After 9 months being in the United States as an exchange student, there are some differences that I have noticed, smaller or bigger, that doesn’t matter that much. Things, that are making America so typical. Differences between cultures but people, too. The way they think, the way they live.

Transportation. I miss public transport so much! In Europe you can catch a bus and be in the downtown in 10-15 minutes. If you don’t have a car, it is not big deal. Thanks to great public transport you can get everywhere, and relatively cheap and fast. Plus you don’t have to be worried with parking. If you don’t have a car in the USA, you are lost (I am not talking about big cities like New York or DC, because the transportation there is pretty good). You have to rely on other people with cars… Well you do have a school buses for kids, and we don’t, but yet our public transport is different, better, so we don’t really need them.

Food. I think food in the States is a big culture thing. Just go and look in your refrigerators. When you open your freezer how much frozen food do you see? Probably much more than just one box. Go to your local grocery and look around. Endless aisles with cereale, bags of chips bigger than your head… Portions in restaurant are huge and expensive, too. Fast food on every corner and fridge full of leftovers. Uuuuh no wonder that after few months my favourite pants don’t fit me anymore…

School. And education in general. I could write a whole book about American education and comparing it to European schools. But there is one thing that I very strongly dislike about education in the USA. The cost of colleges. Most of the colleges in Europe are free. Maybe it is because for us, Europeans, is education number one on our “list”. I feel like if you, Americans, made some of your public universities free, more people would go.

Date. Time. And measures/units. Dear America, you always have to have something special, don’t you? Why do you cut your weekend in half and week starts with Sunday? It is pretty obvious that week starts with Monday so why your calendar says something different? And no, don’t put month before day, it is day then month and then year. It is simple, the number changes the most often (day) goes first. It is really confusing, especially when you see new movie posters and the date when the film goes to cinemas is 5/6/2014. Then we, Europeans, are wondering if it is June or May… And your units are pretty stupid! It doesn’t make any sense! One foot is twelfe inches and one yard is three feet and one mile is SomeStupidNumberThatIReallyDon’tRemember of yards. Well, if you used Metric System everything would be easier because the only number that you use when you are going from one unit to another is 10. And by the way, if you used Celsius instead of Fahrenheit, you would know exactly when it is freezing outside because the number is negative.

Waste. Grrrr you are wasting so much!!!! Have you ever noticed that? You are wasting gas because you don’t know any other type of transportation. Why are you using so many plastic bottles? I have seen in some families that this is the only way how they drink water. Ehm and what about classic glass? It doesn’t cost that much to wash it. And talking about wasting plastic… One thing makes me really mad, especially on my American High School, they use plastic plates, plastic silverware (well, maybe it would be better if I said plastic forks, knives, and spoons because it isn’t really silver…). That means that everyday the have to buy hundreds and hundreds new plastic things…. And that is just my school, I bet that my school is definitely not the only school in America who does that. Can you imagine how much would you save if you used regular silverware and plates? And glasses with water or tea. (By the way, I very, very strongly dislike that the only free drink we get for lunch is milk… I just don’t understand).

Dear America, thank you for opening my eyes and changing my view on the world.