Which countries or even cities in Europe would you describe as “welcoming”?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have only been to 6 or 7 European countries but l felt welcome in all. A few people have mentioned Turkey, a small part of which is considered Europe. Turkey doesn’t feel like Europe though, it feels like the Middle East.

I bring it up because l traveled there for a month in 2010 as a good looking conservatively dressed 35 year old woman and was constant harassed by men, more so than in any other of the 35+ countries I’ve been to, except in Istanbul which was fine. So it was the opposite of welcoming for me, a lot of them treated me like meat. I would only recommend it for a woman traveling with a man, or maybe an older woman.

I was in Turkey in my 20s and the harassment was constant.

I spent a fair amount of time in Spain in my teens, in the 1980s, and the amount of harassment was shocking. Men just picking or smacking my butt on the street and no one cared, men calling after me constantly. I haven’t been back to Spain in all these years….i assume it’s changed now?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How friendly are DC residents to tourists?

Touché!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am black and have travelled all over the world. Black people have very different experiences in terms of being welcomed.

Finland was definitely not welcoming. Turkey was wonderful.

Unfortunately this. I did a summer studying in the Netherlands. I did fine in the Netherlands, my classmate/friend who was Asian American got a lot of weird comments.

What do you think would happen in Asia?

NP but the history of Dutch colonialism in Indonesia has cemented some permanently unpleasant attitudes towards Asian people in the Netherlands among *some* people. We have run into it and been startled by it.

On-topic, I found Austria to be deeply unfriendly toward visitors, and found the directness of the Dutch and the reserve of some Norwegians to be disorienting.

We are a mixed-race family with little kids, we have found southern Germany and Berlin to be very friendly and welcoming, as well as Denmark. As an Asian man, DH gets treated far better in France than I do as a white woman, which given French colonial history is an interesting contrast to my observations about the impact of Asian colonialism in the Netherlands.

[Anonymous]

I thought Portugal was very friendly. Maybe most friendly place we'd been.

I found Ireland to be uniquely unpleasant. Worst place I have ever visited in terms of stares. Didn't happen in Dublin but in every other city we went. I am Black and my husband is White and everywhere we went we encountered stares. Also, the food was terrible.

[Anonymous]

I love this question! I’m going to rank them!

1. Romania
2. Poland
3. Montenegro
4. Northern Ireland
5. Bosnia
6. Hungary
7. Ireland
8. Scotland
9. Croatia
10. Alsace area in France—near Colmar

Least friendly—Slovenia, Austria, Spain and certain cities in France, especially Nice and Paris.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How friendly are DC residents to tourists?

Touché!

I mean, I think I'm friendly. But, you do have a point. That said, tourists should learn to stand to the right on sidewalks, on the metro escalator, and pretty much get out of the way everywhere. I do that when I'm abroad.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How friendly are DC residents to tourists?

I think that’s the point of this conversation, though. People I know who live and work in DC absolutely hate tourists. I’ve been shocked by how openly rude a couple of my usually nice friends have been to tourists. Some places have a lot of people who just don’t want visitors. Other places seem delighted by it. I still enjoy seeing the sites in places like Geneva and Paris (where the residents are clearly hoping I will f… right off back to America) but I love going places where I can hang with locals and enjoy it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How friendly are DC residents to tourists?

I think that’s the point of this conversation, though. People I know who live and work in DC absolutely hate tourists. I’ve been shocked by how openly rude a couple of my usually nice friends have been to tourists. Some places have a lot of people who just don’t want visitors. Other places seem delighted by it. I still enjoy seeing the sites in places like Geneva and Paris (where the residents are clearly hoping I will f… right off back to America) but I love going places where I can hang with locals and enjoy it.

Really? I’ve worked downtown right near the White House for over 20 years and I am SO friendly to tourists. Now with iPhone maps I don’t give directions so much anymore but it used to be a regular occurrence where I would help people find the metro entrances or the White House. I still get questions occasionally. I alway tell people to have a nice visit! I think it’s so important for people to come to the nations capital annd have a nice experience here. I admit the MaGa hats were trying and that grated on my nerves (“welcome to the swamp! Try not to get kidnapped by a cabal of underground sex predators while you’re here or poop on anyone’s desk!”). And I do nicely explain the “stand right walk left “ rule to tourists — I find most of them appreciate the explanation, like it’s part of the excitement of riding an underground train.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am black and have travelled all over the world. Black people have very different experiences in terms of being welcomed.

Finland was definitely not welcoming. Turkey was wonderful.

Unfortunately this. I did a summer studying in the Netherlands. I did fine in the Netherlands, my classmate/friend who was Asian American got a lot of weird comments.

I only spent a few days in Amsterdam but I found the people there weird with no boundaries. Like, once I was sitting on a bench outside a grocery store eating some baby carrots I just bought, waiting for my friend to come out and a guy walked up and asked me for a carrot. Not a homeless person, just a guy in his 20s. It wasn't a conversation starter, he wasn't hitting on me, he said thanks for the carrot and kept walking. There were a few other mundane incidents like that, where I thought wow, these people have no boundaries. So I can believe they would say any racist thing that came to mind, or ask to touch your hair, or other offensive things.

Dutch are very direct.

I’d have said no. I’m very direct too.

Amsterdam is the worst part of the Netherlands to visit - they are overrun with tourists and the locals resent them. Other parts of Netherlands are much more friendly and civil.

While I met many welcoming people in the Netherlands, I remember three funny exceptions from my in college with my now husband and two college friends. None were in Amsterdam.

(1) in Leiden when I struggled to order a grilled cheese (trying the Dutch words) and the waitress asked if I wanted “old cheese” or “young cheese”. She was struggling to explain / ask, I ordered the old cheese, and she continued to try to communicate something. After I confirmed that I wanted the old cheese, the man at the next table said - in perfect English - “the old cheese is quite piquant.”

(2) In Gouda a young child (7 or 8 years old) approached us, saying something in Dutch, and trying to sell us a Dutch-language newspaper. We declined. The child then realized we spoke English and asked in English if we wanted to buy the newspaper, and we declined again and started to walk away. The child pedaled after us in a bicycle yelling increasingly loudly (in English) “hey man, I f*ck you in a**!” over and over. I don’t think the child knew what it meant (who knows) but we were getting dirty looks as we ran from this child on a bicycle. We eventually jumped a wall to get away.

(3) In Maastricht we asked for a beer at a pub. When the person taking our order acted as if he didn’t understand we switched to French and German. I had decent French and my husband decent German, but our college friends were fluent because of the countries they’d lived in during childhood. The one with German had actually lived in the Netherlands for a year when he was 6, so was good at picking up Dutch words (again). The person still acted as if he didn’t understand. It was only when my friend switched to ordering in Dutch that he served us.

By contrast, in Amsterdam a woman chased after me to give me better directions when she realized “4th left” hadn’t included a cobblestone alley (I remember being surprised she knew the word for cobblestone) and a crowd at the train station at about 2 am tried very hard to “correct” us “help” us when we were trying to get tickets to the quiet neighborhood outside Leiden where we were staying as they were quite certain nobody wanted to go there in the middle of the night. (We were staying with people my friend’s family had stayed in touch with.)

PP to whom you replied /

Your second story had me laughing out loud - that was so funny.

Weird about Maastricht. I lived in Netherlands for few years (not Amsterdam) and it was so dang hard to learn Dutch as everyone would hear my strong accent and reply in English for 5-10 minutes and then revert to fast Dutch. I eventually learned but it took so long for a language that is not that different to English .

I have family in Amsterdam in old town and suburb outside and they are always complaining about tourists. I am glad they were kind to you there though.

I was shocked by the directness of the Dutch when we first lived there but got used to it. They are actually extremely loyal to family and friends and I learned how to dodge overly personal questions.

Thanks for the anecdotes - sounds like vintage Dutch.

Have you read The Undutchables: An Observation of the Netherlands, Its Culture and Its Inhabitants? You might enjoy the satire that explores the quirks of daily Dutch life, from coffee to child rearing, from train travel to the toilet (WC).

[Anonymous]

We've had the most luck in smaller towns where we make an effort to show appreciation.

One of the best memories from travel is when we stopped to have lunch at a small suburban cafe in Germany (near France) and we spoke no German and the server spoke basically no English. We used Google translate and tried our best to say simple things, and basically didn't communicate through direct language comprehension at all, but had...conversations? We were all so happy and gracious to the other and it was such a warm, lovely encounter. This is largely a result of the server's personality, but is just one of those things that makes me grateful to be able to travel a little bit.

[Anonymous]

I've been to Italy twice in the last year and only one person we encountered was unfriendly. To be fair, she didn't speak English and while I tried to speak Italian, it wasn't great so I'm sure it was annoying for her!

Everyone else was lovely. Many Italians would help me with my efforts to speak Italian - gently correcting pronunciation, teaching me new words, etc. My traveling companions and I are always polite and respectful. We genuinely love Italy and feel honored to be there so I think that comes across.

[Anonymous]

Much of this is simply cultural differences. Eastern Europeans have traditionally said that only imbeciles smile for no reason, and traditionally American friendliness was regarded with suspicion for that reason.

I don’t mind countries where you are treated formally and with some reserve at first. In fact, I much prefer that to the feigned friendliness masking ulterior motives that you find in many other countries.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Much of this is simply cultural differences. Eastern Europeans have traditionally said that only imbeciles smile for no reason, and traditionally American friendliness was regarded with suspicion for that reason.

I don’t mind countries where you are treated formally and with some reserve at first. In fact, I much prefer that to the feigned friendliness masking ulterior motives that you find in many other countries.

I agree. Eastern Europeans don’t go around smiling for no reason but they are some of the friendliest people in the world.