Comment by grecy | Hacker News Reader

Comment by grecy | Hacker News Reader

Living in far Northern Canada I can relate to this.

Up here, if someone wants to smile and say "Have a nice day", they will do so while making eye contact and you can tell they genuinely mean it. They are usually prompting you for further friendly chit-chat and happiness. Even when there are other customers waiting in line - those customers will be made to wait while two people have a friendly chat.

When they don't want to say "Have a nice day", they won't. Likely they won't say anything at all or kind of grunt/mumble and just move along (even in retail) - but at least you know they're being genuine either way.

Last time I went back to "the real world" I was shocked time and time again when someone would say "Have a nice day" - I'd start to return the sentiment and be utterly disgusted the person wasn't even looking at me, and wasn't even paying attention to me. It all felt so fake, and I was quickly tired of it.

Lots of business up here have a little sign in their shop "Yukon hospitality - it grows on you".

I genuinely wonder if the climate has something to do with this. Extreme cold and very dark days tend to bring people together, and tends to make people more genuine and humble, in my experience.

> I genuinely wonder if the climate has something to do with this. Extreme cold and very dark days tend to bring people together, and tends to make people more genuine and humble, in my experience.

I don't think it's the climate, at least it's not the sole reason. After all, Russia is a huge country and Russians live all over it - from Siberia to the Russian Black Sea coast with its subtropical climate.

I suspect it has to do with the average hardship of life and, at least with Russia, major social and economic upheavals that happen often enough for every generation of Russians to be affected.

> Extreme cold and very dark days tend to bring people together

Also, this is probably the last thing that comes to mind about Russians in general. For the most part, they are notoriously individualistic.

> Also, this is probably the last thing that comes to mind about Russians in general. For the most part, they are notoriously individualistic.

You understand "individualistic" in some specific (probably american) way. Russians may look individualistic if you don't know them well, but actually in Russia close friends and family means much more then in US.

> You understand "individualistic" in some specific (probably american) way.

No, I meant individualistic in a "mostly devoid of the sense of social responsibility" way. In fact, it's a common meme in Russia to lament the lack of a sense of unity pervasive in the culture (the closeness of family/friends notwithstanding) .

In this definition yes, modern Russian people are individualists. But in sense > Extreme cold and very dark days tend to bring people together That is in the sense of small close group they are more collectivists than many of western countries.

If this difference is in fact real and actually represents a difference in emotion or happiness, then I don't think climate has much to do with it. Alaskans have always struck me as overly cheerful people and they get similar cold and darkness.

> Alaskans have always struck me as overly cheerful people

Exactly. They're genuine and real, as are Yukoners.

It always strikes us how similar Yukoners and Alaskans are, to the point people from both places always agree we should break off and form our own country.

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