4 ms·

I have travelled a fair bit in the US. I don’t think anywhere in the US gives a realistic representation of the US. It’s all different, you need to visit a few

I have travelled a fair bit in the US. I don’t think anywhere in the US gives a realistic representation of the US. It’s all different, you need to visit a few different states and types of city and think about the whole. It’s Vegas and NYC and Portland and Salt Lake City and Austin and Mountain View and a whole bunch of other places mashed together. I don’t get this as much with other countries. If someone on here thinks one single place in the US captures the whole country then I would love to go and visit.

Aeolun 5y ago
I think bigness is everywhere though. At least I felt dwarved both in Vegas and Nashville, which are the only two places I have experience with so far.
Aromasin 5y ago
I think this honestly applies for every country though, however it's impossible to recognize unless you grew up in said country, or lived there for many, many years. I would say the UK easily gives the US a run for it's money - but again that's only because I've lived my whole life there and have learnt to recognize the differences. The cultural disparity between Newcastle, Edinburgh, London, Cornwall, Liverpool, Belfast, Leicester, Birmingham, Inverness, Manchester, and all the small towns and villages in between are so vast, despite being so close geographically; the UK is only the size of Michigan, yet travel 40 miles in any direction and the dialect, food, buildings, clothing, and music preference can be completely different. The trip from Chester to Caernarfon is only as far as travelling half way down Long Island, but in one place they speak almost 100% English, and in the other it's more like 20. Granted we don't have the dramatic shifts in climate (although our microclimates are quite unique), but the population density and long, chequered history as a nation seem to make up for it. Any country, despite how unified they look on the exterior, is not a realistic representation of the country as a whole. I'm sure a person from Moscow has very little similarity to one from Vladivostok, or likewise Sao Paulo to Sao Lius. There's no where in the world you can visit, besides some microstates, that give a realistic representation of the country in one visit.
- rrrrrrrrrrrryan 5y ago
  American who lived in the English Midlands for a half year. Your hunch is correct: Britain absolutely has more cultural variation than America. You see it in the accents the most. I never expected to have difficulty communicating with other native English speakers, but I was comforted by the fact that other Brits from different parts of the island struggled to communicate with each other a bit as well.
orangepurple 5y ago
The roads, infrastructure, and general layout might make the US seem the same everywhere on the surface, though. Those are all built to essentially the same standard everywhere. It's deceptive.

Aeolun 5y ago

I think bigness is everywhere though. At least I felt dwarved both in Vegas and Nashville, which are the only two places I have experience with so far.

Aromasin 5y ago

I think this honestly applies for every country though, however it's impossible to recognize unless you grew up in said country, or lived there for many, many years. I would say the UK easily gives the US a run for it's money - but again that's only because I've lived my whole life there and have learnt to recognize the differences. The cultural disparity between Newcastle, Edinburgh, London, Cornwall, Liverpool, Belfast, Leicester, Birmingham, Inverness, Manchester, and all the small towns and villages in between are so vast, despite being so close geographically; the UK is only the size of Michigan, yet travel 40 miles in any direction and the dialect, food, buildings, clothing, and music preference can be completely different. The trip from Chester to Caernarfon is only as far as travelling half way down Long Island, but in one place they speak almost 100% English, and in the other it's more like 20. Granted we don't have the dramatic shifts in climate (although our microclimates are quite unique), but the population density and long, chequered history as a nation seem to make up for it. Any country, despite how unified they look on the exterior, is not a realistic representation of the country as a whole. I'm sure a person from Moscow has very little similarity to one from Vladivostok, or likewise Sao Paulo to Sao Lius. There's no where in the world you can visit, besides some microstates, that give a realistic representation of the country in one visit.

rrrrrrrrrrrryan 5y ago
American who lived in the English Midlands for a half year. Your hunch is correct: Britain absolutely has more cultural variation than America. You see it in the accents the most. I never expected to have difficulty communicating with other native English speakers, but I was comforted by the fact that other Brits from different parts of the island struggled to communicate with each other a bit as well.

orangepurple 5y ago

The roads, infrastructure, and general layout might make the US seem the same everywhere on the surface, though. Those are all built to essentially the same standard everywhere. It's deceptive.