A thread for Expats. List of what we like about the ol USA.

1. Drive thru pharmacies
2. NFL
3. Snow
4. Plentiful Mexican Food

5. The Bold and the Beautiful isnt years behind

6. Seasons

7. Corn dogs.

this will be a short thread. there's not much to like here.

Most of the stuff I miss is food-related but also

8. Kiehl's products available at a sane price.

here is a list i started making in rural Kenya, about what I didn't enjoy about life there. removed all the work-related stuff.

-"travel" (not being around family and friends and my life enough)
-BOREDOM (primarily due to where i live)
-insects - cockroaches, mosquitoes bothering me at night when i'm sitting on the couch
-awful roads
-malaria and typhoid
-verry limited shopping options

so i guess to answer the original thread question, things I like about the USA:

-live near family and friends
-i'm not bored
-i'm not plagued by insects 24 hours a day (seriously, this is such a quality of life reducer)
-nice roads
-i don't get awful diseases
-i can buy things that i want

9. Decent sandwiches

10. Less sexism

I'm a britisher ex-pat, anticipating what I'll miss when I go home, is this allowed?

11. Weather (in CA). Makes an unbelievable difference to my general happiness.
12. People are overwhelmingly friendly and polite, when they're not raving lunatics
13. Not-terrible public transit (in SF)
14. Strong drinks
15. Ease of getting driving licence :)
16. Cheaper video games, electronics
17. Tax deductions
18. Fortune cookies (although -1 for no prawn crackers/prawn toast).
19. In restaurants, getting glasses of water without asking, and getting doggy bags w/ no hassle

20. Pharmacies sell cigarettes and beer

15 is OTM btw

21. Not being behind on tv shows.
22. Late night/early morning access to things like supermarkets.
23. Cheap books! OMG mass market paperbacks. Such a thing doesn't exist in Australia.
24. Neosporin
25. The Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade
26. Thanksgiving in general. It's like practice Christmas without the presents!

27. BBQ

^^^otm

(although -1 for no prawn crackers/prawn toast).

I've had shrimp toast at a dim sum place.

I would like to request that ex-pats say where they're originally from.

BBQ in what sense?

I've had shrimp toast at numerous Chinese restaurants - maybe we're talking about different things. The shrimp toast I've had was shredded shrimp and seasonings, molded onto some kind of bread, and deep fried. Maybe battered, too? Maybe no bread?

I'm originally from Australia (sort of noted in my post but stating for the record)

BBQ as in pulled pork, ribs, slow-cooked tritip over charcoal & wood smoke. A far cry from snags and frozen hamburgers on Dad's sad old flat-plate gas bbq back home.

Though I still love me a gas-cooked snag in white bread with tomato sauce, don't get me wrong :)

what's a snag?

oops. Sausage. Australian super-processed kindof pork product type sausage ...not the fancy actual-meat sausages they have here in the US.

Kinda sounds like "vienna sausage" aka "potted meat with an erection"

lol yeah kind of like Vienna sausage but we don't have them in cans, they're fresh. but similar color, thin casing, long & skinny

When I studied in the UK for six months, it took me a while to figure out whether certain unfamiliarities I experienced had to do with being at a British university or merely being at a much larger school than the small private college I attended back home.

Have the expats on this thread had similar issues?

I guess another problem might be extrapolating some broad national/cultural difference from a specific situation you don't realize is anomalous.

I experienced some similar oddities, in particular with hanging out the washing on a clothesline to dry vs drying in a clothes dryer.

When I first moved here my husband told me pretty much categorically 'we don't hang out our clothes here'. Later on I found out that wasn't exactly true -- he just grew up in a family where his Mum thought it was trashy to hang out your clothes on a clothesline, and their social circle felt the same way.
But for a long time I thought it was a cultural thing - omg Americans don't have clotheslines!

18. Fortune cookies (although -1 for no prawn crackers/prawn toast).

dude, if you're having trouble finding these in the bay area/sf, you need some serious help:
http://thehungrykorean.files.wordpress.com/2008/10/shrimp-chips.jpg

15. Ease of getting driving licence :)

And ease of driving in general. I learned to drive in England right before moving over here and was struck by how much easier it was. Wider streets etc. Though might not be so true in big eastern cities.

Also, automatic cars as easy to drive.

are

28. Ordering something from amazon and having it arrive in 2 days instead of 3 weeks

OK, obviously I haven't been looking hard enough for prawn toast, but by prawn crackers I mean these:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2172/2233538029_9ea2539d36.jpg

Haven't actively sought them out, just that they're a staple back home at a Chinese or even Thai restaurant.

When I lived in the Vietnamese neighborhood those were everywhere. Not so much in whitey town.

xp Ah okay, those also should be available at any asian market. They come either premade or you can fry them up yourself.

If I ever move away, I will definitely miss huge rib eye steaks and prime ribs at somewhat affordable prices.

? for the ex-pats, what do you think of the lack of cigarette smoke everywhere?

(From an American living in the UK)

- Stores being open past normal office working hours, so that you can do some shopping after work (there are exceptions, but they are very few and far between)

- People sticking to one side of the sidewalk/staircase in crowded urban areas (the free-for-all chaos of, say, Oxford St., or any given tube station at rush hour BLOWS MY MIND - this would get you yelled at (or worse) in New York)

- Broader all-purpose "drug stores" like CVS, Rite Aid, Duane Reede (especially 24 hour ones). There is no place in the UK where late at night you can buy - in one place - Ibuprofen, Blank CDs, Doritos, and an issue of Rolling Stone, for example).

- Buttered popcorn

^^ YES to the first one. UK store hours kind of baffle me.
Re the 2nd one, that's possibly due to clueless tourists. People in the US don't seem to queue for buses and all just pile on regardless, so it's swings & roundabouts I guess /phrases I hate

Funny, as an American, I wouldn't mind a pharmacy where I could walk in and not have a Billy Big Mouth turn and start singing at me.

The only things I really missed when visiting abroad (can't say I was really an ex-pat) was hot sauce at my immediate disposal 24 hours a day.

What kinds of stores are we talking about that are only open normal office hours? Certainly not grocery stores? I can sort of imagine clothing stores and electronics stores doing so, but not grocers and drug stores.

I don't know how much this is the case in England these days but it used to be the case that nothing was open past 6pm, save pubs and the occasional Indian/Pakistani-run corner shop.

How do you BUY anything??

Not even grocery stores??

That goes for all-day Sunday too.

It makes no sense, especially with what were the reduced Sunday trading hours. Supermarkets are open late and compared to what I've seen in the US, there are a LOT of them in the UK, of all sizes and loads of locations in most big towns. IIRC most local butchers/greengrocers etc do normal office hours too, hence the massive growth of the Big 5 supermarkets (so I assume).
tbf a lot of newer shopping centres with department stores are open til at least 7pm weekdays but like SGTS says, they are relatively few and far between.

Banks p much all shut before 5pm weekdays too, right? So you're doomed to spend your lunch hour queueing if you need to go into a branch on a weekday. At least my local US one is open til 6pm.

I mean do stores not want your money? This is incomprehensible.

And here I used to think that small towns (and the southern U.S.) were ass-backwards because many stores were closed on Sundays or there wasn't a 24 hour grocery or drug store.

How can services for people who work in offices keep the SAME HOURS AS OFFICES? It patently by definition doesn't work!

We're all dole scum innit

I mean do stores not want your money? This is incomprehensible.

My fiancee and I have a running joke where - in the occasional face of baffling customer service - we quietly scream to each other "Please take the money I am trying to give you in exchange for the goods and/or service that you are in the business of providing!!!"

I've definitely had some mind-bending shopping experiences here. In one recent instance, I was walking into an HMV store at exactly 6:45. The store was due to close at 7pm. I was attempting to buy a CD as a gift for my boss. I knew exactly what I wanted; it was displayed a foot and a half from the entrance.

I was stopped by an employee: "Sorry, we're closed."
I checked my watch. "But it's only 6:45."
Stone faced. "Still, we're closed."
"I don't want to be difficult, but I know exactly what I want - it's right there. I have cash, if that's quicker."
"We're closed."
"I really don't mean to give you a hard time, but can I speak to the manager?"
Huge sigh; big production; Manager comes over: "What's the problem?"
"I just want to buy that CD, but I'm being told the store is closed. It's 6:50, and the sign right there says you close at 7."
"Sorry, mate - if he says we're closed, we're closed."
"But I want to give you this money..."

And that's at a CD store - of all the businesses that probably can't afford to turn money away!

I grilled my coworkers about this, and got a variety of explanations. I was told that many retail employees are paid hourly but NOT paid after closing time at shops, so it's in their interest to shuffle people out as quickly as possible by closing time. Some people said that there just ISN'T that culture of "if there's someone with a dollar to spend, there's someone to take that dollar" - people just value their homelife too much to let this be the dominant attitude towards selling and spending. Stores don't seem terribly worried about a shopper's "experience"; there's definitely not a "customer's always right" thing in most places.

Then again, a couple of my co-workers told me they HATE shopping in America - namely getting mobbed by overeager, perky sales kids.

vegemitegirl otm about clothes lines!!!!

i'm from NZ and def agree about store hours - practically nothing is open after 5.30 in terms of shopping (apart from supermarkets). there is 'late night shopping' on fridays, where a lot of stores might be open till 7pm but weekends everything is closed by 4 or 5pm.

- love the weather here. love not having to consider the weather when planning anything, at any time of the year.

- food, utilities, clothes, everything = way cheaper

- like sunny said: buying stuff online - don't have to pay an arm+leg for shipping and wait 3 months

- amazing and diverse landscape. so so beautiful, and so much stuff to explore just in our area.

BBQ as in pulled pork, ribs, slow-cooked tritip over charcoal & wood smoke. A far cry from snags and frozen hamburgers on Dad's sad old flat-plate gas bbq back home.

Aw, I just have to jump in here in defense of Aussie BBQ! I'm not sure what other people do but we certainly didnt eat plain Coles sausages on a gas flatplate! We had bbq with gas and coal briquettes and we'd do steaks and seafood on it, mostly. Chargrilled chilli octopus = AWESOME.

Maybe my dad's a showoff, lol.

And the only place still with no late night/sunday trading down here now is Perth, and everyone jokes about it - Melb/Syd/Canberra def have trading til midnight or 24 hrs in some cases (7/11, supermarkets)/

Best thing in melbourne: 24 hour bottle shops.

GRILLING IS NOT BARBECUE ASDKFA;SDKFJ;ASJWEUIWERQWEJSDF KN/VN C,/MK DFGLJDFG H;L !!!!!!!!!

- being able to buy hard liquor at the supermarket

xp yes it is in nz/aus! we call the actual thing you cook on a BARBEQUE

HUMBUGGERY!

29. Big wild animals and exotic bugs.

being able to buy hard liquor at the supermarket

Ha I like this just as an *Idaho* expat. Idaho, where the state liquor stores close at 7 p.m. Love being able to go to the grocery on Sunday at 11 p.m. and pick up a bottle of something + grocery stores have WAY better sales than the state liquor store ever did.

I mean "expat" is not the right word but you get what I mean. It was even sillier in Utah. You can at least buy wine & nice beer at the store in Idaho.

10 is a pretty standard time for a grocery store to shut at in Britain, not 6.

Ridiculous laws about where and when you can purchase alcohol are definitely one thing I do NOT miss about the United States.

i've had shrimp chips/prawn crackers in the u.s.! but no, they're not a staple of middle america.

being able to buy hard liquor at the supermarket

i can buy hard liquor at california supermarkets but not in new york state supermarkets -- it's just beer and wine there.

That was my one of my favorite things about living in CA.

Mine shut at 10 or 11 on weeknights, 8 or 9 on Saturday and 5 or 6 on Sunday. There are also lots of Asian shops open all hours - this is Central London.

Minneapolis Vietnamese restaurants do prawn crackers occasionally.

10 is a pretty standard time for a grocery store to shut at in Britain, not 6.

― Efraqueen Juárez (jim in glasgow), Wednesday, 22 September 2010 23:17 (3 minutes ago)

my local supermarkets in los angeles close between 10 and midnight. sometimes stores stay open all night, but these days i think the companies don't want to pay for the extra employee hours if business is light.

people who frequent grocery stores in the middle of the night: alcoholics, couples who need condoms, stoners looking for snacks, and "eleanor rigby" type folks who have nowhere to go.

omg your username

and or ppl who can't sleep/ have terrible sleep patterns xp

can usually find somewhere open til midnight or so round here but open til 2 am would be great

*bows* (xp)

Also don't forget the posses of teenagers looking for snacks and LOLs at 2am - our local 24 hour supermarket was almost a local tourist attraction but it did have an awesome all-hours restaurant.

in CO we can't have liquor in the supermarket but there are like three liquor stores on every street practically.

ditto for MA

sunny i thought u lived in usa

i pretty much never buy liquor, but the last time i was in the wine and spirits store or whatever they're called here, it was a Sunday afternoon, like five minutes before they closed, and i was wondering what segments of humanity i would find shopping in there just then...anachronistic kitchen drunk housewives, get bent's eleanor rigby types, etc

while standing in line i notice this one guy who looks especially i dunno, gristly, a little rough around the edges, and then i realize it's danny bonaduce

way xp but yeah, the awesome wildlife here! fucking SQUIRRELS!! i love them so. and raccoons! and shit i just found out there are foxes up in the hills behind our house <3 <3

NZ has... birds. that's about it. and our new-ish neighbourhood has some really interesting species of birds.

No squirrels in NZ?

Michigan sells everything in grocery stores, except jobs lol. Ohio used to have "state" stores where you had to buy liquor, plus you need a special license to buy wine before 1pm on Sundays. The indignity of it all. Oh, and then there's PA where you can't buy beer in less than case size (24) unless you go to a bar. States, I ask you...

*buy wine=sell wine

You can't buy just a six-pack in PA? That is bonkers.

I thought in PA you had to buy six packs in like pizza places or something?

No squirrels in NZ?

There's no sqrls in NZ or Aus but we do have possums! (not opossums - possums are actually cuet)

Wait, what? not 'possum, as in nickname of opossum?

Huh. I learned something today. Possum is not the same as 'possum, and possums are much cuter than o/'possums.

you can buy six packs in pa at some random places that also sell food, or something like that. i dunno, they've been easing up the laws at a glacial pace over the years. the latest idea is that there was to be like, these vending machines in supermarkets that would scan your id and dispense bottles of wine. anytime there is noise about changing the beer sales laws to be more reasonable though, then the beer distributor outlets cry that they will be driven out of business due to supermarkets availability or whatever

it gets pretty ridiculous, though

yeah we have possums and stoats but you don't really see them. been here more than two years now and still can't get over the awesomeness of squirrels.

oh and deer! we have deer in NZ but you only see them on farms/zoos. there were some deer strolling down our street the other day!

i think the only land mammals native to NZ are a couple of species of small bats.

the first time i saw a deer at a zoo in rome it blew my mind

The most confusing beer sales law for me was the one in Atlanta - we couldn't buy beer at a convenience store on Sunday until midnight (Monday), and then it was available only until 2 a.m. At the stores around our hotel the beer coolers were locked when sales were forbidden. So the clerk had to go unchain them, and chain them back up two hours later.

I understand the law, but it was still weird.

xp - That is sad not to have squirrels. Or various other mammals. I'm sorry for you. My boss has a condo in the center of Chicago and she gets raccoons on her balcony sometimes. We're rich in mammals.

fairly sure kiwis are better than those

are there bunnies in NZ? what would life be without bunnies?

sunny i thought u lived in usa

― my balls and my nerds (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, September 22, 2010 5:47 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

She does. She's an Aussie living in the U.S.

Others on this thread, like Suzy, are Americans living elsewhere.

yeah we have rabbits and we have kiwis, but you basically never see a kiwi (they're nocturnal and they're reasonably rare). you don't really see rabbits all that often either (except down south, where they're a huge pest).

we did see an actual tuatara in the wild, when we were back there in may.

living in new zealand and not getting to see kiwis is just unfair

apparently san diego zoo has them??

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/35/104107291_5cfaf019fc.jpg
'Possum grip by Jesse1, on Flickr

Here is me holding an Opossum that I found on the way home from the bar (also in Chicago).

Same fella

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/19/104107279_ebd0f692b0.jpg
growl by Jesse1, on Flickr

omg that is awful! how were you able to pick it up? you weren't worried it would chew your hand/face off??

nz possums so superior in cuteness:

http://www.richard-seaman.com/Mammals/Australia/Possum.jpg

this possum/opossum thing is blowing my gd mind

It was 4 a.m. and I was feeling quite brave. Also, they really do "play 'possum," so when it crossed my path and I stepped on it (gently!), it was very easy to pick up. Here's the photo story, if you're interested http://www.flickr.com/photos/41894171796@N01/sets/72157617454529536/

Your possums are are way superior in cuteness, no contest!

i can buy hard liquor at california supermarkets but not in new york state supermarkets -- it's just beer and wine there.

Nope, in NY state it's just beer in supermarkets, no wine. In Illinois it's beer and wine, and in Mass it's neither. But in Mass, you can buy beer in a 7-11. Also in NY state, there are stores that sell just beer but can't sell wine, and stores that sell wine and liquor but not beer. Booze laws are so mindfuckingly baffling and pointless from state to state.

its a religious thing innit?

For the most part, yeah.

In Illinois you can also buy hard liquor in supermarkets.

The most ridiculous laws are the no booze before noon (or 11 or whatever) on Sunday.

It definitely was a religious thing in Mass ("blue laws"); up until just a couple of years ago, you couldn't buy booze on Sundays. Now you can, but only between noon and 7pm.

The separation of church and state is a smokescreen just in case you weren't aware. Except for us heathens.

Meanwhile we have 24 hour bottle shops and DRIVE-THRU booze stores =)

Australia, land of the pisshead =)

Sounds like Louisiana.

i can't believe you picked up that insane looking opossum o_O
xps
there are so many great things about America. it amazes me. but Canadians i know who live there or have lived there still always miss this certain sweetness of Canada at least a bit. i wld like to test this theory. of course, my experience of the usa is strictly west coast + east coast (and to nyc only!). lols. i don't rly have a place on this thread; i just like the usa.

i am looking fwd to coming over and finding out whats hot and whats not about yr cities, yo.

rrrobyn, please don't buy into the Sarah Palin idea that NYC and the West Coast aren't "real America." You totally have place here!

yaay! i am a coastal kinda chick anyway :)

Meanwhile we have 24 hour bottle shops and DRIVE-THRU booze stores =)

Ft. Myers, Florida has a drive-through booze store that's been around forever--a picture of it appeared 30 years ago in a National Geographic article about the US car culture.

OK I can't believe you touched that fucking opossum. I have nightmares about things that look like that beast.

A couple years ago we voted here in MA about the selling beer/wine in supermarkets and this dude I knew was adamantly against it but could not give a reason why. He just kept saying that he didn't think it was right. So weird.

I lived in England for two years. When I was there I realized that the following things were good about the US:

Pizza - NY style basic delicious pizza
Store hours/days of operation - Things being open on Sunday and past 6 pm
Cheap but decent nail places

Errr I see the store hours thing was covered already. Note to self - read thread before posting.

keeping track of state liquor laws on tour is always a fun one, always seems to shake out just wrong

also possums used to break into my room in SD alot and I'd have to carry em out (by tail) at like 3am and they're just mean and toothy o man hate those lil dudes

O_O If I woke up at 3:00 a.m. to find that a mean and toothy possum had broken into my room and was staring me down I'd probably shit myself and then die right there on the spot. Seriously.

US-GAY

ha, it was the worst ENBB! the first time I ended up having to ask a housemate (older guy who owned the place) what to do and felt all silly when he just walked in, grabbed it and took it out. i was on my own after that. dozen times at least.

exclamation marks are banned from pseudo intellectual message boards

tho, the thing rustling through a trash bag woke me up and my first assumption was somebody was eating chips or something in my (dark obv) bedroom and that actually seemed a bit creepier than the reality of it

no exclamation marks...that's better

Wait, are we talking about United States 'possum or down under possum?

Ugh, my first encounter with an American *o*possum scarred me forever. Sitting at home late one night and Mr Veg says, "Hey, there's a possum outside! Come see!" And without thinking I put on my shoes and wander out to the backyard....where I see the ugliest creature I have ever seen in my life staring back at me.
Of course, it's made even uglier by the fact I had been picturing something like an Australian possum , since that was my only frame of reference.

I stopped dead in my tracks, looked at Mr Veg with absolute horror and said "what the fuck is THAT???". And he's all, "Duh, it's a possum." And I say, "Um no THAT is not a bloody possum" and I ran back inside. Those things are scary! Those teeth! My memory says it hissed at me, I'm not sure if that's true but it may as well have.

Apparently they secrete some kind of poison from their, ahem, anus. Someone needs to come up with a whole new name for those ugly varmints because they are definitely NOT possums.

I call the big one Bitey.

what do you call the medium sized one?

stampy

I think they do hiss.

My 'possum in the pics looked mean, but he was completely still. He opened his mouth and went limp.

I have never heard of their poison anuses though.

xps

total hissers fr sure

Okay so not poison but 'foul-smelling fluid'

From Wikipedia: When threatened or harmed, they will "play possum", mimicking the appearance and smell of a sick or dead animal. When playing possum, the lips are drawn back, teeth are bared, saliva foams around the mouth, and a foul-smelling fluid is secreted from the anal glands. The physiological response is involuntary, rather than a conscious act. Their stiff, curled form can be prodded, turned over, and even carried away. The animal will regain consciousness after a period of minutes or hours and escape.

Burritos (an American CLASSIC)
road trips
cute girls
more space (in general)
chipmunks
STUPID cars
Los Angeles
Target (haha!)
The Southwest
RAP music
Neon signs (they might have them elsewhere but not like they do here)

FREE REFILLS

where are you originally from?

also, chipmunks>>>squirrels, but far rarer

Obvious ones:

Thanksgiving
Bars/stores stay open later BUT...

AMERICANS EAT DINNER TOO EARLY...what's with restaurants closing at, like, 10???

xp - I am from Northwest London, in the United Kingdom

Shitty businesses in the US have this weird rundown slummy cool aura about them whereas shitty businesses in the UK are...just shit

Oh yes to most of those but esp free refills, good signs and Mexican food in general. Sorry UK but as general rule, your Mexican food sucks ass.

oh and Thanksgiving too

Theres nothing worse than a half-boarded up deserted plaza in a crummy UK market town, thats for sure :/

Erica mexican food sucks in Aus too, fwiw :(

London only got mexican food, like, last year! My wife and I were laughing at some "tacqueria" in Camden market. You don't see quesadillas on the menu of mexican places here in East LA!!

There has been a Mexican place in Camden for years, I wonder if it's the same one. It's pretty meh. There's also a Mexican next to the Pineapple dance studios in Central London that was better but still not really worth it imo.

There's some place in Islington that is blandly acceptable

DRIVE-THRU booze stores

i've seen these in texas

Free papers in DC are pretty good (well, one of them is); free papers in London are hopeless

Thing about Mexican food, it seems to me, is that it should be possible to make well just about anywhere. The key ingredients, the chilies and spices, are light enough that they could be shipped anywhere and not eat into the restaurant's bottom line -- it mainly takes a chef who knows what s/he's doing.

agree/disagree?

Healthcare in the US may be a nightmare, but when you do see a primary care doctor, they seem much less rushed, much more thorough and listen more

Really?? That's the opposite of my experience here tbh

Oh Jesus, please keep that sentiment to yourself until we get our healthcare system straightened out over here. xp to ljubljana

Oh no I totally agree about the primary care thing. That was my experience at least.

Another is dentistry. Sorry but as expensive as it is it's just better here. Fact.

I don't know enough about what goes into Mexican food to answer that question, WmC. I just eat the stuff

Dentistry sure, better here. But seeing a GP? You wait in one room, then a nurse takes you to her station and takes blood pressure, then you wait in another smaller room for another 10-15 minutes. Doctor comes in in a hurry, talk to you for three minutes tops, says he'll write a prescription and disappears for another ten minutes before bringing it back. Oh and you have to book like a month in advance if you want an actual appointment.

Then go to pharmacy and pay out the "ass" for a handful of pills.

Also I had a major surgery (hip replacement) on private healthcare here and a day after I was home from hospital (still unable to walk for another 3-4 weeks, the insurance company was calling me threatening not to pay my $90k (!) bill because the hospital had kept me for one day more than their liking. FUCK THAT

Anyway, things we LIKE - Hot DOgs!!!!!!!

xps re rushed visits
to That sounds like a lot of U.S. doctors' offices, except for the long advance notice. My current doc is great and books 30 min. appointments (and answers his own phone much of the time, and is ALWAYS available to talk on the phone, and often does not charge a co-pay, and is just an INCREDIBLE man), but he's a huge exception.

(BTW, I am so incredibly poorly traveled that I don't even want to go into it, and this thread makes me regret that fact,and possibly spurs to me fix it.)

Or by "here" did you mean the U.S. ?

So glad we have govt subsidised prescriptions and Medicare here :/ If I had to pay more than $20 to see a GP I'd just never go.

Get a better doc Admrl. I love mine and that's not my experience at all but maybe I'm just lucky. I had two diff docs in the time I was in London and I always waited hours to see them and the experience was really impersonal.

Oh the $$$ and insurance BS is a whole other story but I don't think Lub was praising the health care system as a whole and neither am I.

I meant the US

I want Jesse's doctor and I'm not even sick.

I have had like 3 insurers, 4-5 doctors and lived in two big US cities. This has been my experience.

A couple years ago we voted here in MA about the selling beer/wine in supermarkets and this dude I knew was adamantly against it but could not give a reason why. He just kept saying that he didn't think it was right. So weird.

I remember that. There was a seemingly round-the-clock ad campaign from the competing sides that made me aggressively not care about the outcome. Liquor stores wanted to be able to sell the shit exclusively and made it a moral issue ("Your kids will be at the supermarket! With booze in the vicinity!"). The supermarkets ads made it about freedom of choice. Since the vast majority of supermarkets in my area were literally next door to a liquor store, it really didn't matter.

Classic BS U.S. insurance story:

My insurance company is United Healthcare Of The River Valley. My insurance card says "United Healthcare" and NOWHERE mentions any geographical terms. After a week-long stay in the hospital, I got bills for $40,000, $53,000, etc., which said that my insurance company denied ever hearing of me.

After hours on the phone with the hospital's billing dept. and the insurance company, we figured out that United Healthcare Of the River Valley is a distinct company under United's umbrella, and if the claim did not say "OF THE RIVER VALLEY" on it, it would be denied.

Kicker: Both United Healthcare and United Healthcare Of the River Valley have the EXACT same address in the same building in Kingston, NY, and the even the same box number, BUT they do not forward mail between divisions.

The hospital billing lady said that they did that shit on purpose so as to be able to deny claims.

ARGH.

WmC - I and 4 other ILXors all go to that doctor b/c he is superb!

Another good thing about America - AMERICANS!

You know, with that funny wacka wacka Fozzy Bear way of talking that they have (or the meemy meemy mooshie Miss Piggy way if they are a woman), their square chins, love of stetsons and 5 double-cheeseburger a day habit. They really are jolly good fun. God bless them, each and every one.

I mean usually I love it here but some things (mainly to do with "the system") make me think WHY THE FUCK AREN'T THESE PEOPLE RIOTING IN THE STREETS? THEY USED TO

Also - I love Oreos!

Another good thing about America - AMERICANS!

Cosign :) I know some pretty damn awesome USAians <3

Americans - for sure. And they're so curious about us foreigners. It's adorable!
Refills. Cosign 100%. God bless America and bottomless cups of coffee/coke/iced tea/etc
US Dentists, I definitely like.
Monuments. Like, Washington DC National Mall. Americans commemorate the HELL out their history. Hello New World Egypt. It's pretty awesome.
Pies. Pumpkin, Apple, Cherry, Key Lime, Lemon Merengue, Coconut Cream, Chocolate Cream...good American hometown homemade pies are O_O

I always think a Stetson is a type of gun until I remember good old Stagger Lee losing that Stetson HAT.

Along the lines of "free refills," you just don't see this that much in the UK (so it's impossible to make a 'graveyard'):

http://whitmer.wikis.birmingham.k12.mi.us/file/view/soda-fountain.jpg/118193161/soda-fountain.jpg

^buzza

Erica mexican food sucks in Aus too, fwiw :(

It’s dece if you go to a place run by Mexicans! London is fucking OVERRUN by fast-food taquieras though, it was alarming. Probably even more of those than Slug & Lettuces.

Some of the burrito carts are great - Donkey Daddy in Leather Lane in particular.

I do not miss being able to buy gallon Big Gulps of soft drinks seemingly at will in the US, that shit is gross and infantilizing.

Infantilizing? What a weird word for that.

I also miss cinnamon gum (Dentyne, Big Red...)

Donkey Daddy in Leather Lane

uhh

Re: London Mexican
I was suspicious of that Donkey Daddy truck because of the name (and the huge, obnoxious "Kick Ass Mexican Grill!" sign), but I will give it a whirl.

Wahaca is good but edges a little fusion/bourgie on much of the menu.

Cafe Pacifico (the place next to Pineapple Dance Studios referenced above) is decent Tex/Mex but it's always mobbed and it's literally the loudest restaurant I have ever been to.

The Texas Embassy is a nightmare realized (unless you really like movie-theater style nacho cheese sauce on your Mexican food)

Relatively new place: Boho Mexica on Commercial St. near Spitalfields - good but expensive.

There's a new-ish burrito joint in Soho that I have heard good things about.

Thing about Mexican food, it seems to me, is that it should be possible to make well just about anywhere. The key ingredients, the chilies and spices, are light enough that they could be shipped anywhere and not eat into the restaurant's bottom line -- it mainly takes a chef who knows what s/he's doing.

We don't have Mexicans here.

Funny but, on the way to the work today, I saw a guy in a big white stetson, ball-crushing bluejeans and stupid cowboy boots striding along the pavement (that's sidewalk to you folks), quite the thing

it seems like mexican food oughtta be easily preparable anywhere by almost anyone. but decent mexican food, imo, tends to come from people who've got a deep familiarity with the food and culture. and that's a little harder to export/distribute. like the ingredients and prep are simple, but that only makes the difference between good and bad all the more subtle. otoh, "mexican-style" food, of some imagined sort, really is easy...

... also we have Indian food for all our too-hot-for-whitey requisites

that xpost applies goes double for street-cart-type mex

usually in the u.s. for ~1-2 months a year. i look forward to:

the pacific ocean
the state of california esp. its food, weather and people
seeing the best picture nominees before the oscars
being asked if i'm australian because my feeble s. yorkshire accent (this happens everywhere except LA and NYC ime)
tipping (it is a lot of fun!)
domestic flights (different vibe)

Cafe Pacifico (the place next to Pineapple Dance Studios referenced above) is decent Tex/Mex but it's always mobbed and it's literally the loudest restaurant I have ever been to.

Thank you - it was bugging me that I couldn't think of the name of that place. Also, you're right about it being mobbed and loud.

it's literally the loudest restaurant I have ever been to

Well that's Americans for you *ducks*

I had assumed that banks opening after 9 and closing well before 5 and being shut all weekend was a universal thing, what with banks universally being unhelpful money-screwing assholes. Kind of jealous now, but UK banks don't charge you monthly fees just for having an account which I think most US ones do, so I guess I wouldn't swap?

(Obv they try to trick you into charges and late fees and sit on your money for as long as possible etc to make up, but I mostly manage to avoid the first two. Now I live in a city some banks open on a Saturday but the staff aren't authorised to do any actual banking, so all you can do is hand in paperwork to be looked at on Monday. Helpful!)

PS here is a fascinating youtube channel for all your opossum pedicure and psychoanalysis needs:
http://www.youtube.com/user/MEpearlA

Some banks are open all day on Saturday though - not mine of course, they shut at 12.30. Do many banks still have a kind of half day in the middle of the week? (xp)

at one time i would have said

- excedrin

but anadin extra is pretty much the same thing

24. Neosporin

^ this

and on the "hy won't you take my money" front, last weekend i stopped outside a used furniture store to look at a particularly attractive metal desk lamp that was sitting on a table outside. it had an enormous bulb inside it, so i unscrewed the bulb to see if it was special or something. once unscrewed, the bulb socket sort of sagged inside the lamp - it wasn't really attached properly and the bulb was the only thing holding it there. the man who ran the shop saw this and asked in a very sharp tone of voice: "did you just break that?" and i was like "no, i was just unscrewing the bulb. it's a great lamp though, i'm sure it won't be hard to fix.." and he says "please stop touching it" and i'm like "ok, sorry" and then he snatches it away and turns to walk inside the shop! i'm like "i was interested in buying that!" and he just says "THANK YOU!" in an annoyed voice

like, i guess your used furniture business is going so well you don't need people to actually buy your shitty broken shit. how about fuck you and fuck your broken lamp too?

Sometimes people who run secondhand stores are batshit insane and lack social skills? Surely this is universal, or at least replicated in New York.

It is not actually remotely difficult to do your shopping after 6pm if you're in London, in fact it's piss easy. Rest of the UK, not so much.

I'd assumed that every provincial high street would have cottoned onto late night shopping on at least SOME weekdays by now but apparently enough.

I suspect they rationalise it in that in most UK towns there is actually nothing to do at the weekend so you might as well go shopping then.

I think most British people's attitude to Mexican food is the same as Americans attitude towards Indian food - "why would you come over here and eat it when it's so much better on your side of the Atlantic?"

Yeah also that thing about not having any Mexicans. Are Thai restaurants widespread in the US? Seemingly everywhere in Britain has at least two these days. I was in Banbury the other weekend and they had four in a very small town centre.

but UK banks don't charge you monthly fees just for having an account which I think most US ones do

Another point in favo(u)r of UK banks - most of the time, there is no fee to take cash out of an ATM/Cashpoint. Even if it's not a machine from your bank chain.

In the U.S., especially in big cities, there is a fee of between $2 to $3!

But yes, the hours are ludicrous.

In the U.S., especially in big cities, there is a fee of between $2 to $3!

Daylight robbery!

Mexican restaurants and burrito carts are proliferating because they are cheap to launch and maintain, in relative terms, and in recessions these are the kind of independent food outlets that flourish. Also, Latin Americans are starting to find their way to the UK as students and entrepreneurs. The same thing has happened with Korean food in London over the past few years because of those low-rental Centre Point restaurants.

Are Thai restaurants widespread in the US

yes.

xposts to upthread - oh god no, was not endorsing the US health system. I have had stupid insurance stories, and am very, very lucky that my employer helps its staff deal with the insurance company. And as for the wait to see a PCP, yes, I've also had trouble getting appointments and waiting a long time to be called in - both here in the US and also back home in the UK. It's just that once I was seen, I felt as though something that would have been dealt with in 2 mins in the UK and dismissed was dealt with properly here.

But the huge rider is that I haven't had enough PCP experience here to know whether that holds true more generally. And of course all PCP doctors are individuals...

Are Thai restaurants widespread in the US? Seemingly everywhere in Britain has at least two these days. I was in Banbury the other weekend and they had four in a very small town centre.

Yeah, various tiny villages (some <1000 people) I rattle through on my bus through rural Oxfordshire have pubs which have started doing Thai food in the past few years. This would be good but they are all expensive and pretty good at charging you £££ for things you don't think will be expensive until you get the bill.

If any American ILXors come to Oxford, UK, please try our burrito bar and tell me if it's any good, cz everyone I know thinks it's great but to me it doesn't taste of much unless you really pour the hot sauce on, and then it just tastes of hot sauce. Or maybe this is the point?

but at least it doesn't taste like british food? prob why the rave reviews?

That's definitely not the point! Real Mexican food should have lots of competing but complimentary flavors.

the burrito place in oxford has been getting steadily blander, it's really sad - i swear there was a point where it tasted reasonably good.

the burrito place in oxford is dreadful imo

I think most British people's attitude to Mexican food is the same as Americans attitude towards Indian food - "why would you come over here and eat it when it's so much better on your side of the Atlantic?"

Can i please just say for about the millionth time that we CAN get good Mexican food in this country, or at least in London. I really don't know where this prevailing viewpoint comes from and why it won't go away please.

Wahaca, La Tasca are perfectly good sit-down restaurants, while the various burrito carts Suzy talks about, as well as the Subway-size Mexican takeaways serve up lunches that are better, and better value, than pretty much anything else you can get in central london.

Though why anyone would want to eat anything other than Indian food I don't know

This is the 3rd Oxford food place this month that someone's told me was really good when it opened in the last couple of years and now isn't. I guess I need to start making sure I visit new places more promptly. Good excuse, anyway.

(xxp)

if you live in an urban area, food shopping in the UK is generally not a problem before 10pm. and if you're willing to drive then shopping for most stuff is not a problem before 10.

bavaria took a lot of getting used to. everything has to shut at 8, tesco online type things don't really exist, nothing is open on sundays, and quite a lot of smaller shops choose to shut at for saturday pm too. why does bavarians never want to take my money?

retail banking in the UK is really good ime compared to germany, australia and the US. efficient, mostly free, etc. can't remember the last time i physically went to a bank in the UK.

Was in Sweden for a bit, and everyone I talked to asked me why I would want to go to Sweden when America is the greatest most exciting place on Earth. This kind of talk I've heard from people in many countries I've visited.

Trying to think what's exciting about America after being away for so long (over a month). First noticeable thing is all the bright, loud, flashy billboards and fast food restaurants everywhere. You don't see that stuff so much in Europe.

Second is this creeping sense of danger, like you might get hit by a car while walking, or mugged randomly. In America you have the feeling that your life is somehow constantly in danger. I think this started as soon as I re-entered the country and heard "The terror alert is ORANGE" every ten minutes over the airport speaker system. Then walking by 24 hour news shows (which arent displayed everywhere in the Copenhagen airport like they are in every airport in America) bombarding the subconscious with sensational stories of raping priests and sex scandals and corruption. The news has a general attitude of "HOLY SHIT CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS???" where in Europe it seemed more or less like "This is what happened today".

And then of course the ride home and going through the radio because every station was playing loud screaming noisy commercials, getting the traffic report and hearing there is a Code Orange Smog Alert and little kids and old people shouldn't spend much time outside. WOW! I'm not a child nor a senior citizen, but no doubt that smog will affect me in some way. If I accidentally spend too much time outside on the way from my car to my house, will I eventually develop cancer? EXCITING!!!

Perhaps the most amazing thing about America is the self-loving myths it like to tell about itself. They have been bought by people the world over.

Can i please just say for about the millionth time that we CAN get good Mexican food in this country, or at least in London. I really don't know where this prevailing viewpoint comes from and why it won't go away please.

you're joking, right? i'm sure you can get it in london but (i) you have to know where you're going. if you pick a mexican place at random in london it's going to be really bad, which is not the case in the U.S. (ii) there are places in the uk other than london.

xxxp. if it's any consolation the oxford burrito place was never good imo!

if you live in an urban area, food shopping in the UK is generally not a problem before 10pm

It is where my mother lives. Which is most definitely urban.

Actually (xposts to self) p. much any description I ever hear of any restaurant is "used to be really good but last time I went it was disappointing".

So, thinking from there, I am no expat but maybe one thing I liked about the US is it seems to suffer less from the thing where British life is this constant competition to see who can be most jaded and convey the most world-weary sense of opportunities constantly being shut down by unnamed outside forces

(I like doing this! But it is a bit wearing, daily)

another thing i really like about california. I realise how much of the nonsense I follow as it's happening live on rolling news/blogs/whatevs in europe or even the east coast, has already ceased to matter by the time I'm up and about in GMT-8

tom d: does your mother have a car? i feel like a lot of the "i can't believe you can't shop in the UK at 9pm, you can do that in the US!" is actually "i can't believe you can't shop in the UK at 9pm without a car, you can do that in the US with a car!"

tom d: does your mother have a car?

LOL, sorry but the very idea made me chuckle

There are a proliferation of places by Goodge Street that will do a FAT burrito of reasonable quality for £4. Indian food doesn't work as well for me at lunch because I need more than an hour to eat it, and there's always some asshole from Daily Mail Island who interrogates your food choice when you come back to the office: 'you ate CURRY?' which they never seem to do when you have Thai or Mexican. And it kind of tells you everything else about their diet and attitude that the tub of Flora in the fridge didn't.

Indian lunchy-snacky places like Kati Roll are a tad overpriced for what you get, but would be good if they were more price-attuned to what the burrito folks charge.

There are a proliferation of places by Goodge Street

Not that we're Londoncentric or anything ;)

I love California. From the first time I went to San Francisco I remember thinking, “Ah, so this is what life is like, higher up the evolutionary ladder.” I love the daily interactions with the people, the landscape and the way that that general American urge — how can I make my life better? — receives its most extreme expression in California. A surprising number of people in Britain wake up and tacitly think: How can I slightly fuck up someone’s day, including my own? Plus, in California there’s the weather and the ready availability of tennis courts. At some level my life is a complete failure because I’ve ended up living in London and not California.

-- Geoff Dyer

^^^ usually disagree with this, but think it's 100% otm when i am arriving at a uk airport.

(disagree with the description of the uk, not the description of california)

^ outed as Cardinal Walter Kasper

when i read that "like a third world country" quote i didn't realise he was race-baiting. i thought he was referring to the infrastructure, in which case 100% otm.

there's always some asshole from Daily Mail Island who interrogates your food choice when you come back to the office: 'you ate CURRY?' which they never seem to do when you have Thai or Mexican

Is your office from the 1970s?

No, this has happened at every office I've ever worked at, where someone partakes of kebabs or Indian lunch.

Is every office you've ever worked at from the 1970s?

There are more layers to the food issues in a fashion mag office than any mille-feuille I'd like to snarf down in front of them as they watch in horror.

Wahaca is good but edges a little fusion/bourgie on much of the menu.

Is it really spelled Wahaca?

Yes, on purpose. I think we've been through this before. It's probably the most reliable Mexican food in London.

things I miss about the US:

-having a car to carry around groceries and other stuff in
-wide, varied, and cheap selection of liquors and beers

not sure what else

In the U.S., especially in big cities, there is a fee of between $2 to $3!

Fair enough, but this is why I get cash (with no fees) from the big brightly-lit drugstores that sell beer and have photo labs!

Is it really spelled Wahaca?

yeah this is just disproportionately infuriating to me

Some people said that there just ISN'T that culture of "if there's someone with a dollar to spend, there's someone to take that dollar" - people just value their homelife too much to let this be the dominant attitude towards selling and spending. Stores don't seem terribly worried about a shopper's "experience"; there's definitely not a "customer's always right" thing in most places.

Yeah, I wouldn't encourage the American mania w/r/t retail sales, but the idea of not being able to get something AFTER your working hours, like new tights because you ripped yours, or going to the electronics store because you saw a TV you wanted on close-out or your headphones just stopped working, or whatever, feels so defeating. So you can spend the next 4 days until the weekend wallowing in your not-having A Thing because the shops are closed after 6pm? And then join the 56782904684590 other people in the streets and the stores who all waited until Saturday to do THEIR shopping, too?

The thing with Mexican food, is even if there's a restaurant in London (or wherever) run by Mexicans, they're still adapting the cuisine to the local tastes. I went to a Thai restaurant when I was in Iceland--really bland. When we went back a week later and asked for spicier food, they still gave us the bland stuff and my Icelandic friend thought it was too hot.

Kinda why Outback Steakhouse doesn't serve beetroot on its burger plates.

Yeah, I wouldn't encourage the American mania w/r/t retail sales, but the idea of not being able to get something AFTER your working hours, like new tights because you ripped yours, or going to the electronics store because you saw a TV you wanted on close-out or your headphones just stopped working, or whatever, feels so defeating. So you can spend the next 4 days until the weekend wallowing in your not-having A Thing because the shops are closed after 6pm?

Aside from the TV (and even then...) all these things can be bought in supermarkets. I mean, presumably you have other pairs of tights and won't need to wait four days.

This "everything closes at 6pm" thing is being totally over-exaggerated btw.

Supermarkets? Headphones?? Huh. I won't even buy tights at the drugstore, because the quality is so low.

culture of fear is def one of the things that weirds me out about the us, of course. but at the same time, there are so many artists, writers, musicians, academics, etc etc rallying against it - that culture is also very strong, and supportive of each other, moreso than here, i think, where people working in the arts and academia are so used to being funded by the government for the most part, which has been cutting and cutting funding - it's a defeating feeling. i know not that of course not everyone in the us has that 'fighting spirit' or rebellious nature or whatevs, but it's there, and more strongly than here, imo.
xps

first thing i am doing when i go back to visit SF, after i hug my friends, is eat a burrito.

Laurel:

http://media.cnbc.com/i/CNBC/Sections/News_And_Analysis/_News/_SLIDESHOWS/BestBoomerBrands/SS_top_boomer_brands_leggs.jpg

La Tasca are perfectly good sit-down restaurants

Isn't La Tasca a Spanish Tapas chain? That's not Mexican. Wait - maybe that whole post was a joke. I can't tell. :/

Some of the burrito carts are great - Donkey Daddy in Leather Lane in particular.

I do not miss being able to buy gallon Big Gulps of soft drinks seemingly at will in the US, that shit is gross and infantilizing.
--are you robot? (suzy)

Please explain how big gulps are "infantilizing".

The friend-hugging will keep -- burritos are important. xxxp

xp -- enormous drinks that take two hands to hold, v. reminiscent of a sippy cup. I'm with Suzy on this. Not a fan of straws in general.

'that's a damn shame, cuz when yr done disparaging my beverage container of choice....'

Lesson of this thread. Best thing about America = Mexicans

And California which = Mexicans

I would just like to say that I have an infant in my house and I have yet to see her drinking a Big Gulp.

yeah... La Tasca is Spanish o_O

i went to a mexican restaurant in london once and one of their starters was "spicy blinis"

Just wait til she's able to walk. xp

I recently spent a bit over a year living in France, & came back to the USA last month. (Probably someone yelled at people like me posting on this thread, but I didn't load all the messages in the gap so whatever.) All I missed from the USA was Mexican food, including the ingredients to make Mexican food. Wrt what I didn't miss, well, I am looking to emigrate from the USA to Europe permanently, so I guess that's all you need to know. But I will always shed a tear for Mexican food, washing down my tears with an inexpensive Bordeaux that would cost me $30 in this ridiculous country.

french wine is expensive everywhere but france sadly

c'mon you didn't miss hot wings?

blackened catfish?

CORNBREAD??

motherfucking coarse cornmeal is IMPOSSIBLE TO FIND in europe and it makes my blood BOIL

haha no, I didn't miss hot wings, not really my thing (too much mess for too little reward). I kinda missed Cheez-Its though!

xp we ate cornbread over there! We used polenta to make it. It was good!

I would die without bi-monthly hot wings

UK airports are the only airports that always refuse to hand-inspect my film instead of shoving it through the x-ray, whereas even the most provincial airports in this supposed "culture of fear" are only too happy to do so.

That's another thing - originally thought that over-attentive customer service and general persistent friendliness in the US would be grating and phoney, but goddamn if it isn't nice to have a conversation with the guy at the bookstore or the girl I buy my coffee from most days. Dealing with any service person in the UK (or let me correct this - London at least) pretty much always constitutes some of bullshit power game of who can acknowledge the other person less. I know you probably don't like your job and that a lot of people just want to buy their newspaper or whatever and GTFO, but we're both human beings, let's acknowledge that for a second.

All this said, it's possible I might move back to London some time because I do kind of love it. Haha, I am hypocrite

motherfucking coarse cornmeal is IMPOSSIBLE TO FIND in europe and it makes my blood BOIL

Given it's a staple of Caribbean cooking I assume you're not talking about London here?

MFB and I have def discussed the "culture of fear" w/r/t lots and lots of tv ads. Drives him crazy. It's true, the European ads I've seen take the approach of "Perhaps you might find your life improved by our product? Do try it sometime, if you like."

xp -- enormous drinks that take two hands to hold, v. reminiscent of a sippy cup. I'm with Suzy on this. Not a fan of straws in general.

A 7-11 employee told me that she doesn't sell too many of the biggest Gulp size, because it really is too much soda for one person to drink. The 48 ounce size seems to be the most popular. Oh, and I use straws all of the time when I'm drinking out of a can. Less chance of disturbing my lip gloss, and I can drink faster with a straw, which means that I have a better chance of finishing it while it's still cold.

I kind of want to start another thread specifically about US ads because some of them (and the products they are selling) are mind-boggling to me, like the new Symbicort ads where they are hawking an asthma medicine that, according to the warning, shouldn't be take by people who have asthma due to life-threatening side-effects.

...

I'm not even exaggerating.

xp Basically, it boils down to a belief that no adult human needs to drink more than 12 fl oz of any beverage, especially soda and coffee drinks, and for anyone who's not an adult, parents are there to tell them to knock it off. They certainly don't need to carry around a 64-oz BUCKET of something and make tubercular noises with STRAWS all day while they try to finish it in their cars or somewhere else that is not a mall food court.

Dan, when I was last home I noticed that I wanted to throw things at the TV whenever a commercial featured that horrible Seinfeldy SLAP BASS. Which was like every third ad.

I actually get the most angry w ads for household products that target women w being bad examples of some kind of womanhood if the issue the product is made to address doesn't strike fear into their womanly hearts.

BACTERIA OF SOME BENIGN SORT? NOT IN MY GENERAL VICINITY OR THAT OF MY CHILDREN OR PETS!!!

as an American living in Canada, I miss:
24 hour groceries and restaurants
cheap food (and everything, really)
NPR (yes, I know it's online)
plentiful, diverse microbrews

and believe me when I say that I am not some anti-tax weirdo, but shit, I am taxed a lot. So, low taxes.

and even if the grocery stores were open late/24 hours, they are stocked for shit. American grocery stores are amazing.

American groceries have pork/cheese combos I never imagined possible in the most Randian free market.

Ohhh Laurel...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFgEvfirmjg

Matt if you have a source for coarse cornmeal hook me up. Polenta does not work. I have scoured Caribbean shops and the only cornmeal I can find is still too fine.

you need to come to newfoundland, suzy. The bologna/salt meat section of the store is astounding. xpost

that free market is getting a little Randy!

(and yes I have tried the stall in Borough mkt)

as a former New Yorker I miss having all-night delis with sandwiches and fuckin sushi and slices of cake and keilbasa and hot coffee available all the time

Isn't La Tasca a Spanish Tapas chain? That's not Mexican. Wait - maybe that whole post was a joke. I can't tell. :/

I meant La Perla :(

even if the grocery stores were open late/24 hours, they are stocked for shit. American grocery stores are amazing.

i love american supermarkets. also iced water.

ICED TEA.

Matt if you have a source for coarse cornmeal hook me up. Polenta does not work. I have scoured Caribbean shops and the only cornmeal I can find is still too fine.

― progressive cuts (Tracer Hand), Thursday, 23 September 2010 15:46 (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

tracer have you seen this stuff? is it ok?

http://www.afrocarib.co.uk/media/maize_meal/ss_size2/cornmeal-coarse-new.jpg

haha no, I didn't miss hot wings, not really my thing (too much mess for too little reward).
o_O

Oh, I've eaten at La Perla! It's pretty great!

One genuinely great thing about the UA 4 me:

There was some thread about Americans not traveling abroad/having passports and someone said "because we're too busy traveling around our big awesome country" which sounds kind of haha and dickish, but really, the appeal of the road-trip and the sheer diversity of the US never ceases to amaze me. The more I just HATE flying anywhere, the more I remember that I can get in my car and get out of the city and turn up the stereo and pretty much always find a decent, inexpensive place to stay (or camp) and good food (once you get away from the major roads, at least) and see things that just BLOW my MIND.

Haha, the "UA"

you know the United Artists...of America

That's another thing - originally thought that over-attentive customer service

It is wearying and soul-killing for the employees involved, though. I always hated it when customers tried to engage me in conversation, just like I hate it when my patients and (esp.) their families try to befriend me. "Please, I'm just here to do a job."

i lived in a london and berlin for a few months each and the dearth of hamburgers was painful

but now i miss döner

This thread is kind of amusing because British expats who whinge about not being able to get x and y consumer products wherever they are are generally viewed as the worst kind of savages.

It is wearying and soul-killing for the employees involved, though.

Depends on the business, I think. Most of the places I frequent are independently-run or local chains. For whatever reason, the UK just has less of these. I blame Richard Branson, Alan Sugar and Dragons' Den.

tracer have you seen this stuff? is it ok?

http://www.afrocarib.co.uk/media/maize_meal/ss_size2/cornmeal-coarse-new.jpg

No. I should be more specific - What really quality cornbread requires is STONEGROUND cornmeal - the granules are all different sizes from each other, some very coarse and some not so coarse. Polenta is all the exact same consistency. You can make cornbread with it sure but without the awesome crunchy texture

the culture of fear thing is in canada too, esp as we get so much american tv and other cultural influences. but i don't know, i feel like all the americans i know or have worked with from here even aren't exactly shutting themselves in their homes and freaked out all the time. i also like the frequency of casual conversations with random strangers and customer service people - like not forced, just talkin.
but yeah, i don't watch tv or listen to mainstream radio (can't even deal with most of public radio lately) for a reason - fear-mongering bs in content and ads.
xps
i would love to go on a USA roadtrip!

xp Basically, it boils down to a belief that no adult human needs to drink more than 12 fl oz of any beverage, especially soda and coffee drinks, and for anyone who's not an adult, parents are there to tell them to knock it off. They certainly don't need to carry around a 64-oz BUCKET of something and make tubercular noises with STRAWS all day while they try to finish it in their cars or somewhere else that is not a mall food court.

Not everyone drinks those at one sitting. I know I don't.

someone said "because we're too busy traveling around our big awesome country" which sounds kind of haha and dickish

That might have been me! I wasn't trying to be dickish, it's just something to remember when you think about travel in this country. It's thousands of miles for a lot of people to go anywhere of note, or at least to see any attraction you've ever heard of.

rrrobyn, what are Canada road trips like? Why do I never hear about them?

It's thousands of miles for a lot of people to go anywhere of note, or at least to see any attraction you've ever heard of.

Is that really true? Much as my UK-comments are very London-centric, I suppose my US-comments are a little CA-centric, but I've lived (briefly) on the East Coast and been cross-country twice. There is a lot to see, I just think some coastal people are snobbish about it.

also, we only get 2 weeks vacation a year so it's hard to go very, very far.

I actually get the most angry w ads for household products that target women w being bad examples of some kind of womanhood if the issue the product is made to address doesn't strike fear into their womanly hearts.

This was much, much worse 35-40 years ago. (Picture a group of children singing "Ring Around The Collar, Ring Around The...." and dancing around a shirt stuck attached to...a pole? a clothesline? I forgot. This was much less awesome than it sounds.)

one if the best things in the US is the easyness of getting along.almost everything is comfortable and relatively accessible.

but now i miss döner

Love cheap Berlin Doner Kabobs!!

we only get 2 weeks vacation a year

Fuck a Protestant work ethic

i would love to go on a USA roadtrip!

this is one of my LIFE DREAMS

(obv it requires that i learn to drive between now and the world reaching peak oil, which seems unlikely)

also, we only get 2 weeks vacation a year so it's hard to go very, very far.

― kate78, Thursday, 23 September 2010 16:00 (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

^^^ this is still just so hard for me to comprehend

only get 2 weeks vacation

Yeah this is bullshit. My wife only gets a little more than this, but as I said, we are fortunate enough to live <1 day's drive away from a lot of great places, and 40 mins/2 hrs (depending on traffic) from the beach

Dude! It's 1100 miles from my hometown to NYC and that's not even halfway across the country! I guess Chicago is closer but then if you don't go someplace that's really different from where you LIVE, people don't consider you to have "traveled", now, do they? And until you get a long ways away, in the US, most of the places within nearer distance are probably A LOT LIKE the place you already are -- our landscape is pretty homogeneous until you get a good bit away and give things time to morph into something else.

This is why people from the north go to, say, Florida (for warmth) or Colorado (for mountains) or etc, and that is a LONG-ASS WAY from home.

Not only that, but US corporate work culture means the less vacation you take, the more you are the idealized company martyr who deserves to get along. Ugh

only get 2 weeks vacation

Yeah this is bullshit. My wife only gets a little more than this, but as I said, we are fortunate enough to live <1 day's drive away from a lot of great places, and 40 mins/2 hrs (depending on traffic) from the beach

― MIA Deren Brown Sugar Ray Leonard Cohen Afterworld (admrl), Thursday, September 23, 2010 12:33 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

By "very, very far", I mean "leave our rad continent"

our landscape is pretty homogeneous

Not here it isn't - u can go from dense downtown to beach to mountains to forest to desert all within a couple of hours

Our UK office always only requests two things when someone goes to visit- advil and twizzlers.

Maybe that's not true of every state, but I was asked what I like about the USA

xp

Make your own Buffalo wings, because HOW EASY IS THAT?

I'm pretty good at rustilng up iced water in UK restaurants but this is after telling my servers things like 'ice is *plural*' for years.

Most people I know really hate it when US sales associates get up in their faces with a service script, rather than a genuine 'how're you doing?' as they seem to be devised by people who never had to wait on anyone. In my last American retail job I also refused to wear a name tag and justified it with 'weirdos from off the street do not need to know my name on sight'.

All I ask of a shopping experience is that someone be available if I have a question about something on the sales floor and of course, to take my money. If you've ever shopped at Boots in Britain you'll be familiar with 10 registers that say STAFF NEARBY WILL BE HAPPY TO SERVE YOU while two assistants are engrossed in conversation in the middle of a lunch hour.

My American friends in Britain request goldfish crackers, Kraft macaroni and cheese, and Oreos.

Not only that, but US corporate work culture means the less vacation you take, the more you are the idealized company martyr who deserves to get along. Ugh

Does any other country have those periodic "J. Random Smallbusinessowner has never taken a day off in decades, isn't that amazing?" stories in the news?

Dude! It's 1100 miles from my hometown to NYC and that's not even halfway across the country! I guess Chicago is closer but then if you don't go someplace that's really different from where you LIVE, people don't consider you to have "traveled", now, do they? And until you get a long ways away, in the US, most of the places within nearer distance are probably A LOT LIKE the place you already are -- our landscape is pretty homogeneous until you get a good bit away and give things time to morph into something else.

This is why people from the north go to, say, Florida (for warmth) or Colorado (for mountains) or etc, and that is a LONG-ASS WAY from home.

― I've got ten bucks. SURPRISE ME. (Laurel), Thursday, September 23, 2010 10:04 AM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Huh I guess this is just about perceptions about what's worth seeing or what's worth traveling for but IMO, this is baaaaaaaaaloney

Like I can drive over to Wisconsin and go to Madison or Milwaukee or the House on the Rock or wherever and maybe it's not hugely different from Chicago or downstate Illinois but it's still traveling and getting out on the road and seeing interesting things and being somewhere different

Does any other country have those periodic "J. Random Smallbusinessowner has never taken a day off in decades, isn't that amazing?" stories in the news?

Japan?

I remember listening to a partner talk about work/life balance (lol corporate jargon) and how he achieved it by always being at home to tuck his son into bed. He never saw him otherwise.

Or maybe Russia... under Stalin (xp)

I think the thing is that being able to take cool holidays to sunny places wherever you want is part of the whole aspirational British thing.

That sort of work ethic would require people to never leave Britain, and very few people choose to do that.

Nick, I completely agree. But that is not what people from Europe consider to be "traveled". So when non-Americans say, "I can't believe 65% (or whatever) of Americans never get out of their own country, most of them don't even have PASSPORTS, what ignorant clods!" they are not counting driving to the next state over where there is cool stuff to see & do, but where people speak your language more or less the same way you do, share the same/a similar history to yours, etc.

America is quite a long way away from other countries, compared to the UK

o i c
xpost

adam, roadtrips in Canada are kind of quiet and empty and on small highways (even the transcanada hwy is small compared to big US roads!). i haven't been to saskatchewan or manitoba tho, which i am told are even more empty and quiet to drive through! it's all about long stretches of nature rather than getting somewhere fast (a lot of cdns drive through the US if they want to travel east-west long distances faster). sounds pretty nice to me tbh.

In my last American retail job I also refused to wear a name tag and justified it with 'weirdos from off the street do not need to know my name on sight'.

I have heard of restaurants requiring servers to put their FULL NAMES on their name tags. (One stopped after a stalking incident.)

How did you get away with this? I would have been fired right away if I had ever tried that. I'm not all that fond of name tags for retail jobs, either. (I have no problem with wearing one for my current job--I'm going into people's homes, after all.)

in some states it is a law that health care providers wear nametags

I'm pretty good at rustilng up iced water in UK restaurants but this is after telling my servers things like 'ice is *plural*' for years.

if you say it like that i'm guessing your water also comes with special sauce

Japan?

Didn't a lot of this kind of thing come from the US via the post WWII occupation? (IBM was the first company to have its employees sing corporate songs at meetings.)

Hmmmmmm, not sure the Japanese were exactly a happy-go-lucky couldn't-care-less bunch before that

I remember listening to a partner talk about work/life balance (lol corporate jargon) and how he achieved it by always being at home to tuck his son into bed. He never saw him otherwise.

There was a Merrill Lynch employee who had a taxi take him home from the office, wait outside while he read his daughter a bedtime story, and then take him back to the office. And he did this every weekday.

caek, if they're standing there at a bar dropping one cube of ice into your drink, you ask them to add more and tell them ice is plural in a loljoeks way once they've done what you've asked, and thanked them. TIMING. SPOONFUL OF SUGAR ETC.

I 'got away' with no name tag at that retail job because we hadn't started out having to wear them, and I guess my boss thought I made a valid point.

The news has a general attitude of "HOLY SHIT CAN YOU BELIEVE THIS???" where in Europe it seemed more or less like "This is what happened today".

haha

All I missed from the USA was Mexican food, including the ingredients to make Mexican food.

In 1998 I was able to buy refried beans at Sainsbury's in Lancaster, but all of the British students with whom I shared a dorm kitchen had no idea what it was and made jokes about me eating dog food.

fucking British students

Sainsbury's has offered Old El Paso and Uncle Ben's bastardizations of Mexican food for YEARS. Tastes worse than school lunch tacos made in MINNESOTA in the '70s.

My wife, as a young exchange student in Norwich, went to KFC in the city centre and asked for "biscuits". They looked at her like she was crazy.

My boss is American and she is constantly mentioning American stuff you can't buy in the UK and I'm like, "What do you mean, you can get that everywhere!" Try looking, you silly tart.

Has anybody ever tried to sell/serve Southern US biscuits in England?

If I knew what they were I could answer that

are they similar to scones?

Stuff just has diff. names a lot of the time

They look a bit like scones from what I can see.

they are not counting driving to the next state over where there is cool stuff to see & do, but where people speak your language more or less the same way you do, share the same/a similar history to yours, etc.

In Atlanta, that is driving 7/8 hours to the beach, or the nearest big city. For me, most of America is long stretches of highway interrupted by strip malls that are all pretty much the same. Some places don't have Whataburger, some places the Waffle House is a Huddle House. It's not like you can hit the road and go see a castle or town built on an old medieval village or something.

A really good friend from high school moved here two years ago and I've managed to locate everything we keep Jonesing for at places like Selfridges Food Hall. I tend to bring back things from Mexican stores now, like the hot chocolate medallions.

biscuits are def. not scones.

I was struggling to see how scones would work as part of any meal available at KFC.

They might not be US scones but they are UK scones

They look a bit like scones from what I can see.

Don't even start this

For me, most of America is long stretches of highway interrupted by strip malls that are all pretty much the same.

Totes. Not that it has anything to do with the OP, sorry about that, but Adam knows exactly what I'm saying.

no, they're not even UK scones. You don't pour cream over them and eat them at teatime. Trust me on this.

scones in my experience are generally a little bit sweet, biscuits are not sweet at all (except from the honey/jam/whatever you put on it). biscuits are also lighter/flakier in texture, though the texture can vary pretty widely depending on who's making them and how they're making them.

If I knew what they were I could answer that

― Tom A. (Tom B.) (Tom C.) (Tom D.), Thursday, September 23, 2010 10:48 AM (51 seconds ago)

are they similar to scones?

― just sayin, Thursday, September 23, 2010 10:48 AM (41 seconds ago)

I've been hearing that from Britishes, Irishes and Scottishes for nearly 20 years now, and the fact that they STILL aren't on the radar over there makes me think there's some sort of info clampdown conspiracy meant to keep you all from tasting one of the greatest things ever invented.

They're a quickbread like scones, but lighter and fluffier, generally smaller.

Fuck, now I'm missing those fridge tubes of Hungry Jack biscuits

Not all roads are highways.

Also have you ever been to a castle? There are some great ones, but some of them are fucking boring.

Scones are thick and heavy and sweet whereas biscuits are light and fluffy and buttery

I've started something I shouldn't have, haven't I.

Biscuits are actually kinda bitter because the leavener is baking powder -- are scones traditionally a risen dough, or a quick batter?

We have different types of scone over here

ooh, fancy

you used to be able to get 'biscuits' in UK KFCs - they were def a little bit scone-like, maybe slightly harder, slightly less sweet?

Scones don't contain buttermilk.

Au contraire, Laurel - YOU know what I'M saying

=)))

xxxxxxp

Scones. We invented the bastards after all!

xpost

same as you used to get root beer in uk macdonalds

Also - this thread should be called "no non-expats allowed in the room!!!!!"

fair enough. ill just have to comeback in a year or so

Not everyone drinks those at one sitting. I know I don't.

wouldn't it go warm/flat?

Scones are thick and heavy and sweet whereas biscuits are light and fluffy and buttery

― MIA Deren Brown Sugar Ray Leonard Cohen Afterworld (admrl), Thursday, 23 September 2010 16:53 (4 minutes ago) Bookmark

you can get savoury scones!

Scones have nothing to do with American biscuits. I'm not sure why this is so difficult to grasp.

Because you devious bastards had made them look exactly like scones, that's why

Well I've got two arms and one nose just like Brad Pitt does, I guess that means I am the sexiest man alive

haha

Come come now

xpost That's kind of the point. Only order what you'd consume at one sitting; carting around soft drinks has never really been the 'classy' option and people will plumb know I've lost my mind if they find me with a plastic thermal coffee mug designed for slovenly commuters.

Tracer Hand, I admired this thread of yours that covers some of the issues I touched on above:

why must every moderately successful store in the UK be immediately turned into a chain?

A serious attempt over there to sell southern US home cooking/soul food, incl. breakfast, would make a trillion dollars.

or pounds

especially since gussied-up poverty-cuisine has been the hottest thing going for a decade now

If only there were more American things on sale in the UK...

good biscuits are just like wowomg

and i grew up on scones (good ones!)

American sandwiches may be bigger but British people know how to slice theirs = score draw

did you guys know that it's BRITISH FOOD FORTNIGHT?

Wiki:

In the United States it (biscuit) relates to a small soft leavened bread, somewhat similar to a scone.

ah yes, totally reliable information source Wikipedia, touche

"Wiki" needs to get out more, whoever he is

xp

touche is french for "touch", I think

My boss is American and she is constantly mentioning American stuff you can't buy in the UK and I'm like, "What do you mean, you can get that everywhere!" Try looking, you silly tart.

I wonder what kind of stuff she's after? You *CAN* get a lot of stuff if you look around, but the prices are definitely bananas. Selfridges sells boxes of Lucky Charms cereal for £8.00 (That's about $13.50 with today's exhange rate). Cyber Candy in Covent Garden will sell you a twelve pack of A&W Root Beer for £15! A box of instant grits sells at Partridges in Sloane Square for £6.

motherfucking coarse cornmeal is IMPOSSIBLE TO FIND in europe and it makes my blood BOIL
I'm pretty sure I have seen this at a store called Outsider Tart in Chiswick (it's an amazing bakery run by two Americans who were on some kind of reality cooking show in the UK I think. They're very nice - they sell lots of cooking supplies, as well as good American junk food:

http://www.outsidertart.com/main.asp?sec=about

I meant La Perla :(

La Perla is the same owners/chefs as Cafe Pacifico.

i went to a mexican restaurant in london once and one of their starters was "spicy blinis"

The Mexican place on Fulham Palace Road near the Hammersmith Broadway offers Hummus and Garlic Bread as sides with enchiladas and burritos!

I wonder what kind of stuff she's after?

Stuff like those Reese peanut butter cup things - which are about as common as any other chocolate bar in the UK

If you are really homesick for Lucky Charms, you need some kind of intervention

I wonder what kind of stuff she's after? You *CAN* get a lot of stuff if you look around, but the prices are definitely bananas. Selfridges sells boxes of Lucky Charms cereal for £8.00 (That's about $13.50 with today's exhange rate). Cyber Candy in Covent Garden will sell you a twelve pack of A&W Root Beer for £15! A box of instant grits sells at Partridges in Sloane Square for £6.

Presumably because they have to be imported, and, yeah Selfridges is expensive.

The direction this thread is taking is kind of depressing, it's giving me the same head-in-hands feeling as when I went past a BRITISH SHOP in Cyprus that made a big deal about the fact it sold Heinz Baked Beans and Marmite. It's okay for other countries to be different, everyone doesn't need everyone else's stuff available all the time.

i buy quorn and tea bags here: http://www.british-allsorts.de/

can't imagine who pays €4 for a tinned haggis

Wow @ that site. If people are really at the state where they are so homesick for Mr Brain's Faggots and Kershaw's roast dinner in a box that they have to order them off the internet then they probably need to reassess the direction their life is going in.

can't imagine who pays €4 for a tinned haggis

€2.89 for a tin of Spam. Bargain!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=abmrAf0evgk

I'm homesick for Scottish Plain bread and potato scones tbh

thanks, She Got the Shakes! i just called them and they said they only stock Quaker corn meal though. or their own "mix" (which i don't trust naturally)

HOLY SHIT

http://www.americansweets.co.uk/american-indian-head-stone-ground-yellow-corn-meal-907g-827-p.asp

£2.45 a bag

oh man

it's an odd shop. i've never actually seen anyone in there (except me -- i am 100% grateful for the opportunity to by quorn and non-liptons tea bags)

the expat community in munich is massive and weirdly insular. it's a financial/business centre, so a lot of the brits here wouldn't choose to be if it weren't for work. so they all meet up and talk about marmite etc.

Also, the ales section is woefully understocked given they have 25 variations on 'beef in gravy in a tin'.

Matt DC I can't believe you're actually confused about people wanting to eat stuff they grew up with.

the owner is from sunderland, matt

may explained the tinned meat situation

American biscuits are definitely not the same as scones.

This has been mentioned before but I feel it needs repeating.

I think most right-thinking people realise that

Expat: I like living in the UK, but sometimes I do miss me Lucky Charms.
Matt: WHY MUST AMERICA TRY TO DEVOUR ALL OTHER CULTURES?

wait, are scones like biscuits?

Haha @ pp

Yeah, I'm not sure what other direction a thread called "A thread for Expats. List of what we like about the ol USA" to take!

I think a lot of people have hijacked the OP's intentions for their own sinister agendas

Expat: I like living in the UK, but sometimes I do miss me Lucky Charms.
Matt: WHY MUST AMERICA TRY TO DEVOUR ALL OTHER CULTURES?

Hah, American and Britain, to be fair.

Lucky Charms actually used to be available in normal shops over here, dunno what happened to that.

That's silly - my British neighbour emigrated to the US in 1947 and pined for things like Battenberg cakes, Typhoo tea and Licorice Allsorts for the next sixty-plus years. His wife's discovery of online importers was a result when he was declining and nothing else but tea and cake made him happy.

Lucky Charms are at Selfridges.

Forget the supposed ease of recreating "good mexican food", Lucky Charms strike me as one thing you could certainly make at home with a bit of flour and sugar and a large pack of food colouring

i try not to go very often, but i do have a great time in the irish pub here when there's champions league or something. bar staff say "what?!" in strong dublin accent if you try to speak german to them, and they have fosters on tap and a sky feed so you can listen to andy gray. great days.

xxxp i did list a bunch of stuff i like when i'm in the us for non-holiday stuff but none of it was remarked upon :-(

Forget the supposed ease of recreating "good mexican food", Lucky Charms strike me as one thing you could certainly make at home with a bit of flour and sugar and a large pack of food colouring

― MIA Deren Brown Sugar Ray Leonard Cohen Afterworld (admrl), Thursday, September 23, 2010 11:32 AM Bookmark

Swear to God, I knew someone was going to make that post.

"Don't know why you're missing a Cherry Ripe, mate, when all you need is some melted chocolate, mushy cherries and a turkey baster."

In Atlanta, that is driving 7/8 hours to the beach, or the nearest big city. For me, most of America is long stretches of highway interrupted by strip malls that are all pretty much the same. Some places don't have Whataburger, some places the Waffle House is a Huddle House. It's not like you can hit the road and go see a castle or town built on an old medieval village or something.

The Southwestern Native American pueblos certainly count as old medieval villages, at least to me. And we do have castle-like structures here. Mostly built by crazy people, though.

http://www.inarkansas.com/19074/meet-the-neighbors-jean-marc-and-solange-mirat-get-medieval-on-the-ozarks

If you are really homesick for Lucky Charms, you need some kind of intervention

Quickly went from slightly indignant to remembering that I was recently plotting a 90 minute+ multiple train journey to some mall in Essex that just opened the first Taco Bell in the UK (since the early 90s).

there are tons of foods that i had eaten in years while i lived in nz, but have gotten intense cravings for since moving to the US. i don't see what's strange about that.

adamrl totally otm about being able to just get in the car and drive to all kinds of amazing places, esp in california. but i def find it hard to keep in mind that the US really IS like 50 different countries in one - it's a hard thing to get used to when you come from a little island where everything is the same all over.

Biscuits are biscuits, I've discovered - there is no easy way to explain them. What is a biscuit? We might as well as the same of birds: what are birds? We simply don't know. But they are very easy to make with readily available ingredients, so I suggest the rest of the world get its shit together and make some buttermilk biscuits! (The active disinformation theory seems plausible, btw.)

xp

I'd always gotten the impression that NZ had a wide variety of landscapes and climates since it was so long north to south. xp

There's some powerful gnome in a dark office in the British Food Council saying "if we let US biscuits into this country, we're totally fucked, that'll be the final straw that ends the Empire."

You can buy Bisquick here, FYI. I appreciate this may be sacrilege to a Southerner.

xp to WmC - that's true, and ppl are always talking to me about how beautiful NZ is/they've heard it is etc., maybe it's bc i never really travelled round NZ? i admit i led a pretty insular life for the first 28 yrs. and my husband thought NZ was totally beautiful and amazing so. i guess i just feel like here the different landscapes seem almost ~limitless~?

Bisquick makes a totally fine biscuit.

Some of the best biscuits I ever had were at a diner I used to go to in New Orleans. I asked the owner what the secret was and he told me: Pillsbury tube biscuits. He really should have lied!

biscuits are amazing and delish and nothing really like scones - the first time i had one was a revelation.

i fucking hate scones but i love fry bread (scone dough deep fried, served with TONS of butter and golden syrup)

I'm okay with sacrilege. Bisquick biscuits are a lot better than no biscuits at all. I confess that I use frozen biscuits rather than make from scratch -- those darn food scientists have achieved something really noteworthy with those little hockey pucks.

xposts

Justin3 in Utah and Idaho they call fry bread "scones"! It's confusing. You may enjoy that Utah has a chain of restaurants selling them called Sconecutters.

Sorry, The Sconecutter.

http://www.sconecutter.com/
warning: jingle

mmmm!

just1n3, I'd say the LotR movies are about as perfect an advertisement for NZ's natural beauty as there could be.

they were all photoshopped fyi

ok that'll save me a shitload of $$$ on airfare

biscuits are amazing and delish and nothing really like scones - the first time i had one was a revelation.

OK, that's it. Tomorrow morning I make biscuits for breakfast. Darn you and your bad influence on me, ILX!

"Don't know why you're missing a Cherry Ripe, mate, when all you need is some melted chocolate, mushy cherries and a turkey baster."

― http://tinyurl.com/vrrr0000m (Pleasant Plains), Thursday, September 23, 2010 11:36 AM (4 hours ago) Bookmark

lol you think theyre really cherries

? for the ex-pats, what do you think of the lack of cigarette smoke everywhere?

― Fartbritz Sootzveti (Steve Shasta), Wednesday, September 22, 2010 1:41 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark australia was smoke free anywhere indoors for years before USA iirc so more shocked by abundance of smoke

http://www.wildlife.org.au/magazine/editions/2007/winter/possum.jpg
hey lil dude!

Okay this is embarrassing but I just realize that I completely misunderstood the nature of this thread.

I am so dumb that I didn't get this is for US expats to talk about what they like about the US, not 'expats from anywhere living in the US'...which is what I thought. Which makes no sense.

That is all. I'll be over here taking online reading/comprehension tests.

xpost POSSUM!!!!

saw our great dane murder the bejesus out of one of these the other night. http://www.aaanimalcontrol.com/professional-trapper/images/opossum.jpg

also my cat killed an adult version of the cutie in the post above. she stretched its entrails the whole length of the backyard keeping them attached to its body. I think that might be what started the whole killing a mouse then carefully placing its different organs in different corners of the house phase. you'd always find the face (no skull - just eye holes and nose)behind the living room door.

I am so dumb that I didn't get this is for US expats to talk about what they like about the US, not 'expats from anywhere living in the US'...which is what I thought. Which makes no sense.

That is all. I'll be over here taking online reading/comprehension tests.

― VegemiteGrrrl, Thursday, September 23, 2010 5:04 PM (5 minutes ago) Bookmark
this is actually what it was meant to be but i worded the thread title terribly

oh i assumed bc it was sunny that it meant expats from anywhere not-US!

oops

me too

I just assumed it meant anyone not resident in their home country, as logically that would open the question to half of ILX.

Omg sunny. That cat sounds amazing. I'm confused tho- it killed both a down under possum and an opossum?

just1n3 and caek that is what i meant!

but i welcome all expats

Jesse, just an australian possum for the cat. our great dane killed an o-possie last week.

Hooray, I'm not so dumb! Okay I feel better now.

OMG sunny! The cat with the possum entrails. O_o And the mouse faces/organs? You cat is like a tiny feline serial killer :)

I'll be dumb now - I don't get it - you live in AU and you have both possums and opossums there?

she lives in arkansas iirc

cat killed possum pre-move; dog killed 'possum post-move

Thank you, everything makes sense now. God is in his heaven and all o/possums are where they should be.

Praise sweet baby Jesus.

I don't know where we are up to on the list but I have more

- Gumbo, Etouffee, Jambalaya!
- Cornbread!
- Collard greens, kale

(My culinary life was changed for the better by these)

xp to WmC - that's true, and ppl are always talking to me about how beautiful NZ is/they've heard it is etc., maybe it's bc i never really travelled round NZ? i admit i led a pretty insular life for the first 28 yrs. and my husband thought NZ was totally beautiful and amazing so. i guess i just feel like here the different landscapes seem almost ~limitless~?

― just1n3, Thursday, 23 September 2010 20:17 (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

just1ne you really shld have travelled around nz more! it's amazing!

yeah, it's not the same all over! i grew up in auckland, didn't see central otago for the first time 'til i was nineteen and my jaw dropped.

Last night I met up w/an old friend who's been living in the US for several years, and when he was here he was a nervous, lonely depressive, and now he is a laidback cheerful dude who seems confident in himself and all the American ladies seem to love his accent, so the US has been pretty good for him I think

it's shocking what a good slarving can accomplish

xxxp oh i'm totally aware of how diverse nz landscapes are, but a lot of ppl in CA talk like it's superior to what is here - the US is insanely diverse in terms of landscape (obv it's a hell of lot bigger, so it should be but still).

Collard greens
YES!

NZ pro: less air pollution in the cities, presumably?
NZ con: expensive to get there from here

I'd still like to visit, since I read that they eat more lamb per capita than anyone else in the world. MMMmmmm, lamb.

xp - that reminds me, I need to get my mustard greens planted today.
(mustard >>>>> turnip >>>>> collard)

They're all good!

xp all of our best lamb is exported! so you'd probably find better stuff here in the US. i just bought some nz lamb from trader joe's

the other thing about nz is that flying anywhere from there is fucking insanely expensive.

Joe is taking some time off
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Arresting-Tales/361220605171

Two
things will come of this experience (assuming that Arresting Tales still
exists next week):

1) When my kid is proof-reading a post, points to a specific line and
says "Oh my God, Dad, that's harsh" I'll be less likely to reply "so
what" and hit the publish button, and

2) Comments will remain moderated as long as this blog exists going
forward. I'm not going to have a replay of the angry free-for-all that
happened here.

wrong thread, guy

SON OF THE BITCH.

the other thing about nz is that flying anywhere from there is fucking insanely expensive.

― just1n3, Friday, 24 September 2010 16:34 (24 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

yeah thats my most hated part of nz + is the reason why i dont currently live there. ISOLATION

I'm having that problem in nfld.

In the late '70s my dad - who always had a serious case of wanderlust (during my lifetime, we lived in 7 states (AZ, CO, OR, MN, MT, MI, NC) just because the grass was always greener) - decided that we were leaving Oregon for New Zealand. He was convinced that it was heaven on earth and the source of all needs and desires. That fell through so we moved to northern Minnesota instead.

Talk about defeat, snatched from the jaws of victory.

I can't fucking believe he didn't just move us to Canada, which would have been absolutely awesome. Except that as a teenager, I probably would have never given him a moment's peace about it (I was a little bastard and I never took a break from whining about wanting to live in the South).

I keep thinking this thread is about the Expos.

i'm sure there are worse places than northern minnesota

This thread is kind of amusing because British expats who whinge about not being able to get x and y consumer products wherever they are are generally viewed as the worst kind of savages.

― Matt DC, Thursday, 23 September 2010 15:53 (Yesterday)

does this not occur to american expatriates too? admittedly it's a little different with that type of british ppl because they wouldn't even be abroad if global warming gave clacton a mediterranean climate

I remember being mildly irritated when an Australian friend came to visit me a few years back and would not shut up about how 'OMG YOU MEAN THEY DON'T HAVE [insert Australian product]?!!'

But then my husband kindly reminded me that he put up with exactly the same from me for the first few years of our marriage :/

(Honestly I think she was way more annoying about it than I was but whatevs)

My paternal grandfather was from Baudette near Lake of the Woods, which is very near the following exclave:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/57/Elm_Point.png

'OMG YOU MEAN THEY DON'T HAVE [insert Australian product]?!!'

pretty sure it was vegemite

re: cherished expat americana, depending on where you're at in the old usa: grid systems

Wow, Lake of the Woods is way, way up there. We were a little closer to civiliation http://goo.gl/maps/jHWp.

Sometimes a person doesn't even know they want desperately to use the word 'exclave' until they see it.

Grandfather's dad was the doctor for the entire county, and by the sound of things he was a very good one - all the towns burned in 1910 (my grandfather was two) and he had to be a one-man MASH unit to deal with it.

I used to live in the enclave of Point Roberts, WA (although Pt. Bob and Elm Point are technically pene-enclaves).

omg i was the worst about whining for nz stuff when i moved here - but then i went back to nz this year and was all 'meh it's not ~that~ great here'.

another thing i love about the US: books! art! shows! book art shows!!!
there is no way we could run our small press out of NZ, unless we were independently wealthy.

- Deodorant.

I was a bit dubious about all the roll-on deodorants being sticks or creams or gel or whatever ... but they're great! Back home I'm sure they all started to be 0% alcohol and never dried and didn't do anything anyway.

Some of my friends living overseas ask me to bring various Burt's Bees and Kiehls products, & "spicy" toothpastes when I come visit because they're hard to find there.

I have friends who demand cinnamon chewing gum etc; also peanut butter M&Ms

Yes! Cimmamon flavored Tom's of Maine toothpaste is very popular overseas!

Honestly that stuff makes me gag. I think I'm just brainwashed into chemical-mint flavor toothpaste. I don't want cinnamon or sage or whatever.

^^^

I went out on a limb and bought some orange flavored toothpaste.

Everyone's abandoned it, so I'm stuck with finishing off the tube.

finally, a solution to the brushing teeth/drinking oj problem!

UGH. Fuck sweet, fruity toothpaste. I tried bubble gum flavored toothpaste one time and it was terrible, but even it was better than orange shit.

cinnamon toothpaste = yes
orange toothpaste = oh god no

The orange is vile.

Honestly, I think the fennel is maybe at the top of their vile flavor list though. I was handed the toothpaste on a camping trip and didn't read the packaging...omg I nearly puked.

do you Aussies and Britishers dig Burt's Bees or Kiehls stuffs? Or is that stuff kinda whatevs? Cuz it's like super high priority for some of my ex-pat friends!

okay I might be down with fennel toothpaste but it does seem suspicious

Also, "Ahava" brand cosmetics (this one is pretty elusive). xp to myself

I have never tried sage or fennel toothpaste, but I imagine that the revulsion I feel thinking about those flavors would happen IRL too.

sage toothpaste must be a dare

Tom's is probably only moments away from making toothpastes that are already Canadian potato chip flavors...ketchup! roast chicken! dill pickle! all dressed!

poutine-themed floss

Sure you can get Burts Bees stuff in UK. I also have friends who demand peanut butter M&Ms... I've decided that reese's pieces are marginally better, tho.

I like the Crest orange toothpaste, if that's the one you guys are talking about. The key is to use 1/4 or 1/3 of what they show in ads. (True of all toothpaste, imo).

^ totally true. i used to use fennel toothpaste, as i really like that taste. but i switched back to sensitive-teeth whitening blahblahblah colgate b/c it just makes my mouth feel cleaner

also that shit is $$

b/c it just makes my mouth feel cleaner = aluminum lauryl sulfate (the stuff that the "natural" toothpaste makers are trying to get away from)?

Perhaps, but MINT (or even cinnamon) as opposed to fruit makes my mouth feel cleaner.

^^^ this

you know, if they're making sage and fennel toothpaste, why don't they just go whole hog and do marjorum and turmeric toothpaste

I like fruit flavors in general, but they are all SB'd from my toothbrush imo

coming soon: garam masala

haha if I made alum-flavored toothpaste, do you think anyone would buy it

As long as it's minty fresh then YES

haha if I made alum-flavored toothpaste, do you think anyone would buy it

Pretty sure I once saw a Bugs Bunny cartoon with this in it.

Ditto but with a Three Stooges short.

I read that alum is good for canker sores, so I bought some and put it on a canker sore, and the sensation in my mouth was very much like the Loony Toons' visual representation.

Did your head shrink like the opera singer?

(Bugs Bunny/opera singer cartoon, I think he sprays alum into the opera singers throat? And his head shrinks.)

http://www.livevideo.com/video/GoldenAgeCartoons/C25421CC545E4EFF9B73D3A9F1FB5E40/long-haired-hare.aspx

I gave our neighbour kid some alum once, to see if Looney Tunage happened. I mean, it IS for pickling - that's why my mom had some - so I wasn't worried about poisoning neighbour kid with a tiny amount.

I thought it was sour, therefore the puckering, but it's just ultra astringent. It's sort of distressing and upsetting.

Also, "Ahava" brand cosmetics

don't know about the cosmetics, but they make a honey bath salt that leaves you smelling like Drambuie.

for all your bizarre toothpaste flavor needs, check out Breath Palette. They used to offer 32 flavors, now down to only 18.

Um...Monkey Banana? Monkey-flavored toothpaste does not sound v good.

Also, "Ahava" brand cosmetics

don't know about the cosmetics, but they make a honey bath salt that leaves you smelling like Drambuie.

for all your bizarre toothpaste flavor needs, check out Breath Palette. They used to offer 32 flavors, now down to only 18.

― Jaq, Friday, September 24, 2010 2:19 PM (14 minutes ago)

there's one partic type of moisteurizer that is a MUSTBRING gift to my one friend, I swear she'd finance my airfare if I bring her a year's supply?

"Rose" sounds pretty bad too. (I'm against rosewater drinks and desserts.)

wtf fennel is the best toothpaste flavor!

if 'best' = 'worst' then yes

:)

maybe you gotta use it a few times before you really start to like it. now when i use regular colgate or whatever it tastes like i'm brushing my teeth with mint syrup.

The first time scarred me so bad I can't go back, harbl. I'm going to have to take your word for it.

Fennel does sound pretty good, tbh.

I got lemon Colgate once and the first brushing was horrible, then the next 5 were OK, then I thought "fuck this, I'm buying some mint Colgate today" and threw it away

(don't think it is a regular British thing, but I saw it in a corner shop, imported from north Africa somewhere judging by the manufacturer contact details on the packaging - built up an entire backstory in my head that maybe citrus was standard there instead of mint and how other cultures might associate "fresh" with lemon more readily than mint, but googling brings up nothing, so I guess I completely invented that)

I like the fennel b\c it reminds me of the fennel seed+sugar sprinkles you get at the end of an Indian meal.

The thing about the Breath Palette toothpastes - no matter what flavor it is, you end up with that sort of mintiness. But you never taste mint, so it's not like some monkey banana mint flavor mashup.

do you Aussies and Britishers dig Burt's Bees or Kiehls stuffs? Or is that stuff kinda whatevs?

speaking as an Aussie, what the fuck are you talking about?

I like the fennel b\c it reminds me of the fennel seed+sugar sprinkles you get at the end of an Indian meal.

oh dude i love this.

so much reading to do on this thread! still catching up...

Are Thai restaurants widespread in the US?

depends where you are. i think there's at least one or two in every college town. los angeles has a zillion thai restaurants, many of them absolutely brilliant.

Second is this creeping sense of danger, like you might get hit by a car while walking, or mugged randomly.

i haven't been mugged (yet) (knock on wood) but i'm pretty scared of getting hit by a car every time i walk through a parking lot. i also don't have unshakeable faith that cars are going to stop for me at intersections.

over-attentive customer service

maybe some people respond positively to this, but i can't stand it. i don't like being glommed on to when i enter a store. it would be nice to just make eye contact with the sales person, instead of him/her going HI HOW ARE YOU TODAY CAN I HELP YOU FIND ANYTHING IF I CAN LET ME KNOW MY NAME IS _____. it overwhelms me. most of the time i just want to look around, and i'm capable of asking for help on my own.

and i feel bad for those salespeople... they probably have to meet some unfair quota and be really "proactive" about "closing the sale," and their bosses remind them constantly that if they don't make the company money, there'll be no company to work for.

I feel like Thai restaurants are replacing Chinese restaurants as the default Asian restaurant in a lot of the U.S. (though maybe Japanese/sushi was in there at some point too). Maybe just in urban areas? Maybe just in my head?

in the college town in the middle of nowhere USA where I presently live there is one Thai restaurant & four or five Chinese restaurants, plus three or four Chinese buffets...although one of the Chinese buffets serves sushi now also (we're desperate, get used to it). Thai buffets would be the next move, though I guess I've been to one in Hyde Park (at least some days of the week) & one in Columbus, OH, so maybe they're coming this way too in the next twenty years.

where are the malaysian restaurants, is what i want to know

I have never seen a Malaysian restaurant en mi vida.

I eaten at three in the LA area (one has since closed). San Gabriel Valley reprasent!

There's a ton of them in Melbourne. I haven't tried any here though. Apparently there's a Malaysian restaurant in Sac but (shrug). I don't feel as compelled to eat it here, because it's not everywhere you look.

There used to be an awesome Malaysian restaurant in Boston, then it moved to Harvard Square and then in closed ;_;

yeah i don't know about the rest of NZ but wellington is full of malaysian restaurants, and i really really miss a good mee goreng :(

wtf is with me and typos today

overcome with emotion at the end of the nabisco era

Mee Goreng! omnomnom...possibly one of my top 5 favorite hangover foods.

There's a few malay places around Seattle, but my favorite one closed about 6 months ago.

There's a good low-end one in DC, and a couple of others I haven't tried yet.

Apparently there WAS one in Chicago, but it's closed, now there are only two or three in the suburbs. That's weird. I don't think they're even particularly Malaysian or Asian suburbs.

many x-posts to Dan - Penang, right? It was driving me nuts earlier that I couldn't think of the name.

That's also the name of the one in Chicago that closed.

The USA has a kind of international food culture that's hard to match. UK does pretty good, but obviously with different geographic strengths. I miss eating a broadly international array of foods week after week. Growing up on the West coast, I think I ate a different ethnic cuisine just about every day of my young-adult life, and got kind of hooked on that way of eating.

Trying to recreate that habit is a real chore. When I lived in Japan, I didn't try – too hard. Living in Thailand, I had it a bit easier cause of all the internationals and tourist-driven businesses. (Don't get me wrong, I love Japanese and Thai food, but try eating it every day for months on end... The dominant flavors and textures become far too ordinary). Now, living in N. Europe, easy to eat SE asian and Middle eastern food, but not much else. Despite a current "mexican food" fad that seems to have struck Sweden, the stuff available in the stores is basically stale tacos.

Europe has the worst food.

ALL OF EUROPE

potato farls says u rong

I hate to use the "s" word again, but we call them Potato Scones

i gotta nice short 's word' for u and ur fuckin scones man

xp Not least because farls reads as 'farts' if you're speeding along... mmmmmmm, potato farts...

i can see where that'd cause doubts, fair enough.

between ireland and usa....usa has more variety but basic food (by basic food i mean bread, dairy products, PROPER BACON YO) at home is better.

comfort food is comforting

¯\(°_°)/¯

http://the-red-thread.net/steppe-scone.jpg

can you get Ethiopian food in the UK/australia/nz/wherever? this is u+k

yeah you can get most anything in the main cities of australia. countryish towns - chinese and mcdonalds

oddly few and far between in australia - mexican restaurants

Yeah Australian mexican food is not great, or at least it wasn't when I lived there, compared to the stuff I can get here in Bay Area/Sac. Then again, I didn't have any knowledge of 'real' mexican food...nachos grande was about the extent of my understanding and it was juuuussst fine for me.

Honestly, I find that the international fare over here in the US pales compared to what was on offer in Melbourne. (Lol now in Colac the Chinese/McDonalds is spot on. Though add KFC).

Once I moved out of home and was living in Melbourne I got so used to being able to eat load of good cheap Indian/ Malaysian/ Indonesian/ Thai/ Vietnamese/ Greek/ Italian/

The stuff on offer, especially in the Indian & Greek departments just do not measure up at all. But that's got a lot to do with living in Sac/working in Folsom, which is watered-down suburbia compared to what's on offer in SF/Oakland. But yeah, I resent paying $10 for bad Indian...and the Greek place I ate at should have been a warning sign right off the bat bc NO greek ppl in attendance at all.

Yeah, the US has some serious dead spots, though I'd assume that SF must have one of the largest varieties of ethnic restaurants in the States.

Good Indian has always been a bit hard to come by (at least on the West coast) cause not many Indians compared with UK, etc. Most of the decent places I remember are very expensive. I think that's starting to change now. I'd guess there's some good cheap Indian in the Bay area if you know where to look. As far as Malaysian, maybe it has to do with the fact that there are relatively few Malaysian immigrants compared to those with other SE Asian backgrounds. Thai and Vietnamese food is insanely cheap, good and abundant in PDX, LA, SEA...

Not many Greeks on the West coast, relatively speaking (or Italians for that matter). Try Detroit, NYC, Chicago. PDX has a bit of a Greek business/restaurant community along Burnside street.

Yeah, I've lived all my life in Seattle and Portland and afaik never met a Malaysian.

many x-posts to Dan - Penang, right? It was driving me nuts earlier that I couldn't think of the name.

YES

loved that place so much, too bad I was totally broke and therefore couldn't eat there every day while it was still around

I think Sacramento needs to work on their immigrant visa program: specifically target restaurant proprietors in Greece, Malaysia, and India. FREE TRAVEL TO THE US IF YOU DEVOTE THE REST OF YOUR LIFE TO MAKING ME YOUR YUMMY FOOD

Also xposts: will never be able to abide expensive Indian food. And the $$$ indian food = tiny servings. Like, *a* helping of curry. No. For that price I want 9 helpings and I should be able to take all the leftovers home and feast on them for at least 2 more days, lunch AND dinner.

Btw there's an excellent, cheap Lebanese restaurant with huge servings down the street from me. I f/w this restaurant.

Seems like I remember there being a Basque restaurant somewhere up I-5 from you...in Williams, maybe? xp

the Greek place I ate at should have been a warning sign right off the bat bc NO greek ppl in attendance at all.

This has made me realise that I judge whether a Chinese place might be good or not by how many Chinese people are eating at it, but if I did that at Indian restaurants I wd be out of luck, as the clientele is generally 100% white (at least round here)

which has nothing to do with anything, I'd just never thought about it before

anyway I think I already groused abt Oxford's burrito place itt, now I will promise to myself to have a sit-down meal in the Malaysian place next door some time (had takeaway once but ordered sth deliberately simple and mild as it was lunchtime and I was heading back to the office)

There aren't many problems a bowl of laksa won't ameliorate.

can you get Ethiopian food in the UK/australia/nz/wherever? this is u+k

― The Reverend, Tuesday, 28 September 2010 19:03 (Yesterday)

there are ethiopian and eritrean (iirc) restaurants near me

there are probably ethiopian restaurants in all major cities cuz of the diaspora (same w/ however many other national cuisines)

this american way of determining culinary quality (ie concentration of esoteric foreign foodstuffs/restaurants ) shouldn't be extended too far beyond america

i'm sure there are regions of italy which would fail badly using that schematic but nonetheless have better food than any similar region in usa/england

Vegemitegrrrl, there some good Greek places in Sac: Opa Opa, Petra - newish place on 16th and L, and Greek Village Inn on Howe and University is even better but kinda $$$. Do you live downown?

the point I'm getting at is that USA folks like our food culture, a fairly diverse food culture. When we live abroad, we miss that. I'd probably miss that after six months anywhere provincial, even Italy.

xpost Thanks Whitey! I have passed by Opa Opa but it looked v fast-foody/terrifying to me. But hey, if it's good then I will hit them up for SURE. Greek Village Inn I was told about, but the $$$ seemed like a deterrent. Worth the dough?

Off the food topic for a mo: I remembered what else I like about the USA...the magical invention called the whole house fan!
We have one and I like it very much indeed. Especially when the nights cool

Is that the same as an attic fan?

Maybe?

It's like a giant fan in the ceiling and you turn it on and open the windows and it sucks all the cold air from outside into your house.

Note: it is a bad idea to turn said fan on when the barbecue is going. Especially if your husband has cranked up the barbecue to clean the grill racks. house fills with smoke, alarms go off, bad scene all round.

the point I'm getting at is that USA folks like our food culture, a fairly diverse food culture. When we live abroad, we miss that. I'd probably miss that after six months anywhere provincial, even Italy.

― Mr. Shirts, Wednesday, 29 September 2010 22:57 (26 minutes ago)

do ppl in exurban oklahoma tend to like a 'diverse food culture'?

nytimes says abt scones - 'They’re not dissimilar to buttermilk biscuits' !!!

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/13/dining/13mini.html?_r=1

RONG.

lol. one day i will get to try them for myself

I made them here and honestly, they taste better at home. Esp when made exclusively by Australian grandmas at bring-a-plate luncheons/suppers etc. :D