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C | Things in your house | Bathroom | Telephone | Climate | ||
NORTH AMERICA | ||||||
U | You probably own a telephone and a TV. Your place is heated in the winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. | A bathroom may not have a bathtub in it, but it certainly has a toilet. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. You've left a message at the beep. |
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A | You probably own a telephone, a computer, and a TV. Your place is definitely heated in the winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. | A bathroom may not have a bathtub in it, but it certainly has a toilet. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. You've left a message at the beep. | Your state has four seasons, but you define them in very different ways from other Americans. They are summer, fall, winter, and breakup. Summer lasts about three months, fall is around six weeks long and starts in late August, winter goes until April, and breakup fills in the remaining gap of time. Breakup is the only point at which you would dare say that your state looks unflattering; the snow melts and reveals all the trash that has accumulated during the winter, the trees have not budded yet, and large mud puddles form everywhere from the runoff (schools try to keep the kids out of them during recess, to no avail). Every other season is pleasant enough in its own way, though you get sick of the winter after about February and cherish "signs of spring" (which is just breakup viewed in a pleasant light). As a corollary of your experience of seasons, you think that the official definitions of them (March 21, June 21, September 21, and December 21) are absolutely silly. You are used to having at least 20 hours of daylight in the summer, and think that the long hours of darkness in winter are more than worth it. Summer is the time to get out and do stuff; who would want darkness to fall at 9:00 PM? If you vacation in the Lower 48 in the summer, you are amazed and frustrated at how dark it gets - even when the summer sun sets in Alaska, twilight lingers for long hours, so that it never truly gets dark. For some reason, Alaska still observes Daylight Savings Time in spite of this. You probably think this is inconvenient and stupid, but nothing ever gets done about it. Besides, all that winter darkness can't be bad, because you get to see the Northern Lights. You define "a lack of snow" as less than a foot or so. And of course, the only real kind of snow is powder snow, and lots of it. You find the idea of schools down south closing when a few inches have fallen hilarious. Every single major highway in Alaska has to have patchwork done on some part of it every year, because the roads wear down so fast from the harsh weather and frost heaves. Restriping is also commonly done due to snow cover wearing away at the paint. You consider yourself more aware of your vulnerability to the power of nature - you might know of someone who has died in a plane crash or avalanche - and thus more respectful of it, than most other Americans. You probably also fancy the notion that you're tougher than them. | ||
L | If you don't already own your own home, you worry that you may never be able to afford it and will be renting forever (median price is over $400,000; special "affordable" housing starts at over $200,000 - if you're lucky enough to get it). And even renting is becoming too expensive, prompting many people to move away. If you do own a home, you may resent all the people in your neighborhood who are renting theirs. There's a growing homeless population, but you pretend to be unaware of it. | If a bathroom does not have a bathtub or shower in it you might call it a half-bath but never a water closet. | The prolification of cellular phones, faxes, and second telephone lines in houses and offices has used up all the available telephone numbers prompting the phone company to give Suffolk County (the eastern half of LI) a new area code. | Summer is too hot; winter is too cold. You don't have to worry about earthquakes, floods, tornadoes, blizzards, or volcanos like other parts of the country, and, by the time hurricanes get up here, they've usually weakened enough so that only people who live very near the coast need to worry. However, in the last couple of years, this seems to be changing, and storms are getting worse. | ||
L | Owning a house is the norm. Only if you cannot afford a house would you live in an apartment or a trailor. You own at least one TV and one telephone. Getting another of each is not difficult or unusual. Your house is heated in the "winter" and (generally) air conditioned in the summer. You do your laundry in a machine. You know those big roaches can fly, but you're able to sleep at night. | A bathroom may not have a tub in it, but it certainly has a toilet. | Getting another telephone is not difficult or unusual. | A summer temperature of 100°+ F is not unusual, but going longer than a couple of weeks without rain is very unusual. Temperatures below freezing are considered obscenely cold. School is cancelled if it snows. A relative humidity of 100% is common. Volcanoes and earthquakes are best left to other states and countries; hurricanes and flash floods are enough for you. The floor of a house is often elevated 2-4 feet above the ground. Many new houses are built lower and as a result suffer more damage when it floods. Your burial plot is often six feet over rather than six feet under. In certain areas it is unwise to bury coffins because they tend to float. | ||
T | Owning a house when you grow up is what you expect as a matter of course, not something you just wish for. Given the choice of whether you'd rather have a better heater or a better air conditioning system, obviously, you'd take the air conditioner. (Why would anyone want more heat?) |
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| A summer temperature of over 100 degrees F (about 38 degrees C) is not a strange occurrence, and is in fact quite routine. But you probably also see your share of torrential downpours. You leave natural disasters like volcanic eruptions and earthquakes for other states to deal with -- you have your own worries about tornadoes (if you live in the north), hurricanes (along the coast), or floods (just about everywhere). | ||
C | You own a telephone and a television. Your place is heated in the winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. | A bathroom may not have a bathtub, but it definitely has a toilet. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. You've left a message at the beep. | Winters are usually very very cold and summers are usually very very hot, but it varies because of the size of the country (it just rains a lot in some places). | ||
B | You own a telephone, a TV, and likely a computer. Your place is heated in the winter and has more than one bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine, usually in your own home. You don't have a dirt floor. You know what a toque is and you often wear one. You are resigned to the fact that Americans think you live in an igloo and travel by dogsled. | You say you’re "going to the washroom" when you head for the toilet. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. You've left a message at the beep, and attached family photos to your email. | You talk about the weather with strangers and friends alike. You've taken your kids trick-or-treating in a blizzard, and their Halloween costumes are designed to fit over a snowsuit. Western Canadians complain about rain, not snow, in the winter. | ||
O |
| You can use the word "washroom" interchangeably with "bathroom." |
| Because of the Great Lakes the southern part of the province gets a lot of thunderstorms in the summer, and can get huge snowfalls in the winter. In the north it's cooler in the summer and much colder in the winter. You think something is not quite right with the world if there is no snow by December, but in the north it can come much much earlier than that. The military may also help clean up snow in Toronto (if Toronto whines loudly enough). | ||
Q | You probably have cable TV, a phone that works, indoor plumbing and other amenities common to industrialized societies. You don't have a dirt floor. Your place might not have AC, but it is heated in the winter. | Bathrooms have toilets in them, and most likely a bath or at least a shower. | You've left a message at the beep, and used email. |
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LATIN AMERICA | ||||||
B | If you're middle class or up (about 50-70 million people), you have telephone, TV and VCR, and one or more bathrooms at your place. You don't need heating and may not have air conditioning. You pay someone to do your laundry and other household chores like cleaning and cooking. You're quite fastidious about neatness: your house is very clean and you take one or (during summer) more showers a day. | A bathroom almost always has a bathtub as well as a toilet. | Telephones are problematic. To get a new phone is difficult and expensive. You've just brought a new answering machine from New York. | There are only two seasons: hot-and-humid (6-month summer) and moderate. | ||
C | You probably own a telephone and a TV set. Even poor people have TV sets. You don't heat your place at winter, in fact, there is no winter. Your place has its own bathroom. You do your laundry either by hand or in a machine, depending on your resources, but most probably you do it at home. You probably don't have a dirt floor. | A bathroom does not usually bathtub in it, it might have a shower, but it certainly has a toilet. | You expect that the phones will work, but if they don't you don't expect them to be repaired quickly. Getting a new phone is becoming easier. Cellular phones are also easy to get, but air-time is costly. You don't leave messages at the beep. Machines are not meant to be talked to. | There is no winter, so you call "invierno" (winter) the rainy season. Probably in Bogotá or in other places above 2000 meters over sea level, you will need heating at night but usually an extra blanket will do the job. Temperature does not depend on yearly seasons. Tunja is always cold, Medellín is always warm and Barrancabermeja is always hot. A small variation is introduced by rainy and sunny seasons. In warm places, some cooling is needed but Hotels often overreact. | ||
M | You probably have cable/satellite TV and computer w/Internet and dial-up connection. Your place has its own bathroom (unless you're indeed poor). You most often do your laundry in a machine. You probably don't have a dirt floor. | A bathroom most often doesn't have a bathtub in it but it does have a toilet. Most have a shower instead of bathtub. The rich ones have at least a jacuzzi. | You probably have a phone, often a cell phone. You expect, obviously, that phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. It's not very common to have a pager. | Your place is never heated in the rather temperate winter, is cooled in the hot springtime. | ||
EUROPE | ||||||
A | You most probably own a land-line telephone, at least one mobile telephone (which you sometimes forget to turn off when you're in cinema, at a funeral, or taking an exam) and a TV. Your place is heated in the winter and has its own bathroom and toilet. You do your laundry in a machine (front-loading), but you probably don't use a dryer. You don't have a dirt floor (unless you're a student, then you may have a dirty floor). | A bathroom usually has either a shower or a bathtub in it. Toilets are often in a separate room. Toilet bowls aren't completely filled with water; the water comes when you flush. Toilet paper is thick, multi-layered, and soft, except in government offices and schools, where it's thick, multi-layered, and painfully scratchy, obviously in an attempt to discourage people from using valuable public resources excessively. There are no separate taps for hot and cold water, there's a device to mix it to just the right temperature, and you can easily drink from it. You will complain loudly when you encounter a British washbasin for the first time. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. Most new phones are mobile phones. You've left a message at the beep. It goes: "toot - toot - toot - toot". |
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F | Your place is heated in winter and has electricity, a TV, a bathroom and a toilet -- although your summer cottage might not have all of these. | A bathroom (kylpyhuone) is a room with a tub and/or a shower. Toilets are to be found in WC (Water Closet) or behind doors with more or less clearly identifiable male and female creatures. | If you are over 15 (or, in some circles, over 10, or over 8) and under 65, you have a cellular phone and you use it, all the time. The traditional telephones work, too, and getting a new phone is routine. You've left a message at the beep. You probably have an answering machine at home, or an automatic answering service (provided by your telephone company) connected to your phone. | Winters are always snowy (except on the south coast) but not VERY cold. The heating and other technical facilities work so that you wouldn't think of people really getting killed because of snow or cold weather. (Trains may be late, though.) | ||
F |
| A bathroom definitely does not have a toilet in it. Toilets are to be found in Toilettes or W.C. (Water Closet). | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. Getting a Minitel too (kind of a network terminal). You've left a message at the beep. |
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B | You own a telephone and a TV. Your place is heated in the winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. | A bathroom definitely does not have a toilet in it. Toilets are to be found in Toilettes or W.C. (Water Closet). | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. You've left a message at the beep. | It rains only two times a year : one time six months and one time five months. Winter storms are not uncommon. | ||
G | You probably own a telephone and a TV. Your place is heated in the winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. Speaking of houses: You know what people mean when they complain or make jokes about installing certain Swedish products. | A bathroom probably has a bathtub in it (at least in an ordinary house), and it certainly has a toilet. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. You've left a message at the beep. |
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G | You own a telephone and a TV. And a car. You possibly have a PC as well, although you don't know how to use it. You don't have a dirt floor. Your house is well-heated in the winter, and frozen in the summer because you've got air conditioning and you keep forgetting which is the 'power-off' button. Your mum does your laundry in a washing machine, up till your 30s. You 'll always be "her naughty little boy/girl", even if you are a pensioner. If you are over 50, it probably takes you 4-8 minutes to dress-- and you dress in an incredibly bad way-- though according to you, your outfit is a classic one. | A bathroom is the room where the bathtub, shower, and toilet is. Often times the washing machine is in there too. Next to the toilet you keep lots of newspapers and magazines, since you spend a great deal of educational time in there. | You expect that the phones will work-- and they do. However, depending on where you live, getting a new phone for your apartment could be tedious, like anything that involves bureaucracy. You probably own the latest model cellular telephone-- even if you don't really need one. | No volcanic eruptions or hurricanes in this country. On the other hand, earthquakes and floods are somewhat frequent. | ||
I | You own a telephone and a TV. Your place is heated in the winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. You are proud of Italian fashion designers. | A bathroom may have either a bathtub or a shower in it, and it certainly has a toilet and a bidet. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. You possibly have one or more mobile phone numbers. You've left a message at the beep. |
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N | You own a telephone and a TV. Your place is heated in the winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. | New houses have bathrooms with a toilet, old houses have separate toilets and bathrooms. A bathtub is not uncommon, but certainly not standard. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. You've left a message at the beep. |
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P | You probably own a telephone and a TV. Your place is heated in the winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. | A bathroom may not have a bathtub in it, but it certainly has a toilet. Sometimes the toilet is in a separate room. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work; it used to be different, and if you are over 20 you are very happy that it's changed. Getting a new phone takes a very long time, so many people buy mobile phones. You've left a message at the beep. You write SMS messages like crazy. |
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S | You certainly own a couple of telephones and TV sets. Your place is heated in the winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. | A bathroom may not have a bathtub in it: it could have a shower. It probably has a toilet. Otherwise a separate toilet/WC is brutally called by its actual name. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. It is probably a Finnish or Swedish cellphone you are getting these days. You have left a message at the beep once too often; you are bored with it and you are learning to send SMS. |
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E | You probably own a TV. Your place is heated in the winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. The last appliances you've bought came with plugs, but until a few years ago you had to hunt through the house for a plug whenever we got a new TV or something similar. | You usually refer to the smallest room as 'the toilet', or (if socially aspirant) 'the loo'. Cockneys (speakers of the famous/notorious London dialect) call it the 'khazi' for some reason, and 'bog' is a common colloquialism. You'll be understood if you call it the 'bathroom', but some people like to use that for the room (possibly separate) where you take a bath. | You probably own a telephone. You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. If over 50, you still haven't got used to answering machines. |
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Y | You probably own a telephone and a TV. Your place is heated in the winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. Only visitors generally use the front door - the household will use the back door. There is a saying that it's only proper to use the front door 3 times in your life, and you're carried all 3 times (When you are brought home as a baby, carried over the threshhold as a bride, and carried out in a box). | A bathroom may not have a bathtub in it, but it certainly has a toilet. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. If you are older and female, however, most communication will be through a network of gossip over the back fence with your neighbour. If over 50, you still haven't got used to answering machines. |
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S | You probably own at least one telephone and at least one TV, often as a combined deal with a cable or satellite company. Your place is heated in the winter. You do your washing in a machine or the local launderette. You don't have a dirt floor. If you're male and urban, you sometimes wear the kilt in public. Buying a house is safer than in England, since gazumping isn't done here; but you have to pay for several surveys. | Your place has its own bathroom, which has a bath or shower and certainly a toilet. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine, but expensive if you're with BT. You've left a message at the beep, or voicemail. | You consider a few hours of sunshine to be an event worthy of note or even celebration. You cheerfully put up with cold and wet weather which would frighten most people from warmer climes. It snows every winter, yet nobody in positions of authority ever seems to expect it, and there is consequently some disruption to essential services. You refer to the Scottish weather as "dreich" | ||
AUSTRALIA AND NEW ZEALAND | ||||||
A | You probably own a telephone and a TV. If it needs it, your place is heated in the winter, or maybe air-conditioned in the summer, with its own bathroom. You do your washing in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. | A bathroom, strangely enough, always has a bath in it. Toilets are usually in a separate room, and they're also usually indoors these days. There's no point in being indirect about it-- if you are going to the dunny, that's what you'll say. The Sydney 2000 Olympics was a wonderful opportunity to show the world that we do have flushing toilets. But everyone will forget about it within months. | You expect as a matter of course that the phone will work-- unless you live in the Bush, where the sell-off of Telstra is causing problems. You've left a message after the beep. | Snow is always a memorable and freakish occurrence. | ||
N | You own a telephone, a TV, and probably a car. Your place is heated in winter and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. | You usually refer to the smallest room as the "toilet". You understand a reference to the "bathroom", but would use that for the (possibly separate) room where you take a bath. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. You've left a message at the beep. |
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ASIA | ||||||
I | You probably do not own either a telephone or a TV. The masses have dirt floors. | The masses do not have bathrooms and do their thing in the open air. | You've never left a message at the beep. |
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C | You probably have a telephone and a TV at home. If you live in northern China, your place is heated in the winter, but it isn't if you are in the south. It has its own bathroom. Unless you live in a developed city, you do your laundry by hand, and no matter where you live, you hang it out to dry. Villas are built for wealthy men and foreigners. | A bathroom in a house has a good shower and a good toilet in it; the toilet in a public bathroom will quite likely be a hole in the ground with the ability to flush. | You will never leave a message at the beep. Most of the time, in fact, there is no beep. |
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J | You probably own a telephone and a TV. Your place is heated in the winter (unless you live in Okinawa), air-conditioned in the summer, and has its own bathroom. You do your laundry in a machine. You don't have a dirt floor. | A bathroom (basurûmu) always has a bathtub in it, but not necessarily a toilet. The toilet is more likely to be in a separate room called benjo, tearai, or toire. | You expect, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Getting a new phone is routine. You've left a message at the beep. | Being hit by a typhoon or two in late summer to early fall is nothing to be surprised about. | ||
AFRICA AND THE MIDDLE EAST | ||||||
N | A telephone and TV are good decorations to have around the house. They very rarely work! You do your laundry with your hands and soap and water |
| You don't expect phones to work, but that doesn't stop you from having two or more phones. You haven't left a message at the beep because you're trying to conserve money, and you really don't want him or her to know you've called. | The Harmattan (the dry, dusty wind that blows off the Sahara each year from November through March) signals a dramatic increase in crime rates. | ||
S | If you're an urban dweller, your house has all the usual rooms, complete with electricity and running water. If you're rural or live in a squatter camp (shanty town), it might not have all those things. Your house is not heated in winter nor air-conditioned in summer. When it gets really cold you might haul out your bar heater or oil heater and your entire family will sit huddled around it. When it gets hot in summer you just open all your windows and turn on a fan. | A bathroom will have a basin, bath or shower and a toilet. You refer to going to the toilet as "going to the bathroom." You don't use euphemisms to disguise your real purpose for going there. | At least one member of your family has a cellular phone. You also have a land line, and expect it to work. You're shocked when thieves steal the copper cables, but getting a new phone is routine. If they cut off your phone for some reason or other, however, it might take days for it to be fixed. You've left a message at the beep. You've left voicemail at the beep. | Winters are never snowy, except in the Drakensberg. If you've never been out of South Africa, you might never have seen snow in your life. If you have seen snow, you still talk about it with wonder. In the summer, you make sure to put on lots of sunblock because the African sun is brutal. | ||
I | You own a telephone, a TV, probably a computer, and most likely a cellphone. You don't have a dirt floor. Your place probably does not have central heating in the winter, but in certain parts of the country it is not necessary. In places like Jerusalem, where it gets cold in the winter, you will probably heat your home with space heaters. You probably have air conditioning, but not in Jerusalem, where the stone building is enough to keep the house relatively cool in the dry summer months. You do your laundry in a machine, and try to buy a washing machine at the duty-free shop in the airport on your way out of the country for a trip - no taxes. (They will hold it at the store until you return back to the country after your trip) | A bathroom has a shower and a toilet in it, and may have a bathtub. The sink may be located right outside the bathroom rather than inside it. Some bathrooms have only a toilet in them. | Phones usually work. Getting a new phone is now routine, although this is only in recent years. Several members of your household may have a cellphone, including the children. You feel it's important to be able to get in touch with friends and family at all times. |
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T | Your house is well-heated in the winter, but you fry in the summer because you don't have air conditioning. Your mum does your laundry in a washing machine. You are always overdressed, even when you go grocery shopping. | You have your own bathroom with western-style toilet. You do have a second, Turkish-style toilet in your apartment, but you shun at the idea of using it. | You expect that the phones will work-- and they do. However, depending on where you live, getting a new phone for your apartment could be tedious, like anything that involves bureaucracy. You probably own the latest model cellular telephone-- even if you don't really need one or can't afford the bills. |
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SUBCULTURES | ||||||
1 | The first generation migrant generally has all his worldly goods in a back-pack, roller travel-case, or corrugated sheet-metal trunk. Any of these contain a few clothes, a toilet bag with soap, toothpaste and a ratty toothbrush, some 'down or back-home' packaged food typical of his country of origin, and maybe a book or two. If you're an illegal, you've already thrown away your passport and other identity papers so that you cannot be deported to any given country and frequently have to be given the benefit of the doubt, a shrug and residence papers. You no longer have a dirt floor (unless you are a gypsy or new age traveller) though in the beginning you may well have to scavenge for open-air-market rejects to get through the end of the month until the next pay / social security / welfare check arrives. Your studio / hostel / hotel room is heated in the winter, either collectively or with a small portable radiator (and, failing that, you go to the library to read your native newspapers and try to keep warm at the taxpayer's expense), but probably not air-conditioned in the summer. It's possible you have your own bathroom, although in 'bed-sit land' you will almost certainly share all facilities. You do your laundry in a public laundromat until you get an appt. big enough to squeeze a machine in the cramped bathroom (with or without toilet). Once you have your own room/flat/apt/house then things really are looking up and you can buy a TV. You invest in a MW/LW/SW radio to pick up radio programmes from your home country's stations. | If you come from a developing country a bathroom, restroom, et al, can be something of a novelty . You don't really care if you both clean and empty yourself in the same room. However, once you start having children it is best to have separate rooms since young girls are famous for spending half their life behind a locked door while you are waiting outside to have a pee before going to work. Migrants from first world countries think of the problem in the same way as the local population. | You hope, as a matter of course, that the phones will work. Of course they do work ... but, as statisticians tell us that >50% of the world's population have never used a phone in their lives, and, given the state of the phone system in your country of origin, you can never be sure. You recognize that it is the best way of getting news of family and giving your own. Over time you will probably own a telephone. In the meantime, you use the cut-price stores that sell cheap-rate, long-distance phone time. You've left a message at the tone but since the voice mail was programmed for only 1 minute and your lack of fluency meant it took longer than that to leave the message, you didn't get enough time to leave your phone number so they can't call you back. | Once again, being hit by a typhoon or two is not very important since you probably come from a country that is subject to weather patterns of biblical proportions and a bit of snow in January / February is easy to cope with. |
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