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America is such a strange concept

Sometimes i wonder about how strange America is.

it's a single country the size of a continent (yes I know that Canada isn't America)

you all speak the same language

The last one fills my head a lot. I don't think you Americans realise how wild that is.

I'm European for context. I can easily travel to a bunch of different contries very easily. All countries in Europe have widly different cultures and languages - the latter is my real point.

I cannot speak french. I cannot speak spanish. I know a few words, but I cannot keep a conversation in any of them.

I see a lot of Americans on the internet talking about "being bilingual". That word fascinates me. Bilingual. Two-language-speaker. It's only really attributed to people with immigrant parents - not people who've learnt a language on purpose. I sense this weird respect around the word, like your something special if you can speak more than one language. The thing is, bilingualism is'nt really a thing in Europe. The majority of people in Europe is at least bilingual to some degree, if not trilingual. Otherwise you would only be able to visit your own country. If I wanted to visit Bulgaria or The Chech Republic, I would have to seek out people who also can speak english, since that is the only language I speak other than my native tongue.

And english isn't always European's second language. Sometimes it's french, other times german or spanish. Depends on the generation really.

However, in America you don't have this problem. You could literally fly from one end of the continent to the other and still be able to talk to basically anyone. Maybe they have a different accent, but at whole you understand each other. You could go to England, or Australia and still just get by with your mothertongue!!! That is insane!!!

If I wanted to write with someone let's say 1.500 km away (that's around 930 miles for the Americans) I would have a language barrier. We would both translate our thoughts to another language and then back to our mother tongue. If an American wrote with someone 1.500 km away they would both use their mother tongue. Heck, you could talk to someone 4.000 km (2.000 miles) away and still speak your mother tongue!

And now for the size: I didn't understand states for the longest time. I thought Americans were stupid for not understanding the difference between countries and states. I think I understand now. States are more like countries than councils. They all have so different climates. I can't remember the name or place for all of Americas states, so it makes sense for Americans not being able to place Europe's countries. And the Europeans who think Americans are annoying for saying their hometown instead of "America" when you ask them where they're from: that's the equivalent to say your countries capitol where you grew up, instead of the country. You probably wouldn't answer "Europe" to the question "So where are you from?". I know I wouldn't.

TLDR: It is wild that english-speaking people can talk to so many without learning another language.

All my knowledge is from the Internet, I have never visited the US, so maybe I've misunderstood some things. (I know not everyone in the US have english as their mother tongue, but it's still a lot more than in Europe)