September 12, 2021 • 25 mins
Europe is more than just the border that you see on a map!
Here, I talk about some of my experiences with learning just how different parts of the same country can be, from languages, to music, and more.
I hope you enjoy this podcast and don't forget to leave a comment on the episode page at: https://nofairytaletravels.substack.com/
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello.
Hello and welcome to nofairytale travels this week.
I'm going to talk about some ofthe, how to say the
interestingly fractured natureof Europe.
That sounds a little bit harsh,but essentially just that, you
know, Spain, isn't just Spain.
There are many, many bigdistinct groups within the
(00:22):
country.
The same with Germany, the samewith so many other countries in
Europe.
I mean, you go to the UK and yougo to part of it and you think,
well, wait a second, nobody'sspeaking English anymore.
And where did all the vowels go?
And so I'm going to talk aboutsome of my interesting
experiences as it relates tothat.
(00:45):
And we'll see where it goes fromthere.
If you have any questions orcomments, go to no fairy tale
travels dot sub stack.com andfind the post for this podcast
or whatever it is and leave amessage there.
And I'll try and get back to it.
Now I'm going to apologize inadvance.
If I talk too quickly, it turnsout that working out in the
(01:07):
morning, though, it is hell forthe first, I don't know, three
months eventually becomesamazing and it makes you feel so
good.
And you combine that with coffeeand I just got to calm down how
quickly I talk.
So let's pour some wine and talkabout some of the differences of
Europe.
(01:29):
I found a great wine by the way,it's Illuminati.
I don't know if I mentioned thisbefore.
[inaudible] I was thinking maybeI do different wine for each
episode, but this is just sogood and it's 10 bucks, so I'm
going to stick with it.
So anyway, one of the firstthings that we're not one of the
first things, one of the thingsthat I thought growing up in the
states where I'm learning aboutEurope, and mostly you learn
(01:50):
about world war one and worldwar II over and over and over
again in the middle ages.
And so on.
When you think about countrieskind of, or at least for me,
when I thought about them, Ithought, okay, Germany is
Germany, okay?
Belgium is Belgium Britain orthe UK, or however you call it
just that specific island isjust itself.
(02:14):
Spain is Spain, Frances, France.
Italy is Italy because of coursemy frame of reference was the
United States of America, wherepretty much it's a monocultural
society.
Now there are many, many, manydifferent little cultures in
between, right?
If you talk about food, that's areally good example.
You go to some places and you'regoing to get really good,
(02:36):
interesting local barbecue.
And you go to the next city orthe next state, and they're
going to have a differentversion of that.
You go to, I think it's SouthernCalifornia, where I had fried
chicken and waffles.
It was, I did taste like I wasabout to have a heart attack,
but it was, it was a very happyheart attack taste.
Um, so food is a PhiladelphiaPhilly, cheese, steak, Chicago,
(03:00):
you got deep dish pizza in NewYork.
You have the really thin slicepizza.
We have many, many differences,but when you compare them to
Europe, it's really not thatdifferent.
For instance, in America, I cantravel vast distances and still
speak English with someone stillpretty much understand how
culture is going to work there.
(03:21):
How driving is kind of going towork a little bit more angry and
aggressive in New York, a lotmore so in Philadelphia where
part of my family or half of myfamily is from, but still I can
feel relatively comfortablegoing all over the place.
So you think, okay, UnitedStates, we've got English and
we've got a very large countryof independent people, lots of
(03:45):
homes and space and big cars andhighways and yada, yada, yada,
we watch the same TV shows.
We're pretty darn similar whenyou compare it to Europe.
It's really only some, I wouldsay nefarious actors who try to
tell us how different we arefrom each other when we share so
(04:05):
many similarities.
So I think, okay, when I arrivein Europe, all right, Germany,
Germany is Germany.
So, you know, Bavaria, they'renot going to actually speak
Bavarian, right.
Because is Bavarian even alanguage.
I don't know.
And then the first time I'm inBavaria and I go shopping with
(04:28):
my friend, I was staying on hercouch for a month and we're in
there and she ordered some meatacross the counter from the meat
guy.
And I thought, okay, that's kindof a funny thing that she's a
funny noises that are coming outof her mouth.
Um, and I said, what is that?
And she goes, oh yeah, it'sBavarian.
I said, what?
It's a spoken language.
(04:49):
She goes, yeah.
And I said, okay.
So how do you say the name ofthat food in German?
And she goes, I have no idea.
I've never said it in German.
Then we go to a picnic with allof her friends, all people who
might previously met, but justspoken English with, and
everyone is drinking and havinga great time, maybe 10, 12
(05:10):
people.
And it's this, this noise againthat I had never heard, except
for at the deli just recentlybefore that.
And they are all conversingregularly, socially in Bavarian.
Now, I guess in a way you couldkind of compare that to Creole,
(05:31):
but that's only in a very, verytiny part of America where that
happens.
But, and I've never actuallyheard it myself, but in Bavaria.
Yeah, they were speakingBavarian and pretty much every
aspect of their life wasoccurring in Bavarian.
So it wasn't just that peoplefrom Berlin disliked people from
(05:53):
Munich or who may dislike peoplefrom cologne or Hamburg, it was
what felt like when you wentinto Bavaria, just a different
society almost.
And when I meet Germans who arefrom Bavaria versus other parts
of Germany, they are, I can tellimmediately that they're from
Bavaria because they're so muchmore gregarious.
(06:13):
They actually know what a jokeis like a joke that makes you
laugh.
But, but I don't want to get onthat topic too, too much,
because I want to move over toanother country where it's a
little bit more evident thatit's not just a singular unit, a
singular entity, let's go toSpain.
A lot more people know aboutSpain in, or at least know about
(06:35):
what I'm about to say.
And it's kind of interesting.
So in Spain, it's not justSpain.
You have got dramaticallydistinctly different regions of
Spain.
You have Basque territory, whichisn't just limited to Spain, by
the way, it does go into Franceas well.
Then you've got Catalans on theright.
(06:56):
Everyone knows, or a lot ofpeople know about Barcelona.
Okay, well, that's Catalonia thecapital.
I believe the capital capitalcities.
Aren't always what you think.
It's very easy to get trickedlike Canberra in Australia, not
Sydney.
Um, but Barcelona in Cataloniaand the Catalans speak Catalan.
(07:17):
They don't speak Spanish.
Well, they probably speakSpanish as well, but Katelyn is
their language.
And for the Basque people,Basque is their language and
they have a cultural and aheritage and an identity around
that.
And if you read a little bit ofhistory, at least about the
(07:38):
Basques, I don't know too muchabout the Catalans.
You're going to find some, Idon't know, uh, interesting
things that happened in the nottoo distant past that prove to
you just how distinct it is and,and how amazing it is that Spain
is a single country in a singleentity.
Um, then you go to the southwhere you have under Lucia.
(08:00):
You've also got Valencia with, Ithink, do they speak Valenciano
there?
I'm not entirely certain, to behonest, that might be just sort
of closer to a dialect ofSpanish than an entirely
separate language.
One of the problems with livingsomewhere as a foreigner is it
is a little bit easier to hangout with foreigners.
And sometimes we fall into thattrap.
(08:21):
So when I lived in Valencia, I'mnot certain that I had the most
correct Valencia experience,although I loved it there.
And then of course, you've gotMadrid, which is a separate
entity all to itself.
It's like Paris in France or NewYork in America.
I don't really find it a goodrepresentation of the country.
(08:44):
It's kind of got its own littledistinct thing going on there
and all trains, by the way, gothrough Madrid.
It's a very, very, very annoyingto have to go so far out of your
way to get where you're going.
And, oh my gosh, I can't believeI almost forgot this one.
I don't think this is Basque,but I met a girl in London when
I was staying in a hostel there.
(09:06):
One of the coolest people I'vemet and she plays the bagpipes.
She lives in the far leftNorthwest side of Spain.
I think it's north, it's atleast the west side of Spain.
And yeah, I think it's, maybeit's on the Atlantic.
I don't know.
I'm going to have to look at amap, actually.
Let me see.
(09:27):
And she plays the bagpipes andher favorite music.
Yes.
So I think it's above Portugaland her favorite music is music
with bagpipes in it becauseapparently I don't know if it
was the Scots or if it wasNordic people who came through
Scotland and then came downthere.
But at some point in history,people that played the bagpipes
(09:50):
made their way down to Spain andwhere she's from born and
raised, bagpipes are a bigthing.
They, how cool is that?
That's so crazy and unexpected.
You know, when people think ofSpain, they think of topless
women on beaches, which by theway, when I was 16 and I was on
the beach for the first time,seeing that, not the first time
(10:11):
on the beach, but the first timeseeing that, oh my God.
Yeah.
Uh, it was, it was amazing.
We should, we should adopt thatpart of the culture into the U S
um, so they think of that.
They think of running with thebulls.
They think of those things.
They don't think of a girlplaying bagpipes.
(10:32):
So it's amazing to me today thatit is its own country and people
in Catalonia are still trying toseparate.
There are some very recent,interesting history where they
made an attempt to do that.
And it wasn't, I'm not going tomake a comment on it.
The problem with having friendsin every place now is that it's
(10:53):
very easy to, well, no, no, no.
I said that I'm making thispodcast to be more free with
what I say.
I think it's that the Catalanstried to become independent.
And I think it's veryinteresting and ironic that a
lot of your, so then I don'tknow the full thing, but some of
the leaders went to, I think,Brussels and were arrested
(11:15):
there.
Um, I think it's veryinteresting that Europeans talk
a lot about support for thefreedom and the independence of
this group of people and howthey should be able to choose
their own destiny and not beforced to do this because of
some leader in another citytells them they have to live
(11:37):
their life like this.
Yes.
I believe in freedom.
The freedom to choose thefreedom to be yourself.
Oh, but yeah, totally not.
If you want to like break offfrom the country.
No, no, no, no, you can't bethat free.
Just like, like we can be asfree as I, um, as it's pretty
much okay with me, but I likeBarcelona.
I want to go there.
(11:57):
I don't want to have to gothrough a border.
It could be difficult.
Like, so definitely don't breakfree.
Definitely.
Don't don't don't ever actuallybecome independent, but, but be
free.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Freedom, freedom.
Anyway, there is a, maybe sinceI'm on a tangent, I'm going to
say maybe a good way tocharacterize a lot of European
(12:19):
attitudes is hypocrisy.
And I tried to have a discussionwith a girl who has a philosophy
degree from Oxford about, um,just the notion of being able.
Self-determination being able todetermine if you want to be a
part of this country or not.
And it was interesting.
(12:41):
Um, she was unable to have thediscussion because apparently in
Oxford, they are unable toremove their emotions and talk
about principles and just thephilosophical idea of
self-determination.
They can't do that.
I don't know if she really wentto Oxford, but she mentioned it
(13:02):
a lot to everybody and it wasvery annoying about it.
Um, but she broke down very,very quickly when confronted
with just the notion of, okay, Iknow that you don't want them to
be separate, but let's talkabout the idea of you actually,
like if his whole region wantsto be separate, you know, the
principal, do you believe thatthey should be able to choose
(13:22):
their future or someone inanother city should tell them,
no, you don't get to separateyourself from me.
You have to stay under mycontrol.
That's an interestingdiscussion.
And I think that talking aboutthe principle of the ability to
do that should be separated fromthe talk of, is it a good idea
(13:45):
to do it or a bad idea to do it?
There are two separate things,and I'm not even going to
mention the UK because peoplecan't take their emotions out of
that discussion.
They just talk about politicalthings.
And I say, listen, I don't knowany politics about it, but I
think it's cool that people getto at least determine their
(14:05):
future.
I don't know if it's going to begood or bad, but I'm cool with
the principal.
Um, but if every region inEurope followed this, so let's
go to the UK.
Now it would be ratherinteresting.
And one of my interestingexperiences in the UK is I was
in London, in a hostel there anda very, very, uh, social in that
(14:27):
hostel.
And it was very, it was a verygood, hostile experience.
Every time I was there, exceptfor one, I met some really cool
girls from Wales and theyinvited me to go and stay with
them one weekend and they weregoing to show me around Cardiff
and I'm thinking, okay, thesegirls are cool.
We had a great night hanging outtogether.
(14:48):
We were part of a real fungroup.
And so I go there and I get offthe bus.
And the first thing that Inotice is a word, a word on a
sign that seems to have had allof its vowels removed.
And then all of the continentsmultiplied by five.
It was the longest word I'd everseen, even longer than German
(15:11):
words.
And there were no vowels in it.
And I very quickly learned thata Wales has its own language and
it is spoken.
It is written and it is a live.
And this girl named pheonlovely, lovely friend of the
girl who invited me there.
(15:31):
She spoke it fluently.
She spoke it with her family.
She spoke it with her friends.
Not everybody spoke it, but shespoke it fluently.
And it was one of the coolestthings I've ever seen.
Just completely not expectingit.
Having done no research, justthinking, oh yeah, this island,
everyone on it just speaksEnglish.
It's always, they've always justspoken English of course,
(15:52):
because look at all of the landsthat have come from there that
now speak English.
So of course their entire tinylittle island, it speaks
English.
And then I get to Wales and theyspeak Welsh.
Oh, it was so fun.
I loved Cardiff.
You know, I spent, I think atotal of two years living in
(16:15):
London and I almost regret thatnow London's great fun.
But every time that I go outsideof London, I'm just meet so many
great, amazing people.
And when I travel, I meet somany great, amazing people from
all over the UK.
And so I really want to travelaround there more when you go to
Scotland, they have their ownlanguage there as well, but hell
(16:35):
half the time, you wouldn't evenknow it because you can't
understand what they say inEnglish.
I want to do like a languagesegment where I bring people on
and, and try to learn somephrases.
And, uh, I think in Scotland, itis garlic, not Gaelic.
(16:56):
And in Ireland they speakGaelic.
Not garlic.
I don't recall it's it soundsvery similar to me, but they're
different apparently.
Um, Ireland is anotherinteresting one, but not as
interesting as that, becauseit's pretty much, you know, you
don't have as many differencesas Wales and Scotland and there
(17:17):
you've got Gaelic or garlic andEnglish, but it is a spoken
language and all the teachers inIreland, they have to speak it.
And it's a really cool when youhear them speak it.
I think it sounds like some sortof leprechauns going to steal
your gold when they speak it toyou.
It's really, really cool.
You go to Belgium and therethey've got French and Flemish
(17:39):
and Flemish is great.
I love Flemish, like other thanromance.
It's what I'd imagine.
Some mountain trolls would andthe French Belgians, they really
look down on the FlemishBelgians, which is funny because
when everyone visits Belgium,they just want to go to the
Flemish parts.
(18:00):
So there you have, all of these,these language is I would say a
function of culture and aspectof culture.
And it's, it's interesting tothink about that and talk about
that.
As in some languages, you havewords for things you don't have
in other languages.
So I think that maybe it's thebest example of a society that
(18:22):
has many different culturesinside of it.
So Belgium, isn't just Belgium.
It's what is it?
Wallonia and something else Idon't recall.
And I'm not going to look it upnow.
Um, but every one of thesecountries has distinct
different, large chunks of itthat don't necessarily think the
(18:44):
same way as the other part ofthe country.
And they have managed to stillremain a country.
Now, if you look throughhistory, it makes sense how they
can have so many differentcultures because the borders
weren't always what they are forso long.
But I am, I am really amazedthat there hasn't been, you
(19:06):
know, world war three and evenworld war four, maybe it all
just comes down to money at theend of the day, because so much
of Europe is just so different.
So much more than it looks likeon a map where you just see
these big borders and you don'trealize that there are many,
many, many small ones inbetween.
(19:26):
I mean, in the UK on an evensmaller level, you go to a
different city and they have adifferent accent.
I think in the U S you have togo like a thousand miles to get
a different accent or something.
You have to go a very longdistance to get a different
accent.
I have often described Europe asa candy shop.
(19:48):
You get lots of little flavorsjammed together on a shelf, and
you can just go and sample allthese fun little flavors in one
place.
And it's really, really fun andreally interesting.
I'm going to leave the Nordiccountries out of this discussion
for obvious reasons if you'vebeen there.
(20:10):
Although I love them, especiallyFinland, Finnish people are
super cool by the way.
Um, let me see if there'sanything else I wanted to say
specifically, because now I wantto talk about Finnish people.
Oh, okay.
I want to mention, uh, one of myfavorite things about
Switzerland, that it seems likea lot of people don't know.
(20:32):
Yes, Switzerland, a lot ofpeople know has multiple
languages and has multiplecultures, these cultures, by the
way, they don't actually mix asmuch as people think you've got
the French in Geneva.
You've got Germans.
Zurich, I believe is the centerof that one.
Baron is a very interesting cityby the way, as well.
(20:52):
And you've got the Italians inthe south and you also have one
more.
So Switzerland has four nationallanguages, French, German,
Italian, and Roe munch.
Not to mention the dialects.
A lot of people know about SwissGerman.
(21:14):
[inaudible], it's a very, it's avery weird, um, I don't know,
not weird.
It's a funny dialect.
And sometimes they think thatyou can't understand them if you
speak German.
And, uh, that has led to someinteresting mistakes on their
part.
I would say recently involvingme, but yeah, Switzerland has
(21:35):
four languages and the languagesof the trolls and the mountain
that keep all the gold, by theway, that's definitely a real
munch.
The other week, I was actuallyable to learn how to say tree in
roll munch.
I've completely forgotten it,but I was very proud of myself
for that evening.
And I think, uh, three or fourbeers later, I had successfully
forgotten what had made me soproud three or four beers before
(21:58):
that.
So, so cheers to at leastremembering that, uh, you
learned it at one point, but nowthat it got me thinking about
Finland, I do want to talk alittle bit about Finland.
I love Finnish people.
They are so awesome.
And they are, what do I say?
(22:22):
What do I say?
Um, I'm not worried about what Isay, but I'm just thinking like,
are they an extreme version ofthe lack of emotional
intelligence that you get thefarther north, you go in
Germany, maybe I'd have toexclude Hamburg from that, by
the way, um, or Russia, or theyare very cold and very matter of
(22:53):
fact, and very straight forwardand very non-confrontational
very non-confrontational.
I mean, I remember I was upthere.
I've got so many stories to tellyou at some point, this isn't
the point, but this one I'mgoing to tell you, I'm in a
supermarket with a friend, thelocal friend in the middle of
Finland, not in Helsinki.
(23:14):
The friend is from there.
And there are three peoplestanding across an aisle in a
very big store.
And they're all looking in theother direction.
And my friend and I let myfriend walk a little bit in
front of me.
She just walks up behind thatgroup and just stands there.
Doesn't say anything.
Doesn't say, pardon me?
It doesn't say, excuse me, itdoesn't tap anyone on the
(23:36):
shoulder.
Doesn't make any noise to lether presence be known.
And the other people, somehowdon't notice that a human being
is behind them.
They just stand there.
I let it remain like that for 30seconds thinking there's no way.
There's no way.
There's no way.
And then I just said, pardon me?
Could we just get through?
(23:57):
And of course the kindly moved,but my friend just, she was
never going to say anything.
I don't know how long she wasgoing to stand there.
I mean, they they're used to notmoving much and very cold winter
is when they get snowed in, Iguess.
So I don't know.
I don't know a great person, bythe way, I'll tell you lots of
stories about her much, much,much, much later.
(24:19):
Um, but then so th there arenon-confrontational, they don't
let that much out there, notthat emotional, but good.
God Saturday comes around.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Everything comes out.
All of the emotions, all of theenergy, all of the ferociousness
(24:42):
of that was bottled up in theweek is just a let out on
Saturday.
They're not, they're not aviolent, like, um, I'm British
people on a Tuesday evening, butthey just, they'll just open up
to you.
They'll cry, they'll laugh.
They'll take their clothes offand jump and fountains.
(25:04):
I mean, they'll do a lot of thevery public fountains in front
of other people when you're notexpecting it.
And aren't sure if you'resupposed to be embarrassed or
what's going on, just it's, it'samazing.
It's like a switch is flipped.
And, uh, that story didn't haveanything to do with, with what I
(25:25):
was talking about today, but Iwanted to say it because it's so
fun.
So the candy store of Europe isa, is a great place to be.
Yeah, I like that.
I'm going to end with that one.
Cheers to the candy store.
Hello.
Hello and welcome to nofairytale travels this week.
I'm going to talk about some ofthe, how to say the
interestingly fractured natureof Europe.
That sounds a little bit harsh,but essentially just that, you
know, Spain, isn't just Spain.
There are many, many bigdistinct groups within the
(00:22):
country.
The same with Germany, the samewith so many other countries in
Europe.
I mean, you go to the UK and yougo to part of it and you think,
well, wait a second, nobody'sspeaking English anymore.
And where did all the vowels go?
And so I'm going to talk aboutsome of my interesting
experiences as it relates tothat.
(00:45):
And we'll see where it goes fromthere.
If you have any questions orcomments, go to no fairy tale
travels dot sub stack.com andfind the post for this podcast
or whatever it is and leave amessage there.
And I'll try and get back to it.
Now I'm going to apologize inadvance.
If I talk too quickly, it turnsout that working out in the
(01:07):
morning, though, it is hell forthe first, I don't know, three
months eventually becomesamazing and it makes you feel so
good.
And you combine that with coffeeand I just got to calm down how
quickly I talk.
So let's pour some wine and talkabout some of the differences of
Europe.
(01:29):
I found a great wine by the way,it's Illuminati.
I don't know if I mentioned thisbefore.
[inaudible] I was thinking maybeI do different wine for each
episode, but this is just sogood and it's 10 bucks, so I'm
going to stick with it.
So anyway, one of the firstthings that we're not one of the
first things, one of the thingsthat I thought growing up in the
states where I'm learning aboutEurope, and mostly you learn
(01:50):
about world war one and worldwar II over and over and over
again in the middle ages.
And so on.
When you think about countrieskind of, or at least for me,
when I thought about them, Ithought, okay, Germany is
Germany, okay?
Belgium is Belgium Britain orthe UK, or however you call it
just that specific island isjust itself.
(02:14):
Spain is Spain, Frances, France.
Italy is Italy because of coursemy frame of reference was the
United States of America, wherepretty much it's a monocultural
society.
Now there are many, many, manydifferent little cultures in
between, right?
If you talk about food, that's areally good example.
You go to some places and you'regoing to get really good,
(02:36):
interesting local barbecue.
And you go to the next city orthe next state, and they're
going to have a differentversion of that.
You go to, I think it's SouthernCalifornia, where I had fried
chicken and waffles.
It was, I did taste like I wasabout to have a heart attack,
but it was, it was a very happyheart attack taste.
Um, so food is a PhiladelphiaPhilly, cheese, steak, Chicago,
(03:00):
you got deep dish pizza in NewYork.
You have the really thin slicepizza.
We have many, many differences,but when you compare them to
Europe, it's really not thatdifferent.
For instance, in America, I cantravel vast distances and still
speak English with someone stillpretty much understand how
culture is going to work there.
(03:21):
How driving is kind of going towork a little bit more angry and
aggressive in New York, a lotmore so in Philadelphia where
part of my family or half of myfamily is from, but still I can
feel relatively comfortablegoing all over the place.
So you think, okay, UnitedStates, we've got English and
we've got a very large countryof independent people, lots of
(03:45):
homes and space and big cars andhighways and yada, yada, yada,
we watch the same TV shows.
We're pretty darn similar whenyou compare it to Europe.
It's really only some, I wouldsay nefarious actors who try to
tell us how different we arefrom each other when we share so
(04:05):
many similarities.
So I think, okay, when I arrivein Europe, all right, Germany,
Germany is Germany.
So, you know, Bavaria, they'renot going to actually speak
Bavarian, right.
Because is Bavarian even alanguage.
I don't know.
And then the first time I'm inBavaria and I go shopping with
(04:28):
my friend, I was staying on hercouch for a month and we're in
there and she ordered some meatacross the counter from the meat
guy.
And I thought, okay, that's kindof a funny thing that she's a
funny noises that are coming outof her mouth.
Um, and I said, what is that?
And she goes, oh yeah, it'sBavarian.
I said, what?
It's a spoken language.
(04:49):
She goes, yeah.
And I said, okay.
So how do you say the name ofthat food in German?
And she goes, I have no idea.
I've never said it in German.
Then we go to a picnic with allof her friends, all people who
might previously met, but justspoken English with, and
everyone is drinking and havinga great time, maybe 10, 12
(05:10):
people.
And it's this, this noise againthat I had never heard, except
for at the deli just recentlybefore that.
And they are all conversingregularly, socially in Bavarian.
Now, I guess in a way you couldkind of compare that to Creole,
(05:31):
but that's only in a very, verytiny part of America where that
happens.
But, and I've never actuallyheard it myself, but in Bavaria.
Yeah, they were speakingBavarian and pretty much every
aspect of their life wasoccurring in Bavarian.
So it wasn't just that peoplefrom Berlin disliked people from
(05:53):
Munich or who may dislike peoplefrom cologne or Hamburg, it was
what felt like when you wentinto Bavaria, just a different
society almost.
And when I meet Germans who arefrom Bavaria versus other parts
of Germany, they are, I can tellimmediately that they're from
Bavaria because they're so muchmore gregarious.
(06:13):
They actually know what a jokeis like a joke that makes you
laugh.
But, but I don't want to get onthat topic too, too much,
because I want to move over toanother country where it's a
little bit more evident thatit's not just a singular unit, a
singular entity, let's go toSpain.
A lot more people know aboutSpain in, or at least know about
(06:35):
what I'm about to say.
And it's kind of interesting.
So in Spain, it's not justSpain.
You have got dramaticallydistinctly different regions of
Spain.
You have Basque territory, whichisn't just limited to Spain, by
the way, it does go into Franceas well.
Then you've got Catalans on theright.
(06:56):
Everyone knows, or a lot ofpeople know about Barcelona.
Okay, well, that's Catalonia thecapital.
I believe the capital capitalcities.
Aren't always what you think.
It's very easy to get trickedlike Canberra in Australia, not
Sydney.
Um, but Barcelona in Cataloniaand the Catalans speak Catalan.
(07:17):
They don't speak Spanish.
Well, they probably speakSpanish as well, but Katelyn is
their language.
And for the Basque people,Basque is their language and
they have a cultural and aheritage and an identity around
that.
And if you read a little bit ofhistory, at least about the
(07:38):
Basques, I don't know too muchabout the Catalans.
You're going to find some, Idon't know, uh, interesting
things that happened in the nottoo distant past that prove to
you just how distinct it is and,and how amazing it is that Spain
is a single country in a singleentity.
Um, then you go to the southwhere you have under Lucia.
(08:00):
You've also got Valencia with, Ithink, do they speak Valenciano
there?
I'm not entirely certain, to behonest, that might be just sort
of closer to a dialect ofSpanish than an entirely
separate language.
One of the problems with livingsomewhere as a foreigner is it
is a little bit easier to hangout with foreigners.
And sometimes we fall into thattrap.
(08:21):
So when I lived in Valencia, I'mnot certain that I had the most
correct Valencia experience,although I loved it there.
And then of course, you've gotMadrid, which is a separate
entity all to itself.
It's like Paris in France or NewYork in America.
I don't really find it a goodrepresentation of the country.
(08:44):
It's kind of got its own littledistinct thing going on there
and all trains, by the way, gothrough Madrid.
It's a very, very, very annoyingto have to go so far out of your
way to get where you're going.
And, oh my gosh, I can't believeI almost forgot this one.
I don't think this is Basque,but I met a girl in London when
I was staying in a hostel there.
(09:06):
One of the coolest people I'vemet and she plays the bagpipes.
She lives in the far leftNorthwest side of Spain.
I think it's north, it's atleast the west side of Spain.
And yeah, I think it's, maybeit's on the Atlantic.
I don't know.
I'm going to have to look at amap, actually.
Let me see.
(09:27):
And she plays the bagpipes andher favorite music.
Yes.
So I think it's above Portugaland her favorite music is music
with bagpipes in it becauseapparently I don't know if it
was the Scots or if it wasNordic people who came through
Scotland and then came downthere.
But at some point in history,people that played the bagpipes
(09:50):
made their way down to Spain andwhere she's from born and
raised, bagpipes are a bigthing.
They, how cool is that?
That's so crazy and unexpected.
You know, when people think ofSpain, they think of topless
women on beaches, which by theway, when I was 16 and I was on
the beach for the first time,seeing that, not the first time
(10:11):
on the beach, but the first timeseeing that, oh my God.
Yeah.
Uh, it was, it was amazing.
We should, we should adopt thatpart of the culture into the U S
um, so they think of that.
They think of running with thebulls.
They think of those things.
They don't think of a girlplaying bagpipes.
(10:32):
So it's amazing to me today thatit is its own country and people
in Catalonia are still trying toseparate.
There are some very recent,interesting history where they
made an attempt to do that.
And it wasn't, I'm not going tomake a comment on it.
The problem with having friendsin every place now is that it's
(10:53):
very easy to, well, no, no, no.
I said that I'm making thispodcast to be more free with
what I say.
I think it's that the Catalanstried to become independent.
And I think it's veryinteresting and ironic that a
lot of your, so then I don'tknow the full thing, but some of
the leaders went to, I think,Brussels and were arrested
(11:15):
there.
Um, I think it's veryinteresting that Europeans talk
a lot about support for thefreedom and the independence of
this group of people and howthey should be able to choose
their own destiny and not beforced to do this because of
some leader in another citytells them they have to live
(11:37):
their life like this.
Yes.
I believe in freedom.
The freedom to choose thefreedom to be yourself.
Oh, but yeah, totally not.
If you want to like break offfrom the country.
No, no, no, no, you can't bethat free.
Just like, like we can be asfree as I, um, as it's pretty
much okay with me, but I likeBarcelona.
I want to go there.
(11:57):
I don't want to have to gothrough a border.
It could be difficult.
Like, so definitely don't breakfree.
Definitely.
Don't don't don't ever actuallybecome independent, but, but be
free.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Freedom, freedom.
Anyway, there is a, maybe sinceI'm on a tangent, I'm going to
say maybe a good way tocharacterize a lot of European
(12:19):
attitudes is hypocrisy.
And I tried to have a discussionwith a girl who has a philosophy
degree from Oxford about, um,just the notion of being able.
Self-determination being able todetermine if you want to be a
part of this country or not.
And it was interesting.
(12:41):
Um, she was unable to have thediscussion because apparently in
Oxford, they are unable toremove their emotions and talk
about principles and just thephilosophical idea of
self-determination.
They can't do that.
I don't know if she really wentto Oxford, but she mentioned it
(13:02):
a lot to everybody and it wasvery annoying about it.
Um, but she broke down very,very quickly when confronted
with just the notion of, okay, Iknow that you don't want them to
be separate, but let's talkabout the idea of you actually,
like if his whole region wantsto be separate, you know, the
principal, do you believe thatthey should be able to choose
(13:22):
their future or someone inanother city should tell them,
no, you don't get to separateyourself from me.
You have to stay under mycontrol.
That's an interestingdiscussion.
And I think that talking aboutthe principle of the ability to
do that should be separated fromthe talk of, is it a good idea
(13:45):
to do it or a bad idea to do it?
There are two separate things,and I'm not even going to
mention the UK because peoplecan't take their emotions out of
that discussion.
They just talk about politicalthings.
And I say, listen, I don't knowany politics about it, but I
think it's cool that people getto at least determine their
(14:05):
future.
I don't know if it's going to begood or bad, but I'm cool with
the principal.
Um, but if every region inEurope followed this, so let's
go to the UK.
Now it would be ratherinteresting.
And one of my interestingexperiences in the UK is I was
in London, in a hostel there anda very, very, uh, social in that
(14:27):
hostel.
And it was very, it was a verygood, hostile experience.
Every time I was there, exceptfor one, I met some really cool
girls from Wales and theyinvited me to go and stay with
them one weekend and they weregoing to show me around Cardiff
and I'm thinking, okay, thesegirls are cool.
We had a great night hanging outtogether.
(14:48):
We were part of a real fungroup.
And so I go there and I get offthe bus.
And the first thing that Inotice is a word, a word on a
sign that seems to have had allof its vowels removed.
And then all of the continentsmultiplied by five.
It was the longest word I'd everseen, even longer than German
(15:11):
words.
And there were no vowels in it.
And I very quickly learned thata Wales has its own language and
it is spoken.
It is written and it is a live.
And this girl named pheonlovely, lovely friend of the
girl who invited me there.
(15:31):
She spoke it fluently.
She spoke it with her family.
She spoke it with her friends.
Not everybody spoke it, but shespoke it fluently.
And it was one of the coolestthings I've ever seen.
Just completely not expectingit.
Having done no research, justthinking, oh yeah, this island,
everyone on it just speaksEnglish.
It's always, they've always justspoken English of course,
(15:52):
because look at all of the landsthat have come from there that
now speak English.
So of course their entire tinylittle island, it speaks
English.
And then I get to Wales and theyspeak Welsh.
Oh, it was so fun.
I loved Cardiff.
You know, I spent, I think atotal of two years living in
(16:15):
London and I almost regret thatnow London's great fun.
But every time that I go outsideof London, I'm just meet so many
great, amazing people.
And when I travel, I meet somany great, amazing people from
all over the UK.
And so I really want to travelaround there more when you go to
Scotland, they have their ownlanguage there as well, but hell
(16:35):
half the time, you wouldn't evenknow it because you can't
understand what they say inEnglish.
I want to do like a languagesegment where I bring people on
and, and try to learn somephrases.
And, uh, I think in Scotland, itis garlic, not Gaelic.
(16:56):
And in Ireland they speakGaelic.
Not garlic.
I don't recall it's it soundsvery similar to me, but they're
different apparently.
Um, Ireland is anotherinteresting one, but not as
interesting as that, becauseit's pretty much, you know, you
don't have as many differencesas Wales and Scotland and there
(17:17):
you've got Gaelic or garlic andEnglish, but it is a spoken
language and all the teachers inIreland, they have to speak it.
And it's a really cool when youhear them speak it.
I think it sounds like some sortof leprechauns going to steal
your gold when they speak it toyou.
It's really, really cool.
You go to Belgium and therethey've got French and Flemish
(17:39):
and Flemish is great.
I love Flemish, like other thanromance.
It's what I'd imagine.
Some mountain trolls would andthe French Belgians, they really
look down on the FlemishBelgians, which is funny because
when everyone visits Belgium,they just want to go to the
Flemish parts.
(18:00):
So there you have, all of these,these language is I would say a
function of culture and aspectof culture.
And it's, it's interesting tothink about that and talk about
that.
As in some languages, you havewords for things you don't have
in other languages.
So I think that maybe it's thebest example of a society that
(18:22):
has many different culturesinside of it.
So Belgium, isn't just Belgium.
It's what is it?
Wallonia and something else Idon't recall.
And I'm not going to look it upnow.
Um, but every one of thesecountries has distinct
different, large chunks of itthat don't necessarily think the
(18:44):
same way as the other part ofthe country.
And they have managed to stillremain a country.
Now, if you look throughhistory, it makes sense how they
can have so many differentcultures because the borders
weren't always what they are forso long.
But I am, I am really amazedthat there hasn't been, you
(19:06):
know, world war three and evenworld war four, maybe it all
just comes down to money at theend of the day, because so much
of Europe is just so different.
So much more than it looks likeon a map where you just see
these big borders and you don'trealize that there are many,
many, many small ones inbetween.
(19:26):
I mean, in the UK on an evensmaller level, you go to a
different city and they have adifferent accent.
I think in the U S you have togo like a thousand miles to get
a different accent or something.
You have to go a very longdistance to get a different
accent.
I have often described Europe asa candy shop.
(19:48):
You get lots of little flavorsjammed together on a shelf, and
you can just go and sample allthese fun little flavors in one
place.
And it's really, really fun andreally interesting.
I'm going to leave the Nordiccountries out of this discussion
for obvious reasons if you'vebeen there.
(20:10):
Although I love them, especiallyFinland, Finnish people are
super cool by the way.
Um, let me see if there'sanything else I wanted to say
specifically, because now I wantto talk about Finnish people.
Oh, okay.
I want to mention, uh, one of myfavorite things about
Switzerland, that it seems likea lot of people don't know.
(20:32):
Yes, Switzerland, a lot ofpeople know has multiple
languages and has multiplecultures, these cultures, by the
way, they don't actually mix asmuch as people think you've got
the French in Geneva.
You've got Germans.
Zurich, I believe is the centerof that one.
Baron is a very interesting cityby the way, as well.
(20:52):
And you've got the Italians inthe south and you also have one
more.
So Switzerland has four nationallanguages, French, German,
Italian, and Roe munch.
Not to mention the dialects.
A lot of people know about SwissGerman.
(21:14):
[inaudible], it's a very, it's avery weird, um, I don't know,
not weird.
It's a funny dialect.
And sometimes they think thatyou can't understand them if you
speak German.
And, uh, that has led to someinteresting mistakes on their
part.
I would say recently involvingme, but yeah, Switzerland has
(21:35):
four languages and the languagesof the trolls and the mountain
that keep all the gold, by theway, that's definitely a real
munch.
The other week, I was actuallyable to learn how to say tree in
roll munch.
I've completely forgotten it,but I was very proud of myself
for that evening.
And I think, uh, three or fourbeers later, I had successfully
forgotten what had made me soproud three or four beers before
(21:58):
that.
So, so cheers to at leastremembering that, uh, you
learned it at one point, but nowthat it got me thinking about
Finland, I do want to talk alittle bit about Finland.
I love Finnish people.
They are so awesome.
And they are, what do I say?
(22:22):
What do I say?
Um, I'm not worried about what Isay, but I'm just thinking like,
are they an extreme version ofthe lack of emotional
intelligence that you get thefarther north, you go in
Germany, maybe I'd have toexclude Hamburg from that, by
the way, um, or Russia, or theyare very cold and very matter of
(22:53):
fact, and very straight forwardand very non-confrontational
very non-confrontational.
I mean, I remember I was upthere.
I've got so many stories to tellyou at some point, this isn't
the point, but this one I'mgoing to tell you, I'm in a
supermarket with a friend, thelocal friend in the middle of
Finland, not in Helsinki.
(23:14):
The friend is from there.
And there are three peoplestanding across an aisle in a
very big store.
And they're all looking in theother direction.
And my friend and I let myfriend walk a little bit in
front of me.
She just walks up behind thatgroup and just stands there.
Doesn't say anything.
Doesn't say, pardon me?
It doesn't say, excuse me, itdoesn't tap anyone on the
(23:36):
shoulder.
Doesn't make any noise to lether presence be known.
And the other people, somehowdon't notice that a human being
is behind them.
They just stand there.
I let it remain like that for 30seconds thinking there's no way.
There's no way.
There's no way.
And then I just said, pardon me?
Could we just get through?
(23:57):
And of course the kindly moved,but my friend just, she was
never going to say anything.
I don't know how long she wasgoing to stand there.
I mean, they they're used to notmoving much and very cold winter
is when they get snowed in, Iguess.
So I don't know.
I don't know a great person, bythe way, I'll tell you lots of
stories about her much, much,much, much later.
(24:19):
Um, but then so th there arenon-confrontational, they don't
let that much out there, notthat emotional, but good.
God Saturday comes around.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Everything comes out.
All of the emotions, all of theenergy, all of the ferociousness
(24:42):
of that was bottled up in theweek is just a let out on
Saturday.
They're not, they're not aviolent, like, um, I'm British
people on a Tuesday evening, butthey just, they'll just open up
to you.
They'll cry, they'll laugh.
They'll take their clothes offand jump and fountains.
(25:04):
I mean, they'll do a lot of thevery public fountains in front
of other people when you're notexpecting it.
And aren't sure if you'resupposed to be embarrassed or
what's going on, just it's, it'samazing.
It's like a switch is flipped.
And, uh, that story didn't haveanything to do with, with what I
(25:25):
was talking about today, but Iwanted to say it because it's so
fun.
So the candy store of Europe isa, is a great place to be.
Yeah, I like that.
I'm going to end with that one.
Cheers to the candy store.
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