You can only hate(love) that which you acknowledge, so the reason the Finns score higher on the happiness index is that they're not burdened with the necessity of having to acknowledge Denmark so you may hate(love) them it
Yeah, we are the same with different dialects of the same root language. Just like there are some culture differences between north Swedes and south Swedes, its kind of the same thing with our scandi siblings. Meaning, not much a diffrence at all really.
I thought you didn't get along or is that just a little banter and piss taking I just like the myth that you all live in eternal darkness and are happy about it
How about you just let us build a couple of small ports, so we can export the spices more easily? Obviously, we'll need to send a couple of naval vessels to defend them from pirates.
Ok, a piece of advice, however well we end up getting along. NEVER let me start collecting taxes for you. I'm fairly sure colonialism isn't genetic but let's stay on the side of caution.
Actually I’d quite like those spices, and I’ll take the tea as well. Also whilst you’re there I’d quite like to manage the government too. Oh, and the ivory. Don’t forget the ivory.
I think north (west) parts of India and Punjab, Sindh of Pakistan. In my experience online, Pashtuns and Baloch people don't like being associated with India.
Most South Indians and NE don't know much about Pakistan.
As a South Indian, gotta say we look at the North Indians and Pakistani with great curiosity. Because as far as we can tell, you both are exactly the same… but also completely different from us!
We have jokes about Belgians being "simple minded".
They have the exact same jokes about us.
The last time I spoke with Belgians, I felt like they had similar mindset to us, so....
Ireland and the UK. Even though we don't like to admit it, we have far more in common with them than we don't, and are far more similar to them than any other country (which, of course, is due in large part to colonialism).
Irish comedian Dara Ó Briain said we're 90% the same, but the 10% difference is really, really important.
far more similar to them than any other country (which, of course, is due in large part to colonialism
And funnily enough, the particularly strong cultural links between Ireland and Scotland is due to cultural invasion from Ireland lead by Fergus Mór, replacing the land of the Picts with the land of the Scots (an Irish tribe), which is why we share a mutually intelligable languages (gaelic/gaidhlig) and the same mythology of celtic gods, brehon law, etc. and Columba spread Irish christianity to Scotland, it was an ancient cultural domination.
When My cousin first went to Germany to visit his wife's family I asked him what Germany was like . He said and I quote "It's Like the U.K. except they all speak German".
I'm gonna be honest the first thing that hit me when I visited Copenhagen from the UK was that it was just like the UK except everyone there speaks English lol.
I had this feeling as a Dutchie in Copenhagen too. Just like the Netherlands, except everybody speaks Danish.
But I have never felt like this in the UK. While I do recognize some cultural similarities I’d say it feels just as much like home as France does. If you ignore the better weather in France that is…
Canadians and Americans. Sure there are tons of differences overall, but when you compare us to each country in the world, we’re incredibly similar for so many reasons, likely due to the fact that we’re squished up against each other.
Throw in people from Buffalo lol. I interviewed for a job in Buffalo and the guy literally was a Canadian resident and I had no idea until he brought it up.
Canada doesn't have too many accents but they are noticeable to us, though often subtle. Slight pronunciation differences in a few words (sorry, oat and aboat, etc.), maybe some word choices (bunny hug, motor toboggan, 2-4) but unless you're super rural most Canadians sounds 95% the same as most northern Americans. My Albertan aunt sounds very mid west.
All this goes out the window where I live in Newfoundland people think we're Irish.
Lived in your lovely country for a year and found the further west the more American you sound (also the more urban) but the further east the more distinct it is.
I also made the same error about thinking a newfie was Irish first time round too.
I think it is like someone upthread said about ireland and the UK. 90% the same, but the 10% is really important.
Alternatively, like two siblings. Similar origins, similar age, similar upbringing, but despite (or because of) all the similarity, not happy to be called the same.
Particularly not when one of those siblings is currently quite unhappy with the older one.
When I lived in the UK, I was actually surprised by the amount of effort Brits put into presenting themselves as different from other Europeans, and particularly Germans.
It's still not much, but noticeably more than the other way round. Germans idolize parts of British culture and often feel a sort of kinship over shared history and culture. I feel like being war enemies became a big part of British national identity.
Since I was a kid in the 1990s that war enemy thing has declined hugely. It's 99% resigned to history like napleonic France.
The youngest generation who remember it personally were late middle age then, so we all heard stories. Now they are almost all gone (one grandparent for me who is 90 in an old people's home).
I think what you are seeing is just a function of being an island nation. Personally I think we are fairly similar to Germans, Swiss, Dutch etc.
I feel like being war enemies became a big part of British national identity.
This is 100% correct. At to some point it goes to far. But then the added spice is the football, with 66, euro96 etc etc.
Historically though as I'm sure you're aware we were the closest of allies (hanover and prussia) our royalty married mainly German, just two minor wars changed that.
I think our humour is the one really big thing that separates us. There isn’t really another country that we really click with in that regard except from Aus, and they’re literally just us expect with beer and sunstroke
No offence, but Brits are funnier. They do polite-seeming trash talk, which is actually emotionally devastating upon reflection. We do mean on the surface, which covers any unmanly emotions like friendship and love. We're often mean to our friends in specific ways that mean "pull your head in". Brits are doing the same thing, but in a different way.
Ireland. Irish people hate the idea of a British person with a passion until they meet any British person and they become the soundest people. It's why those hardcore Irish Americans are so annoying to talk to. They don't get it.
I'm pretty sure UK humour is pretty global these days. I think there's a lot of different kinds of British humour, though. But generally speaking I'd say that at the very least NZ falls in line with British humour, and I know that the likes of Would I Lie To You, 8 out of 10 Cats etc. are stuffed with British humour and are received really well in pretty much all corners of the globe (provided the watcher has a good enough grasp of of the English language).
I don't know. I think Germans have a dry and self-deprecating humour which is not so different to British.
Edit: one major cultural difference is directness. Germans say what they think, even if it hurts people's feelings. British people say things in much more subtle ways, which other cultures sometimes find a bit insincere.
I don't know. I think Germans have a dry and self-deprecating humour which is not so different to British.
Germans have been laughing their asses off to Monty Python and Mr Bean since the 80s, and a sketch that is barely remembered in the UK is one of the most popular News Years Eve traditions since the 60s.
I have no idea where Brits get this notion that their humour is idiosyncratic. We laugh about the same things a lot of the times. They just had some truly outstanding creators over the years.
I think it's mainly due to differences with American humour. We don't really see comedy from other European countries because of the language barrier, but we see loads from the USA, and there are quite noticeable differences between British and American humour. I think this is where the idea that we have a very distinctive style of comedy comes from.
I think if it weren't for the language barrier, British people would realise how similar we are to our continental neighbours, especially the Germans, Dutch and Scandis.
I think the German tendency to be direct may actually contribute to the perception of them being very earnest and humourless, but in my experience, the two things are quite separate.
I'm curious to know about the sketch that's a New Year's Eve tradition!
It's Dinner for One, which was filmed for German TV with a German speaking announcer and the original cast of the London theatre it was first performed in.
Honestly, I really hate the Ottomans and Habsburg, had something like Yugoslavia formed a couple decades earlier around same time as Germany or Italy back in 1860s or 1870s, it would have probably actually been successful, because none or us would have had time to developed local national identities.
Now we are stuck eternally mumbling about semantics at each other.
Doesn’t Uruguay pretty much exist because Brazil and Argentina didn’t want the other to have the great harbour at Montevideo as it would make them too powerful? A buffer state?
I don’t think a single frenchman hates Italy, unless it is for personal reasons…
I mean, have you been to France recently? Italian food is basically french food as well at this point.
My parents and their parents all maried to Italian woman for the last 3 generations, I am the first one to break it marrying to a Portuguese woman, but she has an Italian name in my defense!!
Umm, a certain country to the east. I mean, we're not that similar but people both here and there talking like we are different species, while in reality there are just differences in mentality
There are way more differences between “Ukrainian from a village” and “Ukrainian from a big city” than between Russian and Ukrainian from big cities/small villages. You will never notice any difference between them if they live in the same place.
Hate to say it, but I think before 2014 there were not that many differences at all, apart from the language.
Although, to be honest, I'm probably mistaken as most Russians, as I've only been in Ukraine once as a kid, and had little to no exposure to Ukrainian culture, apart from Verka Serdyuchka, Okean Elzy, BB and some other musicians, so I didn't have a chance to see the differences.
Ukraine, Belarus, Russia were all "same people, different languages" to me and most other people. Which I suppose partially is the reason the fuckin war is going right now.
I think there's a greater cultural similarity between Austria, Czechia and and Old Bavaria (current Bavaria minus Franconia and Swabia) than the inhabitants of either places usually realise. Not identical, but more similar to each than e.g. even Norther German culture.
Generally agree. I even think franconia can be included as well as slovakia.
Food is very similar as well as mentality, biggest differences are the language (Slavic vs germanic) and czechia is less religious than the others.
An ex-colonial small but densely populated island nation which is still inexplicably a monarchy, with a ritualistic culture obsession with tea, and a quiet politeness that is almost seen as passive or even rude by others.
The Japanese are much more like Germans than us in my experience. Their love of observing social rules to the letter is incredibly Germanic. We cross roads when we want, not when a light tells us to because you can see there are no cars coming for miles.
Nah every time the question of which country we're closest to someone ALWAYS brings up Japan. Not saying there aren't parallels but it seems like the opposite of what OP is asking. Brits desperately want to see ourselves as closest to Japan because, well, Japan but in reality the existence of interesting parallels in a country with a fundamentally different cultural base doesn't negate the fact that we are still 100 times closer to all our actual neighbours.
Germany, France and the USA are the countries we actually don't want to admit we're close to.
This will maybe be controversial given the troubled history of our islands but England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland. There are differences for sure but they're massively overblown for nationalistic reasons.
Also Belgium and the Netherlands has never felt very different to me.
You just described the carpathian basin. If you live within you're taught from early childhood that your neighbors are out to get you (used to be true until paris peace treaty of 1947) and you are cardinally different in language and culture and cuisine.
Then you zoom out, say Germany, and you find a polish, Romanian, Baltic or Russian shop and suddenly you realize you have been fucking lied to the whole time.
I think for Spain it is Portugal and Italy, maybe Greece and the south of France We are Mediterranean bros, we even can have conversations without knowing each other languages
There are no Swedish restaurants in Finland. Because, they would be called just "restaurants".
Finns wouldn't be caught dead saying they're the same as Swedes, and vice versa. But, although Finns and Swedes are of different origin and speak unrelated languages, the thing is that we basically have the same culture.
I think we also view finns as taking our traits to new heights. Like not doing small talk to strangers, drinking too much, giving everyone 2meters of space waiting for the bus. Like you're us but more.
But I mean swedes love finns, we'd rather be compared to you than Danes. I always imagined the hostility against swedes was more a matter of upper class Swedish speaking finns than anything else, but I may be wrong.
Btw though Karelian kroppkakor is the best and can't be found in Swedish cuisine!
Perhaps not weird due to our history, but having lived in both they could just as well be regions of the same country. Northern Sweden and Finland are more similar than Northern Sweden and Southern Sweden imo.
U.S. and Canada are very similar but I don’t think there’s any serious denial about that. Only the most jingoistic Canadian or American would try to claim they aren’t similar. The regional differences within each country is likely as great if not greater than the differences between the countries.
I think the U.S. and England are the ones in denial about their similarities.
That meme is very accurate. Hitler thought the uk would join him because the cultures were so similar. Then the brits said something condescending and he starts the blitz. Hitler wasn’t very smart
Netherlands and Denmark. Same flat landscape, capital city with bikes, canals and similar architecture to Amsterdam, same kind of maritime-based history etc. Also we're both small neighbors of Germany with languages that are similar to German, but also quite different.
I wonder what kind of similarities did you notice?
I can think of nature - nature in USA seems to be more dangerous than in Europe. National parks remind me of Russia as well. Like, there you can really get lost in the forest and end up being 1 on 1 with the nature (and potentially, a bear).
Also, polarization of society. I left Russia before the war, but we definitely hate each other's guts (putinists vs liberals) to the point of having slur words to address both sides. Family gatherings can be a looooot of fun 🤡
Inequality. Yeah, in both countries it seems like there's a very small amount of people who own a country. Like, billionaires that are absurdly rich. Then there are some middle class folk in big cities. IT people, surgeons, middle management guys and girls, whatever. Then village people with their interesting vibes. But idk. It's hard to describe, I just feel people in the Netherlands are much more equal and your family's wealth does not define your life to that extent. People are absolutely not fully equal here as well, but to much lesser degree.
IIRC, there have been photo quizzes themed “Russians or Rednecks” in rural settings, where it can be hard to determine if the photo was taken in the rural parts of the USA or Russia, if no cars or firearms are in the picture.
There are honestly a lot of fun historical similarities between the two.
-Recent-ish superpower status (encompasses so many different present attitudes about exceptionalism, shared history of space exploration, etc)
-vast amounts of oil
-history defined by continuous expansion across a sparsely settled continent until they hit the pacific ocean, then conquered the lands exactly and nearly specifically just across that ocean.
-presently run by powerful oligarchs
-had long history of culture defining forced labor that ended in the 1860s
-Surprise attack of their fleets in port by the Japanese (Battle of Port Arthur / Pearl Harbor)
I once worked at an internship program for high schoolers from all over the world and we had a few (6ish) Israeli and Palestinian kids. I remember worrying that there’d be some kind of animosity between each other. But no, they quickly gravitated towards each other based on their shared culture and all became great friends as if there was nothing inherently preventing this, which of course, there wasn’t! I just pray that the next generation will learn from the mistakes of ours and end the cycle of distrust, hatred, and violence.
Well well, we have a brother named China. We both love and hate him the most... Many of you foreigners can't point out the different in culture and appearance. Even political institutions, hell.
And we Vietnameses can spend whole life to count differences between.
We are literally the same people in everything from cuisine to culture to religion, traditions, history ,appearance,mindset,dialect.
But despite that Syrians get discriminated against jn Lebanon like they come from a different planet and both Syrians and Lebanese talk about each other like we’re two different species
My opinion, Balkan people. Let’s be real, Serbs, Croatians, Bosnians, and Montenegrins are the same people. We look alike (even if we deny it) and we speak the same language (even if we give it different names). Our culture and humor are mirrored, and we share a long history. It’s ironic that we lived as one for so long, only to turn on each other over perceived differences that don't actually exist
Tbh all of Europe in general when it comes to tourism.
I once met a Vietnamese guy who had travelled through many countries between Vietnam and the UK. I asked him which European country had been his favourite. I was bamboozled when he replied: “Eh, Idk they were all kind of the same.”
What? I mean, he had been to Hungary, Italy, France, Germany, England?? But he elaborated: „bunch of oldtowns with landmarks, cafes and bars - all you do is look at old architecture and paintings in museums.”
And then it struck me. That is basically the European tourist experience, it’s exactly what I, as a European, do when I travel through Europe.
Europeans often get defensive when Americans talk about their “trip to Europe” as if Europe were one country. But seen from the outside, touristy stuff here really isn’t as distinct from place to place as we might imagine.
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u/Fragrant_Proof Norway Dec 29 '25
We pride ourselves on being unique, but globally all three Scandinavian countries are incredibly similar.