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Comment by wavepruner | Hacker News Reader

My personal experience while traveling in China is that it is an aggressive, confrontational, blunt, yet very friendly culture.

Cutting in line is common. It seems to annoy locals, but also seems like it's kind of light-hearted game for everyone. Grandmas get carte blanche to cut as they please, and if you get in their way they will hit you, but it's a grandma so it doesn't hurt and is quite funny the first time it happens.

Jay walking is rampant except at intersections that are staffed with numerous traffic police.

If you're fat, people will comment on your fatness while getting to know you for the first time. This is not meant to be offensive. Likewise if you're skinny, bald, old, etc.

There is an odd mix of authoritarian rule obsessed workers and then many who break the rules any chance they get.

They are extremely friendly and interested in a lot of foreigners. Chinese strangers would buy me food and translate for me without me even asking.

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> Jay walking is rampant

In some countries (don't know about China) the concept of "jaywalking" doesn't even exist.

Most countries even. Where is it a thing outside the US?

In Poland for example. You are not allowed to cross the road if there is a pedestrian crossing within 100m range. Also, you can get fined for crossing the street on red light even if the street is completely empty of traffic.

I remember reading that technically jaywalking is not illegal in the U.S. either. You just will almost certainly die is all.

Singapore at least.

What was the punishment for jaywalking in Singapore? $1000 fine? Or maybe caning?

Yeah but rarely enforced instead they put barriers in place specially in places with walkway bridges so that people cant jaywalk.

Any country that has street lights for pedestrians? In Germany, you get fined.

German (from Hamburg) here. We jaywalk all the time. Of course if there is heavy traffic then people usually go to the next traffic light as it will be faster but in my almost 30 years I have heard of maybe 1 incident where the police actually stopped a friend of mine. They didn't issue a fine and let him off with a warning.

Worth pointing out that the Ampelmann is such a cultural icon in Berlin, there are stores where you can buy merchandise of the crosswalk man/woman logos:

https://www.ampelmann.de/en/

As an Aussie tourist in Berlin I once crossed the street against the Ampelmann, and to this day I remember the audible "tut tuts" and disgust of the German locals around me at my actions. Lesson learned: Respect the Ampelmann.

(On the flipside, I remember once talking to a Kenyan on a bus here in Australia, he was horrified that Australians were such mindless robots & so eager to follow government rules that we would even wait for a crosswalk light to tell us when to walk and when to stop.)

The UK has pedestrian traffic lights, but there is no limit where you can cross.

I think a lot of cultures have this inverted side, like how Japan is both serious/stoic, yet has silly media culture. Grow up in an authoritarian shadow and they kind of enjoy breaking unwritten rules.

I've had some similar experiences in Saudi Arabia. People are very friendly, but at the same time very aggressive. They'll corner you, block your way, and shout in your face like a drill sergeant, but it's all playful. They won't touch you and they mean no harm.

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