I recently moved to the USA, from the middle east. My English is pretty good, and I don’t have a lot of trouble communicating with people at work or in stores. I also don’t know anyone here at all, outside of work. All my family is still back in Gaza, and I’ve been here over a year now, and still feel cut off from American people and culture.
How do you make friends and socialize here? How do I learn more about America and Americans culture? I know a bit about history, but not much about anything else.
I don’t drink or go to bars, for religious reasons. I have joined a couple of clubs based on hobbies, but still feel disconnected. I’m not sure how you socialize or meet new people here, in my family everyone came around your house all the times of the day, and here it seems like neighbors just stick to themselves. I don’t want to bug people or anoy them if that is not the customs here.
Also, what are your favorite parts of American culture and history? So far I have enjoyed Nascar and monster trucks very much, and studying mathematics.
If you figure it out, let us know. My kids keep asking me the same thing. I dont know how to do that now because things have changed so much since I was young and meeting people.
It is very sad for me too see this. America was always held up as an example to me, as a giant melting pot of different cultures and classes, where women and queer and minority people and everyone could be friends alongside everyone. I don’t know what changed , or if that was just a dream. It seems like people just stick with the people and cultures they know and grew up with here, for the most part. Still much better rights for me than in Gaza, maybe it just " grass is perfect on the other side of fence, until you get there." kind of thing.
There has been a decline in third places. There was a decline before the pandemic but the pandemic made it worse. Here’s an article about the decline in America specifically and the newer ways people are trying to connect. It won’t help you make more friends, but will help get perspective of one of the reasons things have changed.
It used to be like that. The last 25 years have changed this country drastically, and not for the better. It’s been really sad to watch this great nation crumble from the inside out.
Parks, bars, book stores, stores that cater to your hobbies, and staying with events until the introverts are more confortable talking.
If you’re hobby can be done alone and people are going to meet ups, then they’re hoping for connections, too. They may just want to make sure you’re not a random.
Coffee can take the place of alcohol as a adjusted experience, if that works for you.
Chicago, IL is going to be a lot more segregated than somewhere in California, or Southern Texas. There are so many mixed ethnicities that it becomes a non-issue and everyone blends together. It’s less prevalent as you move further north, since Caucasian becomes a heavy majority and there are far fewer groups of other ethnicities.
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Maybe you fell for the propaganda. My friends group consists of native Americans, Eastern Indians, BPOC, Mexicans, Chinese, SE Asians, and Caucasian.
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If you are not aware, the Gaza strip is an active warzone between terrorists on Israeli and Palestinian side, with my native people caught in the middle.
Yes people suck, but even a land with some rude people and casual racism can be held up as an example of people trying to work together.
Based on your other comments, it’s clear that your view of the world is based on the path you have walked so far, and the narrow stretch of ground you have tread on. Maybe your rich overlords hid the existence of the rest of the world from you, but some of us have been living there.
Fortunately, you have many more steps left to walk, and time to consider the ground your neighbors have been walking on as well. Go, walk with empathy, watch the world and judge it with kindness, and build your heart with room for others in it.
They are letting the idea of perfection be the enemy of betterment.
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No, perfection is just an idea. Betterment is on you, if you want it. I want it, so I make it happen, in whatever contexts I have power to do so in.
It is very funny to me when young Americans complain about rich people. Almost all of you have a few solid meals a day, often hot food with meat. You have clean water all over the place, and you can even waste it to flush toilets and make fountains. You drive expensive cars, ( yes, even the ones you call cheap,) buy new phones and computers. And then you complain that your air conditioned apartment could be a mansion, that your car could be a Ferrari, that your stable, clean job of sitting at a computer could just be you sitting at home. That you college degree you bought cost too much, and no one told you it took money to get fair treatment. All because those rich people above you don’t care about you and just want to make money for themselves. So far this is the main thing I do not like about the USA.
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I’m not saying you are evil or uncaring. You just don’t have and sense of how rich you are, and how much closer you are to billionaires that you think. Yes, money wise you don’t have a billion dollars, I know. But most lower middle class people in the US would be considered top 2 percent in areas with actual poverty. Even in the phase paycheck to paycheck, it’s implied that you know your paycheck will be enough to buy some very basic food and shelter, and that there is basic food and shelter to buy at all.
Think about a city of millions of people, where the vast majority of them live like your homeless people do, in makeshift shelters and harsh weather. Not sure if the city block they live on will be there when they get back at night, or if the tiny amount of money they earn will hod any value to a farmer, of if the farmer will even have any food. Then picture a handful of American houses there, and ask if they are “middle class”. I know things could be better for you, but things could be better for billionaires too, And I bet you laugh at them if they complain their private jet is to small.
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You are saying that all the evil and exploitation in America comes from the rich. My friend, by the standards of the world in general, you are the rich. What are doing to help the poor, and why do you expect the few richer than you to care more about you, than you care about my family in Gaza? Do you not think that your " rich overlords" say" yes and, so what" to your issues?
You want to fix America? I see two lessons from my life. “Eat the rich”, as you say, but not as a online joke or a metaphor. Messy and unstable, but if you survive you can be as rich as you want.
Or, you can use the wealth you have to build something better. Why do you play the game of isolation if you hate it? Are you the only one feeling isolated within an hour of you? Do you truly think that everything you buy is the minimum, or that the luxury you have is worth nothing?
This is one of the main points that is lost in American culture. Face fears. Take your life into your own hands, rather than talking about taking the lives of the people you deem to be the source of your problems.
You may not be to blame for your situation, but you are the one responsible for it.
Face fears. Find friends. Don’t Blake the rich, you are the rich. Live sustainably with what you have.
You’ve got the right idea, friend.
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Well said.