No, this is not a bash the United States post. This is a post about stepping out of your comfort zone and seeing what is “out there”. Here, I argue that travel, and adventure, are the best ways to make us appreciate America, what we have. As well, as to appreciate what we don’t have.
After all, if you live in the desert you begin to appreciate grass, trees and rain. You need to “shake things up” from time to time.
When one speaks three languages: they are trilingual. When one speaks two languages: they are bilingual. When one speaks only one language: they are American.
I’ve done my fair share of travelling, and I can say that no place is perfect. Some things are great here, and some things are better there. What is important is the exposure to those things. It helps us grow.
Have you ever wondered what would happen to the people of North Korea if they were exposed to what it is like outside of North Korea? Can you just imagine? They have never been to a McDonald’s restaurant. They have never seen a K-POP video. They don’t carry smart phones, and don’t know what a search engine is. Imagine what a shock to their system it would be.
They are stuck there in their own echo chamber, in their own bubble of reality.
Just like us Americans. We too are stuck in a echo chamber and our own bubble of reality. My golly, that should most certainly be obvious after the 2016 election of Donald Trump and how outrageous the news media has become afterwards. Everyone is living this fake world and this fictional understanding of life. Everyone. From the news-babes on CNN, to the CEO of Starbucks. Everyone is living in some kind of Bizzaro World.
The weekends in Egypt are not same with ours! This also broke my common sense, I thought the weekends is Saturday and Sunday all over the world! But there're Friday and Saturday in Egypt!
Anyways…
Let’s chat a little bit about stepping outside of the United States as an American Man, for just a spell. Just for a little bit of time, not for long. Just for a little bit. Then return back. Then to think about how to improve our life inside the United States. For now, we have a new and fresh perspective of what it is like outside the United State’s borders…
Step out. Look around. Step back.
Remember, I am a MAN, so this article is from my, a male’s perspective. I am sure a woman would have a totally different viewpoint.
Why a man should leave America
If you’re an American living in the United States, I’m sorry, but you probably aren’t using your nationality to its fullest potential. Sure, you get to honor the flag during baseball games, barbecue hotdogs on the 4th of July and express your loud political opinion. But ultimately, the best way to celebrate your Americanism is to leave the USA. -The Privileged Life of an American Living in Asia
Since I have been outside of the USA, I have lived a freer, happier life. While I have tried to tell and relate this fact to the reader, it is just incomprehensible to most Americans because many have not left the United States. What I relate to and describe is completely foreign. I wish it wasn’t this way, I really do. However, that is simply the truth.
I will have to be honest, it wasn’t until after I left America that I really began to appreciate it.
As well as get really angry as to what it has become.
Here's just a few of the things that I have come to miss... The first day of hunting season. A big garden full of tomato plants, peppers and onions. Football on lazy Sunday afternoons. The local sports section in the newspaper with photos of friends, relatives, and their kids. Fishing brook trout. A compound bow. A Ruben sandwich with real coleslaw. Rummaging around in a auto junkyard and scrounging some spare parts. Meeting some friends at the local bar, or club. Chatting about the latest movies. Depth-charges, and pickled eggs. Cleaning out the gutter, and raking leaves. (Yeah, really.) My riding lawnmower. My tree stand and salt lick. Chilling out with my uncle while jazz played on the stereo in his living room. Having a "Dagwood" sandwich. The editorial section of the Pittsburgh Press. Taking my motorcycle out for a spin on a nice sunny summer day. "Lighting up" next to a hopper while the Indian summer breeze blew some leaves about.
You take these things for granted. It is not until you live without them that you begin to miss them, and appreciate them.
Here is an interesting little vignette from an American who went to visit a coffee-shop in Amsterdam, and discovers that instead of selling coffee, it sold weed and magic mushrooms!
Yeah right, coffee shop that doesn’t serve coffee, but space cakes and magic mushrooms. So, I am from a country where you get skinned, shot at, and hanged for having this stuff. Of course, now I had the freedom to do that, and hence, I headed to a coffeeshop. As a noob, I had no idea how this works. There was a “consultant” to assist you, like a pharmacist!” No kidding , that was crazy! I remember the lady introducing all the products from space cakes and magic mushrooms to philosophical stones and recommend that a noob like me to try the mushrooms. So I asked, “How do you eat this?” She replied, “ Just eat it like eating French fries.” Me after an hour : Damn the French fries was good! -What was the biggest culture shock you ever faced?
This posting is inspired by an article titled “10 Reasons Why Heterosexual Men Should Leave America” written on 16DEC13 written by RooshV. As good as it is, it is (perhaps) a little too dominated by sexual excursions and other opinions by that author. It’s kind of a “turn off”, don’t you know.
Again, and I must REPEAT, this is not an article that bashes America. It is my suggestion that travel to different places, and exposure to different things is beneficial.
We all NEED to Grow
For us to grow and advance in both the physical and spiritual aspects of our beings, we need to adapt to the changing circumstances that surround us. We need to adapt to the environment as we find it. We need to do this with acceptance, and without trying to alter or change the environment; for it is only us who will be able to change. We can only change ourselves, not the environment around us.
In my case, I left the United States, and I moved to China.
Before I left to Beijing for my weekend trip, my friends from Macau & Hong Kong told me how air quality is going to be bad, smog everywhere, take a mask, etc., but when I went to Beijing, I saw bluest sky I have seen and air quality was excellent. When I showed some of my photos, no one would believe, then I saw an article in New York Times how china could change the climate and air quality if they want to. Not sure if this is true but it was a very beautiful day -What culture shocks did you experience when coming to China
Well I moved to China.
As such, I needed to adapt to the Chinese way of doing things. Which was, in many ways, very different from what I have come to expect. This shock to my system, and what I have learned from it was eye opening. As such, I wish to write about some of the things that I have learned. Though, I will have to tell you (the reader) that many of what I will relate will not make any sense, and you will probably not believe me anyways.
“Most people do not believe traveller’s tales.” -Glory Road
Differences are always good
I was in Singapore this Feb 2017. Our tour guide proudly asked us in the bus to look outside and tell us what they notice or see different than our country - India. Everyone looked outside, few minutes passed by and people shouted “Traffic police?”. She said, “Yes! We have no traffic police. Everything is monitored on the CCTV cameras. One of the reasons there is so much obedience in public”.
What a boring place the world would be if all we could eat was salt-free oatmeal, and warm water. Even for you oatmeal lovers out there, it would be boring. Day in and day out. The same old… same old. Lucky for us, it isn’t that way. We can choose to eat ice cream, pizza, pork chops, bacon, and French fries. What a wonderful situation!
If we wanted to, we could eat chicken fried steak with sunny-side-up eggs. We can eat butterscotch milkshakes and brownies. We can eat thick pan, double-stuffed pizza and wash it down with a pitcher of icy cold Budweiser. We can eat bagels and cream cheese and a wash it down with a nice hot cup of coffee with real cream. My goodness! Isn’t it great to be able to have choices?
That means, boys and girls, having choices is a good thing.
You can live in Boston if you want bagels and coffee from Duncan Donuts, or live in California if you want taquitos and coffee. You can live in Florida if you want nice sunny skies, or you can live in Wisconsin if you like ice fishing. Choices are good. Having different choices in different places are good.
That’s pretty important.
That is why it is so great to live in Europe. A two or three hour ride will take you to a different part of Europe with different customs, languages and lifestyle. Well, it used to, anyways. That is until the progressive started to run Brussels and dictate conformity throughout the EU. Anyways, I digress…
Different things are really great.
It doesn’t matter what it is. Not really. Different types of food are nice. Like, for instance, getting a cup of coffee at the Café du monde in New Orleans as opposed to walking into a Starbucks franchise.
Not just about food and drink, mind you, but other things as well. How about having different pets. Having a few dogs around the house to liven it up, and having a few cats to mellow things out and keep everyone in line, is a good thing.
Or maybe having different cars. Like having a beat-up pickup to go mudslinging, or a cheap car to commute to work back and forth, or having a nice big Lincoln to go out to the lounge in the big city.
Different is good. It is really, really good.
We need to Broaden our Experiences
Now, I contend that the greater your experiences are with different things, the broader your personality becomes.
For instance, I never had any Mexican (or Tex-Mex) food until after I graduated from university. Yet, when I had my first taco and burrito, I became hooked. How I could, I possibly live in a world without refried beans, melted cheese, and tacos? Since then, this type of food expanded my experiences. It made me a better person. And, perhaps, a little thicker around the middle.
It doesn’t mean that all that I ate before (my discovery of Mexican food) was bad, it is just that I found another food that I like just as well as (stuffed) pork chops, pizza and double tomato hamburgers. It was equal.
Later, when I experienced “real” Southern cooking and had my first “real” BBQ in Mississippi, I added yet another food to my list of favorites. Shortly after that, I added deep-fried catfish, pickled tomatoes, and hushpuppies. Some of the things that I was exposed to completely replaced the old “standbys”. For instance, once I had “real” Southern mint iced tea, I never bought a regular “iced tea” from a fast food restaurant ever again.
My experiences expanded me.
Muslims male could have more than one wife. My Egyptian friends told me that the Muslims in Egypt could have four wives maximum, that's legal.
having experiences is good. That is a good thing. We have to keep on constantly pushing, striving and working on growth. Instead of just ordering the same $5 pepperoni pizza from Domino’s pizza, mix it up a little and try a Greek gyro with salad and French fries. Instead of a number #2 meal out of Burger King, order their new “signature” special and try it out for a change. Instead of drinking a Coke out of the 7-11, go a little nuts and drink a Dr. Pepper. Let your “hair down”, live a little bit.
Stop going to McDonalds and KFC all the time. Go to “Quaker Steak & Lube“, “Submarina“, “The Hat“, “Portillo’s Restaurants“, “Duchess“, “The Varsity“, “Honey Dew Donuts“, “Bojangles“, “Runza“, “Arctic Circle“, or “Blake’s Lotaburger“.
Please, believe me. You should try different things.
Not all hamburgers are the same. Fast food is NOT about a basic McDonalds hamburger. It can be anything. There are choices out there you know. You have choices. You can decide what YOU want to eat. Your choices are not limited to either [1] a cheeseburger, [2] a big mac, or [3] a quarter pounder.
Step outside your comfort zone. The world is filled with all kinds of things that are are quite different from what you have grown accustomed to. Different is good. Listen to me, different is GOOD.
It’s not only about food either. It’s about everything.
This includes different types of personalities, different fashions, different styles of buildings, different weather, different ways of doing things. Each one has their good and bad aspects. There is no “best” way to do anything. You can select and you can choose.
They use almost every part of the animal in their food. It was a shock when I ordered Chicken in my hotpot, expecting just the meat and find that there is literally a chicken head, chicken feet etc. in my soup.
Don’t fall for the conventional narrative that there is only ONE best way to do things (the way everyone else does things). You are your own person. You can make your decisions and you own choices.
You, yes YOU, can decide.
"I certainly had no idea about sex until I was 52 and living in Asia. But I didn’t understand what I was missing either, so can sympathize with a lot of the white guys living in their home towns. I don’t even bother telling my pals back home about sex out here, they just claim I’m lying, or at best think I’m lying." -John
We need to Push and Strive
You have to push to learn and improve your life.
Unless you push, strive and experience, you will become fat and lazy. We have to constantly push ourselves to be better people. To do this we need to strive. Strive to be good men. Strive to be good fathers. Strive to be great employees. Strive to do what is the best. Strive to learn.
"Of course the game is rigged. Don't let that stop you--if you don't play, you can't win." -Robert Heinlein
In most cases this will not happen if all you do is sit on your lazy-boy and play video games all day. You need to break out of what you know and enter the realm of what you don’t know. You need to go “outside” and experience other ways of doing things, and other ways of thinking. This might mean that the way pizza is made in Chicago tastes better to you, than the way pizza is made in New York City. Or not. Maybe you end up liking both types of pizza. (Like I do.)
But there will be one take-away from your comparative experience. That is, at least you will know the difference between a pizza in Chicago and one in New York. That knowledge is a good thing.
Next time that you eat a slice of your favorite pizza, you will end up appreciating it even more.
Different Food can be found in Different Nations
I have to tell you that I have eaten some of the most amazing food, that I ever ate, in China. You know the Chinese-American food “General’s Tso’s Chicken”? Well, you should try the real authentic Chinese dish; Gongbaojiding.
I have to tell you that Thai food is amazingly delicious. I also love the noodle dishes from Vietnam. Singapore and Malaysia has some of the best and tasty dishes that I ever ate. Australia has some pretty awesome steaks, and my goodness, the cheese out of New Zealand is absolutely amazing.
Come on! If you haven’t had Guinness stout on tap, you haven’t lived.
And… Please understand, there are some amazing wines out of Chile and Australia. You owe it to yourself to try some, if just once. You should understand why many Australians are so relaxed about life, and why everyone says that Morocco is a cool place to visit. You need to go there and learn.
OK. Well, I would hope that I made my point.
The world is filled with all kinds of things. These things are both good and bad. You should not rely on some television or Internet “expert” to tell YOU which is good or bad. I argue that you should go out and sample them yourself.
So, please don’t get too upset. I personally think that YOU, the reader, should know what you want and what you like. You are the expert on YOUR life.
It's like the mainstream news media getting upset because we go to the internet for our news. We do not need the info-babe telling us what the President said. We can listen to his speech directly ourselves.
You are the expert of YOUR life. You can decide what you like and what you don’t like.
Why you should expose yourself to other ways of living…
You, the reader, should not get mad but I really think that YOU should be the one who decides what you like and what you don’t like. Not some “expert” who tells you what to eat, how to live, where to live and what to do.
"Once you go abroad it’s difficult to go back. My first extended experience living overseas opened my eyes in a variety of ways. People will always be people but I believe that culture is the single biggest influence on people. There is definitely something wrong with America in this respect. America may be a lot of good things.. productive, prosperous, and relatively free but the socialization of its citizens is much less advanced than other (much more economically poorer) countries I’ve been in. The way I look at it quality of life isn’t just all about money. It’s about what you can do with yourself in that society and how comfortable you feel around others. In America I was never truly “comfortable” but always felt tense or slightly agitated at the people around me. There’s definitely a hostility and tenseness to social interaction there that I don’t feel anywhere else. That’s a lot of negativity to deal with daily so it’s not surprising that out of all industrialized first world countries Americans generally have the least healthy lifestyles and shortest overall life spans.” -Happierabroad
With this being made clear, let’s take a look at why an American man should step out of America from time to time and sample the customs elsewhere…
[1] It is not as bad as you fear
First of all, other nations are not as bad off as you have been led to believe.
Being in a echo chamber, with our only window outside of the USA is the news media, gives us a really warped idea of life. Particularly, life outside of the United States. If you believe the American news media, the world is a cold dark sooty place, with only the United States glowing in the light.
Hah!
Let me be the first to correct this crazy perception. Nope! It is not that way at all. Those pesky Russkies are in so many ways like your typical middle class American. Those evil commie Chinese are like Americans from the 1950’s. Those Africans from Zambia and Kenya are more conservative than the most conservative Republican can ever be.
What you think is real, it all just a big friggin’ lie!
When I first stepped foot outside, I was stunned. Heck! They had toll booths, ATM machines, cell-phones, taxis, and universities. People wore the same clothes that I did. I could get sunny side up eggs and a great freshly brewed coffee just about anywhere. The girls were amazingly attractive, and the girls in Australia all had these lion manes for hair. It was stunning.
Good golly! The girls are friggin’ stunning. Korean, Chinese, Australian, Singaporean, Zambian… Zambian… oh, did I say Zambian? Stunning!
People had homes with yards, garages, sun-porches, dining rooms, and nice Western-style bathrooms.
Sure they did things differently, but it really wasn’t all that bad. It most certainly doesn’t look like a “Save the Children” commercial, or a Brazilian garbage dump. Other nations have weather girls, news programs, forensics television shows, and often many rights that are no longer available to Americans…
Especially, the freedom to keep your personal records private.
Yes, they have highways. They have their own local pop music. They play games on their smart phones, and they like to fish. Guys like to watch sports, and really get involved in it. Men do household chores and everyone really cares for their children.
Speaking of children. In fact, I was stunned that children in Thailand can buy and own firearms! I was under the impression that American was the ONLY nation that had the “second amendment”. Boy, oh boy was I wrong. I was terribly wrong.
When the democrats are eventually successful in repealing the second amendment, American will obviously need to look to Thailand as the beacon of liberty and freedom.
Anyways…
People in other nations have pets, often treating them like children (for example like in China), and not breeding them as food like CNN likes to announce. And speaking about lies from the media, all these “bird flu” conflagrations are all nonsense. The various illnesses that are developed overseas will not kill you. It is all a manufactured reality to keep you in fear.
And, by the way, Christmas Trees will not kill you. No matter what the big media wants to convince you.
In short, and in summary, the rest of the earth outside of the United States is not what you think it is.
Travelling will make you take a good hard look at what you thought was reality. via GIPHY
[2] You will get to experience real FREEDOM
Another big thing is that you get to compare and contrast. You get to see what “freedom” actually and really is.
Once, you as an American, leave the United States you will finally get to feel what real freedom is like. This is a really big thing with me, as I feel very betrayed by our elected politicians. Today, for the vast bulk of Americans, we DO NOT KNOW what real freedom is.
"But the biggest culture shock of all was that it never felt like you were in a communist country at all" -What culture shocks did you fell when you visited China?
In the USA we always talk about how “free” America is. We talk about it, we sing about it, we praise it, but we don’t live it. We have forgotten what real freedom is. We are just talk about it. It’s all talk, talk, talk.
Yadda… yadda…yadda.
I wonder how many people, not just Americans but those in other countries, have come to the conclusion that the United States today is a less free and less aware society than the societies in the dystopian novels of the 20th century or in movies such as The Matrix and V for Vendetta. Just as people in the dystopian novels had no idea of their real situation, few Americans do either. -Paul Craig Roberts
It’s a truly sad situation, where we don’t realize how absolutely decimated our freedom has become. We think we are “free” when we have to report to the IRS. We believe that we are free when need to show a driver’s license to buy a beer. We are convinced that all is good, and our freedom is intact, when CNN announces that the President suspended habeas corpus. We pat ourselves on the back for exposing the crimes of the FBI.
A truly free society wouldn’t NEED a FBI, let alone use it against the citizens.
Yah, we parrot what the News Media says. “We are FREE!” in the best nation on the planet forever!” Woo Woo.
“Americans should travel internationally, especially in Asia. When they return to the States they will see what a police state it has turned into.” -roddy6667 Jan 8, 2018 3:19 AM
Yeah. It becomes obvious.
America has laws for just about everything, and high police budgets ensure you’re always watched by those in power.
This means everything. All behavior is policed, and it is so very easy to get arrested. In America you are always watching out for the police. We no longer even notice it. It has become an automatic reaction, like when you look down at your speedometer when you see a police car nearby. This all means you’re one party away from getting arrested and going to jail.
Foreign countries are different.
An absence of heavy police presence, combative women, nanny state laws, and surveillance cameras means that you can enjoy your time instead of worrying about getting arrested. Take some beers to beach or drink in the park with your group of friends. Drink a beer in the open or on a city bus. It’s not a problem.
Remember, boys and girls, true freedom is stinky and messy. The more organized and proper a nation is, the less free it is.
[3] You will begin to compare different nations to the USA objectively
You can compare the things that matter to you.
It doesn’t matter what the think-tank in Washington D.C. says about a particular nation. Or, what the Washington Post has to say about you not being taxed enough. You can decide for yourself.
Instead of parroting the narrative that the United States the best and greatest nation in the history of the universe, you will actually get a chance to decide for yourself.
You will see what the differences are from the USA to another nation. You can compare eating a breakfast in your home town against one in Indonesia. You will be able to compare dating a girl in Vietnam as opposed to one in your home town. You will be able to compare the costs of buying groceries in Australia as opposed to buying them in your home town.
You will be physically able to make your very own comparisons yourself.
In places where there just isn’t very much freedom, there is a tendency to be boxed in by rules and regulations. People are afraid to go out and live life. They hide for the most part. When they do go out, they are very well behaved and keep to themselves.
They don’t bother to direct any attention to themselves, least a police officer come over and arrest them. The trash cans are all clean, and there isn’t much in the way of litter. There are no beggars on the streets, and the buildings are all pristine and sanitary.
In places where there is freedom, people are permitted and allowed to experience life. But you know what? Freedom is not pristine and controlled. It is stinky, messy and chaotic. People go about and live their lives in crazy abandon.
Freedom is where you are permitted to live your life free of interference.
All the laws, and all the police, and all the regulations are considered a “price one must pay”. It is considered the price that you must accept to “live in the greatest nation on the earth”. America has the “Bill of Rights” that are always protected. No one will ever try to take away the freedom to speak, or your guns, or your ability to worship as you wish. Not in America! It’s just the price you must pay if you want to be an American.
Which, of course, leads me to think about things.
[4] Comparisons will be stark
Comparisons on FREEDOM between the USA and China
So, in comparison with my Chinese friends, I have discovered that I have more freedom in China than what I had in the United States.
WHAT?????
No shit, Dick Tracy… Let me explain.
Here in China, the IRS won’t come smashing my door down at three in the morning with an armored vehicle. I don’t ever have to report my yearly income to them, and there are no help-lines to assist me in doing my taxes. You simply don’t need them. The Chinese never have to report anything to their government.
One of the first things that I noticed when I moved to China…
The sad truth of the matter is that we as a people have been too propagandized and naïve to admit how corrupt and vicious our government has become, irrespective of who resides in the oval office. Our current problems are deeply systemic and therefore cannot be solved by obsessing over the symptoms and switching out a president. We need to face reality before we can recover as a society, and to do this we must admit certain uncomfortable truths. Most significantly, we need to come to terms with the dangers of allowing extremely secretive and all-powerful agencies to multiply and grow to the extent they have. When well-documented abuses from the NSA, CIA and FBI go on for decades with little to no accountability, what do you think’s going to happen? Meanwhile, superficial pundits and hack politicians are out there telling us about how great the FBI is, yet historical facts point to the opposite conclusion. That this is an agency that’s always been more focused on protecting the status quo than protecting the people. Are we supposed to pretend that the FBI didn’t write a letter to Martin Luther King Jr. telling him to kill himself? Are we supposed to pretend COINTELPRO didn’t happen? - Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog
One of the very first things that I noticed was that China has roads. Nice, really nice and beautiful roads. Roads with well-tended gardens on both sides filled with flowers and decorative trees.
We need taxes, we are told. You know, for roads and infrastructure...
They have high speed trains, and all sorts of infrastructure. Yet, surprisingly the people don’t seem to be raped by taxes for every little thing. In fact the opposite is true. They have one tax. Only ONE single tax., and it is a small one.
You want a bottle of coke, it costs you 1 yuan. Not $2.98 with tax. You are never, and I mean NEVER, trying to figure out the overall costs of something you buy. A noodle lunch costs 15 yuan. A liter of gas is 4 yuan. A bag of betel nuts costs 10 yuan. Simple costs. Simple math. No hidden taxes at all.
So China has roads, bridges, infrastructure, and it’s nicer and newer than what we have in the states. So, why do Americans pay so much in taxes, and get so little back in return?
Personally, I think that there is a significant amount of kick-backs, corruption and graft in the various American governments. There is also an enormous amount of waste. Why is the USA constantly at war? Why are taxes constantly going up and up and up, and the government is just giving the money away to everyone EXCEPT the American people?
Here in China, the FDA will not shut down my business because of some complaint. I can refuse service to anyone for any reason. I can take and buy any drug that I want. I can chew a betel nut and not feel afraid of the police. You can buy any drug ever made by man, at ridiculously low prices, and yet, the Chinese just don’t have an Opioid Addiction crisis. Why is that? Think about it. I do not need PERMISSION to put something else in my body, food, drug, or smoke. No permission is required.
Here, the DHS will not freeze my papers and subject me to household detention for undisclosed reasons. They won’t arrest my children for trying to sell lemonade in my front yard. They won’t run their armored personnel carriers and tanks on my rose bushes.
But, you know, it’s much more than that. It is everything…
So many things we take for granted. It’s almost like we view the cleanliness and design of our handcuffs as a sign of freedom.
The biggest culture shock I ever lived was in Texas. I was arrested, Starsky-and-Hutch style, and jailed, basically for excessive speed. I was on a visit at Texas A&M University at College Station, when friends from Dallas (ca. 180 miles = 300 km north) invited me for the Easter weekend. On the I-45 motorway, I drove at 80-90 mph, so as to alleviate the boredom from the long and monotonous route. I was aware of the speed limit at 75 mph, but I felt safe as most drivers did the same, and some drove even faster. As I was getting close to Dallas, I noticed a police car behind me, with its red lights on. Based on the way the police behave in most countries, I took this for a request to make way. So I pulled over to the right lane and slowed down a little; and I didn’t bother more about it. Then, I noticed the police were still there, but I didn’t understand what was going on. I guessed they were after somebody, but did not figure out it was me: on the one hand, I wasn’t driving faster than most people around; on the other hand, I never thought they would quietly stay behind me if they wanted me to stop — my generation wasn’t addicted to U.S. series. Our home-grown cops order drivers to stop, not by staying behind them, but by moving to their left and signalling with the right arm. I was beginning to find the situation weird, when another police car came to my left, and a policeman signalled me to stop. I immediately did. Then the big show began. The policemen yelled at me to get out of the car and put my hands on it. One was pointing a gun at me. I complied; they frisked and handcuffed me. They asked me why I hadn’t stopped at once; I answered that I had not understood. At first they obviously didn’t believe me, but I explained that the practice is different in my country. They insisted that I had no valid driver’s licence, as I didn’t possess a Texan one. However, I showed them both my French licence and an International Driving Permit, which is recognised in Texas. I had purposely fetched it at my prefecture before leaving France. I felt eerie, as though I had gone out of my body, and watched myself caught in a cheesy crime TV series. Without subtitles: my command of spoken English is sufficient for daily communication but, well, not perfect. Broad Texan shouted at machine-gun speed, with a twang as thick as guacamole, is a bit of a challenge for me. Progressively, I figured out the situation. Those who had chased me first were from Ellis County, and the one who had signalled me to stop was from Dallas County. I had crossed a county line, so the Ellis policemen had to request the help of the Dallas police. I had made them look like fools before their colleagues, so they were quite upset. But my crossing the county line also qualified as “evading arrest”, and evading arrest in a motor vehicle is a felony in Texas law. The Ellis County policemen called their superiors; after a one-hour wait in their car, still handcuffed, I learned that I was going to be taken to jail. The cheesy HBO nightmare was going on. So I was introduced to the Ellis County jail in Waxahachie, Texas. The inner child thought: “What a name! Sounds like the chant of the Indian warrior, after he has captured the white guy who ventured too far, and tied him to the torture post”. My adult self added: “They have killed and removed the Indians, but they have kept the tortures”. The prison personnel seemed surprised to see someone jailed for an offence he did not knowingly commit. They even said the charges should be dropped, as I did not know the custom and had never been arrested before. But, anyway, the sheriff had ordered to jail me, so they had to accommodate me. The check-in formalities are surprising. For instance the disinfection shower: you undress, a guy comes with a big sprayer like those used in vineyards, and sprays the cold stinking disinfectant on you, first front, then rear. You put on a heavy brownish overall. If you ask for reading material, they give you a Bible, a special edition with a foreword saying that God forgives even the worst offenders. Why not? This was Good Friday, after all. I read all of St Matthew and half of St John during my stay. It was time to proceed to the detention room. I was quite anxious, expecting to spend the night in a cell with a few hardened felons, and wondering how they would deal with me. Fortunately, petty offenders are kept in large dormitories of 40-odd beds, with a TV set, tables… and a jailer staying in all the time. No way to pick on anybody when 40 witnesses and an armed guard are present. I won’t say it was a pleasant time, but it was interesting. There was the local drug pusher, locked up without bail until his judgment: he was accused of “destroying evidence”, because he was cleaning his weed pipe when he was arrested. There was the blockhead who had tried to steal the sheriff’s own bathtub. Everybody was baffled by my story; Hispanic people were surprised to see a blue-eyed and fair-haired guy so ignorant of Anglo-Saxon habits and culture. People had a deck of cards, they asked if I would play with them. I tried to teach them belote; obviously it was too tricky… I was asked many interesting questions: Do you have McDonald’s in France? Do you have Twinkies? This one puzzled me: I didn’t know the stuff. They offered me one! Let me thank them: the “official” meal that came on the morning was the most disgusting of my whole life. As they had taken all my money from me, I only had the normal prison grub, while the inmates could buy crisps, sweets and cakes. The drug pusher — a smart guy, actually — explained to me that the whole prison system was geared toward extracting as much money as possible from the inmates. A shocking revelation. There came the curfew; I had to find a bed. To my surprise, I realised that the dorm was neatly divided: the whites on the left, the blacks on the right. And the only place left was in the black section. Just below me was, say, the kingpin. During hours and hours, he kept talking to his visibly sycophantic neighbours, yelling “wawawawaw Nig**r… wawawawaw Bro”. I just could catch those two words. Once he turned to me and, switching to more standard English, ironically commented “This is a f**king professor at A&M…” before returning to his mumbo-jumbo. Was the irony directed at me, or at the system that had put me there? I didn’t get it. Frankly, I would rather have slept, but I found it ill-advised to complain about the loud neighbourhood. The next morning, I was called to arraignment. Of course, I didn’t know the word; I drew a smile from the jailer by ingenuously asking: “who is Raymond?” A judge first lectured me in legal gobbledegook, I panicked as I just could catch one word now and then. He explained to me again in plain English: the case was not dropped, but I could be released if I paid a sum of money. The jailer who had accompanied me expressed again his surprise that the charges had not been dropped. I could call my friends from Dallas, they undertook the formalities for my release. Together we discovered the fantastic world of bail bond agencies, roamed the county to find the pound where my car had been taken (no one had told me about its whereabouts)… One of their neighbours gave me the business card of a lawyer. I flew back to France as soon as I could, shivering with the fear that one could detain me. The judicial process ran its course. The grand jury did not dismiss the case, but finally my lawyer negotiated the re-qualification. The “evading arrest” charge was dropped. I was fined twice, once for excessive speed, once for “failure to give right of way”. The total cost of this fine little joke (bail deposit + car pound + lawyer fees + fines) was almost $10,000. I never came back to the US. In the form that must be filled to obtain the “visa waiver” (actually, almost as complicated as the visa was), there is one question: “Have you ever been arrested or detained in the U.S.?” I can’t even think of that. -What was the biggest culture shock you ever faced?
America is a de facto police state. It is not just the local town and state police, but it is the entire federal apparatus.
The FDA will not require me to have a doctor write me a prescription. Nor will they ban anything. Instead, I can simply go to a pharmacy and ask for a drug and they will give it to me, no questions asked. I do not NEED to have a doctor prescribe ED medication. I go to the pharmacy and tell the woman behind the counter what I want. She gives it to me at a fraction of the price available in the United States. I do not need to ask PERMISSION.
The FCC will not limit my bandwidth on my cell phone. They will not monitor or restrict what I can watch, write, say or listen to. They won’t limit it, and I don’t need to ask PERMISSION to change it.
The NSA will not be monitoring, recording, and indexing all my computer activity. Nobody will care. It’s true, and I say this as I am in mainland China, supposedly behind the “Great Firewall of China”. Yeah, more bullshit American propaganda. Dudes, what you think China is … is a big piece of bullshit propaganda.
The NRO (National Reconnaissance Office) won’t be proudly launching spy satellites over my house with logos that look like they came from the evil side of the a 007 James Bond movie.
The CIA won’t be trying to spy on my though my household appliances. They won’t be trying to blackmail me with some attractive prostitute. Though, I kinda wish that they would try…
The FBI won’t be monitoring my email, or smashing down the offices of my attorney. Putting me on a “hit list” of politically connected people, or trying to frame me for some obscure crime or two. And while on on this subject, why do American police dress like SS Storm troopers? Why? Why is the FBI permitted to act and behave exactly like the dreaded Nazi Gestapo?
However, here in China I am not subject to the American police state. The FBI has no jurisdiction here. I can live my life AS I SEE FIT, not as how the busybodies in government think it should be lived.
I can pick up a water cannon and enjoy the holidays without worry that I might upset someone.
Now, to someone sitting in front of their computer in the United States, this is all very interesting, but doesn’t mean much. “So what?” you ask. We have the Second Amendment, and we have Habeas corpus. Yes, we do. But, you know what? They are not enforced. Not a day goes by without them being infringed.
Habeas Corpus is meaningless if basic English Common Law is not observed.
Not one elected official is defending the Bill of Rights. Not on the federal level, and not on the state level.
Before the reader “has a cow”, let it be understood that what I am discussing is day-to-day freedom and liberty. This is the freedom and lifestyle that you experience every day. This is how you live your life in doing your normal activities. These are the simple things in life. These things include working; eating, spending time with your family, travel, saving money, and spending money. These are the comparatives. These are the measurables and the deliverables that one can use to actually determine how free they are. As well as comparatively determine their overall standard of living compared to the rest of the world.
So instead of pretending to be a “blue ribbon panel”, or “think tank” sitting high up in an “ivory tower”, get off your high horse, and experience life with me.
Life is what YOU personally experience.
It is not what is described to you that you SHOULD experience. True freedom is being able to plant a garden in your front lawn. It is being able to build a geodesic dome on the roof of your house, and being able to make your own home-made moonshine in your basement…
…all without worry that the police will come smashing your door down and throwing you in prison for fifteen years.
Freedom is being able to live your life, to act and think, and do things to your own body without worry that someone else will be offended. True and real freedom is being able to sit down, order a super sized coke, and sunny-side up eggs in a restaurant in New Jersey with your dog sitting next to you on the sofa, and not worry about being arrested. You can do this in friggin’ communist China, but are forbidden to do so in the “land of the free”, the United States.
Dudes! This – is – NOT – freedom.
Once you leave the United States, you get a taste for REAL freedom.
Freedom is never having to take a drug test for anyone, for any reason, at any time. Freedom is never having to fill out a transcription of all the money your earned, and ask for deductions to the all-powerful IRS. Freedom is the ability to withdraw all of your money from your bank when you want without consequence.
Caution: Wet Floor signs in clear view after someone mopped the tiled entrance of a hotel? Nope. Guard rails on steep trails, foot paths, or overhangs on cliffs? Not really. Red tape or warning signs around crumbling sidewalks or two foot wide uncovered man holes? Nada. We do admit seeing a Caution: Hard Hat Area sign where construction was being performed. Yeah, several times, actually. At first we were startled to see such lack of warning signs in Thailand. How could people properly function in society without being spoon fed safety warnings?! But the longer we lived here, the more refreshing it was. One can argue that Thai citizens and foreigners are expected to open their eyes and take responsibility for their own actions. And you know what? Using common sense works! To this day, no one we know has gotten hurt by their own lack of awareness and tried suing the life blood from the company or property where the accident happened. Americans, take a hint! -Tieland to Thailand
Freedom is the ability to light a cigarette at the dinner table in a restaurant. Freedom is not being politically correct. Freedom is doing unhealthy things to your own body. Freedom is home-schooling your children. Freedom is being able to build a tree-house on your property without a permit.
Freedom is having a ladder that doesn’t have any safety warnings on it. It means having a mattress that you are allowed to tear the tag off of. It is the ability to buy beer in a grocery store on Sunday. It is the ability to ride a bicycle without a helmet, safety gloves or arm protection. It is the ability to give your child a peanut butter and jelly sandwich in public without confrontation.
It is the ability to OWN a house, and never, ever…ever pay any kinds of taxes on it.
The mere fact that I have to describe this, and elaborate on it, in such detail is an indicator to how far down the culture and society of America has fallen.
So yeah, when you leave the United States you will be able to do things that are forbidden in the United States. You will feel free simply because you will no longer feel afraid to do the “wrong” thing.
[5] You will experience less anxiety
In USA nothing is easy. Nothing is efficient. To pay rent, you have to use a check? I have never written a check at that time . The last time I got a check was maybe 5 years ago, from my Uncle. Getting an apartment takes so long as opposed to other countries I have lived in where it's just a handshake. That's it. I went to the post office yesterday, and I was waiting in line for maybe an hour—and there were only five people in front of me. I felt like I went from a Western country to a third-world country. People here with money have access to things, but the rest of the people are just trying to survive."
You will experience less anxiety.
To an American it seems like an insurmountable mountain that one must climb. You have to buy tickets, often expensive, smash through language barriers and deal with customs that you don’t understand. Plus, on top of that, you just don’t know anyone there. It seems impossible.
But it isn’t.
"I think generally, the biggest culture shock that people experience in the US is not between their country and the US but between what they thought the US would be and what it actually is. Books and movies about America make the place appear very free and exciting and happening and the people are so interesting and emotional. There is sex and fun and romance going on. When they arrive, the place looks very conservative and the people appear robotic and quiet. Sex is subdued and hard to come by. The people are not open at all, they look closed and mistrustful. Everybody is just working and looking tired and apathetic. Talking to strangers is taboo. There are thousands of little rules and laws and social mores that seem as dogmatic and strict as those in a Muslim society. And every time you are at risk of breaking yet another law and facing very dire consequences. That is the biggest culture shock of all." -Happierabroad
When I first moved to China, I didn’t understand that most people use WeChat and email, and social media to communicate. Packages are sent by TNT. ChinaPost worked, but was generally slow and being phased out. I needed to get up to speed with the new and different ways of doing things.
In America, I was always worried about the police. That was the case even though I was doing nothing wrong. I have been pulled over just so the cop can see my license. I have been observed just because. I have heard stories of how the police find out that you have money and just simply take it for themselves. That is NOT freedom.
In China, I am never fearful of the police. They tend to be very laid back. It’s almost a “Mayberry RFD” vibe. Yeah, going to China forced me to learn new things. Learning was uncomfortable.
Like how those electronic mail lockers worked, how to use DD, and how to use a squatter toilet without falling over myself.
For many years in the United States, I took anti-anxiety medication to control the work stress of life. I took Buspar and Trazadone and they certainly helped me, but you know what, I don’t need them in China.
I no longer have bosses throwing chairs in the conference room, HR that patrol the halls making sure that the “sterile desk policy” is being enforced, and gossipy coworkers. It is fairly rare to be laid-off without notice, the police won’t arrest you for jay-walking, and you don’t need to prove anything to any faceless government bureaucrat.
These common-place American things are unheard of in China.
The sustained constant beat of stressors on your life will no longer be present. You will start to feel free. That feeling is wonderful.
[6] You will be exposed to more traditional human beings
The world is filled with all kinds of people. However the childish notion that a large percentage of people are gay, lesbian, transgender or some other kind of hyphenated and abused minority is simply not true.
In the United States, this narrative is being shoved down our collective throats with impunity. But, it’s all a big lie. It is a manufactured construct for purposes of control.
It is a big lie.
As an American, I particularly HATE being lied to.
Most people outside the United States have real traditional values, and run their families in a very traditional manner. The man works, and he does what ever it takes to feed his family. The wife stays at home, she takes care of the family and provides a safe haven for the family. She is the anchor of the family unit.
The woman is measured by her appearance and how well her family is treated. Even the poorest family will have a clean home, and the best meals that the family can provide will be given to the children.
"Thankfully, traditional beliefs are alive and well in many foreign countries, and homosexuals have to be more respectful of how they behave in public. Another benefit to more traditional societies is that women understand their role of appearing beautiful and submitting to strong men, something that is sorely missing in American culture. Once you live in a country where women spend more time looking good for an afternoon walk than American women do when they go to the club with their grenade friends, it’s really hard to go back." -RooshV
Heck, the girls I knew in Zambia were more traditional than white American conservative grandmothers. It surprised me. I was expecting something similar to the monolithic liberal African-American personality.
I was wrong.
They really know how to treat their men. Let me tell you!
My shirts were always folded “new package” style. Everything was pristine and spit shined. Clothes were crisp and creased perfectly. Dinners were hand made with a balance between taste and what was good for me.
The lady of the house would not only prepare it, but would dress up for it!
It was like a formal dinner with a head of state. Dinners were laid out formally because I was the “man of the house”. I was provided with “my chair”, and absolutely NO ONE was permitted to sit in it, except me.
It is a different feeling and experience to be given such a degree of respect.
To be respected by others. To be treated with respect, and to be held in high regard by others who were polite and proper makes a big difference in your life. Once you are treated with respect, you will never go to somewhere you are not.
Compare that to the huge “white water buffaloes” with attitude, that pass for American women today, and the contrast is stunning.
[7] You can be yourself without shame or fear of exile
I am sure that there will be those offended by my statement about “white water buffaloes” with attitude, but that is just what they are called out here.
There is nothing particularly right or wrong about that, it is exactly what it is. Fat obese chicks with poor manners, unkempt appearance, and foul aggressive manners. It’s horrible and disgusting. Here in Asia, these examples of the female form, are laughed at and snickered to behind their backs.
And guess, what else?
I can say it without shame or social exile. I just did.
Real freedom is to live life without fear. Not a fear of saying something politically incorrect. Not a fear of saying something that sounds hurtful. Not just fear from the IRS, or the latest swine flue from China, but fear of being yourself.
You can live your life on your terms.
Hey! You want to pull out a pocket knife and carve up an apple on the bus, go for it. No one will bat an eye. Hey! You want to take your dog with you while you take a dip in the hotel swimming pool? Good for you. Just go and do it. Hey you want to drink some XO on the porch and watch the pretty girls go by? Do it, as no one is going to take notice.
You can speak your mind, and say your piece.
That’s REAL freedom.
[8] You will pay less for healthier food and a better lifestyle
America has changed. Why does everyone that visits here from the USA seem to be obese? I mean it. Everyone is huge. They are enormous!
I personally think there are many reasons for this. Stress, medications, and GMO saturated high fatty foods, with sugar in just about everything has certainly contributed to this.
When I lived in the States, I was always rushing to make it in time for work. Sure, I might work late nights, but come in one minute late in the morning and you could lose your job. It was always rush – rush – rush. I’d grab a couple of donuts and coffee in the morning and eat a greasy fast food burger for lunch. Dinner was better, but not by very much.
All of this affected my metabolism.
When you leave the United States your life takes on a new pace. You eat differently. You have different friendships and different problems. In general, you do eat better. While you might get the impression that everyone outside of the United States is starving, that is not the case at all. They just eat substantially better than Americans do.
People walk more. It’s nicer to walk, and there are things to do.
When I was in the states, I drove everywhere. Nothing was nearby. If I wanted to walk somewhere it took hours, and I often found that there was a noticeable lack of sidewalks and pedestrian-friendly paths. America has devolved into a very toxic and unhealthy environment. You can see it if you go outside the echo chamber and see the world from my chair.
Most American cities are made for cars. Most foreign cities are made for people. Even poor South American cities have more efficient and extensive public transportation than America, as it was quite a shock to me to ride the Caracas metro system to find trains running more frequently than in Washington DC. Food is fresher and cheaper and doesn’t contain a billion Franken-chemicals whose long-term effects on humans are not understood (many packages of food in Europe contain a ‘No GMO’ label as a selling point). -RooshV
[9] You will be exposed to less corporate propaganda
All my life I have been exposed to advertisements and corporate jingles. You sit down to watch a show and you suddenly have an urge for a coke and lays potato chips. Why is that? Not in China. I never have those urges. But when I sit down and watch an American television show, I immediately get the urge.
I wonder why…
When you’re in a foreign country, the propaganda ends for one simple reason: you don’t understand the ads! They’re in a different language. You stop watching television, stop listening to radio, and instead download all of your entertainment without the ads, though you’ll still be consuming it on a much lesser scale than while living in the US. The result is you stop feeling the urge to buy things just to get a dopamine rush as if you were a caged rat hitting a lever to get a cocaine pellet. You ease into a minimalist lifestyle where accumulating things no longer positively affects your mood. In fact, you start feeling guilty when you buy things, because now you understand that objects don’t bring lasting happiness.
That is the truth. I rarely have any desire to buy anything.
Instead, I have invested in lifestyle, peace of mind and comfort. Where before, I was a rat racing through my cubicle maze at work.
[10] You start to see the real world and your place in it
I know that what I have written will seem like complete bullshit to someone still plugged into the Matrix. If I were reading it from my house in the states, I would be skeptical. I probably would snort, and say “bullshit” while I clicked on something else on my browser.
Americans are the most manipulated people on the planet.
There is absolutely no friggin’ way that they are free. Dudes, having to ask permission to get YOUR money from YOUR bank is not freedom. Having to resort to (twice a decade) elections to get any kind of changes done, and then finding out, year after year that nothing changes…
Just how much control do you actually have on your life?
To continue believing we have a "representative" government of the people, by the people, & for the people is to continue believing in a grand deception. It's an illusion. Our government has been incrementally supplanted by Progressive dissidents to form a dictatorship of arrogant, autocratic, ruling class elitists.
[11] Women and Relationships are Different
Although it's a really different culture than the states, I actually had an awesome experience in China. It definitely opens your eyes to a whole different side of the world. I met some really awesome people and it's very safe. -What is the biggest culture shock you ever faced?
I pulled this title from RooshV. Sounds so chauvinistic, eh? Well, maybe so, maybe so. Yet it is TRUE.
Now, the reader should not misunderstand me. I do happen to like (and love) all women. In fact, my personal tastes in women’s body shapes run a pretty wide gambit. I love both small petite women, and large voluptuous women in equal measure. I really do. In fact, there are women who think that they are far too fat, that I would just die to be with. I find a kind sweet disposition is worth more than being 50 Kg overweight.
I am not at all kidding. I find that each have their various charms, and when coupled with a sweet and caring disposition, I tend to fall “heads over heels” over them.
But, getting back to my point…
Over the last twenty years, something has happened in the United States. Both men and women have gotten larger. But gosh golly, the women are really enormous. Most women in the United States have tended to get on the large size. This is obese, in case you are not reading my meaning correctly.
Personally, I really don’t like being with a woman that weighs more than I do. Seriously, it just doesn’t feel right. I think that both men and women should have the correct body weight for their height. I think that it is healthy.
Why women are like this in the United States, I think is due to the unhealthy and stressful lifestyle, the saturation of salt, sugars, fats and GMO’s in American food, and maybe the lack of tasteful and healthy alternatives. Then, after the Obama Administration, it seemed like everyone wanted to look like Michelle Obama. As she was considered to be the ideal beautiful woman, I am not at all kidding!
- Michelle Obama – 50 Most Beautiful 2015
- 7 Most Beautiful First Ladies | TheRichest
- Website Ranks Hillary Clinton As Sixth Most Beautiful Woman In The World
- American beauty: Michelle Obama named one of world’s 100 best looking women
I personally do not think that Michelle Obama is that beautiful at all. At best, she is rather plain. Of course, I’m no great looker either. But, you know there are all kinds of people and we all come in all kinds of different packages.
American girls…
Yikes!
Like all women, American women can be quite beautiful if they maintain their appearance, but there still exists problems with their attitude that often comes from American culture.
In general, I have found that many foreign women simply have softer and pleasanter personalities: they are sweeter, kinder, more deferential, more interesting, and most importantly, more pleasing. The urban ghetto culture that has taken over the United States does not exist offshore. You don’t see “trailer trash”, “Jerry Springer types” or “Big-assed “Wal-Mart” shoppers offshore.
They are more demure instead of outwardly crass.
This greatly increases the enjoyment you get from male-female bonding. Dating only American women gives you a distorted view of how women are really like. When you date and spend time with women from other nations you get to experience the differences. Some of which are good, and some of which are shocking and a tad mercurial.
Anyways…
Why is this important? Well, I like to think that that a man should be a little taller than his wife. I think that he should be stronger and weigh more. But many of the women that seemingly come from the USA today are so much bigger than me. They are bigger and taller. It is disturbing.
Here is an Amish family. They eat well. No one is obese. The wife is a little shorter and lighter than her husband. I don’t know… it seems right. Doesn’t it?
I really don’t know of too many women who would rather be married to a man who was shorter than them. I’m sure there are a few, but it’s really not a preference. I have always been under the impression that many women liked “tall, dark and handsome” men.
Fat, chubby men, with bald heads and beer guts were not anything that a woman would find attractive or even interesting. But, you know, if the man is a “good man”, kind, and just, his faults can be overlooked.
So, what I am saying is that this goes both ways.
The Important Takeaways
So, what are the takeaways? Once an American man lives as an expat for a few years, and then returns back to the United States, what can be learned?
- You can learn the limits of freedom and how to leverage the freedoms that are important to you personally.
- You can see what is important to you.
- You can better appreciate the things that you have missed.
- You can appreciate the United States more, and work towards bringing it back to how and why it was created in the first place.
- You can see how easily manipulated you have been, and take steps to prevent the continuation of that in the future.
- You can work towards bringing things BACK to a more or less, “normal” reality. One that is free from all the progressive distortions and distractions of the last few decades.
You won’t find that many fat pink-haired femminazi’s in heart-land USA. They cluster in urban enclaves. That is their echo chamber. You won’t find drug abusing mental patients shitting in the middle of the street (San Francisco style) in small-town America. They would be kicked out the old fashioned way; Clint Eastwood style.
It’s time that we start putting our feet down and taking America BACK to what it used to stand for. We can start with one person, and one voice. We can start here, and now. Then two people, and then three.
If the FBI wants to emulate the Gestapo and pay criminals enormous salaries to maintain a jack-booted reality, we can disband the agency.
The DHS is a domestic Army in defiance of the Constitution. It can be disbanded.
If the FDA wants to ban everything, to a point where Americans need to exit the nation to get things forbidden to them, then it is certainly time to disband the FDA.
We have collectively told the government that we do not want to be spied on. Still the NSA exists. We can shut it down.
Any thoughts on the IRS…?
FAQ
Q: Why is it important to travel?
A: You can learn new things and get exposed to different ways of doing things. When you are exposed, you can discover the aspects of life that you like, as well as the aspects that you do not like. You can pick and choose.
“I'm writing this from the West Coast of USA, in a very quiet, very peaceful duplex. I have returned to the US after 3+ years living in Bangkok. I'm still deciding what really happened out there. My decision to move to Thailand, back in 2010, was based on a lifelong dream of living out of the US for at least one year of my life. I had originally wanted to live in Europe, but during the time I was looking for the right place to land, European economics were in meltdown. So I started researching Asia. For work purposes I almost went to Singapore, but then decided Bangkok would be more fun. I was right. It wasn't just the sex. I never had trouble landing women in the States. I broke up with a very attractive Thai / Cambodian woman in the US before I left. She was fun, but a bit of a bitch at times. I know enough about women to understand that ratio changes the longer you're in a relationship. Married, she would have been a bitch that was a bit of fun at times. She wanted kids and I didn't. That was that. Before that I had two different 20-something girlfriends, great sex, lots of drama, not long-term but fun. I had learned stellar game skills and liked landing semi long-term relationships with pretty women. It was worth the pursuit, the hunt, the thrill of the conquest and of course, all the great sex. So I didn't go to Thailand for sex. I went to fulfill a lifetime goal of living out of my country for a year, and when I added up how I was supporting myself, what the costs of living were, and the fact that English teaching provided a safety net if things went wrong, Thailand just made sense. I landed in Bangkok and fell in love with the place. I had lived most of my life in New York City, and spent time in Paris, Rome, London, LA, Berlin, Caracas and many other amazing places. But Bangkok blew my mind. The chaos, the sexiness, the otherness, and just how freaking different it was from the staid, plain US was like medicine. Even New York City – supposedly that wild town – is to me, a very processed and predictable place when compared to Bangkok. So I loved it. I traveled Thailand for a month and returned to Bangkok. I set up shop pursuing my dreams. I got lucky with real hard work, landed my business contacts back West, and managed to live for more than three years in Thailand. I had a nice condo, pool on the roof, and money to play with. There were a few rough patches for sure, but also some nice straight-aways. Basically, it turned out to be what I was looking for: the adventure of a lifetime. That adventure meant broadening my horizons. I loved learning the language. I was a Thai language class nerd. I made a few Thai friends and played badminton religiously. I put a damn good pool game together. I travelled all over, made expat friends, and had a blast. I even finally got a local job offer in my industry, which is really tough to do, and held that for a while, living the Bangkok executive life although admittedly not on the high end of that scale. Still, it was all really remarkable. However, when a job offer came up with an old employer in the West, I took it. After more than three years, I was ready to leave. They flew me back, settled me here, and I plugged in. I actually landed on the fourth of July, if you can believe that. And I was thrilled to be back. I hadn't been back in the US for even a holiday the whole time I was in SE Asia. Any time I had to travel, I had gone all over Thailand, Laos or Cambodia. I love SE Asia, but my reasons for repatting were professional. The jobs are better in the US. I stayed with mine for five months. It was a contract. When I was offered a full time job, I turned it down in order to start another business I had been planning. And that's where I am now. I loved being back in the States when I landed. I loved being back in familiar settings, and hearing familiar speech. I loved catching up with friends. I fully intended to plug back in here, and resume life where I had left it when I had jetted to Thailand. Thailand had been working against me in the half year before I left. I was getting fed up with the visa issues, and the outsider status. I became depressed at how hard it was to positively affect the business world there, or even the fate of the country. I like to think I can make a difference where I am. Of course, there are charities, and I did a bit of work with those. But ultimately, Thailand is for Thais. God bless them for that, is my attitude. In this One World homogenization that is happening, I have lots of respect for countries that retain national values and identities. Although I respect it, that doesn't mean I wasn't frustrated by it, and ultimately, living as a constant outsider was getting to me. I had also come to the conclusion that marrying a Thai, or even having a serious Thai girlfriend wasn't what I liked, due to the many reasons cited in other posts here. I dated “civilians” who weren't in the leisure industry, but found the culture gap too huge to leap. Plus the adjustment I had to make in terms of being 3rd on the totem pole (Family, Career, Boyfriend) never did it for me. After that decision, I partied too much. I was drinking and balling and more than a bit adrift before I left. That's why I was really happy to be back in the US. It was just time to go. My hand had been played. I felt very lucky to leave when and how I did. But here's the problem. After the glow of happy returns wore off, I have to be honest with the fact that I just don't like the US lifestyle. I came back to give the west a full on fair shake. I even saw it with new eyes. And there's much I really love about US that I had to be away from before I could appreciate it. It truly is a tremendous land of amazing professional opportunity, as well as a place where self development is encouraged and valued. Every system is crooked, but the corruption here is way toned down compared to SE Asia. The work place has some clowns, but is largely a meritocracy, where good workers are advanced, and losers get let go. People try hard. They want to make things better. The innovate. But what's really turning me off is how processed it all is. How boring. It feels like this grey machine. A conveyor belt. Relationships feel flimsy. Everybody works... Watches TV... Works more... The amount of hostility towards men is repulsive, as it plays out in the workplace and in media. But the underground of MGTOW and Red Pill is filled with a tremendous amount of hostility as well. I just really can't believe how unhappy and depressed most people in the west are. It's like there is this War on Love, destroying relationships between lovers, friends, and communities. There's not much neighborhood or local cohesion. I feel everybody keeps busy busy busy all the time, working buying and watching, working buying and watching, to avoid admitting how bleak and punishing the average life is here. I don't want to support it. I don't want to fit in and be part of it. I have no regrets I left Thailand, and in terms of timing, when I was pulled back here was really a blessing. But I can't deny the fact that I feel a huge void in my life out here. I believe what I miss most is the excitement and adventure and just fantastic thrill – with all the tribulations that went with it – which living abroad in SE Asia provides. I just had more fun there. I felt more alive there. And what's also really difficult is that all of the experiences I had in Thailand aren't really welcome out here. Beyond the natural bias that women have of "men who go to Thailand", I'm just shocked that nobody really wants to know what life in another land is like. Maybe I'm a bad story teller. But maybe Americans are just living in their bubble. My countrymen have little frame of reference outside of their work and TV shows. It's heartbreaking, really. So much of the world, so much to see and hear about, and nobody wants to hear about it. I read a lot of columns on Stick that talk about how Thais don't really know much about the outside world. But in a way, the Americans don't either. So I'm left with this huge piece of living, and no place to process it. It's disheartening. The place runs well. The trains are on time, as they say, but psychologically, I feel the West is a very hostile and weird place these days. Especially when it comes to men / women relationships. I am shocked at the deterioration in relationships that I have seen, in just the past ten years. It's just so aggressively mercenary. The romance has been drained from the punch. There's very little charm in the process. I found dating pretty pointless, but still fun and sweet enough in Thailand. Even it if leads nowhere beyond walking around a mall and having some sex, it was lighter and more pleasant. In America, dating is this grim operation to perform: shit tests, hoops, Social Market Value, and the flat-out rude bossiness that has become the modern American woman. Joyless. Probably that's what this entire post comes down to… that one word: Joyless. America is not a life. It's a job. The job is work. And work sucks. Thais value fun. They like life light. Sanuk isn't just something in tour books. They have an art to daily living that has a pleasant ambience based on a healthy injection of “I don't give a damn”. All of us who have lived there have been on the maddening side of it. But from where I'm writing now, I see it now as a great way to resist the corporate take-over of every part of life. Why the fxxk should we all have to work so hard? Who's getting rich off our sweat? Just this morning I read that a new crisis on American college campuses is that many American university students are killing themselves or crowding counselor's crisis centers. Shouldn't higher learning be a better experience? They are probably feeling total dread at what the American system has laid out for them: joyless toil. It's like we're all fighting as hard as we can to jam our way into jobs that shred us. Why? Life shouldn't be so damn serious. Thais know that. I miss that. I miss them. I miss their land. With luck I'll be back and honestly, probably bitching about lots of the things I just heralded in the previous paragraph. lol. Should fate decide otherwise, and slugging it out in the US is my path, I have my memories. They will remain a precious jewel for life. Either way, I am richer, wiser, and more the man I dreamed of being for having spent my time in LOS. Enjoy it out there, gentlemen. Play smart and it's a brilliant part of the world to live life. Play dumb and it's still one hell of an adventure. My time there was a blend of both and I wouldn't trade it for anything. “ - “After 3+ Years in Thailand, Reflections From Home” by Rich Archer on the Stickman Blog. Reader submission. May 2015
Q: What do you talk about the USA so much?
A: I am an American. It is what I know, and it is the point of reference that I refer to.
"America is a country for doing business, not living life." -Happierabroad
Q: Do you think American girls are bad?
A: No, not at all. I have dated many a wonderful girl (lady) in the United States. I think, for me, I prefer soft and calm tender moments together, rather than the brash clash of what seems to be popular today. This makes me feel like an old man; a fossil. I think that men and women are different. We are not equal. I think that June Cleaver on the 1960’s television show “Leave it to Beaver” was awesome. I think that Lisa Douglas on “Green Acres” was awesome! I believe that Elly Mae from “The Beverly Hillbillies” was just about the perfect girl. Like I said, I am really super old fashioned. American ladies today are different.
When you are exposed to women who are different than American girls are, you tend to be pleasantly surprised. Like I stated previously, differences are good. You can pick and choose the life that you prefer.
"She looked at her husband, he did like this: You may speak. And she spoke! And I was like, now that's pussy control for you! You know, because I'm used to American women saying: You don't own me." - Eddie Murhpy
Q: Is America free?
A: No, it is not. I contend that it used to be free, but today it more resembles a dictatorship. The only way that you can see this is to compare America outside, and then step back in and look around you.
The problem with saying this is that people immediately get defensive. “No it isn’t!” is the retort.
But the truth is that we are in an echo chamber. We cannot see how really bad it is until we step outside. Which is, I must remind everyone, the entire point of this exercise.
If I want to sit in a restaurant, with my dog, smoke a cigarette and drink a beer. It would NOT be against the law. The fact that it is, and the fact that I can do it almost everywhere else outside of the Untied States is a pure indicator of how REPRESSIVE the USA has become.
At least you could do that in Nazi Germany. Yes you could. Drink a beer with your dog, smoke a cigarette all inside a restaurant.
But you cannot do it in America.
When you can do something in Nazi Germany, that is forbidden in the USA, then you have a real problem. Come on, don’t you think that there is something wrong here?
Anywho, I blog about this all the time(American bashing). I hate their laws, legal system and almost everything about America. I was raise and lived my entire life in NYC but has since moved back to my place of birth in the Caribbean. One will only know how bullshit America is when they actually visit other places on the globe. Americans segregate themselves to just America, and they’re unable to see true freedom. Here in the Caribbean(and almost the entire globe),I can walk around with 100 cans of beers and drink them unconcealed all I want to, and I don’t have to worry about BS tickets. Kids can go into liquor stores and buy alcohol, cigarettes, etc. Not that they use them, but let’s say I as a father cannot make it to buy some booze, I can just send my 10 year old son to do that. The list goes on and on. America falsely prides itself on freedom, but it has no freedoms compared to almost every nation on the globe. It’s like a guy bragging about having a huge dick, then when his pants come down, his 2 inches is exposed. That is America,hypocrisy to the 10th.degree. And one will only know that America has ZERO freedoms only when they begin to travel internationally. -SocialKenny
Q: Is the United States bad?
A: No, not at all. The United States is AWESOME. But, it is not what it was first intended to be. It has changed and today it is a real pale shadow of what it used to be.
It is a police state ruled by elite “insiders” all with political and banking connections. The American citizens work as serfs to service the needs and desire of their overseers.
“The expat rule is, you have found paradise and you don’t want to share it with anyone, especially those you believe to be unworthy.” -Stephen365
Q: Is it ok to retire overseas?
A: From a financial point of view it certainly seems like a good option. There are many places that are far cheaper to live than in “the land of the free”. For instance, you can go to “the land of smiles” or LOS. Which is Thailand, for instance. The problem is that the older you become the less you want to leave the things you know and love.
For instance, I fell in love and moved to China after I was retired out of MAJestic. It was a necessity for my own personal sanity. Yet, there are many tradeoffs that I now miss. For instance, it is impossible to get a “over easy” style egg. Bagels can be had, but I need to make a day long trip to get them. Talking with people who know who John Wayne was is also an impossibility, as is cruising around in a GTO with a trunk full of beer. Those things are now beyond my reach.
If you do retire overseas, you need to be careful where you go. For instance, the UK has gone full-on Orwell. And prices are going up everywhere. Some places have customs and manners that are strange to accept if you spent much of your life in the American echo-chamber. You need to research, and then visit the country that you plan to move to.
Q: Will you return to the United States?
A: Oh yes. My home might me in China, but my heart is in America. As soon as I am able to save up enough money, then I will book a flight out there. I have been daydreaming of doing some brook trout fishing.
I’d buy one of those big donut tire motorized trikes and head down to the state game lands. I’d have a big red cooler filled with beer, probably Bud or Michelob, and just go riding and drinking all day long. It will be a good time, I’ll tell you what. Maybe go plinking with a .22 L. I just pick up some ammo at the 7-11 and get to it. Or, just eat my fill of some BBQ chicken and corn on the cob over a open fire in the backyard. It will be great. I just can’t wait to see the red embers float up into the night sky as I poke the fire.
Yeah, and another thing that I’d do is go to a restaurant and get a Monty Crisco sandwich. I’d eat it with fries and a bottomless cup of coffee, served in one of those “bang on the table” thick rimmed coffee cups. I’ll go in, and grab one of those spare newspapers that are resting on the counter and read the local news.
Maybe I’ll pull into one of the large parking lots at the mall. I’ll go inside and get an Orange Julus or a Sbarro and get a slice or two of pizza. Then go and pick up some gear at Sears or Target. Yeah. It’ll be a great time. Yessur!
Posted for Comments on Free Republic.
This article was posted on Free Republic on 17JUL18 for comments. You can read the comments HERE.
Other Articles by other people on this subject
Television Tax. If you live in Germany and you own a radio, a television or a computer, then you are obliged to pay the TV license fee (Rundfunkbeitrag) and you can't escape this!
Here are some decent articles written by others. We share the same idea that humans need to experience life and often that means stepping out of their comfort zone.
- What immigrants and foreigners say about America that you never hear in the US media
- What surprises Europeans when they come to the United States?
- Why America is bad for Social Life, Dating and Mental Health
- Fragmentation vs. Wholeness: Why you feel alone and insecure in America
- What is the biggest culture shock you have ever faced?
- Debunking the Myth of Freedom and Democracy in America
- Why I’m Moving To Another Country In A Few Years
Posts Regarding Life and Contentment
Here are some other similar posts on this venue. If you enjoyed this post, you might like these posts as well. These posts tend to discuss growing up in America. Often, I like to compare my life in America with the society within communist China. As there are some really stark differences between the two.
More Posts about Life
I have broken apart some other posts. They can best be classified about ones actions as they contribute to happiness and life. They are a little different, in subtle ways.
Links about China
China and America Comparisons
Learning About China
Stories that Inspired Me
Here are reprints in full text of stories that inspired me, but that are nearly impossible to find in China. I place them here as sort of a personal library that I can use for inspiration. The reader is welcome to come and enjoy a read or two as well.
Articles & Links
- You can start reading the articles by going HERE.
- You can visit the Index Page HERE to explore by article subject.
- You can also ask the author some questions. You can go HERE to find out how to go about this.
- You can find out more about the author HERE.
- If you have concerns or complaints, you can go HERE.
- If you want to make a donation, you can go HERE.
Notes
- Compiled and written 10JUN18.
- Completion 17JUN18.
- SEO review and posting 17JUN18.
Love your stuff. I want to read about you growing up in pittsburg where can i get that?
Thank you for that. I have posts on what it is like to grow up in the 1970’s as well what it is like to work. Try THIS for starters. As well, as some lessons on life and politics that I learned in High School. I also have some adventures when I was really little exploring broken down houses. You might also like THIS article on playgrounds.