Things that surprised me on my trip to NYC & DC

[schneefink]

Food
- They put ice cubes into any cold drink. So many ice cubes. To my surprise I got used to it.
- You get free water at any restaurant and they refill it too. Very convenient. Speaking of water, tap water in NYC was good but not in DC.
- A "water fountain" often only has different kinds of soda and no water at all.
- Lime lemonade is very good. We rarely have limes in Vienna but there they seem to be as common as lemons.
- L. invited me to some fabulous restaurants in NYC (e.g. Smith&Wollensky), and some I discovered elsewhere (e.g. Ootoya.) Yum.
- Toasted bagels with cream cheese are very good. I forgive cream cheese for being the most annoying ingredient in American recipes because I can't get it here in supermarkets.
- Cheese cake is good, but very sweet.
- Most street vendors appear to be mobile. In addition to hot dogs, falafel, pizza, and overpriced ice-cream, there are also vendors selling smoothies. I approve.
- Pasta with tomato sauce with vodka is apparently popular. I've never seen it before but I liked it.
- It is actually possible to get some halfway decent bread rolls.
- American hot dogs are weird. They have their burger-type bread, which is basically nothing, and are generally very small. Not very satisfying.

Transport
- NYC has local and express trains. This makes perfect sense, but took a few days to get used to.
- NYC and DC have different metro payment systems. As a tourist I found this annoying.
- The DC metro is generally very darkly lit.
- The NYC metro has some nice(r) stations, but most of them don't look very clean. Sometimes I can't even pinpoint why, just a general feeling, I think it's partly the yellow. And sometimes it's obvious, like that station where there was a manhole between the tracks, people threw trash there, and I counted a dozen rats in ten minutes, or the one where rust practically ran down the walls.
- I quickly figured out uptown and downtown in NYC, but crosstown seems less useful below the Central Park. And despite the numbers it can still be difficult to orient myself on a street corner when I don't know which direction I'm looking in.
- In NYC, at least in Manhattan, you don't call cabs, you hail them from the street. There are so many of them that it works, I tried it myself. It still seems a bit unreliable for when you're in a hurry.

Religion
- I have never seen so many conservative Jews as I did in NYC.
- The number of churches seemed similar to any European city, which surprised me because afaik in the US they have a much more even spread of many more different Christian faiths. Probably people just have to travel further for mass.
- There were people advertising a bible study group in front of the Capitol. Seems extremely strange for a secular nation, but then I already knew that's in practice not true.
- (By the way, there are few non-white people on American tv and in films in general, but I can't remember the last time I saw a Muslim character.)
- The Lincoln Memorial looks like an ancient Zeus temple, so much so that it was disorienting. People really worship the Founding Fathers here.

Nature
- Different birds. Of course the birds are different, but again, I didn't think about it. I have now seen bluejays and cardinals and purple martins and many others (I visited a raptor trust with G. in New Jersey.) I also found out that American robins are very different and, most importantly, much bigger than European robins. Now naming a superhero Robin is at least slightly less ridiculous.
- I knew about the different squirrels, but I didn't expect there to be so many of them or for them to be so completely not shy.
- In DC I experienced some of the worst April weather I can recall. In May! Several days in a row it switched between a light drizzle, blue skies and sun and high temperatures, and pouring rain (the latter always right when we came out of museums.)

Various
- Different power outlets. Somehow I completely forgot about that.
- Many apartment complexes have doormen.
- There's a Belvedere Palace in Central Park and a place called Vienna in DC. Cheaters. (That's why in DC I had to explain that I'm from Austria, so that's where I got the kangaroo question.)
- In NYC instead of in big garbage containers on certain days of the week people throw garbage sacks on the street.
- In NYC there are so many huge water storage tanks on top of buildings, I can't remember having seen that before.
- Random people calling land lines to advertise for political candidates actually happens all the time.
- Flags. So many flags. I especially noticed it when visiting smaller towns in New Jersey.
- The people are very friendly! Polite, helpful, often willing to chat, it was great. In NYC they smile a little less than in DC, maybe that's why I heard they're rude? Idk.

I know I'm forgetting some things, maybe I'll add them later.
LB asked me if I would want to live in either of these cities (after I spent I-forgot-how-long enthusiastically talking about my visit to both of them.) I don't, mostly for two reasons: housing is very expensive, and I don't want to live in the US. Both of these may change one day, but right now I'm very happy where I am.

Comments

[muccamukk]

This is very interesting. I've run into similar surprises, and found some things in common with Canada as well.

The US was going through a serious Classical phase when they did the Lincoln memorial. Frank Lloyd Wright also had a bid in (or someone in a much more naturalist style, I forget), which probably would have been more fitting to the man. Oh well. The endless things named after Presidents is a bit much, though.

I think it's a legal requirement to give people free water in restaurants. I know it is here anyway.

Big cities have fewer churches. You should see smaller cities in the South! Hundreds and hundreds. SO MANY! (New York especially has a reputation for being Godless, with the more conservative parts of the rest of the country.)

You should try get Stilton cheesecake! It's yummy and not nearly as sweet.

I've always had a really nice time in the US. I've never run into the famed rudeness. Though I haven't in Paris either (as long as you speak French, anyway).

DC would have different birds to us too. I love seeing blue jays and cardinals, which we don't get at all this side of the Rockies. Robins very common here. I've got one trained right now, so it eats bugs I throw it while I'm gardening.

[schneefink]

There's a difference between having to give people free water when they ask and automatically providing it with regular refills though, and I like the latter.

I'll try to remember that! This time I had more ice cream, yum.

[beatrice_otter]

Large coastal cities aren't a hotbed of religion. For that, you want rural South/Midwest (aka the "Bible Belt"). For example, I live in a small rural midwestern town, with a population of just under 800 people. We have six churches: one Catholic, one ELCA Lutheran, one LCMS Lutheran, one Evangelical Free, one Assembly of God, and one Methodist.

And at least NY and DC HAVE functional/useful public transit systems, most places (even large cities) don't!

[schneefink]

Whoa, that's a lot of churches for not many people. How do they all survive?!

That's true, and overall the public transport wasn't bad. Not that I used it much in DC except to get from where I was staying to the city and back, because almost everything I wanted to see was in walking distance in the center.

[beatrice_otter]

Well, first, a lot higher percentage of church attendance ;)

But even so, multi-point parishes are necessary, i.e. where various congregations share a pastor (and possibly do things like Confirmation and Vacation Bible School together). The ELCA church (my church) is part of a parish with two congregations, one here in town and one in the country between here and the next town down the road; the LCMS church and the Catholic church are both part of three-point parishes (i.e. where it's three congregations working together). The Assembly of God church currently has a part-time minister, and the Methodist church has a retired pastor who drives an hour up from the city each Sunday to do services. The Evangelical Free church may be the only one that's completely independent on its own; but it's the result of the Methodist and Baptist churches combining into one about 20 years ago. (The Methodist church is populated by the small remnant that WOULD NOT join with the Baptists.)

You have to remember that when the town was settled a hundred years ago, 1) people were pretty spread out on their homesteads, 2) people didn't have cars, and 3) the ethnic and denominational boundaries were VERY STRONG. So you end up with a lot of little churches that were within walking/horseback distance of a certain number of people, but it wasn't 1 church per x people, it was one church per x people of that particular denominational and ethnic background. So, for example, lots of them were Lutherans! But the German Lutherans and the Scandinavian Lutherans (mostly Swedes, for my congregation) would not worship together; they each had their own church. (Partly because of rivalry, and partly because ... the Germans spoke and worshipped in German, and the Swedes in Swedish.) And today the German church is LCMS and the Swedish church is ELCA. But back then there was a pastor shortage and even then some of these little churches would have had a hard time supporting a pastor by themselves, and so they shared with the closest church of similar ethnic/denominational background.

The thing in DC that I really love that few people know about is the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. It's well off the beaten track, but it is an ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS Catholic church, huge and with incredible art (a basilica is a cathedral that doesn't have a bishop). I mean, the National Cathedral is pretty, but it's fairly standard European-style. The Basilica is far more unique, and the art in it (paintings! statues! mosaics! carving!) is all phenomenal.

[inkstone]

Believe me, we're pretty upset about the rainy weather here in DC too. It was not normal and actually broke a record!

[schneefink]

At least there was sunshine too - we took most of our pictures with an amazing cloudless sunny background and it's hard to remember how grey it looked shortly before and afterward.

[princessofgeeks]

Fascinating! Thank you.

New York City's water is a shining achievement of civilization and is quite famous and has an amazing history.

[naye]

Hilariously (?) including a footnote where Aaron Burr raised massive, massive funds (he even got Hamilton to help out with the fundraising) to construct a new water supply after people kept dying of yellow fever and stuff, and then SURPRISE! used it to open his own bank instead.

[schneefink]

Well did the bank pay for a new water supply? Technicalities ;)

[naye]

Nope! The people kept dying of disease, but Burr created a bank that would actually give him a loan,and that's what REALLY mattered.

[schneefink]

Oh and I did go to Ootoya! I had a very good dinner there, thanks for the recommendation :)

[naye]

Oh yay! I'm glad you liked it.

[schneefink]

NYC's water is as good as Vienna's, and that's a high compliment. I'll have to look up the history. (That reminds me of the water tanks! Brb adding.)

[dirty_diana]

I'm glad you had a good time and are home safe! I think NYers have to be abrupt because it's so intense there, but they're not always be bad. It probably helps to clearly be a clueless tourist.

Toasted bagels with cream cheese are very good. I forgive cream cheese for being the most annoying ingredient in American recipes because I can't get it here in supermarkets.

As an ex-Montrealer I have to stan for Montreal-style bagels, but cream cheese is the best. (Can you get soft goat cheese? It would probably be an ok substitute. Slightly stronger in cheesiness.) Montreal is also similar to NYC in terms of having a huge Jewish diaspora, so it was weird when I moved and discovered that not everyone grew up getting Jewish holidays off school, hee.

[schneefink]

Oh definitely, tourists are probably always treated a bit differently. And NYC also had more people who clearly didn't want to be spoken to, but nothing wrong with that.

Montréal-style bagels? Google just shows me bagels with a lot sesame.

I usually use high-fat curd cheese as a substitute for cream cheese in baking, it works quite well. Mascarpone may work even better, but not every store has it.

There's a terrible reason why there aren't many Jews in Austria, but I see more wearing a simple kippa instead of the locks etc. too and in NYC it was the other way around. I did see a boy wearing a Spider-man kippa xD

[dirty_diana]

It's a different bread, basically? It's one of those classic food rivalries, most ppl prefer one or the other.

New York-style bagels are soft, chewy and doughy. Montreal-style bagels, on the other hand, are smaller, denser and sweeter. Both are boiled before they are baked, to create the thick, shiny, chewy exterior, but the water used in each city is a critical distinction. New Yorkers swear it’s the NYC water that makes their bagels so good and impossible to imitate in any other city. Montreal bagels are boiled in water that has been sweetened with honey — a defining characteristic of this style.

http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/montreal-bagels_n_5247880.html

I disagree with them about not putting cream cheese, most Montrealers might add cream cheese but they are just as delicious with just butter.

More information than you wanted, probably. :)

[schneefink]

If I ever get to Montréal I will definitely try bagels :)

I did try poutine! It probably only counts half because it wasn't in Canada (though I think the restaurant belongs to Canadians), but I enjoyed it.

[dirty_diana]

Yay poutine! That's a lot easier than bagels to recreate away from Quebec I think. As long as the chef knows to use real fresh cheese curds, if they just grate some regular cheese that is *not* poutine!

/traditionalist

[goodbyebird]

hehe yeah, when I was in DC I thought it was hilarious what a shrine to Greek culture their capitol was.

Sounds like you've had quite an eventful trip!

[schneefink]

I did! I'm currently writing museum reviews, I saw a lot of them :)

[worlds_of_smoke]

People really worship the Founding Fathers here.

Nyah. They worship the idea of the Founders, which is often warped to fit their agenda.

[schneefink]

True. Just like they do with Christianity.

[falena]

I loved reading this. I've never been to tje US and it's always interesting to read a foreigner's perspective on a country anyway.

[schneefink]

I love reading similar things about my own country too, always neat to see which things you take for granted are actually country/culture-specific.

[dhampyresa]

IIRC, NYC has the biggest Jewish community outside of Israel.

Also, yeah, the flag thing; did it creep you out? I remember it creeped me out the first few times I was in the US.

[schneefink]

Yeah, the flags everywhere were a bit unsettling at times. (Except in that one tiny town where they had as many rainbow flags as they had national flags, that was sort of cute.) Especially, and I'm not sure if that makes sense, in combination with the size of the 9/11 memorials. 9/11 was a tragedy, no question, but every time I saw another memorial I couldn't help but think of the consequences and this general feeling that American lives are valued so much higher than other lives that it's sort of scary.

[jesse_the_k]

amen! hard to imagine, but there were even more US flags in 2001-2002.

[marginaliana]

It's really fascinating (as an American) to see what you noticed. I have to admit that iced drinks, especially ice water, is the one American thing that I am dedicated to. Especially in the summer! I dislike lukewarm water.

[schneefink]

Ice cubes in the summer are great! I like cold water too, but I don't always need ice cubes, especially not so many. They often ended up left over (and/or I sucked them like candy.)

[marginaliana]

My mother is an ice cube cruncher, so I'm used to there never being enough ice cubes!

[naye]

It was really cool to see your impressions of the US! I think I've spent enough time there that I shrug most of it off but THE FLAGS it's so weird. And ice cubes in everything - most homes I've been to have fridge-freezers with ice cube makers. Like. Industrial quantities of ice right in your kitchen. (Tbh a lot of the US gets hotter than Europe ever does so I guess it makes sense...)

[schneefink]

Yeah, in hot states without good tap water I can see how ice cubes could be beneficial. I guess Vienna spoiled me ;)