Tell about YOUR World, and YOUR life

A fellow ATS member replied to my "Popcorn, Sand and Molten Steel" thread with a post which made me kind of sad. The response in essence suggested most Americans live their lives inside an insulated bubble, oblivious of the outside world. You can find that post, and my response...

Here

It's disappointing to read posts like that (for me anyway). So, I thought I would start a thread for the many other members here whom are not from America to (hopefully) tell us what their lives, culture and world is about. Obviously, anyone can reply, but I hope to see responses from people outside America.

I guess you can bash America if you like, but that's not the point here, and not what I hope to see. We're all just like you really, just people trying to get by in a world which seems increasingly out of control. We don't like many of the decisions our government makes any more than the outside world does. However, just like you, we're proud of our home and will defend it, even at the expense of being wrong sometimes. So this thread isn't really an invitation to bash America, but rather a thread for other international members of ATS to tell us what life is like in your part of the world.

Not all Americans live inside an insulated bubble called "Murica", completely oblivious to the outside world. Sure some do, but most don't. For my part, I've lived outside the US in the past in Asian countries and even predominantly Muslim countries. They were fantastic experiences for the most part, and we'd love to hear more about your corner of the world.

Please DO tell us about your part of the World, ATS! I would certainly love to hear about things like:

- What you do for fun
- What everyday life is like for you
- What the weather is like
- What you eat for dinner
- What is a trip to the grocery store like for you?
- How you get to work?
- What differences you see between your life and others outside your country
- Things you like, and even things you don't like
- What your apartment or house is like
- What you do in your free time (if any)

I sincerely hope this thread turns out positive, and doesn't turn into a bash-fest. Again, we Americans are really just like everyone else, not all, but I think far more than your bias media (like our bias media) might lead you to believe. Most of us aren't rich, we have to slog though the daily chores of work and bureaucracy just like you do.

Please do tell us about YOUR World, and YOUR life!

Thanks in advance.

Sincerely,

FCD

Well, originally from Detroit. Then we moved across the River to Windsor when I was a child.
When I was a teenager I was sent to Northern Ontario - Thunder Bay to live with my father.
Fast forward till now, I’m 36, father of 3, and married.
I have a pretty damn cool job. I fly and build drones designed for specific tasks.
I work for a mine site full time flying and 3d modelling. As well as other engineering work.

I contract my skills out to other drone companies- most notably this year Switzerland, Ukraine and Africa. They pay me to fly, crash, design prototype parts that meet their initial intent specs.
Outside of work, I try to be the best person I can be, everyday.
I am a brother mason.
Christmas time is very special to a few of us.
We usually get together at the Walmart (this coming Thursday)
And we will be helping people pay for their gifts.

The weather up here is insanely unseasonable. It’s usually-20 to -30 everyday at this time of the year, but it’s been plus 3 and 4 for the past week now.

As a Christmas gift to myself I bought a new Jeep last week. That makes 3 vehicles in the drive way now.

I don’t drink or anything anymore but I do play video games.- thankfully my wife doesn’t mind. She got me the newest Xbox one the other day - Xbox one X.
I’m playing it right now actually. A space exploration game called Elite Dangerous.

I’ve worked a lot this year so we decided it’s time for some vacation.
I get to spend the next month at home with the family. Ive been off for a week already and don’t go back until January 22!
Being on salary is great. Having a great employer is amazing. Been there for going on 9 years now.

For a few years I was a volunteer firefighter in our community.
Seeing some of the horrible accidents I have, takes effect on you after awhile.
I no longer am part of the firefighters here, but I do keep up to date on my first responder training.
The mine sees to it that I am kept up to date with everything.
I most recently took a Briefing Officer course.
This is for people to organize and take control of the safety efforts of Mine Rescue in the event of an underground emergency.


That’s my life in a nutshell.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

born in dachau, bavaria, working as writer and 'redakteur'

- What you do for fun

Playing Gran Turismo online, reading, watching movies, meeting friends, writing, and i love to eat!

- What everyday life is like for you

Today i do nothing but relax, listen to music (sinatra right now) and searching the internet. later on i will watch darts-wm and maybe american football.

- What the weather is like

its cold and its snowing a little

- What you eat for dinner

mostly italian, greek and bavarian food, sometime japanese

- What is a trip to the grocery store like for you?

mine is right under my apartment, i like to buy stuff

- How you get to work?

with my bike, around 10 minutes, doesn't mater how bad the weather is

- What differences you see between your life and others outside your country

as a german i know how happy i can be to life here, as a european i don't see that huge differences between the countries. the most strange experience was a trip to india during the monsun. it was like entering a different planet, especially mumbai was fascinating and horrifying at the same time. i once was in kenia and tansania and it was different of course but it felt more familiar. was in the usa as a teen and i loved it! the biggest different was the local school with around 2000 kids... in america everything seems bigger than everywhere else.

- Things you like, and even things you don't like

i love pink floyd, cats, my mother and sister, my friends, my hometown, wintertime, movies, king, lem, fc bayern munich!
i dont like matjes (north-german food)

- What your apartment or house is like

apartment with 50 qm2 for 900 euro per month.): living in munich is expansive but its a beautiful place to be

- What you do in your free time (if any)

same as above

Tonight i drink ja@penaes sake to feel the spirits of the temples in my neigbroghood here. it is fishing season now and the sea gods are awaken to help us feed among the fish of the days harvest. yet now we have to see smaller catches no matter how the gods of the sea want to help . sad but the sea here is being depleted . we have too many sushi houses now in this land. the fish are small and getting smaller. but, listen my fellow mankind, the japanese fisherman are now in there 70's and few here are to replace them, so the restaruants are going to go out of business

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Very well, where do I begin? The details of my life are quite inconsequential. My father was a relentlessly self-improving boulangerie owner from Belgium with low grade narcolepsy and a penchant for buggery. My mother was a fifteen year old French prostitute named Chloe with webbed feet. My father would womanize, he would drink, he would make outrageous claims like he invented the question mark. Some times he would accuse chestnuts of being lazy, the sort of general malaise that only the genius possess and the insane lament. My childhood was typical, summers in Rangoon, luge lessons. In the spring we'd make meat helmets. When I was insolent I was placed in a burlap bag and beaten with reeds, pretty standard really. At the age of 12 I received my first scribe. At the age of fourteen, a Zoroastrian named Vilma ritualistically shaved my testicles. There really is nothing like a shorn scrotum, it's breathtaking, I suggest you try it.

Shift-work in the security industry ... otherwise I'm an ATS mouse potato.

I think it's better for most, and they are not as low intelligence as some would paint them. Much too often, a far too wide brush gets used. And bits of hyperbole in the description of strangers is often much too inflated or just plain fabricated. I think the forum has a concentration of those concerned that think otherwise or would not agree, but that is no doubt by virtue of being a public forum, with animosities and mal contentedness more often displayed.

You know, some things are simply not important. Minutia and trivia are so often overvalued as the evidence of a well rounded mentality. Every minute of the day you can come here and find trolling and simple combatants willing and eager to import their opinion or simply argue any and all points. In fact it seems there are tag teams doing such banter. But the very best of Above Top Secret emerges each and every day here, make no mistake.

It's a wondrous world yet, with much to be desired if one will take the time to just look.

My life is good. Age has brought a certain amount of challenges, but I have family and friends that care. My financial situation is sufficient for my needs and contentment.

The weather is not bad here in NC. beyond two or three crummy weeks of snow and cold. The house I live in was finished in 1923 and is in pretty good shape really. My neighbors friendly even though I'm a transplant from the other coast. I live cost free on a 30 acre family estate, which I am able to keep pretty well manicured..... which I would say is also my hobby. Both of my children are successful, and all my family members, ie. cousins, aunts and uncles, brothers and sisters seem to be well and without much drama.

In the spring, it's as green as Ireland here, and a trip to the store is only 9 miles, which by the way usually has No traffic ahead of me.
That is to say a very comfortable speed limit of my choosing, 50-55 ish. Life outside the country..... Well I did my part in the military..... and my conscience with a boomer moral compass.

My lifetime will have been in the best of all possible of time frames that were ever lived. It will never be repeated, and will have been as productive and wondrous the Renaissance, or times of exploration and nation building and discovery. Are we in a time of Decline...... or Opportunity ?

I would endeavor to choose the latter.

" What you eat for dinner " .................oh I don't know, PEZ

- What you do for fun - Mary Jane
- What everyday life is like for you - A dream
- What the weather is like - Chilly
- What you eat for dinner - Pizza or Hamburgers
- What is a trip to the grocery store like for you? - Short
- How you get to work? - I work from home
- What differences you see between your life and others outside your country - America = Safe | World = Barbaric monkeys.
- Things you like, and even things you don't like - Structure, Order
- What your apartment or house is like - Clean
- What you do in your free time (if any) - Mary Jane

a reply to: IgnoranceIsntBlisss

a Zoroastrian named Vilma ritualistically shaved my testicles.

Was that with a 3 or 2 blade Schick?

Only with a Hydro 5 thou shall receive enlightment

The greatest Cape Town sandwich - the "Gatsby.

I wouldn't advise it as an everyday snack, but if you're working class and going into the bush-veld for 12 hours, this is the sandwich to take.

www.capetownetc.com...

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

My name is Michael and I live life.

I am 30yo and single.
I work for the everyday people.
My house is nice and seems like a girl lives in it. As in it’s clean and decorated.
My hobbies include hiking, American football, and loads of random shiz!
My everyday life is mostly just work then sitting in my garage drinking wine and playing on ATS.....also killing these pesky ants....(little bastards)
As for dinner I mostly cook all day Sunday as to not have to the rest of the week. Fast food makes me sick so I eat home cooked meals. Very little veggies in my meals but I make up for it by drinking V8.
I drive to work but also take the bus to get to lunch meetings.(it’s a image thing.)
I don’t see much difference between others from this country and others outside of the webs.
As for free time I do play video games and troll on here.

Kinda sad now......Well F it.

Good thread!!!

I'm 45 and live on the East Coast of the US.

I have a 23 year IS career that is going very well. The full scope of that career has been in the Telecom or Collaboration space. If it's a PBX or telco driven piece of equipment I have probably worked on it. Legacy Nortel, Avaya, Aspect, MiTel, Panasonic, in Contact, Cisco. Could keep listing. Currently I am prepping to take my CCIE Lab which is all consuming. For about 3 week period 14 years ago if you called 1800 Best Buy you heard my voice as I did their IVR at that time.

Over those 23 years I have done Telecom in the CRM, defense industry, health care and currently entertainment working for Blizzard Entertainment which the gamers here should know. The fun part there is I also get to support Activision in their collab endeavors. Also worked my first BlizzCon last month which was great. I stay out of any discussions here around Blizzard for obvious reasons. If any of our gamers wants to talk about anything specific at Blizzard then PM me and I'll talk there.

That career has allowed me to live life the way I want meaning enjoying the hobby of audiophile gear. About to fulfill a childhood dream of owning a piece of McIntosh Audio gear. My three favorite bands are Opeth, Dead Can Dance and Pink Floyd. I also like Emperor and the solo work of Ihsahn. Chelsea Wolfe, Black Tape for a Blue Girl, Katatonia, TypeO Negative and similar sounds.

The only sport I really follow is Hockey which I have played my whole life until an ACL rupture ruined that.

I'm also a huge horror fan and can recommend obscure disturbing films if anyone is looking for them. Lol. Along those lines I watch a ton of the TV show Supernatural and have actually been to at least one of the fan conventions for it and I'm going to another in Feb.

All things being equal I have had a fun life and can't wait to see what comes next.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Now that I have told you my first name, what is yours?

Hi, we're a couple of 40-somethings who live out in flyover which should be pretty obvious from anyone who pays attention to what I post.

We've been married for over 20 years now. We've also been commuters for a few more than 20. Statistics say that's hell on marriages, but we just sort of fell into the role. It's not our favorite way to be, and he's counting the years until he can retire with pension, not because he dislikes his job or place of work but because he doesn't like spending 2 extra hours every day in the car. I'm a bit better off, I only do 1.

We're in KCMO (Kansas City, Missouri -- to be distinguished from Kansas City, Kansas -- one is fairly vital and the other is not, like east and west St. Louis). We live in what's called The Northland because it's the best compromise for travel. He actually works in a town to the north of KC, and I've never gotten anything north of the Missouri River. We're sort of right in the middle of our two jobs.

He works in animal pharmaceuticals for quite a large company actually. I won't say which one. He spent 15+ years in quality control serving as several different roles, but recently, he moved into what's called international regulatory affairs which is a fancy way of saying he is assigned an international territory of markets and is a liaison to those countries finding out what they need in order for company product to go there and then finding out how the company will comply and going back and forth. His region is SE Asia so countries like S. Korea, Vietnam, etc.

This suits us very well because he now gets to telecommute 1 to 2 days per week. LESS DRIVING! More flexibility ... all good.

I work for a small local publishing company. I am the part-time office editor girl Friday. I do whatever needs doing, so proof reading, editing, some writing. This past week I got farmed out to the print floor because they were short of hands and I was ahead on my deadlines. I know I complain about "part-time hell," but the truth is that I could likely land an in-house full-time spot if I tried and it came open. I've been there for 10 years and excelled at whatever they put me to. I used to be the last proofer on our Barnes & Noble account for a few years.

The truth is that he brings home the bacon. We have an 8-year-old who is starting to get active and needs someone who can be there to see him on and off the bus. And my parents are both getting older and their health is suffering. I seem to have inherited the responsible daughter role, so it falls to me to always be there for that. At this point in time, the flexibility in our schedules outweighs the desire for more income. We may not be rich, but we're well off enough that we're content to stand for now. It's hard sometimes though.

We have a wonderful kiddo. Sure, he has a couple learning challenges -- an auditory disorder and dysgrpahia -- but he's smart enough to make in spite of those. He's into martial arts at the moment. I practice with him most mornings since I have the athletic background. I don't know martial arts, but I do have a pretty extensive athletic background, so I can still compensate with my bag of tricks to some degree. Eventually, it won't work if he keeps going, but I can still do the push-ups and situps and stuff with him. Those are universal.

We play a lot of video games. I like to read a lot. I crochet. I'm a college football and basketball fan. I love spending time with family. We also love to cook. We cook a lot of our meals. Husband likes it because it helps him deal with his thwarted desire to work in a lab, and I like it because I like food -- sort of a foodie. Our recipe go-tos are a lot of Mexican, Asian, Middle Eastern recipes with some American standards like meatloaf and chili thrown in.

Grocery store? Always Sunday morning because everyone else is in church. We make a list for the week. I take a calculator. We all go. He stops my impulses. I stop his. We usually get out under $130. We make on big meal on Sunday that's leftovers and smaller meals like fish twice and some quick cooked protein like pork or chicken or maybe a steak on a salad for the other meal with leftovers cut in there for the rest of the week.

I know it's different in the US over other places. Europe is much more compact. It's more possible to ride your bike to work there or take a train. They have a better developed train system ... but they aren't as big as we are. Europe also does things differently, has a different mentality in its people. I'm fine with that. They do what works for them, but they need to understand that works the other way too. We do what works for us. We're different. We're composed of the people who left Europe because that way didn't work for them. But there is nothing wrong with that. There needs to be a place like that -- a place for the misfits seeking a different way.

Weather out here? If you don't like it, wait 30 seconds is the standard saying. It's changeable and has a range. You can hit sub-zero temps in the winter and have blizzards and go to over 100 in the summer. The spring can see some of the more violent thunderstorms on the planet with supercells that create massive hailstones and even tornaodoes, never a dull moment really.

Sorry folks, I'm coming out of a couple hour surgery and tend to make verbal mistakes while medicated..I'm fine by the way, just scrambled

Disclaimer: I'm in one of those moods today. You're welcome.

- What you do for fun
Augustus and I like to take DB to the park. Sometimes we let him off the leash and throw donuts like frisbees. Watching a grown man try to run like that, it's...not pretty. Amusing, but not pretty.

- What everyday life is like for you
Oh, every day is an exercise in finding new ways to hide the poison in Aug's food.

Ok, I lied, I don't put poison in anything, my vanilla cooking is poison enough -- I'm not allowed near the kitchen. I get to wash skidmark laundry by hand instead. Getting real tired of it.

- What the weather is like
DB would tell you dark and damp, but as I'm not one of the basement residents, it's nice out. A little brisk, but quite tolerable.

- What you eat for dinner
You'll have to ask Augustus what kind of meat he's really serving, but I suspect it's various quality cuts of Missing Women.

- What is a trip to the grocery store like for you?
We call the mall "the grocery store". It's a little like stealth hunting in the parking lot.

- How you get to work?
I'm not really sure how I got here, but I don't need to come to and fro daily, I stay. The closet under the stairs is a nice abode, if not slightly cramped.

- What differences you see between your life and others outside your country
I imagine I probably have a larger closet-room than most do.

- Things you like, and even things you don't like
The Friday pizza parties are really awesome, Aug throws a great bash every week. And then there's the Saturday Ritual, but that's not for just anyone to show up to.
I really dislike cleaning up the mess from that, and if you don't get absolutely every last bit or drop of the sacrifices cleaned up, DB tends to find it days later and eat it. It's gross.

- What your apartment or house is like
Kids don't trick-or-treat here, period, so what does that tell you?

- What you do in your free time (if any)
Sometimes I like to unchain the virgins and let them try to escape the house. Keyword being "try". We all have a good laugh over the failed attempts.
Other times, I unchain DB and let him run through the house. It's more clean-up work than it's worth, he's not housebroken. But it's also funny, especially if I throw Cheetos down the stairs.

Great idea for a thread, and from one of my favorite writers here.

I'm going to be 50 at the end of March. Feeling it too. But born in DC, lived in a Maryland suburb (Damascus)till 4, then moved to a suburb of Cleveland till I joined the USAF at 20. Got stationed at (no hope Pope), met a local girl, married her, and fooled her into thinking I was a "catch". 28 years later, she's starting to catch on that perhaps I misled her a bit.

Lived in a few nice houses here, raised 3 kids, and recently bought a small farm for the wife and I to retire at. We "finished" the house, (it's in quotes since she continues to make changes) but it's a sweet little place that costs almost nothing to keep up. I have 5 acres and some chickens. I have a small IT business, started out doing infrastructure wiring, and when the economy tanked, I had to do more of the PC repair kind of stuff. I got into phone systems, and CCTV installations, fiber optic cable and whatever else nobody else was doing. A few years ago, a good friend wanted to buy into a franchise to kill mosquitoes. He needed some help, and I figured I could spare some time, so I jumped in and used my time as equity. I now own a small part of the business and we are going into our 3rd year. Amazingly enough the mosquito thing is the most enjoyable thing I have done in a while. Our clients love to see us, they are happy to pay us, and I usually hear nothing but happy people talking about how they can now enjoy their outside. (NC can get a bit buggy in the summer). We are raising our youngest grandson at the moment, so our "golden years" aren't quite as we had planned, but you do what needs to be done.

This area of NC is fantastic. less then 2 hours to the ocean, a little over 3 to the mountains. a little less than 10 miles to town, no traffic. Mostly good neighbors, and peace. Recently, we decided to get all our rain in over a few weekends, so the swamp I used to live in, has become more of a lake with mud. I do hold out hope that eventually, dryer times will prevail, but over all, first world problems, I'm blessed.

I married my best friend, and she does a fantastic job of keeping me in line, while letting me do things I like. I golf a little, fish a little, work on old buildings around the farm, make messes, and cook meals. I am addicted to ATS and have been for some time. Some members here are like family. I would love to meet more of you in person, so if anyone plans to come to the Dunn, area, hit me up, and I'll buy you a sweet tea.

a reply to: Allaroundyou

Bob

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
a reply to: Allaroundyou

Bob

Nice to meet you Bob, also Mike here.