The 4 WORST Things About Being an American in France I French Culture Shocks

salute welcome back to unintentionally frenchified i'm kate if you haven't seen any of my videos then it is very important for each of you know for this video that i am an american living in france for the last 10 years there are so many positive things about being an american in france however this video is not going to be at all about the positives it is about the five worst things about being an american and living in france as simple as that if you haven't subscribed to the channel yet you know what to do otherwise let's get rolling say [Music] first up people are shocked shocked that i speak french fluently like all the time why because america has a terrible terrible reputation for not being proficient in other languages and for expecting everybody to speak english no matter where they go when they're traveling or living abroad less than one percent of americans speak a second language proficiently thanks to what they learned in a classroom we're not counting people's parents who aren't native english speakers here but still only one percent in some ways i get it english is the international language it's a language for travel and it also happens to be the language that we speak in the us so there's a bit of this like what's the big deal debate like why is it so necessary but at the same time learning a foreign language has so many benefits whether it's opening your eyes to another culture whether it's developing different areas of the brain related to language whether it's opening the doors for new job opportunities the list of benefits are endless and when we don't prioritize learning other languages we kind of give the impression to people that we don't really give a about them a bit of like well if english is the international language then you should be learning english anyway so why do i need to learn your language and the worst part is when you compare americans with say like the uk or canada or australia we as americans really have the reputation of arriving in other countries and kind of screaming english and talking really fast and getting frustrated when people don't understand us so i feel like whenever i meet someone for the first time and i speak french fluently and i speak it with quite an accent it's very evident that i learned it as a second language it's always like wow your french is so good for an american and then i'm like okay well i've been living here for 10 years so it's pretty normal that i picked up like a good level of french now it's not like you can expect american tourists just traveling abroad to be speaking every language and every country they visit and then every time they pull out some embarrassing story about american expats that lived in france for five plus years never bothered to speak the language only use english to get by et cetera et cetera and i'm like yeah well what can i say maybe not our strength but we tend to be very friendly before i go to my second point like go to language school is sponsoring this video and this is the perfect time to do a shout out because whether you're eager to learn another language or whether you're an american wanting to smooth over our reputation of not speaking other foreign languages this is the perfect time to get going because lingoda is having another language sprint who doesn't love a good language sprint you get to transform your language skills and you have the possibility of getting a hundred percent cashback and it all starts on august 2nd lingoda is the number one trusted online language school so whether you want to learn german whether you want to learn spanish french english they have 24-hour small online flexible classes run by native speakers of that language ready to take you from struggling to speaking confidently in just three months and honestly let me show you how easy it is once you sign up for a sprint or sign up for classes to actually book a class like the entire experience is so seamless and i personally love that because it really helps make sure you won't lose any motivation you won't be like i can't figure out how to book a class i don't have any classes that work on my schedule i don't know what i'm supposed to study before class everything's clear all you have to do is once you sign up for the sprint you can access the platform where you click here and you can book a class you can choose day of the week and the time and it really filters things down right away i'm actually a pretty big group fan because i like listening to other people and learning with them and the classes are on average two to three people so you still get a ton of one-on-one time so pretty much you can scroll and choose the class you can find out more info also you can download the course material ahead of time if you want to learn you can see how many seats are left since it's like a max of five people and then you pretty much just click book now yep it is that simple easy peasy so for the super sprint it is 30 classes a month for three months and you can get a hundred percent cash back if you commit and you do it as long as you sign up before june 24th this is an early bird special after that you can still purchase the super sprint and you can still sign up for it but you only get 50 cashback if you commit and you make it and of course you can still sign up for the sprint so until registration closes on july 16th you can sign up to do 15 classes a month for three months and then get 50 cashback i have put all the links below in the description so you can check out more info on their website i highly recommend going to their instagram account and checking out some of the different reviews and experiences that alumni sprinters have left read the faq page that i put below and don't forget to check out terms and conditions that's always important whenever you're committing to anything general sign up is until july 16th and the early bird special for 100 cashback is until june 24th so go go go do not miss out okay back to the second worst thing about living in france as an american speaking too loud is anyone out there all right yes yes i'll admit it i'll admit it americans scream we shout at each other i have no idea why if anyone out there in the youtube atmosphere knows why americans talk so loud please let us know in the comments but yes we talk loud on a scale to 1 to 10 in volume i would say what a three is for americans would be like a 10 for the french like all out screaming as you talk to each other and when i first moved to france this was really frustrating borderline annoying because i just felt like people were constantly staring at me and constantly glaring at me and the thing was is it was just second nature i didn't realize that i was being loud i didn't realize that i was bothering people and i was just like taking people off every time i stepped into a restaurant every time i was in a store talking to someone literally just like every time i left my house i was annoying people after 10 years this has gotten better but i would still say on a weekly basis my husband is like kate shh we have neighbors like we actually share a wall with our neighbors right here lower your voice and i'm like yeah you're right i'm shouting again but for the most part i have adjusted to the point now where when i hear other americans shouting for example it's the metro in the morning at 8 am and there's a group of tourists on their way to do something and they're shouting about their day there's a part of me that's like lower your voice everybody in the metro is glaring at you and then there's another part of me that wants to look at everyone say stop judging them they don't realize they're so loud they don't realize them they're being so annoyed they're not doing it on purpose calm yourself so number three and four are topics that i really don't enjoy discussing with people i don't know but the french love love to talk to me and when i say the french i mean people i don't know i'm meeting you for the first time or i'm writing in your taxi and you're chatting to me it's really not people that i'm close with that bring up these topics so number three is a tricky one it's obesity in the us and kind of obesity in general the us and france have very different views when it comes to approaching obesity in the us we have a very large movement about learning to love your body to accept your body that your weight is a private matter it's not something to be discussed and dissected by other people and really just to stop fat shaming people and just let people live their lives it's a personal matter and it's up to them to live as they feel comfortable living then you have the french with a social welfare system health is definitely not seen so much as a private topic as much as it's a public topic and so therefore obesity is seen as a health issue that affects the entire society and that needs to be fixed so it's less about appreciating your body and more about losing weight for a health reason therefore the rising obesity rates in the world and specifically in the us is a topic that they feel very comfortable bringing up and asking about often so when it comes to the portion sizes in the u.s because they're two times larger than in france when it comes to what children eat in the u.s and what are the vending machines and why don't we offer correct lunches to them what about hormones in american food and what we're eating and do we realize you know the nasty stuff that we eat on a regular basis i mean the list goes on and on and the thing is i do understand what the french mean when they say that it's a health issue because you want your friends and your family to be as healthy as they can be and on the other side of that i've gone through a period in france where i've gained weight and i have been so fat shamed and had so much pressure to lose that weight that i also understand what that can do to somebody's mental psyche and health when someone's constantly like criticizing or making comments about your body like you can't see it or aren't living in it and i find most french people just can't really see past the medical side of it and they constantly want the american's point of view about america and even like as i'm discussing it right now i'm just like by myself but i'm getting kind of heated about it it's just not a topic that i feel comfortable discussing and of course i mean i can say to someone i don't want to talk about it but it's just when you first meet someone and you're trying to be polite and you're trying to keep the conversation going you don't want to put like a blocker but at the same time i'm like do we have to discuss this again all right and the second one a topic that gets brought up all the time is politics i've talked about this before in some of my other videos the thing is growing up in the midwest of the us politics was not a subject that you would talk a lot with people even you were close to but definitely not something that you would bring up with someone you didn't know really well it was pretty much considered impolite to grill someone to even ask somebody what their political views were or like how did they vote or what did they think about politics i mean it just was a pretty much a taboo subject i would say france is not at all on the same wavelength about politics it is far from being a taboo subject and most people are very comfortable talking about politics debating politics discussing giving their points of views over a beer with someone that they just met it's not at all taboo or at least way way less taboo and the u.s politics is quite a hot topic because our politics does dictate a lot of what happens on the world stage and so it's something that gets discussed quite regularly so even before president trump's arrival in office i would get asked my views on politics from the server at a restaurant the taxi driver someone in a party that i just met the first night i mean really random people that i didn't really know i can't even begin to explain to you what life was like during president trump's presidency and all the different questions that i got but at the end of the day it's the same thing as the last point yes you can say to people i'm not really interested in talking about it point three with the talks around obesity and body image that would be an easier one to be like i'm not interested in talking about it politics is a little bit harder because in france people are taught when it comes to cultural things and things like politics that there's nothing worse than not having an opinion because when you don't have an opinion it means that you're not cultured enough on the subject you're not reading up you're not educating yourself and honestly kids are really taught in france to have an opinion on subjects so by being like i don't want to talk about politics it doesn't necessarily come off as like oh it's a touchy subject for me it more comes off as like oh you don't really know that much about politics too and it's kind of seen as like a negative thing so it's harder to get out of that discussion all right everyone that is a wrap on the five worst things about being an american in france this is obviously my take on it and what i find complicated i can't wait to hear in the comments if you're an american living in france let me know if you are from a like just a foreigner living in france i want to hear what your situation's like and what do you find difficult about living in france i can't wait wait i'm looking forward to these comments below don't forget about lingoda check everything out in the description below the early bird special finishes on june 24th and general sign up is done on the 16th so go find out everything in the description below i hope you all have a fabulous week and i will see you la cemento [Music] you

Channel: Unintentionally Frenchified

Views: 80,502

Keywords: worst experience in france, expat in paris, negative expat stories france, i hated living in france, life in france negatives, negatives life in france, life in france downsides, downsides to life in france, downsides to life in paris, reality of living in paris, bad things about living in france, reality of living in france, bad experience france, negative experience in paris, american in france, unintentionally frenchified, french culture shocks, culture shocks

Id: b3BHpCWuweg

Length: 13min 54sec (834 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 09 2021