Cultural Guide For Americans Moving to Belgium

[foxgrrl]

Does anyone know of a book or website which tells you about all of the little cultural differences you never notice while you're immersed in your own culture. I mean, like a guide for: If you travel to <foo>, these are the tiny differences you'll encounter in your daily life. (Most guides just have the big things).

Like for example, in Belgium, in the supermarket, you're expected to bag your own groceries. And (sometimes) the bags cost 0.10€ each. For context, if you're unfamiliar with the US system: In the US, employees of the grocery store bag your items for you. So if you don't know this when you visit Belgium, you stand around in the check out line, while everyone looks at you funny.

Comments

[jarandhel.livejournal.com]

It's almost impossible for such a guide to really exist at a practical level. While some stuff may hold as generally true, there's a lot more variation in a country the size of the US. Our own culture differs from the cultures of other areas of the US more often than not. The grocery bagging thing stands as an excellent example: while a lot of places in the US have baggers, there are also a lot of places that don't. In almost every case, bags remain free. And in at least one case that I know of, in Hancock MD, you check out and put all of your items back in your cart unbagged, then go over to a little table near the exit of the store and bag them there, rather than bagging them at the checkout line itself. I haven't seen any other store that operates that way, but it wouldn't surprise me if more exist. It's just not the norm where I usually shop. First time I stopped there on the way to Thresholds, it confused the hell out of me.