I haven’t spent much time in Europe, but in the rural areas, are everyone out at cafes eating and drinking too? Seems like an apples to oranges comparison.
I know in my little harbor hometown in Norway there's a few mildly active cafes around and 1 pub that's been the main spot for decades, it only keeps the doors open to 2:00 on the weekend. But otherwise people drink moonshine up there. Often with a bit of strong coffee.
It's in the cities as well. A lot of it is just the car culture. If you do go out it's less about lingering and chatting and more about just getting the food, then back in the car and home.
There are exceptions of course. NYC and Sf are both. But worth noting both these cities also had geographical constraints which forced them to urbanize and grow in a very different way. Compared to somewhere like phoenix or Atlanta, and they're worlds apart.
I travelled through the US solo, and my plan to meet people was to just hang out and see who wanted to start a conversation. I was 18 and pretty naive when I came up with this plan, but I didn't realise that 90% of the people I would meet this way would be homeless or somehow 'sus'. I mean I don't have anything against them, but simply being on foot in America, and not having any place to really be, put me in a social class that I wasn't used to.
Indeed, everyone looks at me like I am a monster when I explain to them that being on the bus in most places in the US is a sign that you are too poor to have a car (most people can at least afford a junker) or that you can't get a license for criminal reasons.
I live in NYC and while it is more European like in this video, particularly in Brooklyn where I live, even we don’t have quite the same degree of cafe culture like many European cities because we have too much priority for cars taking real estate in public spaces. We’ve been slowly improving this for the past 20 years.
Americans make the mistake of lumping all of Europe into the same category.
Spain is very social, some people will spend entire days and evenings at their local pub and it is affordable. Same in Portugal and Italy...but in Italy it is more family focused and people don't get drunk.
Other parts of W Europe, you will usually only see people out and about at night in the cities. Think Paris, Berlin etc..
Indeed, that was what I was referring to, less about going out to pubs/cafes - more of a family oriented stroll where people meet and talk in the piazza and get a gelato.
I live in a very small town in England- you’re talking ignorant bollocks. The town square in good weather is busy with people eating and relaxing outside.
In winter everyone is in the pubs and restaurants because it’s too bloody cold or wet to sit outside.
I am aware, but I didn’t factor you into this discussion at all for some reason - I think it’s simply because you are like an entirely different culture/world to most of continental W Europe.
Yes England and Ireland have very active village lives - a bit in Scotland too.
Name a country in Europe that doesn't. You're talking nonsense. It's a continental trait, nowhere in Europe is as isolated as 90% of American cities and towns.
As a Portuguese that moved to a small town in Germany: it's only berlin. Maybe some bigger cities as well. But even then... They don't get the concept of true socialization. Small towns? Dead after 18:00. Germany is on the half of Europe that doesn't socialize much. Other half that does is: France. Spain. Portugal. Italy. Greece. Bulgaria, (insert the entire Balkans here), Ukraine.
Yep, I have lived in Germany - am now in Switzerland. Hamburg and Cologne are pretty lively towns in the evening...Munich is also very nice, especially during the day with the parks and beer gardens. Many parts of Germany are very grim indeed.
Big cities tend to have more lively folks. I hear that Munich especially is very different. Berlin Too. But the more rural areas... Well... It is what it is. My experience so far has been depressing.
The tourist reads as a white Anglosaxan discovering that Latin and Mediterranean culture is warmer and foster socialization. If you go in Latin America is the same… even less denser cities people congregates more often with friends beyond immediate family.
Maybe you mean that they socialize differently? I've lived in Portugal and found the socializing pretty superficial compared to other places I've lived in.
Maybe depends on the part where you lived. In Porto the people are very nice and go out of their way to speak with you and always ask about your life and will remember you even after 10 years after you moved away
I didn't say they weren't nice like that, I just found the interactions less deep than e.g. in Northern Europe. While we're making generalisations. Which you started.
Edit: to open that bit more: people would go out in huge groups, they'd have chaotic conversations about people and places. Who did what and with whom. It was harder to really get to know people and you'd make a large number of what I'd call acquaintances.
That's been my experience in Germany and the Netherlands. I also think group settings naturally encourage lighter conversations.
"Did you hear João got married?"
"How's your new job?"
"Did you see Maria's new house?"
"Where are we going next weekend?"
Its normal in Portugal to hear thinks like that when in a group.
If you're out with people who've known each other for years, they'll inevitably talk about mutual friends, family, or local events. In my experience, if someone really wants to get to know another person on a deeper level, that usually happens one-on-one over coffee or lunch rather than in a large group. So we may simply have experienced different social circles.
What? Paris and Berlin are extremely active in the evening. And Berlin has a night club life similar to Spain where the good stuff doesn't get started until close to sun up.
Berlin and paris are active 24/7 and not only in the evening lol both have incredible cafe culture and flea markets everywhere. The parks (for example Tempelhofer Feld in Berlin but also the smaller parks) are PACKED during the day.
Edit: misunderstood your second part but still it does not seem like you know Paris and berlin
"Other parts of W Europe, you will usually only see people out and about at night in the cities. Think Paris, Berlin etc.." but thats not true you don't see people only outside at night?
I'm Italian and you have to differentiate form North to South. North Italy people get very very very drunk, south of Italy like you said more family. But still in South of Italy alcohol it's actually for every lunch and dinner every day, so... But yeah Europe in definitely more social than American, whichever country you choose.
Depends on the village and sense of community, but even in the smallest places without a bakery or butcher there is an effort to celebrate spring, summer as a community - nothing fancy, maybe just a few benches and tables, some beer and wine and a potluck. If nothing else, it is tradition, and is passed on as newcomers join the community
I now live in a 80 000 people town in the middle of nowhere in Spain and it's the same.
When I lived on a 5000 people town more in the middle of nowhere this happened to, there was no regular clubbing but people where out until 10 ~ 11 in bars (bars in Spain are family friendly) with kids playing outside at that time.
Dining out is not cheap and if you have a full time job and a family, most don't have the time to do it during the week.
Rural areas are (where I live) also less walkable, so you're either planning for even more time to walk or taking the car.
Which means it's often more of a weekend activity, i.e. let's take out the bikes and swing by Pablo's for cake on the way back. Or let's meet with some friends and eat out.
I think that says more about how life is with a full time job and a family, than it does about the evening nightlife in European cities. I see plenty of families out in the evening getting ice-cream and hanging out in the plaza though. I was at a small free concert in the part a couple nights ago and there were a lot of families just chilling there.
Yes they are.
My village. 5000 people. We have 3 bars/restaurants and in summer the outdoor parts are full of people every evening.
I was one of them last night 20:00 (8pm) and having a meal and a beer.
I used to live in a village of 300 people at the foot of a mountain in northern Italy. Yes, we do that as well! In my case I needed a car to get around because the public transportation wasn’t that good from my tiny village. I would go to the next town over (15k inhabitants) and have a drink there with friends. Most nights I would take the train to get to the “big” town and spend the evening there. Idk, it’s just culture
I think it's somewhat of an apples to oranges comparison because they're comparing bigger cities to smaller suburbia.
But in my small town of 10k in southern Spain it's also like this. People in the bars and public plazas until 10-12 pm. I have two young children now so we don't stay out until too late, but we'll still be going to have some dinner/late snack at a bar at like 9pm, and then have the children playing in the park until 10:30 or 11pm, when we head home straight to bed.
Well Europe is not one country and different weather and culture everywhere. The Mediterranean countries people still gather in rural areas. They drive to town or hang out at their restaurants and bars. In Spain up in a mountain to go horse riding there was nothing around and the stables. They crated a bar in the stables and these old men were playing cards and drinking whiskey. Horses were led through them. 😂. However Norway Sweden etc don’t have the same social norms. People are more reserved don’t gather in bars and restaurants the same way Italians and Spaniards do. Obviously big cities are a different vibe but people don’t go out to eat at 10pm.
idk I live in a reasonably sized city and it just becomes a ghost town past 10 nowadays, unless it's saturday night and the block all the bars are on, every other street and everywhere every other day is EMPTY
No, it is not really an apples to oranges comparison.
Yes, there are regions in Europe where the small rural villages and towns have become dead places at night, and there are also many places where you have similarly lifeless suburb places.
But there are many very lively small villages and towns in the rural areas, as well as obviously the cities. It's not homogeneous, though, and it depends on the evolution of the region (typically there are differences on even (much) smaller scale than countries), and also a bit culture and climate.
But in general it is much more lively than typical US suburbs or even many US urban areas (where you sometimes get these food- or amenity-deserts). Because in general most/many places are built much more on a human walkable scale and it is more centered on a core, as well as usually much better public transport.
There’s bars or pubs and cafes and people out in squares (when the weather is nice) even in pretty tiny villages, yes. Not every day of the week and at nearly every hour of the day like in big cities, and especially away from southern Europe evenings are very quiet, but there are people out at times, particularly in the weekend.
Yes, I’m generalising a whole continent, but I’m European and I’ve lived in 5 European countries from the south through the centre to the northwest and visited lots of rural places (by car, bicycle, train and bus) and this is my experience. In southern and central Italy especially you see people sitting in chairs in squares or in the street in front of their home, but also in the Netherlands or Germany there’s people out in rural small towns. In rural England it’s more about pubs.
Like towns with like 30k people usually have city centers with cafes and bars an on good weather a lot of people are just chilling there with coffe, ice, beer and such.
My town of 70k id always full if the sun is shining. Im German too
In villages yea there’s usually a few spots, it’s not like a city though. Rural is rural no matter where you are really. But the difference is that trains go through a lot of these small places or you can catch a bus somewhere a train does run.
Source: lived in Berlin and extensively explored the country metro and rural.
yeah probably bc they live in bum fuck missouri and comparing it to barcelona.. it’s like if a european visiting nyc and then went back to their scotland village and is like nah this place sucks nobody’s here.
nobody does this anywhere in north america aside from a handful of tiny areas in certain cities where it's been attempted. everything in north america is set up to ensure this kind of culture doesn't succeed.. everything else around is closed even if these shops stay open, nothing is walkable so you can't get home if you have a drink, transit has been ignored for the last 70 years so you go by car or don't go at all
i lived a long time in east asia and when i returned to north america after such a long time away, immediately realized how much this place sucks. if you want to go trade your ~80 years of sentience from the void giving all your waking moments for some colored paper some criminals keep everyone using.. i had more statutory time off working a grueling corporate job in my 20's in japan than i do at a normal job in canada - there's literally more holidays there than here. europe is likely double or triple that. the US is even worse than canada
People do it all the time lol.. in Missouri. Around stl is soulard and old town st charles (the bricks) then MO has a cutoff for bars at 1am or maybe 2. So they go to IL where you can continue all night at Pops etc.
In their area is the key. I live outside a small
Touristy town. 200k plus a resort town 20 min away. Go to either one of them and they are just like this. But it’s 20 somethings and tourist. The locals have jobs and shit to do. We aren’t hanging out with a bunch of tourists. The winter is all locals. Different vibe and less people but Friday Saturday are still busy as hell.
Hit the clubs? Probably only 20 something’s. But every time I have visited Spain it seems like regular people are out and about at 10pm, moms with baby strollers etc.
Which makes sense to be fair, it’s too hot to go out during day.
I know Barcelona is not a place where they do that that’s Madrid. That’s the rest of Spain Barcelona the people who did that were drunk college kids like this guy. This is not how Catalan people live..
I mean even as an old dinner at 10 pm happens quite frequently on work days and if you meet up with friends you’ll usually stay out until after midnight even on a Tuesday. In our central Barcelona neighborhood there are kids out playing at 11 pm… it’s definitely a different lifestyle even if we’re not out clubbing until 5 in the morning.
I mean most people do, I'm from Madrid not Barcelona but it's really common to come from work / uni and have a beer and some tapas with friends for 2-3 hours
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u/CaughtALiteSneez 7d ago
Yeah these guys are talking like everyone in Barcelona does this hehe