Austin 19th of America's snobbiest cities

[kermit_xc]

Originally Posted by austin-steve

I was going to post an "Oh brother" response but I did in fact encounter what I perceived to be a form of "snobbery" Wed night.

My 19 yo niece and her boyfriend are visiting Austin for 4th of July weekend, staying with my mom, from up in the smalltown hinterlands close to Oklahoma, so my wife and I along with my 20 and 17 yo daughters decided to take them out for a slice of the Austin vibe.

My wife drug us to some new eatery in the '04. First of all, it's not clear whether it's a sit-down restaurant, coffee shop or what. It has full size menus but you order at the register then go sit down. There were six of us and the only 6 seater table was occupied by an oblivious hipster on a Macbook, sitting alone, drinking something from a coffee cup, so we move some tables together ourselves. We were the only people in the place. The menu was sufficiently confusing, being some sort of Thai/Vegan place that also serves meat. But they don't call it meat.

When I bravely ordered first, the cashier asked "and which type of protein would you like on that?". I said, "like powder or something?" I was confused and her face betrayed annoyance. "No", she said, "chicken, beef, pork ,,, or tofu". "Oh", I said, "you mean meat", to which she responded "or tofu". I took the chicken.

For drinks, I asked for an Iced Tea, but they only serve the bottled beverages located in a display fridge, all of which were non-standard weird drinks, except for the bottled Cokes, and not even any bottled water. We all ended up drinking water from a little water station set up near the register, which was self-serve.

The food was so hot my nieces' bf had to go into the bathroom and rinse and spit several time. He came back sweating and his face was a little red. Welcome to Austin, dude. My stir fried rice with chicken (which they term 'protein') was hot, but I actually liked it, though it was over-flavored. I think it was hotter than most people would want, but ok with it. When mentioning how how it all was, the "waiter" said, "yes, that's how it's supposed to be". My wife and I looked at each other with "oh brother" faces. It's not supposed to be that hot. Even the "peanut" dressing was super spicy. I'm the only one who ate my entire meal.

Anyway, after we left I felt like I just departed a Portlandia skit. I would have to rate the snob factor very high in this case. Just one example, I know, but it didn't used to be this way.

FYI - we then all headed to Amy's on 5th where we experienced the opposite of snobbery. My niece agreed to try the icecream toss whereby she stands all the way on the other side of 5th street and the employee tosses a scoop which, if she catches in a plastic bowl, earns her a free ice cream. She did it and was ebullient about it. They don't do that up in her parts either.

Steve

All I can add is this video:
Sh*t Austinites Say - YouTube

[BatWing]

Every city has it's snobs. Even poor towns have snobs.

[AustinGuy]

The definition of "snobberry" in this list is sort of ridiculous. This is how it is determined: "ranked the nation’s cities by snob factor, looking at education, high-end shopping and cultural events, such as ballet and theater, as well as tech-savviness, eco-consciousness and coffeehouses."

That being said, you can make a good case that Austin is becoming a snobby place these days (using the real definition of snob), which I think would've been laughable to say even just 10 years ago.

[verybadgnome]

There are other parts of Texas that can be just as bad. I was just in Houston and attended a get together where the conversation went:

"So where are you from? To which I responded "Austin." Then he replied in a stern non-sarcastic tone "I'm sorry." [Silence]

Of course I really don't care what he thinks as I've been around the US and the world enough to know what I like and what I don't.