The Most Pleasant Surprise Immigrants Found in America

 

shutterstock_359673578Immigration has dominated the GOP primary campaign. So a member of Reddit asked a simple question. Immigrants to America: What was the most pleasant surprise? Nearly 13,000 comments later, here are a few of the favorites:

The road directions to go from a city to another 2,000 miles away is extremely simple. (E.g., get on I-80 exit to I-90, then exit 40.)


I’ve driven the extent of I-90 a couple times during the time I lived in Seattle. There was an indescribable, special feeling when I would use I-90 for a short trip out of Seattle in my day-to-day life and look down the road ahead and envision the 3,000 miles over mountains, plains, and cities. It was nice to have the daily reminder that it was there and all I had to do was start driving — the opposite of feeling trapped.


Not having to haggle prices when buying things, not having to know who to talk to (or bribe) to get any little bit of paperwork filed in a reasonable amount of time, not having to worry about being cheated on every little transaction you have. Just having standard reliable procedures for daily tasks was wonderful. You guys might hate going to the DMV, but let me tell you, it could be much worse.

Then it got even better with automation and e-commerce, and not even really having to interact with people for many tasks.


Very seriously, free refills.


Free public restrooms and how every establishment has air conditioning.


The seemingly endless rows of food in the grocery stores. And all the apples. Who needs 50 different kinds of apples?


Showers and running hot water. I was born in the Philippines. Showers and hot water aren’t really common in older homes over there. Not having to fill buckets with water and boiling some over a stove top was such a big surprise for me. Experiencing that as a twelve year old was an unforgettable experience. Yet, most people who live here (me included) take it for granted sometimes.


I came here four months ago and everything has been a shock in one way or another. I’m from a third world country, and we know a thing or two about America, but you have to experience it.

  • Choosing your own shower temperature!
  • Everyone is so polite and good manners are everywhere. Any religion or race you are, everyone seems to say “thank you” and “you’re welcome,” or ask me how I am or how my day is!
  • How easy you can buy stuff online and they arrive so fast!
  • Buildings and bridges are so … amazing. Like, the infrastructure is good, it makes you think, “wow, mankind did this.
  • Big-ass celebrations!
  • How people can go out look gay, wasted, weird, etc., and no one bats an eye.
  • And the biggest of them all, fast internet!

Air. You don’t really notice how real fresh air feels like when you’ve been breathing in polluted air all your life.


I moved to the US when I was 21; it’s nearly been 2 years. Two things surprised me:

  • I apparently have a mid-Atlantic English accent. The Japanese-descent population here in Northern California is a lot less that I thought it would be. Most are in the Bay or are farmers up in the Central Valley.
  • My most pleasant experience is the constant assumption that I am American, primarily because of my English. It feels beyond amazing. My nationality has always been a major issue. I strongly and culturally identify with my mother’s country, a place where I grew up and speak two of its languages fluently … yet everyone there saw me as a foreigner because of my father’s origin.

Ex-African here. I’m pleasantly surprised by the US Postal Service. You can stick a cheap stamp on a letter, throw it in a blue mailbox in NY and it will get to LA 99 percent of the time. It doesn’t get “lost” or stolen, it just gets there. And every day a nice person in light blue overalls driving a weird little blue-and-white truck pulls up and fills my mailbox (at home) with junk deals from the local market and even my paycheck sometimes. Hooray! And don’t even get me started on trash collection!!


OMG! The cops thing! It was smart to have a healthy, yet irrational fear of police where I grew up. You had no idea what you were in for when you were stopped (especially if you were well off/in a relatively nice car).

I remember that when I was getting my driver’s license in Trinidad, everyone (friends my age and adults alike) told me to go with a few hundred dollars in my pocket, at the ready. They said that it’s very common that even if you pass the driving test, you’ll be asked to pay a bribe in order for them to sign off on it. I didn’t need to pay, but I had several people in my life who admitted to paying when they were asked.


I came to the US literally with nothing but my clothes, driving a car that that wasn’t even mine in June 2006 with my girlfriend from Mexico, legally, in case you are wondering.

In January ’09 we bought our house in Austin, TX.

Fast forward to 2016, we’ve already paid like 60 percent of our mortgage; we even installed solar panels.

What do we do for living you may ask? We are teachers…

It amazes me that this country is so rich, that there’s enough for everybody, even for a normal guy like me. I feel as if I’m the luckiest guy in the world since I always dreamed about living in the US.

You guys have no idea how lucky you are to be born in the US.

Since most of our politics is based on complaining about what’s wrong with America, it’s nice to be reminded of what’s right — even little things like hot showers and junk mail. How about you, Ricochetti: what are some everyday things you appreciate about the US?

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  1. Randal H Member
    Randal H
    @RandalH

    Eric Hines: That’s interesting. I spent four years in Germany in the last century, and I never encountered any of that. There weren’t any public drinking fountains that I saw, but I never heard anyone, including my fellow Americans, complain about the tap water. …

    I was in Germany in the 70s as a college exchange student and before I left the US, a number of people told me not to drink the tap water. I found out while there that their drinking water standards are higher than ours, and that they rely on UV sterilization rather than chlorine for destruction of pathogens. It’s just that most Germans I’ve met drink bottled (usually mineral) water and turn up their noses at tap water. The area my wife grew up in produces a large quantity of mineral water, so that might be part of it. Mainly, the point in my original post was that she was surprised by the plethora of drinking fountains and how nice it was to be able to grab a quick drink rather than buy water (convenience stores were rare in her area) or sit in a cafe just to order a glass of mineral water.

    • #61
  2. Charlotte Member
    Charlotte
    @Charlotte

    As a native-born ‘Murrican, I too am gratified to read all these comments.

    But I wonder, and I worry…do most immigrants understand why things are the way they are here? Do they make the connection between capitalism, property rights, the rule of law, personal freedom, limited government, ordered liberty on the one hand, and our (seemingly) boundless wealth and high standard of living on the other?

    We are fortunate indeed to live in the United States. I would dispute that we are lucky. We didn’t get here through sheer dumb luck.

    • #62
  3. Charlotte Member
    Charlotte
    @Charlotte

    To answer Jon’s question:

    The endless array of high-quality, low-cost, interesting, fresh, and varied food that can be found at even the most down-market grocery store.

    • #63
  4. drlorentz Member
    drlorentz
    @drlorentz

    Charlotte: We are fortunate indeed to live in the United States. I would dispute that we are lucky. We didn’t get here through sheer dumb luck.

    Some of us did. My parents brought me here; I didn’t have much to say about it, though I strongly objected to going back to the old country (to no avail).

    • #64
  5. Charlotte Member
    Charlotte
    @Charlotte

    drlorentz:

    Charlotte: We are fortunate indeed to live in the United States. I would dispute that we are lucky. We didn’t get here through sheer dumb luck.

    Some of us did. My parents brought me here; I didn’t have much to say about it, though I strongly objected to going back to the old country (to no avail).

    Right, drlorentz, of course that’s true for some. I meant “we” in the broad sense of “21st-century Americans” and “here” in the sense of “to our current state of peace, prosperity, and superpower-dom”.

    • #65
  6. drlorentz Member
    drlorentz
    @drlorentz

    Charlotte:

    drlorentz:

    Charlotte: We are fortunate indeed to live in the United States. I would dispute that we are lucky. We didn’t get here through sheer dumb luck.

    Some of us did. My parents brought me here; I didn’t have much to say about it, though I strongly objected to going back to the old country (to no avail).

    Right, drlorentz, of course that’s true for some. I meant “we” in the broad sense of “21st-century Americans” and “here” in the sense of “to our current state of peace, prosperity, and superpower-dom”.

    I take your meaning. However, most Americans have little appreciation of, and role in, the things that make this place great. I’d argue that the same concern you expressed in your comment applies to natives as well as immigrants. In that sense, they are lucky. For example, consider all supporters of Bernie (Feel the Bern!) Sanders  or Barack (You didn’t build that) Obama.

    Charlotte: Do they make the connection between capitalism, property rights, the rule of law, personal freedom, limited government, ordered liberty on the one hand, and our (seemingly) boundless wealth and high standard of living on the other?

    • #66
  7. Charlotte Member
    Charlotte
    @Charlotte

    drlorentz: However, most Americans have little appreciation of, and role in, the things that make this place great. I’d argue that the same concern you expressed in your comment applies to natives as well as immigrants.

    Hoo-boy, you’ve got that right. 100% agreement.

    • #67
  8. Randal H Member
    Randal H
    @RandalH

    Eric Hines: As to politeness, it’s true that Germans didn’t line up as much as we do, but the apparent chaos of the crowd didn’t mean people lost their turns to late comers. In the gasthauses, for instance, everyone just crowded up to the bar, but the barkeeps kept track of who was next just fine.

    I wasn’t making a point about politeness (the Germans I know are very polite). It was more about the orderly process of forming a queue where none exists. My wife pointed out this difference before it had even dawned on me, and I chalk it up to higher population density. Americans (at least in the moderate sized southern Appalachian town where we live) tend to self organize into a queue and Europeans tend to move directly into a space if one is there. I had it happen to me numerous times while at a service counter that, in the process of allowing others to move into a queue in front of me while I held back to fall into the rear of the queue, someone else outside the group forming the queue would step in front of me. The person just assumed I wasn’t in line, but here most people would ask if I were in line. I simply had to learn to be more aggressive. The angriest I’ve seen my wife is at being cut off that way over there, something that almost never happens here.

    • #68
  9. Randal H Member
    Randal H
    @RandalH

    drlorentz:

    Randal H: My wife is from Germany and one of the first things that surprised her was public drinking fountains. Germans don’t really drink tap water (although despite urban legend, it’s perfectly fine to drink), and increasingly neither do people here. But, it was a surprise to see them.

    Many years ago I recall using a public drinking fountain somewhere in Germany, probably in a train station. A few guys were walking by and yelled out “Gift! Gift!” I took it to mean that I should be drinking beer instead of water, but maybe they meant something else.

    Yeah, a German friend of mine would frequently remind me that water is for animals, beer is for people.

    • #69
  10. Boss Mongo Member
    Boss Mongo
    @BossMongo

    9thDistrictNeighbor: I spent a couple of weeks in Medellin, Colombia, as a teenager. The family I stayed with had guards armed with machine guns. They turned the electricity off at night. A cricket got into my room and made such a racket–and I couldn’t turn the lights on to whack him. Worse, however, was the morning I woke up to find a cockroach the size of Nebraska living on my toothbrush. I used my finger as a toothbrush after that.

    Yeah.  But tell me you don’t love Medellin.

    • #70
  11. Boss Mongo Member
    Boss Mongo
    @BossMongo

    Charlotte: But I wonder, and I worry…do most immigrants understand why things are the way they are here? Do they make the connection between capitalism, property rights, the rule of law, personal freedom, limited government, ordered liberty on the one hand, and our (seemingly) boundless wealth and high standard of living on the other?

    Miz Charlotte,

    In my experience, they do in fact, know why.  And they hate it.  So they ignore it.

    • #71
  12. JimGoneWild Coolidge
    JimGoneWild
    @JimGoneWild

    With solar energy and wind power, will still have all those nice things, right?

    • #72
  13. hokiecon Inactive
    hokiecon
    @hokiecon

    Great post, Jon. Too often we take for granted how great we have it here in America.

    • #73
  14. PHCheese Inactive
    PHCheese
    @PHCheese

    I totally agree with all our bounty, but we need to ask why. INMHO it is our system of free markets and the rule of law and class mobility that allows for the bounty.

    • #74
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