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We are back for another video. I would say
this is a B level intermediate English video.
Hopefully a natural conversation
between myself Camille and oh
Calvin. This is unscripted so, but whatever
let's get started you guys. This video is
about American culture. So a lot of people are
interested in American culture and their idea
of American culture comes probably from films
and series I would say, TV. Yeah. If you want
to learn real life English dialogues be sure to
check out my 31-day workshop. And I think a lot
of the films are filmed in like Los Angeles, New
York City, yeah maybe Chicago, yeah when people
think about visiting the US, they think oh I want
go to those big cities. I want to visit New York,
Miami, Las Vegas, LA, but America is huge and
has a lot of different cultures even within the
country. Like if you went to Hawaii or Alaska
South Carolina, New York, like the Midwest,
you would find different accents, foods, like
culture. So we don't know what's going to come out
in this video, what we're going to say, but we'll
tell you from our experience. You were born in,
Washington state, not Washington DC which is the
capital, they're very far from each other, yes
and I was born in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan,
but we both spent a lot of time in South Carolina,
which is where we met. Yes at Dunkin Donuts.
true story. Dunkin Donuts, love you. So I think,
what are some of the stereotypes of about the
US? Coming from Americans, like coming from
us? Either, coming from us, or the things that
we've heard? Yeah oh America is very patriotic,
which that's true. I pledge allegiance to the flag
flag of the United States... Yeah so basically
everybody every student in school has to do the
Pledge of Allegiance, at least I think we still
do it right? Maddox knows it. Yeah they still do
it in most schools. yeah so we do the Pledge of
Allegiance. 4th of July is one of the biggest
holidays in America, fireworks, barbecue, pool
party, pool party, you wear the stripes and stars,
red, white, and blue, and a lot of people hang the
American flag on their porch, their front porch,
it's out on their lawn. You'll see a lot of flags,
so America is pretty patriotic. Unless you're
in the south, you might see some rebel flags,
but that's a whole other story. That's true.
I think as well I'm I'm looking at my notes,
oh sports, so Americans love sports, and one
of our biggest sports is football, and I'm not
talking about soccer, I'm talking about American
football. Yeah you can share more, I mean you
went to Clemson University which was a pretty big
football school. Yeah I would say in some places
even high school football is huge, like Texas.
You have just crowds going to these high school
football games, and then you go to college and
it's almost on the level of professional football,
yeah and then you go to the professional football,
and it's like huge massive stadiums with tons and
tons of people. Yeah and yeah they're watching
the the old pig skin you know being thrown around.
Yeah even like Thanksgiving, I mean we have a
lot of holidays Thanksgiving is in November,
and most people watch football, there's a big
game on Thanksgiving Day, so after you eat way
too much food, you'll either go out and play
football in the yard, or you'll watch football
on TV as a tradition. Yeah it's true I think uh
that always reminds me of the Friends episode,
yes I'm sure if you've watched Friends uh you know
the episode where they're playing football. Yes
that is actually a pretty accurate picture I think
of American culture. yeah yeah yeah uh people,
a lot of people think about guns with America.
That's true, yeah I don't know if I should say,
but yeah I come from a gun family. I have never
owned a gun, I mean you have to have a specific
license even for hunting animals, like my dad
always hunted growing up, so he would shoot deer.
I am also a vegetarian, so I am like not really
on that page with guns and stuff. We've never
owned guns, but a lot of people we know own guns.
They're very proud of it, they think it's one of
our, well it is one of our rights I guess as an
American citizen. Yeah I think it's the second
amendment, yeah the right to bear arms. I grew up
with guns as well, we have a lot of guns, we had a
lot of guns, I guess, not here in Portugal, uh and
I actually even hunted animals and so yeah there's
there's kind of a leisure gun culture in America,
where you go shoot cans, you go shoot targets, uh
or you go shoot animals like deer, elk, squirrels,
birds yeah. So anyways yeah the the gun culture
is pretty big there uh I think there's some uh
unspoken sort of advantages to it, uh because
most of the talk about guns is always negative,
and there is definitely that reality too, the easy
access to guns, and the sort of violent culture,
um so yeah but that's a whole another video that
we won't go down today. Yeah we'll never make that
video probably. No. So also I think when you think
about American culture, maybe you think about
university life, I don't know, maybe not because
most people do go to college, and something that
is different about the US is that we leave our
families when we're young. So I left home right
after high school when I was 17, and I married
Calvin at 18, which that is not as common now,
but people do get married younger, have babies
younger, and they become more independent younger.
Like you're on your own at 18. Yeah basically like
we're kicking you out, you know go try and
live on your own and and create your own life
essentially which kind of is you know the the
spirit of America. Kairo, you can't be in here
playing with that stuff buddy, okay. We love you.
The reality of shooting with kids, yeah. So yeah
America came out of like leaving countries, you
know everybody are or many people are immigrants,
unless you're a Native American, and so there's
this kind of spirit of like, I can do this on
my own, you know this independent spirit right? So
it kind of is yeah an extension of that going out,
when you're 18 going to university, trying to
find out what you're going to do for the rest of
your life. Is the American Dream still possible
Camille? oh the American dream, I mean what is
the American dream? Because a lot of people are
shocked when they find out I'm American, but I'm
not living in the US, they don't understand it. In
their mind, the American dream is still possible.
If the American dream means opportunities, I think
yes, I think America has a lot of opportunities to
offer. um what is the American dream though? I
think the American dream was that you could come
to America, or if you are already in America and
move up into a a more higher class, more quality
of life living, and in other countries this
wasn't necessarily possible. So if you were poor,
you would always be poor, you know and so what
America offered and maybe still offers is this
idea that we can with enough hard work, you can be
successful, you can improve your quality of life,
and I mean personally I think it does still exist,
but uh you know as an immigrant, it can be hard.
It just depends on on so many factors, luck or
uh where you live, where you're coming from,
all those things factor into it. But if you
want to take the risk, go for it. I guess you
know you only have this one life, yeah you know
do it legally of course, yeah I mean for us our
dream isn't to live in America, I don't think. Our
dream? No yeah we have a international dream. Yes
okay um some funny things that I've heard people
comment on, like why do Americans wear shoes in
the house? And it is true, I mean he has slippers
on, these floors are freezing. But we usually do
wear shoes in the house, I mean not every single
American, but I think it's pretty common. We don't
even think twice, we'll walk through our house
with our shoes on. Yes another funny thing about
our culture is this happens even with Calvin's
parents, sometimes people say goodbye without
even saying goodbye. They just leave. You know In
some cultures it takes forever to say goodbye. In
Turkish culture you're like bye bye like you say
goodbye for like 5 minutes. In American culture
we're just like, see you, see you like to a whole
group of people, we don't go individually kiss
their cheeks or anything like that, we're just
like okay guys I'm leaving bye. Maybe a high five,
maybe a hug, but that's it, yeah or like I
said some people leave without saying anything,
and then you're like hey where'd they go? You just
hear the door slam and they yeah what happened?
It doesn't mean something's bad or they didn't
like their visit, it's just part of the culture,
it's maybe different, but it is what it is. A lot
of people I've talked to, uh especially coming
from uh Muslim backgrounds or Muslim countries,
they associate America with Christianity. Like
everything that America produces because it's a
Christian Nation represents Christianity, and this
is obviously not true but it's just kind of one of
those interesting things that happens, and I'm I'm
constantly correcting people saying no America,
maybe there was some Christian values that
were um that America was founded on, but it has
shifted so much over the 300 years of existence,
to be much more of a secular country. uh you
can find a lot of Christians still in America,
I would say it is the majority faith, but uh
culture-wise what's coming out of Hollywood, does
not represent Christianity. So also, something
about American culture is I would say the majority
of Americans don't maybe know geography so well,
or I feel bad saying that, or also like most,
this obviously isn't everyone, but most people
don't learn other languages as well. So those are
a couple things that are true probably, because
English is a universal language, they don't have
to learn. It's not enforced in the the school
system, and so a lot of people don't know where
a lot of countries are, or much about language
learning. If you look at America geographically,
you have Canada to the north, which they speak
English and French, uh but mostly English and
then you have like Mexico to the South, and you
know those countries. It's not like Americans
are going there to to like get a better life or
to learn Spanish you know, in general. And so so
yeah the need is not like Europe, where you're
by France, you're talking you know like Italian,
you have Spanish you have Portuguese, English,
German, you know Dutch, all these different
languages in in basically the size of half of
the United States. So it's a huge country and
all of us speak English you know, so why do we
need to speak any other language I guess would
be the sort of reasoning. However, we encourage
everyone to learn a language. Exactly, we love
languages and we think geography is important,
language uh helps you connect with cultures,
and helps you understand people. yeah and
honestly breaks down our own preconceived ideas,
like you right now listening to us talk about
America, you're learning uh and maybe there's new
things that will shift how you view America and
Americans because of it. mhm yeah and of course
it's hard to think about culture and not talk
about food. I would say that in the south there's
some specialties with food, you know shrimp and
grits and okra and sweet tea, and there's like
a food culture that comes from the south. As far
as the rest of the nation, I don't know what the
food culture is. Yeah I think there's certain
uh dishes or like sandwiches, certain things
in different regions like Chicago's known for I
think like deep dish pizza. True and like isn't is
it New York or is it the Philly cheese steaks, oh
Philadelphia, we don't know I'm just shooting off
the top of my head. Philly cheese steaks, like a
sandwich with like beef I think, and cheese. Never
tried it I don't eat meat. I've had it and it's
good. Okay um yeah so each region uh has their own
specialties. I think barbecue, oh that's true you
know the American barbecue is very distinct like
if you compare it with like Brazilian barbecue or
Argentinian barbecue, like it can be more simple
in a way, but you know a lot more burgers and hot
dogs, but also you can do ribs or you know there's
a number of things. And we're very thankful for
the other cultures that have come in and opened
up restaurants and exposed us to different
types of food from all around the world like,
we love Thai food, Indian food, Japanese food uh
we love so many different types of food because of
restaurants that have come into the United States,
and given us the opportunity to experience them.
Yeah I would say that is one of the beauties
of America, is that it is a melting pot. You
can find almost any culture there, any country
represented there and we get a try the foods which
is our favorite thing. Yes we're foodies, we love
to eat. Thank you for your food people. I think
even though there's more things that we could
cover, I think we covered a lot, I think this
video could be getting a little long, so we're
going to go ahead and end this video. Let us know
if you are still curious about things, maybe you
have a stereotype and you want to know and we'll
try to answer in the comments. Thank you or a part
two video, that's true, we could do that as well.
Let us know what you guys want, if you want to
hear more about American culture, we always love
to hear from you in the comments. Thank you so
much for watching and we'll see you next time.
Bye
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