I based my statement on my experiences in Germany in 1980-82. I was amazed at how many of my fellow soldiers did not understand the simple courtesy of recognizing the cultural differences between the US and Germany. A simple example, that always stunned me, was how many insisted on using dollars instead of marks when off base. yes, the stores would generally accept them, but at very bad exchange rates when compares to the bank.chasfm11 wrote: ↑Sun Mar 06, 2022 6:57 amA couple of decades ago, I had the opportunity to work in multiple European countries. I had a couple of American colleagues with me and I was surprised/appalled at how ignorant they were - on a couple of levels - regarding the laws, rules and norms of countries besides the United States. I called it the "Ugly American Syndrome" after the book title in the 60s From such small things as the date format through the metric system measurements, the Americans were annoyed that italy or France did not do things the way they were used to.
Many of our soldiers also thought there was nothing wrong with making a weekend run to Amsterdam to buy drugs and bring some back with them. Some of them found out the hard way that Germany did not tolerate drugs nearly as much as the US did.
One of my favorite examples of how the Ugly American syndrome played out was with a hobby shop in Wittlich. I learned to fly RC airplanes while over there. As a general rule, we ordered most of our supplies from American companies (saved on taxes and shipping was cheap to an APO). I also went to several of the local hobby shops for more immediate supply needs. This one store I went to, I had usually dealt with the son of the owners, He was about my age, very friendly and spoke English. I had seen his mother in the store before but I saw her refuse to speak English to some customers. One day I needed a starter battery for my plane and she was the only one there. I used my very poor German to greet her and ask for the battery. She got it and asked, in perfect English, if this was what I had meant. Turns out, she just wanted the courtesy of us recognizing this was her country and not ours.
