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I’m an American that lives abroad (UK). I’ve gotten a little more proud of being American the longer I’ve been out of the place, and my below response will reflect my experiences living in Europe.
The best thing in my mind is our friendliness and openness to new people. Brits are by far the friendliest Europeans but it’s honestly like a beauty pageant at a truck stop for that one. Europeans think our friendliness is strange but I think their aloofness is strange and years after making the move, I still don’t understand why you wouldn’t be friendly to people you encounter in everyday life.
Another thing is our work ethic. Sure the uber-progressives can chant anti work all they want and say it’s rooted in late stage capitalism, but I can tell you the Americans at my office in London are pretty much all the best employees in their departments without exception. We are resourceful, hard working and understand how to cut through bureaucracy to get things done.
Our skepticism of blindly following rules and process I think is great. The UK is the most like the US in Europe in many respects but they’re still very “computer says no” about things without questioning why. I like that, in my experience americans aren’t afraid to shake things up a bit and question authority a bit more than our European counterparts.
I love living in London but a big part of my personality was shaped by the US and I’ve learned to embrace it as something that makes me unique here.
I will say, of the Europeans I met, they may not be outwardly friendly but once you get under their skin they are teddy bears.
It depends on who, in my experience. I adore Scandos and I feel your sentiment about the Dutch and most northern Eastern Europeans (poles, Czech, Russians etc). Mediterraneans tend to be more gregarious but in a super different way to Americans and I warm up to them as well.
The French and Germans/Swiss I fundamentally don’t understand as people and have never met one that I felt like I could get to know.
I guess my experience is skewed toward the Netherlands as being the most recent. Had a boss from the UK who was a total secret softy. Also a manager from a different department who was your cliche hard ass but maybe it's just me, I could always get him to lighten up.
Brits arent hard nuts to crack if you can handle the banter. Insulting you is their way of creating emotional intimacy. If you laugh with them you’ll get on fine with most of them.
Speaking of the topic of this post, actually, that’s something I don’t like about Americans. We’re too soft when it comes to taking a joke about ourselves.
Tell me about. 99% of my comedy is self deprecating and the blank stares and looks of concern I get are a joke within the joke.