month. I checked some UK weather records (I'm always checking out facts of all kinds in my job as accuracy and detail are paramount) and the sunniest month on record in the UK since 1900 (official UK weather records began in 1659 apparently) was July 1911 when both Eastbourne and Hastings, on the Sussex coast in Southern England, recorded 384 hours of bright sunshine in the month - that's an average of 12.4 hours per day - not bad for the UK!

Such sunny months are exceedingly rare in Britain.

Scotland would never attain such a high sunshine total in a month. Our Scottish record is the 304 hours recorded at Dunbar, on the South East coast of Scotland, just due east of here, in June 1959. That works out at just over 10 hours per day on average.

A summer temperature of +30C in Scotland is considered a very hot day indeed, and amazingly some of the places right up in the Highlands have been known to get up to that figure in certain weather situations in summer, and down to -25C on extreme winter nights above a deep snow cover, such as at places like Braemar and Altnaharra.

It was an American (from Louisiana) who told me about chiggers - after he had been almost half eaten by Scottish midges on the shores of Loch Lomond not so long ago.

I love Reno (,Sacramento and Tucson).

Oh, I remember chiggers from being a kid in Virginia. Evil little minions of Satan. Sadly, I also remember fireflies ("lightning bugs") from Virginia ... haven't seen a firefly in decades. (Sniff.) I used to catch them in a glass jar and use them as a lantern. I remember their distinctive smell, too....

Chiggers bite but don't fly, and if I remember correctly they are more like ticks or spiders than true insects. If you want to find flying AND biting insects in North America, may I suggest mosquitoes or blackflies....

I'm from Michigan, but I lived in Texas for awhile, so I know about chiggers.

We don't have chiggers here, but we do have tiny bugs here that we call no-see-ums, which are tiny gnats, that may be similar to a midge.

We have fireflies here, too. I see some every night in the summer.

"that we call no-see-ums"

lol.

I've heard no-see-ums before, too. I can't remember if there were fireflies in New York, but if you have them in Michigan, I bet there were. I haven't seen them anywhere out west, though.