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I once heard, in a different century, that the "modal restaurant script" differed between the US and the UK in that in the former, the waitstaff asks the diners a bunch of (to a cultural outsider) overly prying questions, while in the latter, the diners ask them of the waitstaff. Still true? Never was?

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UK: the diners aren't asking questions of the waitstaff unless things are very quiet, nor are the waitstaff asking you either. You might have a bit of "where have you come from today" in the more rural pub destinations. Tipping culture is basically "high end only" or a service charge sneaking onto the bill for larger groups.

Australian who has spent time living in the US: yes, the difference is still true today between how waiters at an Australian restaurant and servers at a US restaurant interact with customers.

Waiters wait. If you need anything you make eye contact and they come over.

Servers are overly friendly and will interrupt conversations to ask if the food is up to standard, etc.

I've always thought it was due to tipping. Servers need to be active and show they're being attentive in order to get tips.

> I've always thought it was due to tipping

I've been bothered far more by wait staff in Australia than I ever have in the US. Must be down to the location and the restaurant.

It's also interesting to think about it when you say bothered.

I'm super american, born and raised and now living in the western Midwest. When the wait staff talk to me, I'm genuinely interested in hearing about them. I like meeting new people, even if those people are being paid to meet me. I legitimately enjoy learning about the lives of the people I meet, even briefly.

Is that an American thing? Is that a bad thing?

I don't think it's a bad thing, but it is most strongly a Midwestern and Southeastern thing, and I'm from the South. Boston might give a different answer.

I'm also Australian I experienced an overly attentive waiter recently when I was eating at a steakhouse with a few friends. It felt like every 5 minutes they would come up to the table interrupt the conversation to ask something like "How are you enjoying the meal? Can I get you anything?" It was a little bit jarring because of how frequently it occurred. I don't mind once or twice but the frequency in this case seemed excessive.

Possibly it was because it wasn't very crowded and the junior waiter was trying to look busy in front of their supervisor.

> Servers are overly friendly and will interrupt conversations to ask if the food is up to standard, etc.

The median American in any restaurant with chairs not bolted to the floor can be assumed to operate on roughly the level of a marginally clever, but ill-parented and intemperate, four- or five-year-old child. Even nice places have to deal with this, because neither the child nor the American recognizes any such distinction.

The waitstaff need you to convince them they won't deal with this with you, which you can quickly and easily do by dressing appropriately - I know, but an American would need to be told - and comporting yourself in the correct fashion you described. A place worth eating at will recognize this and leave you pretty much in peace thereafter.

I'll take even the worst, unkempt dining experience at a deep south waffle house over the treatment that europoor Parisians give to those who don't speak perfect french at even high end restaurants in the heart of Paris. Also, foie gras, traditional veal, and many other European delicacies are disgusting (ethically).

Coincidental, even the ghettos of Baltimore/Detroit likely have a higher GDP per capita than most of continental Europe, and this is validated by the increasingly hilarious US-euro monetary exchange rate.

I'm comforted by seeing lots of snapbacks and "SUPREME" printed on clothes by the five-year-old minded Americans around me, because the alternative is hollier-than-thou European mentality of 1. requiring money to use public bathrooms, 2. not giving water by default at many restaurants (and being too poor for ice when asked for it), and 3. spitting in the food of/protesting the existence of the expats/tourists/immigrants who bankroll your entire nations existence in the first place.

Reap what you sow. Watching the UK get flung deeper and deeper into its recession as a result of one of the most hilariously stupid and preventable economic self-pwns ever (brexit) is especially delicious to watch. Reminds me why we threw off our tyrannical monarchists in the first place.

    > higher GDP per capita than most of continental Europe

I once read that the cost of university alone in the US explains a large part of this difference. (I cannot evaluate that claim, as I am not a trained economist.) In many European countries (there are 50!), university is nearly free, when compared the the extortionary rates in the US.

    > increasingly hilarious US-euro monetary exchange rate

I have seen this on HN a few times in similar reactionary screed. If you look at the USD/EUR FX rate since 2015, it is pretty stable at 1.10.

Brexit was a product of democracy, as sad as that is. Your own country is just barely holding on to it's democratic status, in the eyes of other first world nations. I wouldn't be so quick to throw stones. The US GDP doesn't seem to be getting it's citizens much in return, it's a very poor measure for a country's success and prosperity.

"Democracy" is a funny way of spelling "fraud".

The dumbest thing about this post is the usual grouping of "europeans" all together as if it's one country with one set of rules, cultural values and expectations.

Awful lot of eurohate for someone posting with a German username.

Max Stirner is the only good thing Germany ever produced.

Most food in the US it's a turd compared to a semi-decent restaurant in Spain being far more cheaper.

Hmm, not certain about wait staff. I’m certain that barbers do it everywhere I’ve ever been though.

Historically, in the United States, the barbershop was a meeting place. It was a place you went to talk and relax. It's weird in the modern society of fast cuts and what not.

But barbers tend to go into that business because they like talking to people. And you're right, every barber I've ever had has pried into my life. But I've also been more willing to share life experiences with barbers, and listen to their experiences than any other profession. Not sure why.

> But I've also been more willing to share life experiences with barbers, and listen to their experiences than any other profession. Not sure why.

It is like going out for a smoke on a party to talk with some prospect partner.

Having an excuse to talk other than talking makes it easier.

You are not flirting. You are smoking.

I hadn't understood the social power of smoke breaks until my welding instructor admitted he had been convinced for the first week or two of class that I was a tweaker because, given a bunch of rods to weld, I'd disappear into a booth and not come out again until I'd welded them all[0], no matter how many smoke breaks the other students had taken in the meantime.

It's a pity that when we realised the cancer sticks[1] aren't so healthy, we just got rid of them instead of trying to replace them with an activity that also allows colleagues to down tools and socialise for a well-determined short time.

(in the Old Country, anyway: over here, many businesses have a coffee break/round of snacks at ~9 and ~16)

[0] apparently one of the prereqs of becoming a welding instructor is knowing all the places in a booth lazier students will attempt to hide their unwelded rods

Smoko¹ is serious business².

¹ /watch?v=j58V2vC9EPc ² /watch?v=P_dza9y6cg0

Is your pulmo worried? Would you like us to assign someone to worry your pulmo?

After a tip from hispanophone colleagues in California, I started going to their hairdresser: it was Monday only, $5 or $10 instead of $30, and that was because the girls only took 5 or 10 minutes instead of 45. That was when I learned that the traditional barbershop package consisted of, say $10 worth of haircutting and $20 worth of rag chewing.

> barbers tend to go into that business because they like talking to people.

There's someone on staff at my local grocery who once told me she likes working the register because of the human contact, so whenever she's there and there isn't already a line I head for the register instead of the self-checks.

If your grocery store has a union, best do that always, if you have the time. Makes it harder for management to lie down how many people they need.

I think for many men this may be the only professional they engage whose job involves touching the body and doesn't presumptively involve pain. (Not everything a doctor does will hurt, but one wisely assumes anything a doctor does might. This does make a difference, I think.)

"Intimacy" is a word and concept much misunderstood in this culture as relating only to sex, but at root it has to do with the passage of social and personal boundaries; its root intima refers to the inside of something, and so "intimacy" more usefully describes a spectrum of closeness or a point thereupon.

In that frame, the work of a barber is very slightly more intimate than that of many professionals. I don't know whether it's for having helped create that context - nobody makes you sit down in the chair - in which folks feel a little easier about speaking of things they never ordinarily would. But if I wanted to explain the "barbershop effect" I think it's something I would want to investigate.

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