Ok, so the UK has quite a few differences than the US. The differences that have been most noticeable to me though are the social differences. I don’t have time to go into all of them right now but I’ll cover a few, and even toss a story in afterwards.

1. Proximity.

The distance that people are willing to get near each other in the UK is much, much closer than in the US. You know that comfort zone that everyone has, and only certain people are allowed to enter your comfort zone….that zone in the UK is minuscule. It has taken many months to become more comfortable with this closer zone but I still can’t shake the feeling of “You’re too close!” most nights at the bar.

2. Humor

Most people already know that the british sense of humor is a bit different than the American sense of humor. That apparently also applies to Scotland. I classify the humor hear as slightly more personal and aggressive(not exactly the word I want, but best I can currently think of). The humor is just much more about a specific person and is more uncomfortable(think, Ricky Gervais). I see the US humor as more situational and about common feelings that people just don’t talk about(think, Dane Cook). The humor here takes getting used to.

3.Music

They love their dance/club music out here. That’s all that need be said.

4.Celebrities

My god do they love their celebrities…if we can even call them that. Most of the celebrities here are from reality TV shows. Speaking of which they also love their reality TV shows out here. In fact the popular shows that aren’t reality TV shows are shows with characters that pretty much act like reality TV show characters/actual normal people. Imagine the show Friends with average looking people, in average situations, having average reactions to them…that’s the majority of the TV here…well that sprinkled with popular US TV hows.

5. Black People

They simply don’t have as many over here. The few they do have aren’t your typical African American, many are from Nigeria for some reason. Nigerians look a bit different and have a Nigerian accent.

I’ve been meaning to write down all the differences that I’ve noticed but a few just culminated in a strange situation a few days ago. I was bowling with a few friends and decided to go to the bar to get a round of drinks. As I was heading to the bar I passed a group of people who were positioned in a way that I had to walk through the middle of their group. So I’m walking and there are two people leaning on the railing to my left and 2 or 3 leaning on the railing to my right. The US/Detroit in me came out and I didn’t feel comfortable have this many people this close on both sides of me as I walked by them. Which turned out to be a great thing because the girl on my left tried to trip me. Yes, literally stuck her leg out and tried to trip me.

Luckily I was on alert and avoided it but or legs definitely made contact. So I think “WTF!?!?” but laugh it off and say “Woah, you could’ve killed me.”

She seems to kinda slunk away in embarrasment and I continue to the bar. I’m at the bar and the girl walks by heading to the bathroom and says she’s sorry and that she thought I was someone else, a friend of her’s I think she said. The bad thing is that she said this while passing by me and didn’t actually come there to tell me this or even stop walking to actually apologize. So that apology was worthless to me.

So I get my 4 beers. The bartender puts them on the type of tray that waiters use to carry food and tons of drinks to people. The kind of try that most people need practice to learn how to carry correctly, practice that I didn’t have. So I’ve got no choice and need to carry this tray back to my group of friends. The bar is in a whole other room from the bowling alley so going to get help to carry them was really not an easy option.

I’m carrying this tray back to my friends and I’ve got to walk past the same group that involved the girl who tried to trip me. The girl is still in the bathroom and as I pass the group nothing notable goes down. After I’ve passed the group, and am very carefully balancing this tray, one of the guys from the group stomps and makes a loud noise near me and in my direction with the obvious intent of trying to startle me into dropping the tray. Now I’m pissed! I got a tray full of drinks so I can’t stop and get in this guy’s face about what he just did. I’m forced to stay calm and keep this tray balanced.

I’m still pissed I didn’t drop that tray and punch that guy…and at least push the girl. As I continued my game of bowling I just told myself that maybe he didn’t get the memo that I’m not the ‘friend’ that the girl thought I was, and maybe he didn’t get the memo that I don’t find those types of annoyances funny,…and maybe he didn’t get the memo that complete strangers don’t interact like that without expecting some form of violence be brought upon them in retaliation of their annoyance.

In this case I’m chalking this situation up to me allowing someone to get close enough, to attempt to trip me and attempt to startle me, as being the cause of number 1. Everyday I’ve got to tell myself not to get on edge when someone is ‘too close’. In this case that ‘too close’ sensor worked just right and kept me alert enough to not be taken off guard. My ability to stay cool and not cause a scene in that bowling alley I will attribute to number 2 and 5. Maybe they both did think I was some other black guy in Dundee and really did just want to have a laugh with me in their own brand of humor.

I’m a fan of living life without regrets, but now I’ve got an extra regret to tack onto my life. The regret that I didn’t show these people what happens when you annoy the wrong people. Well hey, you live and you learn, and now I’ve learned that no one else gets to play the ‘Oh sorry I did something inappropriate, I thought you were someone else’ card, it has already been spent.

Tags: Life, life lesson, People, Scotland, UK

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 24th, 2010 at 4:44 am and is filed under Blog, Life, Story. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.