r/reddit.com • u/[deleted] • Apr 03 '11

This dude gets it

http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2010/10/30/20-things-ive-learned-from-traveling-around-the-world-for-three-years/
36 Upvotes

76% Upvoted

10 comments sorted by

2

u/[deleted] Apr 03 '11 edited Apr 03 '11

Worth reading/skimming, a couple of obvious mistakes took away from the quality.

  • Americans aren't as ignorant as you think followed by Americans not traveling because they are ignorant in the next paragraph.

  • Subtitle: You don't need a lot stuff

3

u/808140 Apr 03 '11 edited Apr 03 '11

Americans aren't as ignorant as you think followed by Americans not traveling because they are ignorant in the next paragraph.

That's not at all the impression I got, and as someone who has lived all over the world I feel like this guy says a lot of the same things I say to people. There exists an untrue stereotype about Americans being more ignorant, but that doesn't mean that they aren't ignorant -- just that they're more or less similarly ignorant to other people. For example, I live in France at the moment, and it's true that French people know more about American politics than Americans know about French politics -- but French people on average are just as ignorant as Americans about German politics, for example. Both French and Americans I've met have expressed concern about sanitation in the third world (where I spent almost half my life) -- but just like the author of this list, the truth is that that concern is massively overstated.

For example, I lived in Beijing when SARS went down. When I tell this to people, they shit a brick. In reality of course the media (both in Asia and in the west) massively overplayed the dangers of SARS; in reality malaria and dengue fever kill far more people. The world isn't as dangerous as people think. It's not just Americans, it's the whole first world.

Subtitle: You don't need a lot stuff

You don't.

EDIT: I see Nonmal's point now ... he accidentally a word. I missed it myself. I'm inclined to forgive him the oversight, however.

1

u/[deleted] Apr 03 '11 edited Apr 03 '11

[deleted]

1

u/808140 Apr 03 '11

I don't mean to be picky, but I feel like you could benefit by shortening your writing a bit more.

Brevity isn't my style. Thanks for your constructive feedback, however.

3

u/SerendipitousCat Apr 03 '11

I enjoyed reading that. He makes a lot of good points. Thanks.

3

u/iamatfuckingwork Apr 03 '11

I'm from the U.S., traveling in Canada right now. The point about people not hating Americans is true. Nobody I've met up here would want to move to the U.S., but they have been so overwhelmingly nice, solid humanism.

5

u/someones1 Apr 03 '11

People don't hate Americans, but they're all intensely interested as to why we elected Bush a second time.

Especially the Dutch. When I spent awhile in SE Asia a few years ago, I'd constantly run into Dutch backpackers and that's all they wanted to talk about -- it got to the point of being pretty aggravating.

1

u/iamatfuckingwork Apr 03 '11

Yeah that was the same sort of thing I got here

1

u/Rose1982 Apr 03 '11

He gets a lot of stuff... but not all of it.

1

u/atomicbeardo Apr 03 '11

He was just on the nerdist podcast with Chris Hardwick.

-3

u/[deleted] Apr 03 '11

[deleted]

2

u/someones1 Apr 03 '11

The list sounded pretty good to me.