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I have lived in New York city for three years and wanted to share my observations as a woman from Europe.
1. You can tell what social class people belong to based how they dress. Lower classes to middle class dress slobby to mediocre. While the upper classes generally dress very sharp. This is different from my country where people regardless of their social class take pride in their appearance. The exception seems to be trendy areas with a lot of young people or tourist like Manhattan or Brooklyn.
2. People here are very blunt and straight to the point. This made me happy because I cannot stand passive aggressive behavior, however sometimes a lot people use the excuse of being blunt to just be plain rude which I didn't appreciate. Despite the stereotypes I found New Yorkers to be very friendly and helpful generally but lack the patiences to deal with people who are a bit slow to grasp things.
3. People here are also very loud. Where I come from it's distasteful to want to bring attention to yourself, here people love to be the center of attention and drag everyone else into their drama. I have seen couples loudly argue on the subways, parents scream at their children in public and friends loudly having conversations about personal matters for everyone to hear.
4. There is a great diversity of races and people here. For the most part I never felt any racial tension and everyone seemed to get along. The only thing I notice, is while people for the most part are friendly, most people stick with their own race. I didn't recall seeing that many interracial relationships during my three years in New York.
5. The men here are too aggressive in their approach with women. I honestly thought the whole catcalling issue was exaggerated -boy was I wrong. I never in my life had to deal with so many creepy men making gross comments about my body, following me on my way home and trying to hit on me at inappropriate times. I don't know if men in New York are just clueless or always horny but it got ridiculous. I have counted several incidents of men masterbuating in front of me on the subway as a joke. Anytime I met a normal men who approached me with class they were almost always-gay, European, or a recent transplant from another state. Before you blame the way I dress for all this unwanted attention, let me tell you that I never showed off my body or wore tight/revealing clothes and I still got a lot of attention.
6. On another note, I found the women here to be a bit b*tchy and hard to make friend with. They seem to have chips on their shoulders or they are too stuck up to notice anyone around them. After seeing how the men here behave towards women, I can see why sooo many New York city women have this don't f*ck with me facial expression. That being said the New York city lady friends I did make are some of greatest women I have ever meet.
8. People here LOVE to swear. Everybody swears, from elderly ladies, to doctors, teachers, and thugs. I can't tell how shock I was at how casually people in my professional office setting used foul language to communicate with each others. IMO I am not stickler about cussing but sometimes excessive use of foul words can make you sound low class.
9. People here like to complain and dwell on the negative aspects of life too much. Sometimes I had to tell some of my New York friends to sit back and try to enjoy/appreciate the opportunity to live in one of the best imo cities and the world!
Finally I would like to say that people in New York are great to be around. I loved living in a city that actually felt like a big city. I enjoyed hustling aspect and being able to see/meet many different people everyday. This city has made me more mentally tough and I look forward to coming back in future but at last I must go back to Europe soon to take care of my family.
I have lived in New York city for three years and wanted to share my observations as a woman from Europe.
2. People here are very blunt and straight to the point. This made me happy because I cannot stand passive aggressive behavior, however sometimes a lot people use the excuse of being blunt to just be plain rude which I didn't appreciate. Despite the stereotypes I found New Yorkers to be very friendly and helpful generally but lack the patiences to deal with people who are a bit slow to grasp things.
I don't agree that NYers or Americans in general are blunt and straight to the point. But I do agree that NYers are much more friendly and helpful than what non-NYers think they are.
I don't agree that NYers or Americans in general are blunt and straight to the point. But I do agree that NYers are much more friendly and helpful than what non-NYers think they are.
Americans aren't terribly straight to the point. But I find New Yorkers are more so than other Americans.
I don't agree that NYers or Americans in general are blunt and straight to the point. But I do agree that NYers are much more friendly and helpful than what non-NYers think they are.
Agreed. I think that sometimes some individuals from the NYC metro (ie, certain well-to-do 'burbs) give all New Yorkers a bad name.
Europe is a big place with all kinds of people and behaviors. I think this is a troll thread. I've met a lot of sloppy rude people from Europe.
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