US student studying in Wales reveals her biggest culture shocks… including ‘old ladies dying their hair blue’
- An American student in Wales has revealed the biggest culture shocks for her
- The video by @schlond.poofaa has been seen by over 100,000 people in a week
- READ MORE: I moved to Glasgow from Las Vegas – these were big culture shocks
An American student studying at Aberystwyth University has revealed the biggest culture shocks she’s faced since moving to Wales.
From specific things like old people dyeing their hair fun colours to shopping and greeting people, the TikToker has compiled a long list of the differences she has noticed.
The video by @schlond.poofaa has been seen by over 100,000 people in less than a week.
The student told viewers ‘I’m from New Jersey and I live in Wales now and I wanted to talk about some big differences that I’ve realised’ – scroll down for her full list.
culture shocks as an american studying in wales #wales #cymru #fyp #fypシ #foryou
The video by @schlond.poofaa has been seen by over 100,000 people in less than a week
Old people dyeing their hair fun colours
She started the list with something very specific: ‘This is a thing with old people that I love – a lot of old ladies here dye their hair pink and purple and blue and I don’t know why.
‘I guess it’s just a little trend for them and I’m like that is the perfect thing to do with white hair because it’s a perfect base for that. I find that really really fun.’
Everything is less expensive
The TikToker also found the UK to be a lot cheaper, telling viewers that ‘everything is just a little less expensive and I am taking into account the exchange rate.
‘I got a steak right, £3.99 which is roughly five American dollars. I’m like, that’s crazy because at a shop back home that would be $10-15.
It was like a good cut so that was crazy to me and very exciting.’
The bacon is different
When it comes to food, bacon is one of the delicacies Brits and Americans do differently.
She explained ‘In America, there’s like Canadian bacon which is a thicker cut of bacon, all bacon here is Canadian bacon.
‘They call what Americans know as bacon, streaky bacon and it’s just not as popular as what their normal bacon is.
‘I was like why is my bacon not crunchy? Is it just like soggy?’
Pizza tastes ‘really weird’
Sticking to the topic of food, she added that ‘pizza here tastes really weird every time I have it, even like Dominoes.’
Continuing ‘If you don’t know, New Jersey and New York had a lot of Italian immigrants and we still do so I feel like we have good grasp on certain parts of Italian cuisines.’
‘I haven’t had like a good pizza here and it’s really sad to me’.
An American student studying at Aberystwyth University has revealed the biggest culture shocks she’s faced since moving to Wales
READ MORE: American woman who moved from California to the north of England reveals FOUR huge culture shocks
Swearing is more common
The American has also found that people in the UK swear or ‘cuss’ a lot more than they do in the states.
She told viewers ‘People here curse to their parents. Obviously not everyone, all of these are very blanket statements.
‘I’ve heard so many people just like curse on the phone to their parents or call their mom the D word and I’m just like what??’
‘That’s crazy. How are you doing that? That was really rude to me?’
Grocery stores and ‘off-brands’
A big item on the TikToker’s list was convenience stores and ‘off-brands’.
She said ‘There is a convenience store near me called CK’s – love CK’s it’s so inexpensive but walking in is like so weird.
‘The first few weeks I was here, I was like wow, every store here feels like I’m in a parallel universe.
‘You know in TV shows they have off-brand versions of things like the pear pad and stuff like that in Victorious, it felt like that.’
Adding ‘Here’s an example, Walkers crisps, it’s literally just Lays. This is the Lays logo with a different word. Why bother? Why do that?’ Walking into a food store is like wow, everything is so different.’
However, one commenter explained ‘walkers crisps aren’t a knockoff brand, that’s just what Lays is called here. same company!’
Another joked ‘I can’t believe I’m hearing about CK’s on my fyp’.
‘No diversity’ in grocery stores
Following on from the point about grocery stores, she adds that she ‘hasn’t seen a lot of lot of diversity,’ which she finds ‘really weird’.
She explained ‘Back home you’d be able to go to H-Mart, or there were a lot of Mexican markets near me, or Italian markets, Eastern European markets, a bunch of different stores that you could go to to buy food from a certain cultures cuisine.
‘They don’t have that here, at least where I live. I live on the west coast of Wales so obviously it’s not the same as someone living in London.’
‘It’s weird to me, the international section is very small and they have a little American section which is so cute’.
‘It was a culture shock to me, like what do you mean you don’t have an Asian market or an Italian market?’
A Welsh person took to the comments to write ‘We do have shops for other cultures! They’re mainly in bigger cities tho so you won’t find any here .Cardiff has a lot tho!!!’
Another viewer said ‘I used to live in Texas, I live over in Denbigh now. If you want markets you need to go to the bigger city’s like Rhyl which has an Oriental section.’
One Brit argued ‘you not comparing like with like, go to small town America and you won’t find any stores but USA’.
I can’t understand what people say
A classic culture shock is always going to be a language, or accent, barrier.
The American explained that she ‘can’t understand what people say sometimes because diction doesn’t seem to be a big thing here.’
Adding ‘So like, pronouncing your consonants very well isn’t a thing as much from what I’ve experienced.
‘I know people who have the Welsh valleys accent, which I love, but ear is like ‘YUR’ and year is also ‘YUR’.
‘The amount of words that sound exactly the same, they’re completely different words sometimes so how do they sound the exact same?’
One Welsh native took to to the comments to defend her accent, writing ‘I am from the south wales valleys. Ears and years are definitely different words and pronounced differently’.
There’s not a culture around greeting people
List of the biggest culture shocks the TikToker noticed after moving to Wales from New Jersey
- Old people dye their hair fun colours
- Everything is less expensive
- The bacon is different
- Pizza tastes ‘really weird’
- More swearing
- Grocery stores have ‘off-brands’
- ‘No diversity’ in grocery stores
- Not being able to understand what people say
- No culture around greeting people
- Everybody ‘hates’ Liverpool’
She also finds Brits to be typcially colder and more ‘grumpy than Americans:
‘When you go into stores people aren’t like ‘Hello, how are you doing today?’
‘There’s not as much culture around greeting people I was talking about this to my British friends and they said yeah, that’s because back in America they expect a tip.
‘I was like I don’t tip a cashier, I don’t think that’s a common thing.
‘I’ve said like ‘have a good one’ and ‘have a nice day’ and I’ve had store employees just look at me like ‘what are you doing?’ but some of them are also like ‘aww thanks”.
‘It’s like a fun surprise to them which is very nice but it’s strange to me because in America we’re very friendly. Not many people here are fake friendly, a lot of people are grumpy.’
One viewer wrote ‘I’m in Cardiff and proper giggling. Everyone really is grumpy… unless we win a rugby match’.
Everybody ‘hates’ Liverpool
Finally, her last point is that allegedly everyone hates Liverpool.
She said ‘Everybody hates Liverpool for some odd reason, I have no clue, I don’t have Liverpool.
‘I know a scouse person, they’re great, they’re wonderful.
‘People are always like ‘I hate the scousers’ stuff like that and I’m like wow what? I don’t really get that but it’s probably because I’m not a local here.’
One commenter chimed in with ‘Love this video! For the Liverpool hate, it might have something to do with the flooding of Tryweryn. That’s the only reason I can think of for it.’
Another added ‘the scouse thing might be a generational thing related to capel celyn but I personally have never heard it (I’m in SW) Welcome to Cymru!’
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