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The Official "Your country is weird" Thread

iGary

iGary

Guest
Original poster
May 26, 2004
19,580
7
Randy's House
Since we have such an international flavor to this board, it only seems appropriate that we pick on each country's -- as Vincent Vega in Pulp Fiction put it -- "little differences."

I'll start.

Why are there like no traffic lights in Great Britain - why all the roundabouts - and in the most bizarre places?

It cracks me up how Brits call going to the movies "to the cinema." So old-fashioned sounding. :)

Beans and tomatoes for breakfast? *hurl*
 
Please Apple, release something! ;)

USA is funny country. All the people live on the east coast, but slowly migrating west. You can see it from the map.
 
There are traffic lights EVERYWHERE here.

This email I was sent seems quite fitting ;)
TOP10 REASONS FOR BEING FRENCH:

1. When speaking fast you can make yourself sound gay
2. Experience the joy of winning the world cup for the first time
3. You get to eat insect food like snails and frogs legs
4. If there's a war you can surrender really early
5. You don't have to read the subtitles on those late night foreign films on Channel 4
6. You can test your own nuclear weapons in other people's countries
7. You can be ugly and still be a famous film star
8. Allow Germans to march up and down your most famous street humiliating your sense of national pride
9. You don't have to bother with toilets, just **** in the streets
10. People think you're a great lover even when you're not.

TOP10 REASONS FOR BEING AMERICAN:

1. You can have a woman president without electing her
2. You can spell colour wrong and get away with it.
3. You can call Budweiser beer
4. You can be a crook and still be a president
5. If you've got enough money you can get elected to do anything
6. If you can breathe you can get a gun
7. You get to be really obese
8. You can play golf in the most hideous clothes and nobody cares
9. You get to call everyone you've never met 'buddy'
10. You can think you're the greatest nation on earth
10a. When you're not
10b. At all

TOP10 REASONS FOR BEING ENGLISH

1. Two world wars and one world cup, doo-dah doo-dah
2. Proper beer
3. You get to confuse everyone with the rules of cricket
4. You get to accept defeat gracioulsy in major sporting events
5. Union Jack underpants
6. Water shortages guaranteed every single summer
7. You can live in the past and imagine you are still a world power
8. Bathing once a week - whether you need it or not
9. Ditto changing underwear
10. Beats being Welsh
10a. Or Scottish

TOP10 REASONS FOR BEING ITALIAN:

1. In-depth knowledge of bizarre pasta shapes
2. Unembarrassed to wear fur
3. No need to worry about tax returns
4. Glorious military history prior to 400 AD
5. Can wear sunglasses inside
6. Political instability
7. Flexible working hours
8. Live near the Pope
9. Can spend hours braiding girlfriend's armpit hair
10. Country run by Sicilian murderers

TOP10 REASONS FOR BEING SPANISH

1. Glorious history of killing South Amercian tribes
2. The rest of Europe think Africa begins in the Pyrenees
3. You get your beaches invaded by Germans, Danes, Brits etc.
4. The rest of your country is already invaded by Moroccans
5. Everybody else makes crap paella and claims it's the real thing
6. Honesty
7. Only sure way of bedding a woman is to dress up in stupid, tight clothes and risk your life in front of bulls
8. You get to eat bull's testicles
9. Gibraltar
10. Supported Argentina in Falklands War

TOP10 REASONS FOR BEING GERMAN:

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

TOP10 REASONS FOR BEING INDIAN:

1. Chicken Madras & Cobra Lager
2. Lamb Passanda & Cobra Lager
3. Onion Bhaji & Cobra Lager
4. Chicken Tikka Massala & Cobra Lager
5. Rogan Josh & Cobra Lager
6. Bombay Potato & Cobra Lager
7. Popadoms & Cobra Lager
8. Chicken Dopiaz & Cobra Lager
9. Meat Boona & Cobra Lager
10. Kingfisher Lager

TOP10 REASONS FOR BEING WELSH

1. You've got to be kidding, right?

TOP10 REASONS FOR BEING IRISH:

1. Guinness
2. 18 children because you can't use contraceptives
3. You can get into a fight just by marching down someone's road
4. Pubs never close
5. Can use Papal edicts on contraception passed in the second Vatican Council of 1968 to pursuade your girlfriend that you can't have sex with a condom on.
6. No one can ever remember the night before
7. Kill people you don't agree with
8. Stew
9. More Guinness
10. Eating stew and drinking Guinness in an Irish pub at 3 in the morning after a bout of sectarian violence

TOP 10 REASONS FOR BEING CANADIAN:

1. It beats being American
2. Only country to successfully invade the US and burn its capital to the ground
3. You can play hockey 12 months a year, outdoors
4. Only country to successfully invade the US and burn its capital to the ground
5. Where else can you travel 1000 miles over fresh water in a canoe?
6. A political leader can admit to smoking pot and his/her popularity ratings will rise.
7. Only country to successfully invade the US and burn its capital to the ground
8. Kill Grizzly bears with huge shotguns and cover your house in their skins
9. Own-an-Eskimo scheme
10. Only country to successfully invade the US and burn its capital to the ground

TOP 10 REASONS FOR BEING AUSTRALIAN:

1. Know your great-grand-dad was a murdering bastard that no civilised nation on earth wanted
2. Fosters Lager
3. Dispossess Aborigines who have lived in your country for 40,000 years because you think it belongs to you.
4. Cricket captain not afraid to cry live on TV
5. Tact and sensitivity
6. Bondi Beach
7. Other beaches
8. Liberated attitudes to homosexuals
9. Drinking cold lager on the beach
10. Having a bit of a swim and then drink some cold lager on the beach.
Click to expand...
NOTE TO THE OVER SENSITIVE: It's a joke!
 
edesignuk said:
There are traffic lights EVERYWHERE here.

This email I was sent seems quite fitting ;)
NOTE TO THE OVER SENSITIVE: It's a joke!
Click to expand...

You Brits like your Inidan food, that's for sure.
 
iGary said:
Why does Canada still pay homage to mother England?

Why is the Queen of England on the 20-dollar note? Weird! :p
Click to expand...

Are they paying homage to loons, too? It's hard to go to a strip club with nothing but coin :rolleyes:
 
Roundabouts make much more sense than the stop signs you get in the US. We have roundabouts all over the place here in Norway, too.
 
gekko513 said:
Roundabouts make much more sense than the stop signs you get in the US. We have roundabouts all over the place here in Norway, too.
Click to expand...


One thing I noticed about Sweden, Denmark and Norway (from the air, at least) is how clean it is there.
 
you know what's weird... how in some cities, in some states in the U.S. you can legally turn right when the lights are at red.

now that's weird.

iGary said:
Why are there like no traffic lights in Great Britain - why all the roundabouts - and in the most bizarre places?
Click to expand...

We also have traffic lights on roundabouts too ;)

Why roundabouts? well they have a significantly greater potential flow rate than stop lights for a start. ;)

gekko513 said:
Roundabouts make much more sense than the stop signs you get in the US. We have roundabouts all over the place here in Norway, too.
Click to expand...

Yeah, stop signs are are relatively rare here in the UK too, only the worst blind junctions are usually stop, instead we have a far higher degree of give ways.

The difference between the two, well stop signs also have a solid unpainted line, and you have to stop, even if it is clear, give way's are distinguished by having broken white lines, and you don't have to stop at those.

Is Norway the same?
 
iGav said:
you know what's weird... how in some cities, in some states in the U.S. you can legally turn right when the lights are at red.

now that's weird.
Click to expand...

Beats turning left on red. :D
 
iGary said:
One thing I noticed about Sweden, Denmark and Norway (from the air, at least) is how clean it is there.
Click to expand...
I've never really thought about that. Maybe it's because all three countries are socialdemocratic and have huge tax rates that can be spent on things like keeping the country clean. Or maybe we're just brought up better. :p Montpellier in France is the cleanest place I've visited. I kept almost getting run into by those small trucks with circular brooms that sweep the streets.
 
gekko513 said:
I've never really thought about that. Maybe it's because all three countries are socialdemocratic and have huge tax rates that can be spent on things like keeping the country clean. Or maybe we're just brought up better. :p Montpellier in France is the cleanest place I've visited. I kept almost getting run into by those small trucks with circular brooms that sweep the streets.
Click to expand...

I just noticed form the aerials that I processed that all the little towns, yacht basins and ferry landings were immaculately kept.

I'm visiting you in Oslo one day. :D
 
I'm from Singapore.

1. The people here are pretty competitive.
2. we can actually have queues with people not knowing what they are queueing for.
3. The government are actually promoting people to have kids now after years of telling them 2 is enough.
4. Singapore has only 40 years of history so far.

these are only a few stuff i can remember off the top of my head.
 
Lets see, The US

1. We have a fast food restruant about every 3 blocks ;)

2. We have a Starbucks, Seattles Best, Tullys, etc. on every block.

3. We're some of the laziest people in the world

4. We say we invented the Pizza

5. We shop at Costco and buy everything we need for a week when the french could live on it for a month

6. We have more PCs than Macs

7. Our schools are... meh.

8. We kill animals for oil. :mad:

9. We buy Huge SUVs.

10. We complain about gas being $2.80/ a gallon when europians pay around $4 (US).
 
iGary said:
I'm visiting you in Oslo one day. :D
Click to expand...
You'll be most welcome.

On beans: Beans in tomato sauce, baby sausages, eggs and bread/toast is called Cowboy-breakfast in Norway. I thought it was American.
 
iGary said:
Since we have such an international flavor to this board, it only seems appropriate that we pick on each country's -- as Vincent Vega in Pulp Fiction put it -- "little differences."

I'll start.

Why are there like no traffic lights in Great Britain - why all the roundabouts - and in the most bizarre places?

It cracks me up how Brits call going to the movies "to the cinema." So old-fashioned sounding. :)

Beans and tomatoes for breakfast? *hurl*
Click to expand...

We do have traffic lights.. and roundabouts. :p It should be the other way round.. whats up with practically NO roundabouts in the US..? eh? eh? :D

Also, pancakes for breakfast.. THAT is screwed up. ;)
 
iGav said:
Yeah, stop signs are are relatively rare here in the UK too, only the worst blind junctions are usually stop, instead we have a far higher degree of give ways.

The difference between the two, well stop signs also have a solid unpainted line, and you have to stop, even if it is clear, give way's are distinguished by having broken white lines, and you don't have to stop at those.

Is Norway the same?
Click to expand...
Norway is the same. If there's no roundabout it's usually a give way. At the give way's do you give way to cars coming from the left since you drive on the left? We give way to cars coming from the right.
 
BakedBeans said:
beans

why take it out on the beans man.

thats below the belt.
Click to expand...

Yeah.

If you carry on at this rate, we'll have to criticise having maple syrup with pancakes, with bacon, with toast..! Owww.
 
gekko513 said:
You'll be most welcome.

On beans: Beans in tomato sauce, baby sausages, eggs and bread/toast is called Cowboy-breakfast in Norway. I thought it was American.
Click to expand...

Holy kripes!! $214.00 round trip to Oslo in February.

Maybe a birthday trip....How effing cold is it there in February?
 
japan is weird/cool because they have 24hr cable channels devoted to porn, along with huge areas of major department stores that sell porn!
but is it true that they blur the naughty bits over there?

france is weird cause they call middle school college (yeah, i know it's a different language, just kidding)

russia is weird because...well...it's friggin cold!
 
I presume everyone has seen this.. End of ze world, but just in case.. it provides a good overview of all the country's citizens stereotypical behavior. :)

WARNING: Video contains swearing..
 
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