1y ago

What's a skill that's taken for granted where you live, but is often missing in people moving there from abroad?

I was thinking about that when I was dropping my 6 year old off at some hobbies earlier - it's pretty much expected to have learned how to ride a bicycle before starting school, and it massively expands the area you can go to by yourself. When she went to school by bicycle she can easily make a detour via a shop to spend some pocket money before coming home, while by foot that'd be rather time consuming.

Quite a lot of friends from outside of Europe either can't ride a bicycle, or were learning it as adult after moving here, though.

edit: the high number of replies mentioning "swimming" made me realize that I had that filed as a basic skill pretty much everybody has - probably due to swimming lessons being a mandatory part of school education here.

493 comments

Winter driving and shoulder season driving. Snow, ice, black ice, freezing rain, slush, hydroplaning, driveway clearing, walkway maintenance, windshield scraping, and keeping an emergency kit for breakdowns. Stuff like that.
- Or driving in general. As an American who didn't get a driver's license until I was 21 (gasp! so old) due to some reasons, I can attest that many, many people here simply can't comprehend the idea of someone over 17 or so not having one. I got turned away from a hotel once because they didn't know how to use a passport as an ID.
  The only other people I've met with this problem were immigrants. And we were always able to bond over lamentations of how difficult it is to solve this problem... the entire system to get a license here is built around the assumption that everyone does it in high school, so every step of the way is some roadblock like "simply drive to your driving test appointment"...
  
  As an American who didn't get a driver's license until I was 21 (gasp! so old)
  I'm now 41, never made a license - there wasn't really much of a need until now. I can get anywhere I want with a combination of bicycle and public transport.
  
  I moved to the USA and then Canada as an adult. I had never needed to learn to drive in my home country because there were decent buses and trains. But you really can't function easily in North America without driving a car, so I had to learn and start polluting like everyone else. It's not a good setup.
- This right here is a big one. I live in a college town in Minnesota and the students from out of state are absolute mennaces on the road in winter. My dad used to plow snow for one of the local universities. He had multiple students drive directly head on into his plow because they never cleared off any of their windshield before they started driving down the road. Luckily the snow plow tends to handily win in those situations and the plow trucks all had dash cams for exactly that reason.
  You also get the people who think they're invincible in the snow because they're driving a 4 wheel drive truck. Newsflash, 4 wheel drive doesn't mean you stop any better and it doesn't do much when you're on glare ice.
  Similarly people who haven't dealt with snow have no idea what to do when they do start sliding. So many people will just hit the brakes when they start to slide, which anyone who is familiar with winter driving should know that is the exact thing you never want to do.
  Snow tires are another big one. I drive a tiny crappy rear wheel drive pickup but as long as I have a good set of snow tires on it and a few sand bags in the bed of the truck, then it still out performs any other vehicle with all weather tires in the snow.
  
  I live in a ski town that caters to the Los Angeles crowd, and I feel you on all that. 4 wheel drive does not mean 4 wheel stop lol. We are lucky in that we don't get that permafrost y'all get up north, usually the roads dry out a few days after a snow storm so snow tires aren't mandatory up here. But the number of overconfident goofballs in the winter is way too high.
  The big one I can think of are snow rated tires, most people have plain old radials that don't do squat in snow. And then you have people that don't know which axle is their drive axle and that's always fun to watch. Thankfully I have a two door wrangler with all terrains that is a breeze to drive in snow, very rarely do I have to chain up.
- What's shoulder season driving?
  
  So it will snow at night but warm up during the day so you're dealing with icy conditions that have a layer of melt water on them. Or freezing rain that flash freezes at dusk to black ice. And so on.
  
  Fairly certain the shoulder here is referring to the season. The in-between fall and winter and winter to spring.
- Was a bit of a learning curve for me, having moved from subtropical Florida to Colorado the land of eternal winter. I bought a Subaru.
  
  I had an Uber driver in Florida last time I was there (business) and when he found out I was from Canada he told me he went to Boulder in the winter for a vacation and thought it would be cool to rent a car and drive up a mountain. Yeah, he was pretty freaked out by that driving experience. :)
  Good call on the Subaru. My wife had a couple and they were great in the snow. First car we ever had with heated seats, too!
- A few years ago I was stuck in a terrible traffic jam, five hours through ice and snow for a drive that should've been 50 minutes.
  A woman froze in her car in that jam, and since then I've made sure to always have a warm sleeping bag in the car.
  Also, heated side mirrors are so nice
- Something like two of the mates I grew up with can drive at all.
- One variant of this I encounter is driving in the rain. I moved to SoCal from NY, and everyone here freaks out when it so much as drizzles, and there is always insane traffic due to accidents upon any precipitation...

Speaking more than one language. Being from Switzerland, we're required to study 2 languages (+ our native one) at school. So it's not infrequent to encounter swiss people who speak 4+ languages
- In Germany it's also mandatory - but learning the language at school unfortunately doesn't necessarily mean you can speak it. LucasArts adventures contributed more to my language skills than my first English teacher. I'm always shocked about the lack of English skills in a lot of Germans when I'm back visiting. Rather surprisingly one of my uncles born in the 30s spoke pretty good English, though.
  We're now living in Finland - me German, wife Russian, we each speak to the kids in our native language, between each other English. So they're growing up with 4 languages.
  It's quite interesting to watch them grow up in that situation. When learning about a new historical figure my daughter always asks which languages they spoke - and few weeks ago she was surprised someone only spoke two languages. So I explained that some people only speak one language - she gave me a very weird look, and it took a while to convince her that I'm not just making a bad joke.
  
  Also Germany.
  I learned english in school but only enough to be able to read it.
  Once I started reading user submitted short stories (lile fan fics but different) my grammar really improved.
  Nowadays the content I consume is basically 90% english based.
  Just my capitalization and grammar structure sucks. Also my vocal skills as I have no one to talk to.
  But: I really have to thank my last Grundschul and Realschul english teachers. Without those two I may have never got into english that well.
  
  That's a point current generation children are actively working on by following English-speaking streamers, communicating in predominantly English Discords, etc. The worst: my kid chose to prefer American English. Where did I go wrong?
  
  Of course I know people that only speak one language.
  It’s me.
- In the UK I was given the option of German or French, but I wasn't taught very well, and could barely speak a few basic sentences after 5 years of schooling. If this is a common experience, as I believe it is, it results in a populace who speaks english only. (Obviously an issue exacerbated by the commonality of English on the internet and popular media)
  It blows my mind how inefficient my school must have been. Right now, I can't imagine learning something for 5 years and retaining nothing.
  
  I don't know that it's necessarily that it's "inefficient". Moreso that it's difficult for a language to actually stick and be useful if you're not immersing yourself in that language. You can go to class all you want, but if you're not trying to actively immerse yourself in it beyond class, you're not going to learn the language no matter how good the teacher is.
  It's relatively "easy" to immerse yourself in English language content because English has sort of become the "lingua Franca" of the modern world. Something like Polish, for example, isn't.
  
  Same with French here in Canada. I took French for six years and I still don't speak it at all, and I actually did really well in my French classes.
  
  It doesn't help that outside of school, you will never use that language. Even if you go abroad, everyone either wants to practice their English or thinks your French/German is so poor that they'd prefer to just speak English.
  
  I took Spanish for three years here in the States. Most of the Spanish I know now I learned after high school. This seems to be a pretty common problem in nations with English as the official language...
  
  and could barely speak a few basic sentences after 5 years of schooling
  Thanks to events earlier last century pretty much everybody at least in Europe/Russia can speak a few basic sentences, and is often more than willing to demonstrate: "Haende hoch!" (hands up), "Nicht schiessen!" (don't shoot) and a few others.
- Oddly it's actually very common (and required in some areas) in the US to study more than one language also. What is extremely uncommon are opportunities to use a second language, so very few people actually ever become fluent. It's a shame really.
  
  Exactly. Unless things have changed dramatically, one or two years of a foreign language is a requirement in high school, and there are more opportunities in lower K-12 these days from what I hear. However, you're right that this is not especially helpful without some immersion, and the practice of trading your kids to a foreign family for a year is far less common. Then, after K-12, opportunities to practice greatly diminish.
  The German mother of a good friend moved to the US West coast when she was a young adult, married, and had my friend. She never lost her German accent. When I was in my early 20s, I had the opportunity to live and work in Germany for a couple of years, and when I came back, I was fairly fluent - enough to pass as a native from a "different region." I visited my friend when I returned, and tried to have a conversation with her mother in German; she sadly informed me that she had forgotten most of her German, and could no longer converse... there are few opportunities to speak in German on the West coast, and even native language skills attrophy if unused.
  In a related annecdote, when I first returned to the states, I'd sometime fail to remember the English words for the odd thing, like "trash can." All I could remember was the German word for it.
  All thay has gone away. Years later, I can barely hold basic conversations in German. Maybe some people have an ability to retain language skills without practice, but I believe it's far more common to lose fluency you once had.
  
  It also has to do with the wide diversity of languages spoken. The elementary school where my kids go put out a statement during the pandemic that there are 32 different languages spoken by kids at home. They had gotten many requests for school communications in more than just English and Spanish, and had to explain why that wasn't feasible.
  So there are a ton of bilingual kids in their school, but my kids could learn the 4 additional languages spoken by the kids in their classroom, and the following year they would need to learn 4 entirely new languages. They learned to count to ten in several languages, but like you said, they will never have the opportunity to become fluent if they don't go somewhere less heterogenous.
- Only speaking one language fluently makes me feel like garbage regularly, none of my schooling really stuck and I can never commit to language or feel enough confidence to use anything I do learn.
  
  Found the Brit/American/Australian? (Delete as appropriate)
  
  I believe firmly that anyone can do it. You just need to find community and a good reason to keep going.
- I can speak a few languages, but only the one I speak right now is useful.
- In Sweden kids learn English from second grade and a third language from fifth grade.
  What really annoys me is how many programmers seem to expect us to only be able to understand one language. I much rather have the program made in English than to read a bad Swedish translation.
  
  As in non swedish programmers try to translate into Sweedish for you?
- Growing up in Australia I was required to learn a second language in years 7 and 8. All I can remember is how to say "and now cumshot" thanks to my friend and I finding his dad's porn collection.
- we’re required to study 2 languages (+ our native one) at school
  This is crazy to me. I studied French at school for years and got to a decent enough level, but then when I tried to take Spanish later on I couldn't deal with it. Maybe if they'd been concurrent it would've been a different story but I just couldn't keep the languages separate in my brain. Then years later when I moved to a different country the French pretty much left my head as a new language replaced it.
  I guess I've only got one "foreign language center" in my head and only one language can occupy it at any time.
  
  you need to keep using it. Watch a show or read a book in that language every once in a while. It'll do wonders to keep the brain on it.
  
  Keeping them separate is a struggle! Especially if they come from the same ancient language. I have troubles separating like German and English, and also Italian and French. Especially when I try to speak German, I end up throwing in lots of English words and structures

Knowing how to swim. Basic life skill in a water-rich country, but many expats can't.
- Surprisingly, many Irish don't know how to swim, even though it's an island.
  
  I can relate to this.

We learned swimming in primary school in Germany, no opting out.
But having lived in several African countries and now in China, it's surprising how many people not only can't swim, but are deathly afraid of water.
- If you can't swim, bring desthly afraid of water is a good survival instinct.
  After an incident of near-drowning as a toddler, my parents prioritized swimming lessons in my childhood. I can never remember not being able to swim. However, when I was in the military, there was a survival swimming section where you had to get in a pool with full clothing and a weapon, and swim a length. You were supposed to keep the weapon above water at all time. So you're doing a side-stroke with one arm holding a 7lb weight above water, in long-sleeved shirt and pants (I recall being grateful no boots or socks). Most of us California boys made it; lots of people didn't make it with the rifle the whole way, or tapped out without getting anywhere at all. The point is, near the end, when I was exhausted from fighting the water, and it was starting to get hard to keep my head above water, I felt an unexpected panic rising. I can easily believe that if it had gone on much longer, the panic would have taken over and years of swimming experienced would go out the window, and I'd have ended up thrashing futiliy in the water like the guys who dropped out at the start.
  Drowning is a singularly frightening experience.
  
  Crazy! I was drownproofed as an infant, and was a water baby my whole life. I joined the swim team in highschool and university. That swim test was stupidly easy if you knew how to backstroke. Just hold the weapon above the water in both hands, and kick. Your head will dip below the water, but will come right back out, so breathe then and exhale while your head is under the water.
  They made me do it side stroke as well. That was much harder, but I could have kept going for at least 200m (down and back 4 times.)
  I had no clue that us competitive swimmers have that much more endurance in the water than the average swimmer.
- One of my friends is 33 and she and her older sister can't swim. They grew up on a rural farm far away from any body of water. "Where would we have learned or practiced?" Over the years, I have learned that a lot of people in the US cannot swim, especially when they were poor as kids, even in major cities near water.
  
  One of my friends is 33 and she and her older sister can’t swim. They grew up on a rural farm far away from any body of water.
  Gen-X. Lived near a lake or ocean 80% of my life. Grew up poor. Swimming lessons were a costly luxury that didn't make the budget. Ever.
  
  (Un)surprisingly, the US had lots of public pools, but they got removed because of racism. Definitely affects everyone especially the poor with little means of travel. https://www.marketplace.org/2021/02/15/public-pools-used-to-be-everywhere-in-america-then-racism-shut-them-down/
  
  Ever indoor pool I've gone to in the UK has offered Swimming lessons. Not having natural bodies of water isn't a great excuse for basic swimming. Seems to just be a culture difference since everyone I know had lessons at an indoor pool as kids
  
  Typical for colored people
- Maybe that’s different from state to state. I grew up in Hessen but don’t remember having mandatory swimming lessons. I learned it mostly on my own so I don’t even have a „Seepferdchen“ and know a few people from NRW who don’t either. I remember there was the option to do it in school but not sure why I didn’t take it then.
  Either way, not being able to swim at all is pretty rare in Germany because going to the pool is a popular activity for kids here.
- Same in the US. Most schools do not have their own pool and swimming is not a required skill. Tons of people don't know how to swim here.
  
  Many schools in Germany also do not have their own pools. You will be transported on a bus to the closest one.
- For me it's not for a lack of trying. It just hasn't stuck I guess.
  
  I cannot understand how someone can not learn how to swim. Idk, it's like never learning to jump, or skip, or run?
  I know things get harder to learn when your brain isn't plastic and malleable (i still can't roll my Rs), but it's still strange and seems dangerous.

In Australia it's not just knowing how to swim but where to swim and when. A lot of tourists drown in the ocean here because they don't know how to read the waves / don't have an understanding of the local area.
- Never swam in an ocean, could you elaborate?
  
  As an Aussie what the person below has said is a big one here. We just call them rips. Basically if you just try to swim in them normally you won't go anywhere and will just make yourself tired. Same goes if you're caught in a rip and trying to get out. It can lead to people drowning from tiring out and going under. What you want to do is swim diagonally across the rip. Then you can go about your swim or swim safely back to shore. Another tip is if you don't know what a rip looks like then it can be hard to see them from the shore or while your in the water. They aren't waves.
  https://www.google.com/search?q=beach+riptide&tbm=isch&client=firefox-b-m&hl=en-GB&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwio2KnNkI6BAxWEamwGHV0UAmwQrNwCKAB6BQgBEK4B&biw=678&bih=708
  Another one I think people usually have issues with or you hear of a tourist going missing is swimming in water inland. This is more of an up north Aus thing. Basically if you can't see into the water your going to swim in them don't. Crocs like to hang out in that sort of water. Very easy to not see them at all.
  
  He must be referring to riptides. In some spots the water hits the beach as waves. In others nearby, the water gets pulled back into the ocean, and those are the spots you need to avoid.
  Then depending on the ebb and flow of the twice-daily tides, the riptides are stronger or weaker.
  There are ways to see where the riptides are, yet many people from my own coastal town are oblivious to these dangers. Inland/landlocked tourists are even more oblivious and vulnerable.
- If the internet has taught me anything, it's taught me to never swim in Australia. In freshwater, crocodiles will eat you. In the ocean, sharks and saltwater crocodiles will eat you.
  
  Also riptides will pull you out, small venomous fish will crawl up your urinary tract, volcanic gases will take away buoyancy from the water so you will sink (plus the poisonous gas will kill you). Oh, and the sun will give you cancer. That is, if you don't get bitten by a spider or snake in your hotel room before you even get to the waterline.
  Btw did I mention that basically the entire population is descended from criminals who were sent there as punishment?
- Swimming in Australia? Are you suicidal? Hell, even just being in Australia is a threat to life, if the internet is to believed. If it isn't animals that want to murder you in a painful way, it'll be plants or fire or plain water.
  
  Our first nation's people are one of the oldest cultures in the world which is really amazing if you consider just how harsh the country is to live in.
- Knowing where to swim is easy in Australia.
  You go to a beach patrolled by our awesome Surf Life Savers. Think like Baywatch, but they are real.
  The life savers put flags out in the safest area, and they keep an active watch in the area. You swim between the flags.
  No flags, no swim. Simples.
  
  i never been to australia. For me as a good swimmer even as a kid the flags at the balticbsea cost meant nothing. my sports club would regularly go for a camp at the balticbsea and the stronger the waves the more fun we kids had. With such a background that the flags are just a hint for old and unsporty people, it is easy to underestimate the ocean.
  
  A lot of people who don't grow up here don't know this though. I used to go on trips to the beach with my international student friends and they had no idea what those flags are and why you should swim between them.
- Riptides are scary shit. Even if you do know how to spot them, and what to do if they catch you. Thankfully my 42 year old ass brings a surfboard with me every time I go to the beach. I dunno if our beaches in SoCal are as dangerous as your beaches though.
  Even the beaches in Australia want to kill you!
  /j
- Recently had a similar discussian with an Australian-German who went to elementary in Australia and a German life guard and the "how" is certainly interesting as well. Apparently, you get drilled to crawl in Australia (which is just called "swimming") because that's the only style that's powerful enough to save your life in the face of strong ocean currents. Meanwhile, Germans start by learning the breast stroke in elementary because it's the most efficient/least tiring form of swimming and the most dangerous water scenario here is people swimming too far out into lakes in forests in the middle of nowhere with no life guards, so the no. 1 priority is stamina to get you back on shore.

In Ontario, it’s often swimming.
Lots of lakes here, children need to be taught to swim
- Dutchy here.
  Most, if not all, children learn to swim when they reach age five. Lots of water here, it’s pretty much a basic life/survival skill.
  
  That leads to a follow up question to people from different areas: Is swimming a regular part of school sports?
  I grew up in Germany with pretty much no lakes, and we had blocks of sports classes in the swimming pool from first grade - didn't make me a great swimmer, but I can go swim a bit in a lake without having to worry.
  Now we're in Finland (lots of lakes here), and also swimming classes take place from first grade.
  
  I had swimming as a subject from 7 years old in school here in NL.
  
  It used to be part of the school curriculum but it was often after most children had at least learned the basics in swimming classes.
  There’s dedicated swimming schools, run by swimming pools and overseen by the government.
- Same for Swiss. It's not normal that you can't swim here.

Italy.
Cooking, every foreign person I know eats 20x more takeout and fast food than I do.
- You remind me of chatting with a friend from Hong Kong and how surprised she was that I, as a young man, knew how to cook and did it for fun.
- I technically know how to, it just tests my patience a lot.
  
  The challenge for me has been finding dishes that you can split out the thinking in to nicely separated activities, rather than committing to everything in one go. Marinades and slow cooking are great for that.
  
  I tend to make multiple portions so it lasts me a few meal. Losing so much time every single meal seems crazy to me.
- Dude, you live in Italy, the food is amazing! That said, after a two week trip to Italy, my wife is a much better cook of Italian food now. ...In America.
- Guessing it's high income country, where I live eating out the most expensive option, but from what I gather about US for example there's a big eating out culture there and cooking at home can be a pure hobby for most of them
  
  I'm in the UK and in my mid 20s and I'd say anyone over 30 has learnt to cook at home to save money and 75% of eating out is due to just being out over mealtime or doing something specific like taking someone for dinner.
  I'd say I'm not a great cook. I enjoy following recipies and the presentation of food but generally I'd avoid cooking for anyone but my partner and closest friends because I don't feel good enough to cook for others. When I'm cooking for myself I generally make something quick and easy that would either impress nobody with its 2-3 ingredients or all comes from one packet, but that's less because I can't cook at all and more because we culturally don't care about food enough here and I'm gonna enjoy that pack of instant noodles with old spring onions just as much as a homemade curry because it's faster, I won't inevitably get the measurements just a bit wrong and I have a weak British palette.
  
  I’m from the US and moved to Germany. I’m still regularly surprised at how little Germans cook. Tbf, lunch is the big warm meal, so I get not cooking much during the week, but it’s very different from what I’m used to. Everyone seems to be surprised that Americans ime eat out less than Germans, so I don’t know if it’s just that I moved from a home cooking hotspot to a takeout hotspot.
  German takeout doesn’t make me feel nearly as shit as American takeout though, so that might be the real answer

In the dry SW US the answer is drink water when it’s 100F or worse 115F+. Having a half liter of water from the hotel for the half day mountain hike, or pounding a half gallon of ice water and throwing up five minutes later. Your body doesn’t tell you when you should drink, it tells you when you are already behind on drinking.
- This is no joke. Even experienced hikers won't bring enough water for their trek and will end up either being emergency heli-evac'd out or just plain die.
  
  I just carry a half gallon thermal jug with me all the time. Hiking or not. If my mouth feels the slightest bit dry, I need to drink more water. I tend to piss clear, or very pale yellow cause of this, but the upshot is that I was fine wandering around Anzo Borrego national park, and two of my friends (who thought that my idea of covering myself head to toe in jeans, a trench coat, and a trilby was a bad idea,) damn near got heatstroke. I basically threw my water at them when I noticed they weren't sweating anymore.
- This is a real killer. People have no idea and tend to overestimate the risk from wildlife and underestimate the risk from weather conditions and exposure. Far more people are killed by hypothermia caused by extreme heat or cold than anything else in North American wilderness areas.
  I've been part of my local SAR community here in Oregon for decades now and while we don't have to worry so much about the heat, what gets people here is the cold.
  If you are somehow lost or stuck in the high Cascades at night without adequate clothing or a heat source, you are in big trouble, especially if it rains or snows, both of which can and will happen even in the middle of summer.
  River crossings are also a big danger since the current is always much stronger than it looks and the water is near freezing and if you fall in and don't have dry clothes and it starts to rain and blow, you are fucked.

Dealing with winter. I live in the rural upper Midwest, where winter can hit -20 with whiteout blizzards, week-long power outages, and car-burying snowdrifts. I've seen too many people move here from warmer places and think "I guess I'll buy a warmer coat and a snow shovel", rather than "I should have a backup generator, a backup heat source, a few barrels of spare fuel, a month's worth of stockpiled food, and at least two different pieces of heavy snow-moving machinery tested to be in good working order".
- I had a friend visit from London, (the real one, not one of the many towns in the US) in February one year. I warned him he needed heavy winter gear. I picked him up in Indianapolis. He deboarded the plane in a track suit. I pulled the car as close as I could to the terminal, and he made a mad dash for the car as I loaded his luggage. I asked him if he had any heavy winter gear, and he replied, "I'm wearing it!"
  Off to Walmart we go then, I pulled up right next to the door and let him dash inside. Parked the car. Found him bewildered and lost in the women's clothes section. Took him over to the hunting and sports section to get him a real coat, and coveralls. He was much happier when he left Walmart, and asked me why I didn't warn him.
  I just asked him what he thought it meant when I told him it was -26° C
  He said he thought I was exaggerating. SMH
  
  Apparently there have been issues when US and British forces have worked together before du to the "I thought you were exaggerating" mindset.
  The brits have a tendency to downplay really bad situations to the point where, "It's actually quite chilly" means "We're in deep shit". I read somewhere that this caused serious miscommunications several times, because Americans didn't understand that brits were downplaying things, while brits though the Americans were always exaggerating.
- week-long power outages
  Out of curiosity. How do you deal with week long power outages? I'm assuming you mean in the winter.
  I'm in Eastern Ontario. We're on well water and septic. We also have very dodgy power lines out here (supposedly the lines are over provisioned in this area and high wind days can cause overloads of some kind).
  We have a portable generator as well as a wood stove.

Here in Switzerland the question you ask is usually, "do you ski or do you snowboard"? It's just assumed that you can do at least one.

How to walk on ice is a big one. How to cross a street is another one here in Chicago (hint: look at the cars, not the lights).
- For the ice one you mean taking a running start, sliding on it, and yelling weeeeeeeee... Right?
  
  Just like crossing a street.
  
  I didn't, but that's another learned skill in this category, yes.

I guess here in Korea it's eating with chopsticks. In Sweden it was Swimming (especially for my Indian work mates). In Germany it was opening a beer bottle with anything you just happened to have in your hand at that time. In Poland I'm not sure, but probably making those elaborate sandwiches for parties.
- Is the chopstick thing a dexterity issue? I'm so more inclined for chopsticks that, if eating alone, I'll use the other ends of my silverware like chopsticks (and I'm not a part of any chopstick culture).
  
  I dont think it's so much an overall dexterity issue just a practice issue. Someone who doesn't regularly use chopsticks might have really high hand dexterity but they just haven't practiced that finger coordination. I.e. its easier to teach an athlete a new sport but a football players gonna have to practice to play hockey well.
  The most common mistake I see with infrequent chopstick users is overgripping and a low grip. If you squeeze too hard it not only fatigues your hand but it actually makes them harder to control, same for choking up on them. If feels more secure but it actually gives you worse control. For any one wondering a high grip and only as tight as you'd hold a pen should make it easier to use chopsticks.
- Yeah, opening a beer (or other bottpe with a capped lid) is a very cool skill to have (one which I haven't really mastered since I drink beer very, very infrequently).
  
  I feel that. Always makes me feel like a failed German lol
- In Germany it was opening a beer bottle with anything you just happened to have in your hand at that time.
  This goes for Denmark too.
  
  Used to be the case in Switzerland, now most beer bottles have a twist-to-open cap that still looks like a normal beer bottle cap.

If the country is big enough (aka Canada) these differences can be between provinces. People from Ontario can't ride bulls, but every kid in Alberta can. Newfoundlanders can fish but Manitobans are afraid of water. In British Columbia you are taught how to roll marijuana cigarette in high school but in Nova Scotia scotch is the bag lunch drink of choice.

Southern Georgia, USA.
This is more of a regional rationalization about occasional weather hazards. Here in coastal Georgia, we get snow from time to time, about a half an inch to two inches once every three to five years. There's a lot of people from colder climates that move here for work or retirement; they hear "a possible light dusting of snow" on the news or from a weather app and think that means nothing. Where they're from it's just normal, happens every year and there's often more. They'll even laugh at us for shutting down the schools and staying home from work for freezing rain. Here's the thing: no one here knows how to drive in snow and will likely only see black ice a dozen times in their lifetime. Further, we have no salt/sand trucks, we have no plows, we have zero civic infrastructure to meant to deal with our very occasional ice storm or light snow. It happens so infrequently that there's no way to justify spending taxpayers' money to prepare in that way for those kinds of situations. So we shut down the schools and most businesses for a day or so and everyone mostly stays home. We're not necessarily unprepared for winter weather, we just prepare in a different way that makes sense for the situation.

Just misunderstanding social cues. Where I live (Spain), there's a script you're supposed to follow for certain things and newcomers, understandably, don't understand the script. One famous example is buying new clothes. They all look great on. The idea here is that the poor person spent their hard-earned money on the new clothes. Damned right they look great on! Another would be birthdays celebrated in public venues. Perhaps someone you know is celebrating their birthday in a public venue and you had no idea they were celebrating their birthday on that day. You walk up to them and wish them a happy birthday, BUT you were not invited to this celebration. Since you weren't invited you did not come prepared with a present for the birthday person. The safe thing to do is to ignore, socialize with the people you came with, and make like that person isn't even there until they approach YOU. When and if they approach you, you make pretend you're all distracted and you have to be like, "Ahhh! I didn't see you! What's up?" The reason: that person is buying all the invitees the drinks and food. In exchange, the invitees have brought presents. It's a very nuanced and weird situation all of us have encountered. We err on the fear of not having brought a present because we had no idea because we were not invited.
- The birthday thing fascinates me because it's the exact opposite of how you would handle it in the US. Here you would wish them a happy birthday and then move on since you weren't invited.
  
  In the USA, the birthday thing is the best thing about the USA. It's all about being selfless (I'm American btw, been living in Spain for so long I'm a citizen) and it's actually something that creates conflict in interpersonal relationships between natives of Spain and the friends they make that are not from here. It is a huge drama that somebody needs to make a documentary film about now. This birthday thing has no age. It could be a 20th birthday or a 100th birthday. You ain't invited, you didn't know, you didn't bring the presents, you just keep to yourself in the public venue. It's harsh. It's harsh because you were excluded and you don't care, because you're American, you just want to be nice and wish them a happy birthday. Spanish people are all nope on that shit. It's all about the presents and who bought you the drinks and food.
- That's interesting. Would you please further explain the clothes shopping thing? Is it that it is rude for a shopkeeper or, say, the people you may be shopping with to say anything except "That looks great on you"?
  
  It's more like after they bought the new clothes. Like, your friend bought new clothes and wants to show you what they bought. It could be a friend, a brother, a sister, a cousin, an aunt, anybody. While shopping for clothes, before they buy the clothes, is the right time to criticize. It's perfectly acceptable, and desired, to be out shopping and trying on clothes before buying them, to say whatever you like. "That makes your ass look huge, don't buy that!" is desired, not discouraged. Never trust the salesperson. The employee of the store is going to tell you it all looks good so you buy it, even if it looks bad. They even try to sell you more crap, saying things go together when they don't. I'm talking about after they bought the clothes and they're showing you what they bought because you're their friend or relative or whatever.
- Lmao wtf is going on with the birthday party one.
  
  I really think it would be a great movie plot. Could even be a slasher film.

Norway.
Cross country skiing. It's basically expected for every kid in school to be adaquate at cross country skiing. P. E. classes during winter could often consist of a ski trip, and a couple times per year the schools would arrange ski days with different acrivities on skis.
- Learnt this the hard way when moving from Denmark (some snow, but not enough for snow sports) as a kid.
  
  Also no mountains in Denmark of downhill skiing

Cutlery.
Growing up everyone around me could use a knife and fork, whereas chopsticks were something most people couldn't use or only used badly. It never occurred to me that the opposite might be true until I shared a meal with some co-workers from mainland China and saw how clumsily they used our utensils.
It wasn't until that point that I appreciated the amount of dexterity and finesse that goes into using cutlery well, and that I took it for granted because it's something learned in childhood.
- Did you know the details on how to eat with knife and fork differ across different countries as well?
  
  In the American style, also called the zig-zag method or fork switching, the knife is initially held in the right hand and the fork in the left. Holding food in place with the fork tines-down, a single bite-sized piece is cut with the knife. The knife is then set down on the plate, the fork transferred from the left hand to the right hand, and the food is brought to the mouth for consumption. The fork is then transferred back to the left hand and the knife is picked up with the right
  Maybe I shouldn't be saying this since it's cultural, but I feel like if it is possible to use cutlery wrong, then I think the American style is definitely one of the wrong ways.
  
  I had no idea that I'd adopted the European method because fuck all that transferring back and forth.
  
  in the American style the fork is held much like a spoon, a pen or much like an excavator
  Shots fucking fired.
- My family-in-law, all 4 generations, are like 462874th generation American. They use cutlery in their fists like they're cavemen stabbing at the last mammoth chop.
  I definitely do not think chopstick experience is their problem.
  
  That's fair. Funnily enough, in the discussion that resulted from the meal I mentioned, my Chinese co-workers did say there are plenty of people who can't use chopsticks well either.
- This is definitely a generational, regional, ethnic, and class thing.
  As a non-Asian kid on the US West Coast in the '80s, I learned to use chopsticks only slightly after learning to use a fork or spoon, even though we rarely ate food from cultures where chopsticks are standard. Heck, I'm pretty sure I was given chopsticks to eat tortellini at least once!
  I was somewhat baffled as an adult when a partner's parents weren't comfortable using chopsticks ... and they (the parents) were from New York City and had grown up eating Chinese takeout regularly.

If you aren't from south / southeast Asia you'll struggle with our traffic. Our roads are a stream of everything from cycles to busses with no dedicated lanes. If you want to cross the road and can't find a zebra-crossing you gang up with other pedestrians, hold up traffic by shouting and waving, and cross.
Understanding languages you don't know - every city will have people speaking three or more languages, so you need to understand what someone is saying even if you don't speak their language. Broken English with gesturing is a lingua franca.
- When I was in Vietnam I just walked out and kept walking at the same speed while trying to get eye contact with the drivers. Worked good.
  
  Yes, this is how you do it. Actually it is a lot safer than it might look.

I'm Danish. Opening beer with a lighter or other things that aren't technically a bottle opener.
- Everything's a bottle opener.
  
  Opening bottles with your phone used to be a thing too. Most used Nokias from the 32/3310 era in Denmark have scratches at the bottom from people not doing I properly. I've seen some people open beer with iPhones, but I wouldn't recommend it.
- Hold up - as a Canadian, this isn't a skill everyone learns in/around high school??
  
  Czech here - definitely a part of the curriculum.
- I once opened a glass bottle of soda with my teeth, having nothing else around. It worked but it wasn't worth it.
- So how do you open one without a bottle opener?
  
  A few methods that come to mind
  put the side of the cap on the edge of a table and hit the top with your palm
  get a fork (or anything else), grab the bottle's neck a bit under the cap, put the end of the fork just under it, the middle part on your fingers, push the other part down to open
  find a door, put the bottle cap inside the metal rimmed hole in the door frame that the latch sinks into (sorry, don't know the word in English) and use it as a normal opener. Be quick as your beer might spill.
  get a screwdriver and a hammer, put the screwdriver to the middle of the cap and gently hit it with the hammer. The cap will slightly sink into the bottle and the sides will release their grip
  
  Perhaps the easiest (and most flashy) is a wooden table top. Wedge the cap onto the edge, and the smack it with your palm. This method is widely discouraged, especially on your host's dining room table, as it usually takes a small chunk of wood off the edge and damages the table.
  Like the Dutch, Germans have an impressive lexicon of commonly-known ways to open beer bottles without a bottle-opener.
  
  Basically anything that can be used as a lever while using your finger as the fulcrum. A lighter is real easy, but you can do it with anything vaguely stick-shaped and somewhat sturdy. A nice, thick twig will do the trick.
  
  Leverage and fiddling around
  
  You grab the neck of the bottle tightly with your dominant hand so your finger a thumb is holding the cap tightly. Then you take the lighter in the other hand and wedge it in between the dominant hand and cap. Squeeze tightly and use the lighter as a lever.
  
  This guy has around 60 YouTube episodes showing how to do it. Have fun!
  https://m.youtube.com/user/BeNuzzer/featured
- The entire reason behind the unending popularity of these
  
  Nah. BiC lighters are where it's at. Clipper lighters always run out of flint before fluid. I have a Zippo, and still carry a BiC for specific situations like opening beer bottles, or hitting a bowl.
  
  I thought these were popular for pulling out the little stick to pack a joint with. Never seen anyone open a beer with them.
  I've seen people open beers in a lot of different ways though. I had an alcoholic friend in my early 20s who could do it with anything. Even his teeth. He chipped his tooth once and stopped doing it with his teeth though, lol.
- A bottle of beer or a can of beer?
  
  Bottles. It's similar in The Netherlands, it's a bit of a sport to open beer bottles with anything and everything, except dedicated bottle openers. Quite popular are Bic lighters, other beer bottles and the edges of tables.
  Beer cans usually have pull tabs, they're just soda cans with a different brand on it.
  
  A bottle. As some Dutch person said in another comment, cigarette lighters, edges of tables and another bottle are popular options. Please don't use your teeth. I have a nice, rounded tooth that I used to use for opening beers when I was younger - I was lucky I didn't damage it more.
- What if you do it wrong and you make the lighter explode, taking a finger with it
  
  Why would it explode?
  
  Cigarette lighters don't explode that violently if they're punctured. The greatest hazard would probably be getting plastic in your eye. If you do it wrong the lighter usually just gets scratched.

I grew up in rural Canada, but have been living in major metropolitan areas for most of my adult life. It still surprises me when I learn there are other adults that don't know how to chop wood, start a fire, work basic tools, etc.
- Are chopping wood and starting a fire common activities in the metropolitan area where you live?
  
  Going to the beach or camping, not unusual to start a bonfire.
  
  Suburbia I'm canda just mean the great outdoors
- I have no earthly idea how to do those things and I'm from Canada. It's also a gender thing if you're older like me.
  
  You're an immigrant or from the city? Everyone from rural areas know how to do it

Rural Japan.
My kids (2 and 4) can use chopsticks already. Plenty of restaurants around here where you won't see a spoon, fork or knife. (However, it's certainly possible to ask the staff for western cutlery, and in the main cities they're more likely to be prepared for that question)

Kinda reverse, but when I moved to Singapore I was amazed by how few people knew how to cook their own food. But then again you can get a meal outside for 3-5 bucks so not really an issue
- Same when I moved from Scandinavia to the U.K. to study. Not a lot of my fellow students had any confidence in cooking and even the ones that said “I know how to cook” were spooked at the slightest level of complexity in a recipe or just didn’t understand the basics (how do things get crisp, what treatment makes meat tender, etc etc).

Pooping in the toilet.
When I went to university with a lot of international students, there would often be poop on the seats.
My understanding is Asian toilets are different and a good few students from there were standing on the seat and aiming at the bowl from height, with mixed success.
- The opposite happened to me in Japan. For the love of God I can't do an asian squat and there was only this old style squat toilet there. On top of that I really had to go because I had a bit of a diarrhea situation going on. I had no idea which one was the front and which was the back of the toilet. I figured if I try it I will just shit on my pants, so I had to completely remove them. Then I awkwardly lowered myself down no some kind of a weird squat, holding on to the walls of the stall for life, sweating like hell and bam, some of it went on the toilet.
  I was relieved that I didn't shit myself but mortified how to clean up my mess. In the end I was able to clean it with some water and I was lucky that it was in the night (at a cheap hostel) and nobody came in why all of this was happening.
  
  Hadn't thought about the trickiness the other way. Before I visit I will definitely spend some time googling how to poop in Japan.
- Wait, that's how that happens? I always found it weird with those signs to not poop while standing up.
  
  Lol no, you poop squatting on the toilet, without any part of your body touching the toilet. Toilets in India (and probably rest of Asia) are at ground level, with two porcelain blocks on either side to keep your feet on (the blocks are set into the ground and have a rough top; neither you nor they will slip). Most hotels will also have western toilets.
  Also using toilet paper is considered unspeakably gross. You are supposed to use water and/or your left hand (right hand if you are left-handed), and to then wash your hands with soap. Because of this, you should touch food only with your dominant hand; using the other, however clean it actually is, is seen as uncivilised.
  
  That's how it was explained to me by an Asian buddy who'd been back and forth. He and/or I could be wrong (or he could've been fucking with us...)
- I have yet to figure out how a person who has leg problems or a back problem ever uses a toilet that you don’t actually sit on.
  
  The flexibilility is maintained by practicing it from youth and doing it every day. Also, there are safety handles.
- And related to this, using a bidet.

Going by yourself under at least 13 is nonexistent in the United States.

Pronouncing local place names. Lots of scattered areas here with place names that are spelled like other places names (for example we got a town called Egypt, a town called Binghamton, etc.) except that they're all pronounced differently. For example, we have a town called Leicester, named after the actual Leicester, and locals tend to raise an eyebrow when someone asks "how do you get to lester" (that would be the normal way to pronounce it)?
"Who's Lester? Is he the new guy in town?"
"What? No, the town."
"That's Leesester, not Lester."
"I'm sorry, wut?"
I of course just add to the confusion if I'm the one to break the news, as I have a Kiwi accent, which is atypical around here. So it becomes a "what do you know" kind of interaction.
- There’s a place in Colorado called Buena Vista, yes, named in Spanish for good view. The locals all state that it’s Spanish. But they want it to be unique, so no, it’s not pronounced bwena. It’s fucking pronounced byunah. They literally know they’re pronouncing it wrong, they claim that it’s Spanish, and then they still say you’re pronouncing it wrong if you actually say it correctly.
  
  There's a city in Kentucky called Versailles. Pronounced, you guessed it, vur-sails.
- I briefly lived in a place with some very unintuitive place names that I had no idea how to say.
  Problem is that unless it's a very large area, there's often not an easy way to look up how local place names are pronounced.
  I remember for some of the places, I had taken to searching on YouTube hoping to find local news reports where they said the name out loud lol.
  
  Imagining you looking up this video
- Ruairidh: "Rory"
  Featherstonehaugh: "Fanshaw"
- Where I live basically every location is some combination of "French, native American, English, Scandinavian", "pronounced natively or not", and "spelled like it's pronounced or not".
  The fun ones are the English pronunciation of the French transliteration of the native word.

The swimming lesson thing was interesting. I also assumed everyone learned how to swim in school.

How to stay safe in the wilderness. We get too many people that aren't from around here that think you can do a hike late in the afternoon wearing sandals and only bringing a water bottle. People don't realize that the wilderness is a dangerous place if you aren't prepared. Weather can change rapidly and you need proper clothing and footwear to account for it. Make sure you have enough time for the hike and bring the essentials just in case something happens and you need to spend a night outdoors.
- The death valley Germans comes to mind. The theory from the guy who found their bodies was that they thought area 51 would have patrols/guards like US bases in Germany. They didn't realize that area 51 has a largely unguarded area as part of its "official territory" because death valley does the guarding for them.
  Great long form write-up from the guy who found them: Here
  
  I'm somewhat upset at you for having spent literally 8 hours on that wonderful blog. Thank you and also fuck you for that link. People give warnings for movietrope links, I might recommend the same.
- And petting wildlife. Or trying to take selfies with wildlife. Or feeding wildlife.
  No, no, and no.
  Even a cute lil’ chipmunk is a no-no. Bison, moose, and their sweet huggable calves are serious no-nos.
- Yeah, while I'm not a big hiker myself, being Swiss I know how prepared you need to be.
  Walked around in Taiwan when I came across a hiking trail. 1.5 hours, like 150m verticality only, labelled as easy. Cool, but not enough water (only carried a 2l bottle). Went to a local teahouse and got me 4 more bottles to be safe and went for it. Walked past countless others because I was underprepared, and am glad I did because those could have turned out not so nice if I did go.
  
  I've also been caught out by this in other places. I was in Hong Kong and went up to The Peak, which has a 3km path around the top. I thought one water bottle was enough for a flat walk in 35C humid summer heat. It wasn't and ended up rationing water halfway through and chugging two whole bottles of water when I got back to where I could get water again.

Hiking and basic wilderness knowledge.
I live in the Mojave Desert. Simple stuff like knowing not to cut through bushes, wearing proper shoes, avoiding feral dogs, and always having something to defend yourself with when walking in the desert aren't common among a lot of people who aren't originally from here.

Male being good at talking and flirting with girls. Where I grew up (south of Italy) you have to be able to know what to do as a young heterosexual man, otherwise girls would completely ignore you. When I was young, italian girls expected "work" from boys, a lot of work. You could not throw money or take shortcuts (I don't know if it is still valid).
When I moved to north of Europe, in 3 different countries, I realized that for north european guys existing was enough to get many girls. It was so easy, girls flirt with you, they literally go after boys. You could do nothing and a girl would start flirting with you. And being decent at talking with girls meant that any average Italian guy abroad was a Don Giovanni.
- You could do nothing and a girl would start flirting with you
  does this work for lesbians too?
  
  On a night out in Newcastle? Absolutely, sweetheart
- So everyone in Italy has "acts of service" as their love language? Noted.
  If a guy is interested in me, I just expect him to be his best self.
  
  Don't know what to answer.
  Normal and healthy mammals relationships start with courtship display https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Courtship_display.
  It is the normal behavior in humans as well. Not doing it would be pretty unusual, and probably worrying.
  The difference is that in Italy, girls used to require a long, complex and time consuming courtship. One night stands were not even a thing, they were unthinkable, some fantasy from Hollywood movies.
  North European girls not only had much lower expectations from men, required much less effort, but many of them even proactively started the process themselves, flirting and clearly communicating their intentions. This made the process particularly straightforward, but it also didn't allow local men to improve their communication skills. Therefore average Italians looked extremely good with women: charming, listeners, caring... Despite the language barriers
  I don't know if it is still valid tough, I have been married for a long time
- Is it like that across all Italy, and is there an age group where that kinda does down?
  
  I don't know how it is now. I am an old millennial that has been "out of the market" for over 15 years. It might have changed due to social media.
  I can't say if it was all of Italy, because it's rather big. But from discussions with other Italians, it was a pretty general feeling, particularly for those from south of Italy.
  
  Never goes down

Driving. Moved here from Bangladesh to UK. I did a big mistake by not learning to drive in my country. Now its too expensive here to learn. Here driving is required if you want regular job well paying jobs. Don't be like me. Learn how to drive.

I always think it’s weird when I run into people that can’t whistle or make a horn sound blowing a blade of grass. I’m not even talking like those ear-piercing 2-fingers-in-mouth whistles, just regular Andy Griffith style.
Definitely understand there are many whistling taboos(as there should be, Russia) and some bored rural-ness that factor in.
- I can whistle normally, but can't do the two fingers in the mouth nor can I properly do the blade of grass trick. Wish I could though
- I've never been able to whistle and I'm so sad about it. I can do the grass trick though, and I can also make a whistle/scream sound using an acorn cup.
  
  Mr Rogers was unable to whistle, so you're in very good company!
  
  Oak my god, I’ve never heard of the acorn trick! To the rabbit-hole!
- I couldn't whistle until I had dental surgery and realized it moved my teeth so much I could finally whistle. So I was like 20 the first time I ever whistled.
  
  Could whistle normally as long as I can remember. Tried forever to learn the two finger loud whistles as a kid and never could make a sound but still tried. I still recall when I was around 13 yo reading Goosebumps and randomly did the gesture when suddenly I made the first successfull attempt. I literally turned to the mirror on the side becuase of the surprise and had that Shaq face on Hot Ones. After practicing for a while I discovered that, while you can whistle EXTREMELY loudly this way, you legit hurt your own eardrums the most. Basically kamikaze whistling. I don't use it that often because of it.
  The third way of whsitling is by blowing through your palms which makes that owl-like howl. You can basically do the first part of the song in Once Upon a Time in the West this way.
  Also, snapping your fingers in a very "snappy" loud and deep kinda way.
- I could never get a whistle when exhaling no matter what I tried. It takes no effort for me to whistle while inhaling though, but the range and volume are limited this way.

In my immediate surroundings: small-scale farming. The old folks all know how to run a few goats and sheep, will have a few pigs and chickens, a vegetable garden, some fruit and olive trees, grapes, small fields. Once you figure it out you can feed yourself comfortably, but it's a steep learning curve if you didn't grow up with it. Quite a few foreigners who move in because they dream of self-sufficiency overload themselves with new stuff and become overwhelmed. I still can't compete with my neighbors at gardening after 20 years but I'm getting the hang of it.

Can't ride a bicycle in my area without very insanely high risk of death. You don't see bikes on roads at all. None of my kids know how to ride. Ive ridden vast distances though. Makes me very sad.
- Are there any paved trails they can learn on? Rails-to-trails can be great, as they're naturally flat and straight, if there are any of those near you.
- Dutchie here, we have the opposite super power. Bikes are everywhere, we are used to them. Most of the times in urban settings the bike is the best option.
  We also get buffs to perception. Being used to bikes means noticing them. 'the Dutch reach', where you open the door with your opposite hand, so you watch out for bikes, is a lie. We don't do that, we've gotten used to looking for them, because everybody knows what's it like to actually be on a bike themselves.
  
  Yeah I lived there when I was young. It is a completely different reality to where I'm living now.
- Are you in one of those north American developments with long straight multiline roads without proper sidewalks?
  If so, something like this doesn't exist here at all. The smaller roads are not really suitable for high speed driving, and there's not much traffic. The main roads all have wide foot and bike paths on both sides next to them - so only thing you need to know is how to safely cross a road.
  In addition to that there are lot of small pedestrian/cycle only paths as shortcuts between parts of the city.

Swimming. My brother in law is from India and he never learned how to swim due to him growing up in a place with only one extremely dirty river and no other lakes or swimming pools near his family. Apparently no one in his family can swim. He kinda can swim now but it still looks funny. A bit like I must have looked from the outside when I learned to swim - as a six years old. I always found this very odd because the dude is smart, hard working and has a degree but it took years and him becoming a dad to realize that swimming is something pretty much everyone can.
- Better that than being unable to (such is my dilemma).

The ability open a glass bottle with a utensil instead of using a bottle opener.

Dealing with potentially 100°F/38°C summers and sub 0°F/-18°C winters
- I can do at least one of those. Very rarely will you see me not in warm clothes.
- Flip flops and cargo shorts all year is how.

New England: Staying upright on ice.
- Is the secret the penguin walk?
  
  From what I can tell, the secret is rubber boots.
- Just relaxing and knowing where your center of weight is helps.
  (My practice is Moscow in early spring or late autumn days after everything melted and froze again.)

Seperating Litter, I guess. Many dont do it correctly anyways, but its worse in other countries.
Speaking English I guess. Not the best, but better than in former eastern countries. But yeah, fuck colonialism, so not really a great thing.
Riding the bike. Everyone should do it, and shocking to see many other countries struggle with that even more.
- Which country are you from?
  
  Wakanda
  
  Guess
  
  Elbonia

Canada BC specifically
The proper use of flushing toilets and bathroom etiquette
The industry I work in has many new Canadians and I believe they all need a crash course on this from the companies they are working for.

Skiing is pretty much a must where I live

How to dress for -30C weather. How to get out if you fall through ice into water.
- Where I live in the northern Rockies, -40°F is common enough that you kinda forget about it. But it's also a college town. And every year we get a bunch of incoming students who treat the extreme cold like some sort of game or a challenge to their masculinity.
  Same with driving. There's a reason why the regional natives fastidiously use our turn signals and give a ton of space to cars in front of us. Because each of us has gotten into a fender bender by not doing that.
  Seriously. Treat the cold with respect. It can debilitate you in just a few minutes.
- TIL there are extra steps if you fall through ice.
  Not that it says much, I haven't even mastered the basic steps.
  
  It's basically just dont try to stand, stay flat and roll away from the hole. At least that's how I was taught
  
  Carry ice picks (more like ice awls) with you when you travel on ice. If you fall through ice turn back to the direction you came from and start breaking the ice with your elbows (no use trying to get up as long as the ice is so brittle you can easily break it), then drag yourself up and start rolling away from the hole and trace your steps back. Also, try to get rid of the wet clothes as soon as you can.

how to harvest produce, my town is surrounded from farmland, so we learned how to harvest everything from tomatoes to maize, from lemons to turnips

Clapping. Spaniards can clap, other people can't. I took me years to figure out what they mean when they say that foreigners can't clap and learn to do it properly.
- Is clapping something other than slapping your hands together in Spain?
  This sounds more like a particular region doing a common thing differently rather than other people not knowing how. Like, I'm pretty sure Americans know how to clap. I've seen them do it. Not to brag, but I've done it a time or two m'self.
  
  Yes and no. Of course if you're applauding someone like during a speech or something it doesn't really matter how you clap. But if you're watching live music (especially flamenco but not only) and you're trying to 'accompany' the musicians it does. You often see tourist clapping to some music and not only can't they keep the rhythm they also don't make any sound. Spaniards usually just know how to keep the rhythm, can do complex patterns, can 'double' the claps* and can make them sound nice. If you hit your palms the right way they make this strong snapping sound. Spaniards just know how to do it, for them that's clapping. I had to learn.
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7uZry5IMtY
- Wut? Please explain.
  
  I just did in another comment. Basically, if put enough Spaniards in one place they start doing stuff like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SW6L_lTrIFg
- Have Spaniards finally cracked the world's greatest mystery and learned how to produce the sound of one hand clapping?
- As in, being able to make a strong sound while clapping? Or being able to keep rhythm? I know for sure from concerts in America, England, Germany, etc. that people cannot keep a rhythm to save their lives...
  
  Both, actually. They are good and keeping complex rhythms and can make it sound strong.
- Please enlighten us
- You mean that sound of finger bones clicking against one another? Just have to clap sufficiently hard and fast.

Don't walk on dark places at night.

Sooooo you moved to live in the Netherlands, I assume? Awesome country, do enjoy!
And yes, swimming is a ver basic and required skill there as well
- No, living in Finland.

Paying attention to the weather to know if rain or severe winds are coming. I know people have access to hourly forecasts but locals can just tell when the weather will be bad.
southern USA
- Where I am the weather is unpredictable for everyone, even locals. The sky could look 100% ready for rain and then it's like "pscyhe!"

Canoeing. I'm not an outdoorsy guy at all but everytime I see US tourists in a canoe they just spin in circles. It feels like Canadians are just born knowing.
- That might just be a growing up near water thing. I think that on average, Canadians live closer to larger bodies of water than Americans do, since more than half are within day trip distance of the great lakes waterway, and then there's Halifax and Vancouver.
  Growing up in a place with water, basically everyone I know also has at least a passing knowledge of recreational small watercraft.
  
  Canada also has a strong cottage culture, where families will spend time in the summer at a cottage, or campground, or other, and they are often on lakes (we have so many lakes, they're just everywhere, at least where people live.) I don't specifically remember learning how to canoe, but I think it happened initially on a field trip with school when I was really young. That being said, not all Canadians know how to canoe. I had to teach a friend of mine how to properly paddle when canoeing solo because he had just never been taught. Ironically, it was his canoe we were using.
- Canoeing is definitely a big thing in the US. At least in the east, I suspect it's much less common in the Midwest and desert states. I think that tourists are disproportionately likely to be canoeing for the first time, though.
  That said, if you can't figure out the physics of a canoe within the first couple strokes then maybe boating as a while just isn't your thing
  
  That said, if you can’t figure out the physics of a canoe within the first couple strokes then maybe boating as a while just isn’t your thing
  I have no difficulty with the "basic" canoes, but I struggle with the long and thin ones, where I can't even keep myself upright for longer than 30 seconds, before capsizing, having tried a few times. Is boating not my thing?
- J stroke baby

It's cycling here as well in the Netherlands. Additionally in my circles: starting a campfire.
- In Germany a lot of people reduced the amount of cycling they did once they had a driving license - now here in Finland a lot more adults keep using bikes, and also use it in Winter. Back in Germany I always was the odd one for cycling in the snow.
  Starting a camp fire is something I'm teaching my kids just because I don't want them to burn my house down - being allowed to play with fire outside along with an explanation of which are the dangerous bits took the fascination out of all the fire starting equipment in the house.
  
  Starting fire is pretty relevant skill in Finland for multiple reasons from saunas to cabins to campfires. While I partially learned at home, scouts are pretty good here and definitely taught me a lot of wilderness and survival skills.
- I technically "know how" to start a campfire, but the actual process is too much work. And then when someone does start a campfire, where I live, for some reason they can't do it without singing the Campfire Song Song. Not something I look forward to.
  
  Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/watch?v=R4qDveKoGvA
  Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
  I'm open-source, check me out at GitHub.

Parallel parking. And overall parking in anything else than a US parking lot. People have no idea how to move their car around if it doesn’t go straight forward or backwards. I’ve even seen people failing simple K-Turns. I have both a French and US drivers license. Also manual transmission, but that’s less surprising.
- This is the one part of driving I actually got a perfect score on.

Swimming. It's sometimes dangerous for foreign children to see Dutch kids swim and try to join them.

Simple math like additions and subtractions. Giving change back seems like trigonometry for some. (Note, I actually do enjoy trigonometry. It’s so much easier to calculate angles with fractions of Pi than the random 180°)
- My mom didn't let me use a calculator as a kid and I'm really glad now. I can do simple calculations much faster than if I had to use a calculator.

I feel like Latin Americans in general take for granted that you're supposed to pull and push everything to make it work. Sometimes with clever but shitty and overspecific solutions for the problem, or shifting the goals to something more achievable. Some examples:
Three examples:
- [Replying to self to avoid editing the above]
  Ah, on a more local area, Paraná: whisking homemade mayo for the Sunday potato salad. One does not use bottled mayo for that, it got to be handmade.
- In India we call this sort of engineering 'jugaad'. And we do it all the time, sometimes to a dangerous level.
- !!< In between the ! And !
  On sync for lemmy and probably other apps, there are buttons to do the markdown automatically haha. By the way, a new line is made by giving the previous line two empty spaces.[ ][ ]
  New line. I just learned that one, and it's better than Shift+Enter new lines.
  These new lines
  Waste so much space.

Swimming. Here, kids have to take mandatory swimming courses at school. I have quite a few eastern european friends, and they all tell me, that swimming is something that people learn if they want to and if they can afford it, but it's not learly an universal skill in their countries.
Most people who drown here are actually immigrants, who see everyone swimming and think that it can't be that hard...
- Or in my case they just assume. Which is why I had brush-ins with the experience in the last sentence.
  
  Sounds like you got a story to tell.

I didn't learn how to ride a bike till I was seven or eight, im central US

Being able to recognize poison ivy. Growing up in a forest, it was one of many basic automatic skills learned in childhood, and I see and avoid it without much thought. I've had to prevent many friends from other regions or countries from causing themselves serious harm by ignorance of poison ivy, though.

493 comments