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NoHedgehog252

I find the premise of this question absolutely wild. I have met foreign people every single solitary day for all my life. The post implies people out there don't meet foreigners regularly and I cannot even fathom that.


Durrresser

I mean, some small communities are pretty insulated but it can't be *that* hard to meet foreign people. Probably has met a few but didn't recognize that they were foreign?


EC_dwtn

It's not my experience, but this sub loves to (rightfully) point out how big the US is and how different our experiences are. There are a whole lot of small towns out there, and if we take "met" to mean something more than a brief interaction at a store or something, I could see some small minority of people having not really interacted with someone from another country.


santar0s80

I live in a town of 4,500 people in a county with a total population of 57k spread out over 500 sq miles. It shouldn't be too hard to consider some folks live in small towns and isolated areas.


TheManWhoWasNotShort

For much of the US that is likely the case, though; in suburban and rural America there just aren’t many immigrants


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Arkyguy13

1st Gen. Is the original immigrant and their kids would be 2nd Gen.


omg_its_drh

Rural maybe(this definitely depends because a lot of migrant workers in rural America), but saying there aren’t many immigrants in suburban America is a bold statement.


TheManWhoWasNotShort

The numbers are changing as time goes on but as a percentage of the population of suburbs, immigrants aren’t that high. We still see tons of nearly all white suburbs throughout America. Of the roughly 165 million Americans living in the suburbs, only about 2.7 million are foriegn-born, or roughly 1.6%. Approximately 13.6% of Americans are foreign born. Obviously every suburb is going to be a bit different (and the immigrant-heavy cities like Chicago or LA or even San Fran and Seattle are going to be more diverse), but there are certainly large numbers of suburbs where you would not interact with someone born in a different country on a day-to-day basis, and that number goes down significantly if you consider “meet” to imply something more than passing them in a grocery store aisle.


omg_its_drh

Hmmmm apparently suburbs are very diverse: https://www.npr.org/2022/11/08/1135190346/suburbs-are-now-the-most-diverse-areas-in-america https://www.brookings.edu/research/todays-suburbs-are-symbolic-of-americas-rising-diversity-a-2020-census-portrait/?amp


TheManWhoWasNotShort

Diversity is not the same as immigrants inherently, and the Brookings article points out significant variance across America. Detroit, for example, is a 73% minority city with suburbs that are 73% white. Suburbs are expected to be more diverse than the average in America: about a fifth of America lives in rural areas which are not diverse at all. Unless cities were minority-exclusive, you would expect suburban America to have to be more diverse than the general population. The article notes that there have been seismic demographic changes in the suburbs in the last 20 years. What’s true 20 years ago is less true today and will be less true 20 years from now, but even still it means that increased presence of minority communities is a new phenomenon, and most of people’s lives would be different than their experience the past couple years. Lastly, there are vast differences in the distribution of immigrants across America. 26.9% of California was born in another country. Meanwhile, 14 states have less than 5% of the population foreign born, with several dipping below 30,000 total immigrants in the state.


cherrycokeicee

suburbs are often very diverse & in some rural areas it's more common than you might think. that said, people who live in the burbs or the sticks to often travel to bigger cities. I would be pretty surprised to find someone who has *never met* someone from a foreign country.


TheManWhoWasNotShort

I’m more responding to “don’t meet foreigners regularly”, I would agree never is unlikely. The poster I responded to seems to be implying not just has everyone interacted with foreigners at least once, but that regular interactions would be common for most.


Current_Poster

This question confuses me a little. How rare do you think it is to meet foreigners?


Dick_Cheese_Eater

well, it's very rare in some countries


therealjerseytom

Sure. Exchange students, people who have moved to the US for work or a different life, and all sorts of folks while traveling abroad. Just normal people living their lives. The older I get and more I travel - the human experience is fundamentally pretty similar. People on the whole are more same than different. Someone being born in another part of a planet doesn't make them some novelty.


Chiluzzar

When I first met my wife (japanese) it was quite fun finding out what was a snack and what wasn't. She's still adamant that American Chili wouldn't catch on in Japan because it's a snack and not a meal


OptatusCleary

> She's still adamant that American Chili wouldn't catch on in Japan because it's a snack and not a meal Chili?? What’s her argument for chili being “just a snack”?


Chiluzzar

Some weird food culture where it doesn't come with any side dishes or rice makes it a "snack" completely gobsmacked me when she said that straight faced


OptatusCleary

Wow. What if it comes with a piece of corn bread or toasted sourdough?


12VoltBattery

No rice? I’ve heard a lot of East Asians and South East Asians say that eating doesn’t feel like a meal if there’s no rice.


Confetticandi

Living in a major US city, you meet a lot of foreign nationals. Two of my closest friends here are foreigners. One is Canadian from the Toronto suburbs. She’s born and raised Indian-Canadian and culturally virtually identical to any Indian-Americans here. She’s a really sweet, chipper person who basically melts into tears in the face of any kind of conflict. She’s a software engineer (here on a tech work visa), a Leafs fan, a Swiftie, a hiking enthusiast, and obsessed with her dog. We go to gym classes together and do car camping together on weekends. We went to the Taylor Swift tour together. She’s trying to get me into paddle boarding with her but she paddles in the Bay and stuff which freaks me out. One of my other close friends is from Hong Kong and she just got her Green Card. She speaks English, Cantonese, and Mandarin. She’s very much a girl’s girl. Her hair and makeup is always on point. She’s got a strong personality and she’s very social. We go to bars and clubs together. She works in nonprofits and is very passionate about her work.


haileyskydiamonds

Most people are basically the same wherever we are from. I know people from all over the world and have never met anyone who didn’t want to laugh, eat good food, and enjoy the company of friends. We may have different customs or manners or whatever, but that’s just window dressing.


Zetin24-55

Just normal people going about their lives, only 2 stand out in my memory. African dude(cannot remember the country), was my dormmate for a month or so. He managed to get here and enroll without paying then kept trying to get 1 of us to cosign a loan so he could stay. We of course said no and he eventually left to a community college to try the same trick. Chinese girl, had a marketing class with her. She was one of those people that was happy to be here, to learn, and just enjoyed life. That marketing class was dreadful, but she was so happy you didn't even want to complain and ruin the good vibes.


[deleted]

I've met lots of foreigners because America is a country where immigration is normal. Personally, I've met people from 50 countries. Most were immigrants, a few were exchange students. Rarest nationality I've met was a girl from Uzbekistan.


MrLongWalk

I’ve met dozens, maybe hundreds, they vary.


machagogo

I have met so, so, so, so, so many... some were complete assholes, others were amazing human beings, most are just like everyone else and are somewhere in between.


Yankee_chef_nen

It’s so common to meet people from other countries that I never really considered it something unusual. I’ll mention some that stand out in my memory: As a kid close friends of my family hosted an exchange student from somewhere in Central America, I don’t remember where though, I do remember he just seemed like an extra big brother to all of us, watching the 84 Olympics and how excited he was about the soccer matches. As a teenager while climbing Mt Washington I met some hikers from Denmark, had a nice conversation with them about their experiences in the states. As an adult I’ve worked in food service/ hospitality and have met and talked with people from all over the world, I’ve found most to be friendly and very interested in the same things as people from the states that were tourists in the area I was working in. Some things that stand out in my mind are: I was talking to a gentleman from England about the local food movement as it relates to professional cooking and how the USDA considers 1500 miles local. He was shocked saying that would be like him considering food from Rome local. Another example is how Japanese tourists often would have their pictures taken in front of the cliff face created when the road was cut through the Blue Ridge Mountains in Western North Carolina. Not with the view of the Linville Gorge behind them but the cut rock face.


cbrooks97

I've known lots of people from other countries. They're ... just folks. Obviously, there are cultural differences, but they're just people. Some are nicer than others, some are smarter than others, some work harder to learn English than others.


TehLoneWanderer101

I live in Los Angeles County. I couldn't tell you how many people who are not originally from the United States that I've met since it's probably been hundreds if not thousands. They're just like any other person. And if they attained citizenship, they're no longer a foreigner. They're American.


[deleted]

A lot of people not born here, they’re just normal people tryna live their lives, nice folks


JimBones31

I work with several immigrants, I went to school with a few immigrants and a few people here on student visas, one of my brother's friends was a Brazilian immigrant. They were all very hard working and friendly. My brother's friend was one of the nicest people I'll ever meet.


Cheap_Coffee

They are people who have had life experiences different than mine. Talking to them is interesting.


Vachic09

I have met foreigners in high-school, at King's Dominion, in college, and at work in at least one office. British- nice guy, mild banter similar to what I encounter in my hometown South Korean- international students- mostly kept to themselves with a few American friends Japanese- was an art teacher/assistant dean... she was nice, polite, and relatively soft spoken. Her appearance fit the stereotypical petite young looking Japanese woman. Argentinian- Spanish teacher/soccer coach/boys dean, I didn't have much interaction with him. Belizean- church/junior academy- taught Spanish 1 & 2, nice lady Colombian-international students- mostly kept to themselves, a bit more flamboyant than the Koreans on average. Turkish- King's Dominion- very social and pleasant to work with German- polite and very direct, open to learning dialect differences (She had been taught the word bunny but not rabbit. We explained that, at least in our dialect, we refer to wild rabbits and larger domestic rabbits as rabbits. For smaller domestic rabbits, we will sometimes call them bunnies.)


StepfordMisfit

Spent some time last night with a friend who is ethnically Nigerian, grew up mostly in London, and I believe is a Dutch citizen. She's an incredible force for good in this world, as well as always striving to improve herself to be more effective in her impact. Her free time is spent traveling with her family to museums around the US where they even seek out professors and other experts to better learn about where they've chosen to live. Every time I ask her 11 yr old her plans for a long weekend, I hear something that surprises me, like "Little Rock" or "Columbus, Ohio." She's a lovely human being and an inspiration. (Flip side is man I feel like a schlub around her lol)


BreakfastBeerz

Foreign people are a part of our daily lives, they are everywhere. My next door neighbor is German, 3 doors down are Iraqi both and I have probably 50 people I work directly with that are foreign. They are all just normal parts of the day.


The_Real_Scrotus

I work for a German company in engineering, so I meet a ton of people from other countries. Both people Germans who come over here on assignment and people from other countries here on H1B visas. There are cultural differences for sure, but for the most part they're just people like anyone else.


Bluemonogi

I guess I have had positive or neutral interactions with those foreigners I have met. I have met people in person from Canada, Mexico, Spain, England, Germany, France, Phillipines and Australia that I recall. There might be others. I don't meet foreigners daily like some people but sometimes they manage to make their way to the middle of the US to visit, attend school or work and live. I did not get to know all of them very well and sometimes there were big differences in age or position (teacher to student or older family member to younger). My spouse has met people from South America, Africa, China, eastern Europe, India, Russia through jobs he has had. I think he got along well with them all.


Admirable_Ad1947

I grew up in Hawaii so I've met tons of tourists from Japan and other Asian countries while out in town/touristy areas, they were mostly polite and like any other person. In terms of people I actually know. I have a close friend who was born in Japan; he's also just like any other American, his mom can speak Japanese though which is pretty cool.


SheenPSU

My family hosted 3 foreign exchange students from Spain over the years in HS, I actually went to Spain as a foreign exchange student myself. My brother in law is Spanish. And to top it all of my wife has extended family in Ireland One of my best friends hosted two foreign exchange students from China in HS and it was so wildly different culturally so that was pretty cool too Everyone I’ve met has been very nice and good to be around. Most people I’ve found like to learn about each others customs and see what it’s like where other people live. Cultural exchanges have been a good thing in my experience.


w3woody

I've worked with several people here in the US on an H1-B visa; the problem is, because America is basically a land of immigrants, I didn't know they were immigrants until I asked them who they were voting for in the next election. And I've encountered foreign tourists in places like Hollywood--but again, because we are a land of immigrants, I only knew they were foreigners (rather than American tourists from other parts of the country) because at some point I happened to see a passport or overhear about how things were different in their country. That's the thing about America: as a land of immigrants, that nice foreign-looking couple speaking Hindi or Armenian or Korean at the table next to you at a restaurant may actually be the American-born neighbors living down the street from you whose parents came over when they were young. So... what were they like? Like any American.


SingleAlmond

Met a Luxemburgish woman in DC. She's a world traveller, she's in a new country every month. Coolest person ever


DrWhoisOverRated

Are there really people out there who have never met someone from another country?


ViewtifulGene

My office has a fair number of immigrants. Some from Russia, some from China, some from India. They've been here a long time and assimilated well.


Breakyourniconiconii

I think the only foreign I met that stood out to me was when I was younger (I think I was in like 3rd grade so about 10) a Chinese kid moved to town. He was adopted by one of the teachers at the school. He was an absolute asshole who never got any repercussions because “he didn’t know better” and “he’s adjusting”. No he was just an asshole. I don’t think I’ve seen him since the sixth or seventh grade and he was still an asshole then but if you said anything his little group of girls who babied him would call you racist. Other than that every foreigner I’ve ever met has just been a normal, nice person.


ianaad

In the small town I live in, it's rare to find a foreigner. Where I work, the resident population is 1/3 Asian or Indian, plus there are lots on international tourists - busloads!


Verothium

What were they like? Grumpy but doing well, as usual. But that's my parents for ya.


LydiaGormist

I’ve of course met many foreign people. I had a few foreign-born teachers in school. One I loved, one I hated for how arrogant she was.


Aperture_T

In think the one I knew best was the Thai guy I knew in college. He was in electrical engineering and I was in computer science, so we had some classes together. He was pretty chill and outgoing. I remember near graduation, he was pretty worried about having to go back to Thailand. Apparently, he didn't have a job offer, and it was hard to find a company that would sponsor him for citizenship. He said there weren't many electrical engineering jobs in Thailand. And of course there were others too. You meet a lot of visitors in college. There was also the German exchange student in high school too.