Traits To Keep

Upon moving to Seattle in 1999 we almost immediately missed the largeness of everything in Salt Lake - large parking spaces, large Targets, wide freeways - but, as time passed and we became educated in energy consumption and urban sprawl, we realised this was something we no longer desired.  Now, after nearly 13 years of absence, there is not much of Salt Lake culture which we still miss, though it is still home to our favourite takeaways.  Every time we return, our meals consist almost exclusively of Sconecutters, Crown Burger, and Apollo Burger.  Sweet Jesus, we miss those places.

By the time we left Seattle in 2010, I was fed up with the passive aggressive residents and forced winter hibernation and was hard-pressed to say anything positive about my 11 years spent there.  But, after our short time in self-imposed exile in Scotland, I have come to view Seattle in a whole new light and miss our former home immensely (especially Shiku, Joey’s, and Noc Noc).

Still, food cravings aside, most of what we miss can be generally classified as American traits.  For instance, courtesy abounds in the States but is almost entirely lacking in the UK.  The phrase ‘excuse me’ is not used here, nor understood; if needing to be somewhere someone else is, one must wait until they move or pretend they’re not there.  Pushing is not acceptable but nudging or brushing is, holding the door for someone is for suckers, and moving out of someone’s way is unacknowledged because no one asked you to because they don’t do that here.

Especially given my past rants regarding poor customer service (here and here), who knew I could function some place where customer service, poor or otherwise, is almost completely absent?  One can usually rely on decent customer service in the States but here it is not expected and rarely received but often complained about.  The favourite retort to the common complaints regarding customer service here is ‘well, this isn’t the States’.  Apparently, even Britons acknowledge the customer service found in the States is superior.

A favourite phrase here is ‘I can’t be arsed’ meaning one cannot be bothered.  It is often used and a generally accepted excuse for poor performance.  For example, if one is expecting a latte but the barista ‘can’t be arsed’ to steam the milk, one is expected to accept an americano instead.  A real example was a conversation I had last summer in London, in response to a comment I made to someone about moisturising after showering, ‘you moisturise after every shower?  I just can’t be arsed.’  This appears to be the general disposition of most Britons.  We miss being surrounded by people who can be arsed.

As our time abroad continues, we hope to identify traits we’d like to keep, those we'd like to adopt, and some we'd like to shed.  And, as my perspective is not entirely unidirectional, there are definitely aspects of British culture which are superior and which we hope to adopt as well as American traits which we’d enjoy shedding.  I look forward to writing about those traits in the future but today I can’t be arsed.