", that's politically correct talk. Neither more or less. The discerning traveller knows better than to paint all countries with the same brush"

Now I'm going to step back and fundamentally consider whether anyone with an ounce of intellect would put type those words out. At the risk of sounding patronising ... Go back read your opening post, read Ann's response and then yours and establish who is racial stereotyping and then consider which one of you is a "discerning traveller" .

To give you a little hint it's the one that lives in Cornwall and has become a rounded individual over years of travel.

Now run along and play with your Lego.

"USSR was the very worst- ubiquitously obese women in dirty white uniforms never saying anything more than a grunt."

PQ, you should visit again..St.Pitersburg and Moscow are great cities ;
you can get first class service ( in English) in many restaurants and shops.
The still grumpy people are passport control officers and security guards in hotels.
The ordinary Russians were always very kind and helpful when I asked for directions (in my
limited Russian).

Petersburg

The best people in the world are for me people from Quebec : as open as americans, but frenchspeaking and thus civilized. Without being arrogant
______
They are detested in south Florida as being cheap, surly, and rude.
__________________________________________________

In all our travels the people who have been the rudest are the French and Guatemalan military.

Among the nicest: Scots, Irish, Belizeans, Italians, Spanish, Turks, and Portuguese.

I have found people in Europe very friendly especially when they discover we are Australian and not English. In Fiesole in the bathroom a woman asked if I English and when I said Australian she insisted I meet her family sitting at the next table. Turns out her grandfather was interred in Australia in WW2 and he was visited by the local community regularly and the locals treated him and the other detainees really well. Her elderly mother had tears in her eyes when it was explained to her who we were. I wasn't even born when that happened yet these complete strangers were so friendly. We have also had experiences in France where people have been friendly as well.

Now England is a whole different story......

Excellent post BC.
Problem is that poster has no Lego. He/she comes back every so often with incredibly offensive posts.
which fits the definition of a troll.

Cheska. Why in hell do you think people like Australian better than English ? Some friends behave the same way and say they are Belgians not French. I don't. If someone is stupid enough to dislike the English or the French as a whole - or to think the Italians are the rudest - I just let him believe it and avoid him as much and as fast as I can.

And some people disliked the Jews and some dislike the Mexicans and build a wall.

WO I don't think any particular way it was what we experienced. Our English friends commented on how the reactions were different. Maybe we have been lucky enough to see and meet people of different nationalities when they are having a good day. Either that or my language skills were so lousy in French and Italian they took pity on me. I put money on the latter.

Same for me Cheska !
Even when speaking French the French take pity on me...
Now err no they are mocking me !
Can't trust a French.

I must confess that a sentence like 'can you call me later to tell me about it' can be said in Belgium like 'tu sais me sonner tantôt pour me dire quoi'.
Which does use French words but is a challenge for anyone non Belgian.

WoinParis on Feb 15, 17 at 9:17am

Can't trust a French.

<<----- This from the guy who spends his time lecturing about civil rights and chastises me for overgeneralizing.

Loacker I've taken the sentence by WO as a joke. From my short time on this forum I have found WO says things that makes me laugh,although building a wall anywhere is not a joke.

Loacker has no sense of humour. Which explains his dark spirits. and cannot read emoticons either.
But... ansi soit-il. Amen.

Ah Woin

I generally find everyone in Europe are very friendly. I'm British and have a natural "self-reserve" which I have to turn off as much as possible as I cross the channel. While this group is not completly European I find
Syrians
Moroccans
incredibly friendly,

then most of Europe until I hit the old Iron curtain, where their "natural-reserve" (or even self-preservation) steps in.

I suggest slow down, show respect and interest in anything the person says and you'll find that people get nicer.

I suggest slow down, show respect and interest in anything the person says and you'll find that people get nicer.>>

agreed, bilbo, but of course we're just being politically correct [though with what motive I cannot discern from the posts of the OP who seems to want to be argumentative for the sake of it, which may explain some of his problems]

Cheska - your anecdote does not support the conclusion your draw from it - the lady was interested in whether you were English or Australian because she had a particular and well-founded fondness for Aussies, not because she disliked the British.

On the same subject I was surprised to say the least many years ago to be welcomed with open arms by two elderly Germans who it turned out had been PoWs of the British; one in Hamburg and one in Nuneaton. It was not what I had been told to expect by those who had been to Germany and found Germans unfriendly which has never been my experience.

When people are unfriendly I tend to think that it is because I have not understood their customs or that they are having a bad day - I can think of some days when I rudely pushed through the tourists on Oxford Street which would have given them the impression of extreme unfriendliness but that would not be typical of my behaviour towards them.

On our first trip to Corfu in the 70's, we stopped for fuel at a small petrol (gas) station on the way down south. When the owner found we were English he brought out a water melon and soft drinks, sat us at a table on his forecourt and produced pictures of his family in Manchester. As we are from Manchester it took us an hour and a half to resume our journey.

We learned from him that he hated the Germans, despised the French and Italians from his war time experiences of Corfu being occupied and found the Brits most friendly out of all of the Europeans, especially the Brits from the North of England.

How right he was!

Annhig I didn't know much about WW2 history at that stage and it wasn't until this woman had said to me that her grandmother did not like the English because of the war. I was so surprised that someone felt like this. Yes she did have a fondness for Aussies and at the time I was a bit embarrassed because I didn't know that Australia interred people for the war or much about the suffering of countries like Italy during that time.

Australia recognises battles in WW1 more than those of WW2 and there is a lot being planned for Villiers Bretonneux next year and we hope to be there.
I did then find out more about WW2 though.

I truly don't notice if people are standoffish especially in Italy and France because I haven't got a clue most of the time what is being said or understanding the nuances.

I had an uncle who was PoW in Germany. He spent 4 years there and well, actually it wasn't that bad... He was sent on 'sonderkommando's' which despite its ugly name could - adn did - mean for him to be sent to a farm. Of course the husband was away on the eastern front. I know it looks like a movie but it was like that. I'll add that my uncle was married and despite the temptations and the duration remained faithful. For the anecdote he let himself die when his wife passed away.

On the other hand it was strictly forbidden to speak German with two of my aunts (not same blood) one having been pushed by soliders by the butt of his rifle in the stairs, resulting in several broken bones and the other one never saying why.

This being said, I find the Germans absolutely charming, fun, full of humour. And it is not (totally) their fault if Adolf turned out to be the monster that everybody sees he was from the start - afterwards - when a lot of other countries had the same kind of ugly people (Degrelle in Belgium, Laval in France to name a few I know).

You'll notice I didn't say anything about recent elected guys...

In Moscow and St. Petersburg the people were wonderful. Yes, even the initially scary, uniformed Soviet era looking woman at a metro station in a telephone type booth from whom I asked directions. She even walked me to the correct stairway.

Rudest waiter was in Lugano, the Italian speaking section of Switzerland.

<i> Strangely I find people more or less the same everywhere - some nice, some not so nice, some friendly, some not.
</i>

I agree, and no traveler ever sees enough people to make a generalization about a whole nation.

In Italy, Tuscans have a reputation for being reserved and people from Romagna (as in part of Emilia Romagna) have a reputation for being outgoing. Of course, this is a gross generalization, but, for the sake of argument, let's say it's true. A tourist who goes to Pienza and a tourist who goes to Rimini would encounter entirely different types of character, but both would go home and attribute it to "Italians".