Observations So Far

It’s very odd being in a country where I know the language, but don’t really know the culture. I suppose usually you would have got one together with the other, or be ignorant of both, and it’s certainly unnerving sometimes!

It’s a very disorienting experience going shopping without knowing most of the brands, either of the stores (is this one the equivialent of Waitrose or Asda?) themselves or the products in them. I suppose it goes to show how much we rely on brands around us being familiar.

More…

There’s a tendency towards using lots of condensed type on signs, both new and old.

Why would you take a perfectly good QWERTY keyboard, and swap the Z and the Y keys? It gets confusing typing on subtly different keyboards at home and during the day. Plus, CTRL+Z isnt quite as easy.

A lot of people smoke (more than in England? no idea, but it seems more socially accepted, even if the statistics don’t bear it out. And there are a lot more smoking ads).

The transport system is great (and yes, it seems to run on time).

So far… I like it.