Speaking more than one language. Being from Switzerland, we're required to study 2 languages (+ our native one) at school. So it's not infrequent to encounter swiss people who speak 4+ languages
this post was submitted on 02 Sep 2023
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In Germany it's also mandatory - but learning the language at school unfortunately doesn't necessarily mean you can speak it. LucasArts adventures contributed more to my language skills than my first English teacher. I'm always shocked about the lack of English skills in a lot of Germans when I'm back visiting. Rather surprisingly one of my uncles born in the 30s spoke pretty good English, though.
We're now living in Finland - me German, wife Russian, we each speak to the kids in our native language, between each other English. So they're growing up with 4 languages.
It's quite interesting to watch them grow up in that situation. When learning about a new historical figure my daughter always asks which languages they spoke - and few weeks ago she was surprised someone only spoke two languages. So I explained that some people only speak one language - she gave me a very weird look, and it took a while to convince her that I'm not just making a bad joke.
That's a point current generation children are actively working on by following English-speaking streamers, communicating in predominantly English Discords, etc. The worst: my kid chose to prefer American English. Where did I go wrong?
American english is the standard dialect for online content. And without exposure other dialects can be really hard to understand.
Not if you're exclusively consuming Black Adder and old Top Gear videos online.^^
I guess you didnt realize until it was too late.
Yeah, I think I've lost him (to the Colonies).
In Sweden kids learn English from second grade and a third language from fifth grade.
What really annoys me is how many programmers seem to expect us to only be able to understand one language. I much rather have the program made in English than to read a bad Swedish translation.
As in non swedish programmers try to translate into Sweedish for you?
Presumably what they meant, yes. Sometimes YouTube translates video titles for example. Of course, the video is still in the original language, so it's completely useless, except for videos without speech.
Every program should have a setting to define in which language you want to interact with it.
YouTube supports multiple audio tracks these days and sometimes it decides that I should listen to a dubbed version of a video. Somehow all media players are very limited when it comes to settings for language preferences.
Which is ridiculous and funny, because our (at least 15 year old) DVD system can swap between audio tracks flawlessly!
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How to stay safe in the wilderness. We get too many people that aren't from around here that think you can do a hike late in the afternoon wearing sandals and only bringing a water bottle. People don't realize that the wilderness is a dangerous place if you aren't prepared. Weather can change rapidly and you need proper clothing and footwear to account for it. Make sure you have enough time for the hike and bring the essentials just in case something happens and you need to spend a night outdoors.
Yeah, while I'm not a big hiker myself, being Swiss I know how prepared you need to be.
Walked around in Taiwan when I came across a hiking trail. 1.5 hours, like 150m verticality only, labelled as easy. Cool, but not enough water (only carried a 2l bottle). Went to a local teahouse and got me 4 more bottles to be safe and went for it. Walked past countless others because I was underprepared, and am glad I did because those could have turned out not so nice if I did go.
Swimming. Here, kids have to take mandatory swimming courses at school. I have quite a few eastern european friends, and they all tell me, that swimming is something that people learn if they want to and if they can afford it, but it's not learly an universal skill in their countries.
Most people who drown here are actually immigrants, who see everyone swimming and think that it can't be that hard...
Or in my case they just assume. Which is why I had brush-ins with the experience in the last sentence.
Sounds like you got a story to tell.
Not really stories, just not-good experiences. Had a couple/few moments where someone disagreed with the whole hard thing. I was going along a ledge near water recently and people assumed I had the same floatation magic as everyone else when I was thrust in and even after they (except for someone's dog) saw what amounted to thrashing. So it works both ways.
That sucks pretty hard.
If you want to, they do offer swimming courses also for adults, at least over here.
It might be worth the investment.
We learned swimming in primary school in Germany, no opting out.
But having lived in several African countries and now in China, it's surprising how many people not only can't swim, but are deathly afraid of water.
Maybe that’s different from state to state. I grew up in Hessen but don’t remember having mandatory swimming lessons. I learned it mostly on my own so I don’t even have a „Seepferdchen“ and know a few people from NRW who don’t either. I remember there was the option to do it in school but not sure why I didn’t take it then.
Either way, not being able to swim at all is pretty rare in Germany because going to the pool is a popular activity for kids here.
Same in the US. Most schools do not have their own pool and swimming is not a required skill. Tons of people don't know how to swim here.
Many schools in Germany also do not have their own pools. You will be transported on a bus to the closest one.
There is schools with their own pool? Heck, half the inner city schools dont have a proper gym hall and use public ones.
I think one of the schools close to mine actually had their own pool for some reason. We always went there.
Don't walk on dark places at night.
Do you mean going outside, even if it's dark is the skill?
Or do you mean not going to dangerous places is the skill?
Because those are two very different things, if you're in a peaceful region.
Here in Switzerland the question you ask is usually, "do you ski or do you snowboard"? It's just assumed that you can do at least one.
Makes me wonder, is there a higher rate of knee surgeons in Switzerland than in the rest of the world?
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In Australia it's not just knowing how to swim but where to swim and when. A lot of tourists drown in the ocean here because they don't know how to read the waves / don't have an understanding of the local area.
Never swam in an ocean, could you elaborate?
As an Aussie what the person below has said is a big one here. We just call them rips. Basically if you just try to swim in them normally you won't go anywhere and will just make yourself tired. Same goes if you're caught in a rip and trying to get out. It can lead to people drowning from tiring out and going under. What you want to do is swim diagonally across the rip. Then you can go about your swim or swim safely back to shore. Another tip is if you don't know what a rip looks like then it can be hard to see them from the shore or while your in the water. They aren't waves.
Another one I think people usually have issues with or you hear of a tourist going missing is swimming in water inland. This is more of an up north Aus thing. Basically if you can't see into the water your going to swim in them don't. Crocs like to hang out in that sort of water. Very easy to not see them at all.
Great advice, appreciate that! I've only swam in small lakes, a couple of rivers, and the Black Sea, so yeah, I could easily see myself making some mistakes in Australian waters. Not that I'm planning to anytime soon, but if I do, I might as well stay alive thanks go this thread.
Cheers, mates!
Swimming in Australia? Are you suicidal? Hell, even just being in Australia is a threat to life, if the internet is to believed. If it isn't animals that want to murder you in a painful way, it'll be plants or fire or plain water.
Our first nation's people are one of the oldest cultures in the world which is really amazing if you consider just how harsh the country is to live in.
It could be me but I think all cultures are "the oldest". It's not like the Dutch just magically spawned into existence 50 years ago and the first Nations people today are culturally very different from the ones a thousand years ago.
Beyond that, if you survive living in Australia for thousands of years then you deserve it
I don’t really see that- there’s a difference between a contiguous culture and genetics. If you’re living in western Italy, you might be descended from and still inhabiting the area of the ancient etruscans, but it doesn’t mean you have the same culture. One could make an argument that you’re from the Roman or florentine culture, but you are from a culture that’s younger than etruscan culture.
Aboriginal Australians (I’m not sure about Torres Strait Islanders, so I hope that’s the right terminology) have been practicing elements of the same culture for longer than any other civilization we know about. You raise an interesting point about them now vs them 1000 years ago, but I grew up wildly differently from how my father did, and we’re still part of the same culture. It’s sort of like the question of stepping into the same river twice- the water is different, but it’s guided by the same constraints.
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Italy.
Cooking, every foreign person I know eats 20x more takeout and fast food than I do.
Guessing it's high income country, where I live eating out the most expensive option, but from what I gather about US for example there's a big eating out culture there and cooking at home can be a pure hobby for most of them
I’m from the US and moved to Germany. I’m still regularly surprised at how little Germans cook. Tbf, lunch is the big warm meal, so I get not cooking much during the week, but it’s very different from what I’m used to. Everyone seems to be surprised that Americans ime eat out less than Germans, so I don’t know if it’s just that I moved from a home cooking hotspot to a takeout hotspot.
German takeout doesn’t make me feel nearly as shit as American takeout though, so that might be the real answer
I'm Danish. Opening beer with a lighter or other things that aren't technically a bottle opener.
So how do you open one without a bottle opener?
Perhaps the easiest (and most flashy) is a wooden table top. Wedge the cap onto the edge, and the smack it with your palm. This method is widely discouraged, especially on your host's dining room table, as it usually takes a small chunk of wood off the edge and damages the table.
Like the Dutch, Germans have an impressive lexicon of commonly-known ways to open beer bottles without a bottle-opener.
Just do the same move on the 20 bottle plastic case you bough the beer in. The cases are sturdy and the breweries dont care for the scratches
Good idea! I've never seen those used here in the US (our beer tends to come in cardboard cases or kegs - we call those plastic created "milk crates"), but if we did, the trick would probably be better known.
Everything here is cans or twist-tops, anyway.
From a logistics point of view we need to keep the population density and shorter ways in mind. In Germany we have a deposit system for the crates and bottles and because of the short ways and high deposit most of them find their way back. But with a thousand miles between brewery and customer that system becomes tricky to implement. Also cans only weigh a fraction of a glass bottle.
So for a local brewery that is only distributing locally glass bottles in crates are a good system, but not so much for longer ranges. Also a reuse system needs a critical minimum size to be viable.
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The ability open a glass bottle with a utensil instead of using a bottle opener.
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