2015 – Observations of American culture

I spent my entire year in the United States this year rather than in my hometown. As such I saw a lot of differences I thought was interesting. I mean, I thought I knew the US. But there are surprisingly many notable stuff I found jarring when I really lived there. I took the liberty to note some of them down during my stay.

It started with lots of thing at the start because, I guess, I was a cow out of town. Then the frequency dwindled as I got desensitised as I lived there little longer. Most of them are strictly about San Francisco rather than the whole US at large. Here goes:

Food

Of course there is the legendary American size food portion. Yep, confirmed by yours truly. In the really value-for-money neighbourhood (my place), you can even get 3 days worth of fried rice in one serving! Large portion isn’t necessary a bad thing, and it’s not the cause of obesity. It is very common to pack your leftovers to go because nobody finishes a monster’s size of food.

The upside to this culture is that the food samples are huge too. I mean, I can hardly taste anything from that small cube of chicken sample in Singapore, so good job America!

But people in the Bay Area do not just eat a lot. They eat really healthy. You are likely to see organic, wholemeal, gluten-free, cage-free, locally-sourced branding everywhere you go. According to my boss, the trend got big because films like Food Inc. and Super Size Me got big in the area and shaped people’s perspective.

People also pay a premium to “upgrade” their dark meat chicken thigh to white meat chicken breast. *Shocker* It’s almost always the other way round in Asia. What are these people thinking!

Strangely enough, soda seems to be an exception as I see lots of people throwing money at anything carbonated. Good job Coca Cola.

Last question before moving on. What utensil should you use with your rice bowl. Spoon? That’s for kids, kiddo. We adults use fork to scoop them rice into the mouth. Note the efficiency of this choice of a tool. Yep people in Asia, start scratching your head now.

Hygiene

That thing is called a toilet seat cover. And it’s everywhere in the US.

Lifestyle

Quite a few separate observations.

First. Services are not as customer oriented. You will likely expect friendly greetings smiles from behind-the-counter staff in Asia, but don’t expect that from those impatient teenagers waiting on you to finalise your McNuggets meal order to-go. They’re just earning their allowance from those minimum wages.

Speaking about fast food. This is what I saw on the Subway napkin the other day.

The US is a free country with free speech. And the other time I also saw this Super Bowl advert (a very high profile TV airtime where ads are most watched of the year) where Sprint outright tells you how they are better than AT&T and Verizon (they are all telecom companies if you’re wondering), and they can buy you out of your phone contract with the rivals. Singapore’s never gonna allow this kind of negative business practices. >:)

Third, speaking of napkins. Whenever someone sneezes, there’s this overwhelming unequivocal urge by everyone within audible vicinity to chime in a “bless you~” to the victim of the unfortunate sneeze. In Singapore, you probably just get eyeball-ed by the auntie sitting next to you, life goes on.

Fourth. The homeless situation in San Francisco… Now I have to recall that SOMA vagina and that Leland dick (which look like a blowfish no joke) that I saw on the streets. I cannot, this needs to stop.

Fifth. The street-dumb me nearly got conned twice, once my bank nearly emptied by this con-ster. And then I learnt never to trust people unnecessary again, in this city. Just don’t bother helping. And I don’t mean to be racist, but they are always the African-Americans. Not just to me but to everyone else they attempt on the street. A few bad apples totally tarnishing people’s trust of the entire racial group.

Sixth. San Francisco is a Tech Hub. People more readily accepts new tech that really improve the convenience of life. For e.g., payment apps like Venmo and food services like SpponRocket are used widely. It takes forever for Singaporeans to accept their DBS Paylah because, quote my friend, “I don’t want to hold virtual cash”. I just feel that with out acceptance for change, one’s life will remain status quo and it will always be as inconvenient as it is.

Oh and because its a tech hub, you get ads you don’t see anywhere else:

You get ads getting developers to adopt some other developers API.

Last and final. I hate the cold. You can’t go anywhere without a jacket. Showering (that part where you rush to dry yourself or freeze to death after turning off the tap) was therefore the most torturous thing ever.

Systems, infrastructure and environment

I would like to think that US city road are planned out more logically than in my home country. I particularly like how streets grided and numbered, and how locations are referred by intersections much like graphing papers. It makes a whole lot of sense compared to the disarray roads over here. That OCD part of me is screaming support for the US.

And that keep-to-the-right-side thing. Not just on the roads, while you’re walking as well. Best thing ever, because everybody follows that. You never go head on into people again. Singapore needs to standardise this.

And then the not so good things.

I wouldn’t say the same about the transportation planning though. Public transport systems are not well integrated into one despite the attempt to do so. For example the differences in Clipper tapping methods aboard MUNI, BART and Caltrain and the transitions in between is just clumsy.

And you know every time we mentioned we’re from Singapore and the locals reflexively go “Oh Singapore is very clean!” You know why? Because the public facilities in SF (can’t speak for other US cities but I know Pennsylvania have it worse) looks like this:

In case you’re wondering, you should focus your eyes on that small wet looking thing on the ground near the banner. That insignificant thing is the source of all night soil hell. Also, expect human faecal deposits along your path to be a common sight. Their origins are unknown but the homeless situation is a best guess for creation of these SF heirloom. Singapore is not clean, its just normal standard, which highly surpasses the imagination of the SF dwellers.

Finance and credit

I think the credit culture is strong system wise. There is large credit utility and transaction has evolved to be come pretty cashless. Card swiping dominates instead at where I come from, cash probably only served a purpose 1 in 10 times because I practically swipe for everying everything, even $1 coke. I attribute this phenomenon to the very high rebate and perks that the credit companies offer. Singapore’s credit card offering just seems laughable in comparison. Again, a very SF focused view. I didn’t have this over at New York city.

If anyone really had to use cash, they go to those pesky ATMs which charges you $2.50 per withdrawal. I don’t understand why people even let these machines have it their way…

When handling cash, no one wants to handle any tender beyond $20. So you’re better off cashing your $50 notes into the bank or use them at tourist spots. Pretty surprising how its a pretty common sight to use larger tender amounts like $50 and $100 notes over here but not so over there.

Overarching all thing money and credit is the credit score which I think Asians will probably be less familiar with. The Americans let their trust worthiness be weighed by a man-formulated mathematical score, which is based on a bunch of factors. I guess it has something consumeristic debt inclined economy or something. The Americans guard their score as a secret with their life.

Things that didn’t really make sense to me in Singapore started making sense when I am in the US. Because Singaporeans are prudent with their spending, they pay credits like it is a debit with an extra step. Hence it serves no purpose to me to have credit when you can debit (you shouldn’t even be spending money you don’t have!). Why have debit when in Singapore there is NETS (its much more secure with PIN).

Careful credit management and score building will get you everywhere, including some of the best credit cards. I accumulated hundreds of dollars just by having great score and using good credit cards (I had five).

Insurance play an important role in life, because visiting the doctor is hell a lot expensive without one, so its best to just subscribe to a cover.

Summary

In all, I also come to realise that Singapore as a city state has been pretty amazing. It manages to squeeze so many functions, such as self defence, into itself and still work fine. San Francisco at roughly the same area and same population could probably never be able to achieve that due to its inefficiency. The majority of its workforce stays outside of its boundaries!

I also feel like San Francisco is losing its significance over other cities. The Gold Rush in SF (which happened in the 1800s and the reason that built SF up into a big city) happened a long time ago and its legacy momentum is waivering into the modern era. San Francisco remain geographically bounded by its coastal limitations and can never physically grow like the rest of the cities like Los Angeles and San Diego. As such it risks losing its place in the world if not for the rising prominence of the tech industry in its neighbouring Silicon Valley/San Jose area.

However the people culture in San Francisco remains something Singapore much desires. The openness, friendliness and the vibrant forward nature of the people beats the contented and stagnant, albeit rich Singapore. Hence I always thought I would prefer SF better if I were to be pulled away from my cultural bias.