jamaesi
To Save A Lamb
As many of you know, I´m currently in Brasil for a year. There´s that pesky culture shock I´m currently dealing with, I´ve been here a few things and things are certainly different. The most amazing thing though is how people view my country. They love me for who I am, but they have some... different ideas on how America is. If a lot of them ever went to America- the culture shock they would be in for... o.o
In my English class at school as I´m the only America, I was asked many many questions about my country- about food, and my daily life, and the invetiable 9/11 question. They were shocked when they realized I hate Bush and what he´s doing to America- they think that some people don´t like Bush in America.
Their general impression of America is a country where everyone waves a little American flag and loves Bush, that we have NO POVERTY, everyone is rich and has a huge house with maids and big cars, everyone owns about five guns, and people only speak English, and that we live on french fries and burgers.
As a multilingal, poor Democrat, who was a vegetarian for seven years and has a small British car back home, I was absolutely shocked. Probably about as shocked as they were when I was showing them my The Daily Show DVD and it has a homeless person in New York shown. My friend turned to me and asked if that was a real homeless person and we actually have them in America.
So, the point of this post is, because we have so many diverse people people from so many places, I´m curious about what everyone thinks or wonders about everyone else´s countries.
When I first came to Brasil I really only knew about the Amazon and that the people are very nice here but some of them are rather poor. Now I know just HOW NICE these people are, I haven´t seen the Amazon except for flying over it when I first came and OMG it is even bigger than I imagined. I´ve lost all concept of personal space, and the poor are so poor it hurts your soul to see them. I wish I knew more about the government here because there is talk about it being so corrupt- but my Portuguese isn´t good enough so that I could read or ask about it yet. We also eat tonnes and tonnes of rice and beans here.
So if you want to talk a little about your country and out down a few common stereotypes it would be facinating to read- or ask questions about other countries I´m sure there is someone who can answer you here.
(Jensa, you can post about the "poor, poor!" South! :jiggy: )
In my English class at school as I´m the only America, I was asked many many questions about my country- about food, and my daily life, and the invetiable 9/11 question. They were shocked when they realized I hate Bush and what he´s doing to America- they think that some people don´t like Bush in America.
Their general impression of America is a country where everyone waves a little American flag and loves Bush, that we have NO POVERTY, everyone is rich and has a huge house with maids and big cars, everyone owns about five guns, and people only speak English, and that we live on french fries and burgers.
As a multilingal, poor Democrat, who was a vegetarian for seven years and has a small British car back home, I was absolutely shocked. Probably about as shocked as they were when I was showing them my The Daily Show DVD and it has a homeless person in New York shown. My friend turned to me and asked if that was a real homeless person and we actually have them in America.
So, the point of this post is, because we have so many diverse people people from so many places, I´m curious about what everyone thinks or wonders about everyone else´s countries.
When I first came to Brasil I really only knew about the Amazon and that the people are very nice here but some of them are rather poor. Now I know just HOW NICE these people are, I haven´t seen the Amazon except for flying over it when I first came and OMG it is even bigger than I imagined. I´ve lost all concept of personal space, and the poor are so poor it hurts your soul to see them. I wish I knew more about the government here because there is talk about it being so corrupt- but my Portuguese isn´t good enough so that I could read or ask about it yet. We also eat tonnes and tonnes of rice and beans here.
So if you want to talk a little about your country and out down a few common stereotypes it would be facinating to read- or ask questions about other countries I´m sure there is someone who can answer you here.
(Jensa, you can post about the "poor, poor!" South! :jiggy: )
I think that the only time we point out that we are North American too , is when we come across one of those " rude, arrogant braggarts ". 
