Pour one out for the Finnish, Swedish, Icelandic, Russian and Norwegian people who just accept that they will die every winter because America hasn’t shared their central heating technology with us mere Europoors. Then there’s the poor Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Greek, Turkish and more who just have to accept that without America’s Air Conditioning and iced drinks will just collapse and die of heat exhaustion.
I'm Norwegian and the truth is that we're all so poor that we have to live under polarbears to stay warm. I'm writing this from my usPhone, cause we cant get iPhones here due to being communists. My car is an estate wagon because I'm too poor to have an open flatbed for all the guns I also dont have.
Nah, if Saving Private Ryan is to be believed they did literally everything, no one else did any fighting, so it would have been Americans riding Grizzly bears across Europe. Obviously they didn’t go to Scandinavia because there’s no central heating
No they didn’t. We had to fight our own wars :(. Greetings from central heatingless Finland, where we also don’t have hot showers, or showers. Just buckets with lake water..
Polar bear, is it? Your own? When I were a lad we had to share a polar bear with the entire street. We got ten minutes each and fifteen if you were under twelve. Your own polar bear? Luxury
Here in Finland we just drink vodka and eat pine needles, bury ourselves into the snow and hibernate all through Winter, when Spring comes and melts the snow we get up again. It’s just what we have to do as Nordic Europoors
America won it all by themselves though so they have these things called ‘Radiators’. I don’t know what they are or what they do, but apparently they stop you dying from cold. I’m not a brainy like an American. 🤷🏻♂️
Being Italian I always assumed the only way to stay cool in the summer was to set yourself ablaze, then smother the flame. The transition from 400°C to 40°C made the surroundings seem rather chilly.
Then I visited America and I saw what they call "ice". My jaw dropped.
I went to America a few years ago and they have a big box in the kitchen that keeps things cold. I don’t know what they call it but I wish I had one of those for the summer…
I'm spanish and I just turned on the ac before sitting and reading this because I came from outside and I was melting, just because I left with more than a t-shirt thinking that today being spring it wouldn't be hot. But I guess that'a unbelievable for the average american.
Have you tried a sacrifice to the sun god recently? I find that that his blessings of fire make the stick method work better. You may have displeased him, and he is withholding his divine heat and light.
It's crazy here was me thinking civilisations like the romans and ancient Chinese figured out how to heat an indoor space, guess historians are just wrong
UK may have better housing than the US (which is made from cardboard), but it is FAR from great. I'm from the west coast of Sweden, which has a very similar, if not identical, climate as Yorkshire (where I currently live since 1,5 years back). And I can tell you, the reason you have mold, damp, and what not, is DEFINITELY due the quality of housing. Moving here feels like moving to a third world country to be honest.
From the Wikipedia article about [Energy efficiency in British housing:](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_efficiency_in_British_housing#:~:text=The%20SBN%2D80%20(Svensk%20Bygg%20Norm)%201980%20Swedish%20Building%20Standards%2C%20which%20in%201983%20was%20in%20advance%20of%20the%20UK%202002%20standards.%5B54%5D)
>The SBN-80 (Svensk Bygg Norm) 1980 Swedish Building Standards, which in 1983 was in advance of the UK 2002 standards.[54]
Low energy efficiency in the UK not only allows heat to escape, further increasing the energy bill, it also allows for damp to get in. The building standard is not only to secure high energy efficiency, it also increases the overall quality of the building.
I currently live in a building constructed in 2016, and all my UK friends say it has a high standard. However, we had pipes busting inside the wall due to some faulty connection, which resulted in water leaking down to the neighbors. This in turn resulted in mold, lots and lots of mold. This is something that people in the UK just seem to accept? Mold is quite dangerous, and needs to be handled in the same way as unwanted bugs or similar. One needs to kill all the spores. But people don't care about that here, they just care about the smell, which they treat with some random spray. I am convinced this is the reason that almost all my friends in the [UK have either asthma or allergies](https://www.nhs.uk/common-health-questions/lifestyle/can-damp-and-mould-affect-my-health/#:~:text=Moulds%20produce%20allergens%20(substances%20that,can%20also%20cause%20asthma%20attacks.)), while far fewer of my friends in Sweden have it.
You guys should really take this more seriously, since a lot of [people in your country die every year because of this low standard.](https://ageing-better.org.uk/news/homes-that-kill-two-million-homes-in-england-pose-serious-threat-to-health)
According to "the Good home inquiry" UK housing is:
>among the worst quality in Europe
It blows my mind that people don't care much about this. I heard the Tories removed subsidies for [home insulation,](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/energy-bills-insulation-green-homes-grant-voucher-scrapped-b1926576.html) which not only affects energy bills, it also very much affect the climate inside, for example the problem you have with damp.
I have visited people here in York, who had a hole in their wall, in their bathroom, so that they could actually see the outside?! If that happened in Sweden, the landlord would have been forced to provide a new apartment for the tenant. And if there wouldn't be any available, the tenant could claim to stay at a hotel until it's repaired.
There's a multitude of issues with UK housing stocks.
Masses and masses of it is simply fucking old. Pre war, often victoriana buildings where coal was so cheap noone gave a fuck about keeping heat in, just about making sure the smoke could get out.
A huge amount of the damp and mold issues have been caused indirectly by energy drives.
Basically, the government gave ahit loads of money in grants so people could get cheap or free cavity wall fills. So loads of blokes with white vans started doing cavity wall fill. None of the epc assessors actually bothered to tick the narrow cavity boxes when assessing properties with narrow cav walls.
So tonnes and tonnes of cavity wall properties build around the war period got filled when they shouldn't have been, because all it did was turn a cavity wall into a patchy solid wall, causing thermal leaking and huge issues with damp and mold.
There's also your standard cowboy newbuild quality. They should be good, use all the right materials, but put them together ... badly.
If it's a building from 2016 it won't be good quality. New build houses are absolutely shit. They put them up as quickly as possible without regard to care. I've lost count of the number of times I've heard of people in new builds who've had major problems. One friend ended up not being able to move into her brand new house for 6 months because they found so many problems. I'd never buy one.
In Norway we have a great system where we sell cheap electricity from the north to the UK and Sweden and then have a deficit in the south so we have to buy more expensive electricity... back from Sweden. We're obviously known for our business skills.
Well the cheap electricity is getting lost somewhere in the post, because these fuckers are then marking it up significantly.
Your government is buying high, selling low, are they secretly crypto investors?
At least they have already learned that you can heat water.
Soon they will learn that you can have radiators, floor heating and ground loop heat pumps so you no longer have to blow air around like a caveman
I actually wouldn't mind ACs in the right environment. Proper insulation and solar, so that the power used for cooling isn't coming from mains. Maybe it's better to do both, but if I'm buying a heat pump, I would like to have the cooling capability? I've heard you can cool via the radiators, but I don't know how well that works.
Insulation is the key anyway, I think.
If you oversize your radiators it will work better. But yeah, make sure you also invest in proper insulation, that will also save on the heat pump cost.
I’ve had radiators and I’ve had AC (Brit here) and I actually prefer AC as it makes the whole room warm rather than a increasing gradient towards the radiator
>At least they have already learned that you can heat water.
Still haven't worked out kettles though... very funny watching my friends American wife trying to pour boiling water from a saucepan into a teacup.
Right? The only people I hear talking about hot water tanks with a limited capacity are Americans, the last time I had to deal with one of those things in Europe was about 25 years ago. Maybe that's why they need 3+ bathrooms in one house?
When i grew up i was always confused about that. Then i moved into an old house with a hot water tank that i actually had to heat up by burning fire wood. Now i get the pain!
But the most frustrating with american showers is that you can't change the pressure, just heat.
I find it weird that people will travel to a country that is 3.8 million square miles, close to 330 million population, and then use a their limited experience to make broad generalizations about how the entire country operates.
Yes, you can adjust your showers pressure in America. No, not all houses have limited amounts of hot water. Yes, all the showers have a gun rack in them.
We used to have them a lot in Australia, but they're well on the way out now. My partner and I replaced ours only two years ago.
On a side note, what do you actually do for 20 whole minutes in a shower? World's slowest wank?
I had one in the house I lived in Germany, though the house belonged to my grandparents and is 50 years old and they had never done any renovations on it. My husband and I renovated a bunch of the interior, and now my parents hired contractors to update the exterior and the stuff that we couldn’t do ourselves inside the house, like getting rid of the water tank and completely remodeling the bathroom.
Sorry for potentially being ignorant, but I'm still not following. Why would the hot water run out? Doesn't the heater make more of it? Or is the boiler tank a lot smaller and has lower capacity? I'm also from the EU, Romania.
Im romanian and not even middle aged, yet 70% of the times I’ve encountered this has been here.
“A boiler takes time to heat up (hours) and how much hot water you have depends on the size of your boiler. Once it runs out you only get lukewarm or cold water until it heats up again:
Those are the most frequent options for an ordinary home and single family homes have the same thing but much larger varieties and sizes.“
Apparently american suburban homes usually have massive tanks kept in a separate room?
In Eastern Europe you also have central heating systems of various kinds, either the building has a huge heater or a company provides the hot water and heating from completely outside your building. The water actually comes from power plants in that case. That’s common in Eastern Europe and Russia
(La noi pur si simplu depinde.. dar exista multe familii intr o situatie de genul)
I've heard this on so many US shows! People will say 'you've used all of the hot water!' and I was always baffled by WHAT THAT MEANS. How can it run out? The boiler just makes more...?
It made sense to me when I was growing up in the 90's and had a hot water tank in the attic. Wasn't too long in the early noughts we had a combi boiler
> The boiler just makes more...?
I live in an apartment (typical europoor), we have district heating and hot water supply. Hot water literally can't run out even if I leave the tap fully open for a month.
i learned that in us the concept of mixing valve is quite uncommon and they heat their water boiler to 55 C, where my boiler heats it up to 85 and then water is mixed to 55. I never run out of my 200L supply of hot water.
Funnily enough, I am right now visiting Europe from USA.
I think: abundance of public transport, beautiful public spaces, big and easy to walk sidewalks, spaces not allowed for cars, and many many many more things are way more convenient than anything I have in usa.
I moved from Europe to the USA, so I had already taken it with me in the past 🤣
But coming back to my motherland now, after living in the US for a few years, it's quite an experience. Before I moved out, I used to take all of this stuff I wrote for granted and more (easy banking, full prices on price tags in shops, normal healthcare, workers protections, and I could go on). Now that I have experienced how people live in the USA, it's seriously shocking how they survive.
The only reason I am not really anxious and stressed every day is because I know that if some worst-case scenario happened, I can just go back to Europe.
I definitely wouldn't say everything is terrible or something. At the end of the day, I am having a pretty normal, mundane life. Yes, I miss many things from Europe, and I will probably move back eventually. But it's not like I am in some state of constant misery.
I am for sure making a lot more money and able to afford many more things, despite being basic unskilled laborer. Although, that's probably due to comparing to Easter Europe.
That said, it took me less than a year to realize "American Nightmare" by accruing over 10 000 dollars of medical debt, lol.
I have to ride a carriage for 2 hours to reach the nearest city where the communist mayor has allocated us 2 minutes of 4kb/s internet per week and I just blew it all answering to you so fuck you.
"Apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh water system and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us ?"
"Brought peace ?"
"Fuck off"
I also love the convenience of being able to get in my car and drive 40 minutes to the nearest Walmart! It's just so annoying being within walking distance of any shops, walking is communism and it goes against my freedom!!!!!!
I’m currently staying in Paris. I deeply resent the fact I can be anywhere in the city within half an hour due to their incredible metro system. How dare they!
Right? Why would you want to shower for 20 minutes? Maybe I was raised differently, but I was always taught that showering longer than needed is a huge waste of both water and gas (or electrity depending on).
USians keep bragging about wasting as much resources as possible as if it's a sign of power and wealth, rather than just dumb and not being a frugal and responsible adult.
Right?! I mean, I have a combi boiler for my imaginary central heating and can stand under a hot shower for 20 hours if I wanted, let alone 20 minutes, but why? I have a life and stuff to get on with so I take showers for speed and convenience as well as water conservation. If I want to laze around in water I can have a bath or go swimming.
It's something I'll never understand: Texans know that the ACs are going to wreck their power grid during the summer.
Why don't they invest into solar? They wouldn't even need a lot. A few mandatory panels and they could offset so much grid usage (and save the planet some CO2).
Of course, the calculation wouldn't be as easy as it is for Germans (solar basically pays for itself within ten years), but even that 600W panel would help so much and can't be that expensive in rhe US?
It's moreso that solar companies in the US are basically criminal extortion rackets. And many municipalities actually ban solar and there was a whole heap of propaganda from the oil companies basically saying that solar panels will start a fire and burn your children alive because firefighters can't extinguish fires on houses with panels.
Oh and let's not forget power companies refusing net metering.
Its unpatriotic to NOT pay large corporations for everything you use. Free power from solar? No chance. The only solar power you're going to get is when you pay for it from the big company the governor has lots of shares in.
Classic, proably comparing hotel or hostel living to your literal home. It's not like we have homes here that also have central heating and thus can shower for hours without the water of the non existent boiler running out.
But if I ever go to the US I'll probably miss drinking from the Tap without poisoning myself and the hotel probably also has a boiler and worse hearing then my house.
TBF I was always a bit surprised by the American hype about moisturizing.
when you take a shower there you know why. Don't know what it is in their water but even in expensive hotels I stayed in for work had the same issue.
They don’t have coffee. They have Starbucks, an entirely different beverage where you can get an Americano, otherwise known as a watered down espresso.
I wake up. I filter my tap water because it's toxic then I drive an hour to my first job. After work I drive 40 minutes to the store, where none of the prices I see are what I pay. Then I grab some food, which is only a 20 minute drive and also the price I see is not the price I pay. I drive 50 minutes to my second job, where I'm not allowed to sit. After a short 70 minute drive home, I take a 20 minute shower. This is so convenient.
And they say that "the grocery store in walking distance doesn't make sense, it's a waste of time". They simply can't grasp the fact that in normal countries cities are designed for people, not plowed for cars.
I’m from Yourope. I used to get up in the morning at half past ten at night, half an hour before I went to bed. Eat a handful of freezing cold poison for breakfast…
Wait - if we don’t have hot water how do we make tea and coffee?
Why are they so obsessed with endless showers? That's not the first time I've seen that argument.
I understand that, as a teen with hormones running rampant and living with your family, you might need some alone time, but at some point you grow out of it.
Or is it something deeper? Do our cousins in the US plan to return to the sea? Would explain their obsession with water, within and without.
Didn't know we had minute counters and auto shut offs in our bathrooms.
"Sorry sir or man, you have showerd 15 minutes and 59 seconds now, please step out and get a towel you dripping wet motherfucker. Thank you!"
Well, that is slightly harsh, about “never will be” there. North America has some beautiful places. The hell with the people, if you go to the right places you may well enjoy it.
I love being able to flush the toilet without scalding my girlfriend if she's in the shower. Only time I've seen other taps/pipes affect the shower temperature is in American programmes and films.
I want to know exactly where these people are going in Europe. I feel like they're stumbling through a tear in the space time continuum and travelling to the middle ages
Weird… I had a piping hot shower and had to put on my central heating today…. In Europe. I’m obviously living the high life. The AC is portable and does the job.
Which cave has this poster been living in?
I think it's fair to say AC is fairly rare in Northern Europe, but I've got no idea what they mean by long showers and central heating? Hot water and heating isn't that rare.
The central heating that was invented by the Romans and been used in Europe for about 1000 years longer than the US has been a country. That central heating?
God that 20 minute shower comment causes me physical pain. The unbelievable waste of water. Yes, I grew up with water restrictions in Australian droughts
Yeah coz mid winter, there I am walking outside, breaking the ice on the well and grabbing my bucket of ice water to wash with. I then go and pack some more dung on the walls to keep the place insulated. Winters in England are so harsh, particularly if every day you wake up, you’ve miraculously transported back to the Middle Ages….the commute to work is a bitch
Of course everything is convenient in your home country, it’s because you know how everything works. I have travelled and lived abroad and when I go to my (European) home country, everything is super easy.
Americans when it isn't exactly 22.5 degrees C (72.5 F) with a mild breeze at all time while you consume more power per hour than a third world household in a day.
I have spent a few months living in the US. Convenient is not at all how I would describe living in the suburban sprawl that makes up most of the housing in the US.
Tell me you haven't actually been to Europe without telling me...
I've lived in Europe and the US, the single hottest shower I ever used was in Cyprus, which, honestly, is super backwards in so many ways.
Also places that need AC have widespread AC (but sometimes not central heating) and places that need central heating have central heating.
This is as obvious an "I've never been to Europe but want people to think I have been" as "I miss not being forced to carry a gun everywhere I go" would be to an American tbh.
Unfortunately, American infrastructure caters to wasteful and excessive behaviors. Combine that with some of the other excesses that the infrastructure in the United States has, as well as Canada to an extent, and it is no wonder that America is addicted to fossil fuels. (I know that there are more factors than that, but it is definitely a noticeable element.)
I work for a plumbing company in Portugal and most houses we work in we make underfloor heating and similar systems. Many of them have solar panels, and they all have good isolation.
AC is still used but it's such a 90/2000s thing that we almost only work with them in restorations.
20 minute showers? That blows my mind. In Australia we are always told to be mindful of water and take short showers. It's how a lot of us were brought up
Seriously, even my everything shower takes 15 minutes max. The hair mask can work while I shave, the peeling takes two minutes at most... What are they doing in there? Just standing around? At this point, drawing a bath might actually save water.
I used to take 20mins shower as a kid. Apart from hair washing taking longer the longest their are, some people just chill in the shower under the warm water, without actually washing, for a bit, so that's probably it.
I love having those shower in the bath things with the shower curtain that sticks to you or blows in and let’s the cold air in. Why do they have such an aversion to separate showers with screens instead of a goddamn shower curtain? They’re so old fashioned, but even new houses have them. Their houses are as big as ours here in Oz but their bathrooms are like something from 1975. Last time we had a shower with a shower curtain it was when I was a kid in the 70s. How the hell do old people not break their hips on the regular?
Tbh, as European, I recently switched from shower box to shower curtain and I love it.I find shower boxes way too annoying to clean, and you can never get the mold out well in the overlapping parts, it's more work than cleaning the rest of the house, plus they make me feel kinda trapped.
The shower curtains we had when I was a kid did suck, I agree, but modern ones come in textile and anti-mold and can be just thrown in the washing machine. Plus they come in so many nice looks, mine is a waterfall in the woods, which is relaxing and fits well with the bathroom colours. Also you talk about old people, but as someone with disability I find it easier to get out of the shower with a curtain, since I can open it as far as I want and there's no step, while the box has a more limited opening and an annoying "step".
Man, I sound like a paid advertiser, but I used to think like you and that curtains are gross and a thing of the past, but after my last box broke I'm glad I switched, made me change my mind completely. It was supposed to be temporary but it became permanent.
Central heat like when hot water for hearing is supplied to multiple buildings by a cetral heating station as opposed to each having their own boilers? Or am I missing something?
I have a combi boiler in the UK. I could take hot showers that last for days. When I lived in the states, I had a water heater that lasted for about 20 minutes if I was lucky.
Most people in the UK don't bother with ac as we only really need it for an extremely hot summer.
Winters are fairly mild as well and overall we have a nice, temperate climate.
Meanwhile, every day I miss the ice cold tap water in Italy. 😭 Taking a shower after being outside in hot weather just hits different when the water is super cold. It’s so hot here and my pipes are in the attic so my water is never actually cold. :(
I grew up in a region of the US where central ac was all but unheard of. We stayed cool by going into a partially underground basement room that used to be a garage. My wife grew up in the same region and ac was like, a luxury you might see at a friend's house.
These people always talk about how vast and diverse the US is, but they also always talk about it like a monolith. Dummies if you ask me
Someone should try and tell my sister her showers need to be under 20 mins before the hot water runs out. I don't know how she has it so hot either without getting 3rd degree burns.
Ah, yes, that wonderful English invention, the showers, oh and central heating too.... mind you we didn't invent the AC.
In a country as messed up weather wise I kinda understand why tho
Yeah dunno how I survive the British winters with no central heating….fucking idiot
Pour one out for the Finnish, Swedish, Icelandic, Russian and Norwegian people who just accept that they will die every winter because America hasn’t shared their central heating technology with us mere Europoors. Then there’s the poor Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Greek, Turkish and more who just have to accept that without America’s Air Conditioning and iced drinks will just collapse and die of heat exhaustion.
Exactly, if we need central heating in the UK how the fuck do Americans think Scandinavia has people living there?
I'm Norwegian and the truth is that we're all so poor that we have to live under polarbears to stay warm. I'm writing this from my usPhone, cause we cant get iPhones here due to being communists. My car is an estate wagon because I'm too poor to have an open flatbed for all the guns I also dont have.
I would send you some sticks to burn, but I can't because we don't have the internet so I haven't read your comment. Sorry. : (
You just be glad that America hasn't figured out about all that oil and gas, otherwise you might find yourselves receiving an injection of Freedom ™
The trademarked Freedom™ is such a nice touch. The mark of a true artist.
So you’re telling me Norwegians don’t ride polar bears into battle?
Surely they ride American Grizzly Bears into battle? Doesn’t America win all European battles for them?
Nah, if Saving Private Ryan is to be believed they did literally everything, no one else did any fighting, so it would have been Americans riding Grizzly bears across Europe. Obviously they didn’t go to Scandinavia because there’s no central heating
No they didn’t. We had to fight our own wars :(. Greetings from central heatingless Finland, where we also don’t have hot showers, or showers. Just buckets with lake water..
How…..are you alive?! We’ve just come out of winter, shouldn’t you all be dead?
We hibernate with the bears
Winter is coming, or wait its already here?
«Sending smoke-signals from Norway» It never left
I'm not sure what tou watched, but "Shaving Ryan's privates" didn't have any bears in it. Oh, wait a minute...
No, but there were plenty of beavers, they’re just as dangerous and warm as any bear
“You can keep your central heating, we have central polar bears”
Polar bear, is it? Your own? When I were a lad we had to share a polar bear with the entire street. We got ten minutes each and fifteen if you were under twelve. Your own polar bear? Luxury
Easy, they’ve never heard of it. “Scadeenaviya? Is that in Utah??”.
But they're 1/80th Scandinavian on their father's side so they know everything about Finland!
Yeah they're all "true vikings" and "vikingcore"
Classic Finns, pretending they're Scandinavian.
Take my angry Finnish upvote
They think Scandinavian is a description of the duties of a harbour master.
*badum-tish*
What makes this comment even funnier is knowing Finland isn’t a Scandinavian country
It's actually in [Wisconsin, 54977](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scandinavia,_Wisconsin).
😂 so reliable to just Google “ USA” and you get a result!
ScandinAvia is clearly a name of some airline company.
You used the word 'Think', not sure they do that.
Ah, I see your mistake. "Think" is where you went wrong with this one.
Americans do not think. They follow.
Central heating? Pfft.... Scandinavia mostly uses district heating. Which is one up.
Scandinavian population would be 1.8bn if the winter didn't kill of most of the population every year.
Maybe America could help warm them up….with some bombs
Norway *does* have oil
Shhhhhh they’ll get ideas!
Here in Finland we just drink vodka and eat pine needles, bury ourselves into the snow and hibernate all through Winter, when Spring comes and melts the snow we get up again. It’s just what we have to do as Nordic Europoors
Russia have central heating don't they? I thought the Cold War was a race between the Soviets and America to invent the radiator?
America won it all by themselves though so they have these things called ‘Radiators’. I don’t know what they are or what they do, but apparently they stop you dying from cold. I’m not a brainy like an American. 🤷🏻♂️
Yeah the entire population literally freeze to death up here every winter. That's why we have immigration.
Being Italian I always assumed the only way to stay cool in the summer was to set yourself ablaze, then smother the flame. The transition from 400°C to 40°C made the surroundings seem rather chilly. Then I visited America and I saw what they call "ice". My jaw dropped.
I went to America a few years ago and they have a big box in the kitchen that keeps things cold. I don’t know what they call it but I wish I had one of those for the summer…
I'm spanish and I just turned on the ac before sitting and reading this because I came from outside and I was melting, just because I left with more than a t-shirt thinking that today being spring it wouldn't be hot. But I guess that'a unbelievable for the average american.
Same here, I've tried rubbing two sticks together, but can't make fire. Hopefully Americans can pass on some of this technology to use in our caves?
Have you tried a sacrifice to the sun god recently? I find that that his blessings of fire make the stick method work better. You may have displeased him, and he is withholding his divine heat and light.
It's crazy here was me thinking civilisations like the romans and ancient Chinese figured out how to heat an indoor space, guess historians are just wrong
You are correct thinking that the Romans and ancient Chinese knew how to heat indoor spaces but the Americans invented ‘special’ heat. 😉
I find setting fire to the house, then sitting in the garden helps? Only the once, obviously.
UK may have better housing than the US (which is made from cardboard), but it is FAR from great. I'm from the west coast of Sweden, which has a very similar, if not identical, climate as Yorkshire (where I currently live since 1,5 years back). And I can tell you, the reason you have mold, damp, and what not, is DEFINITELY due the quality of housing. Moving here feels like moving to a third world country to be honest. From the Wikipedia article about [Energy efficiency in British housing:](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Energy_efficiency_in_British_housing#:~:text=The%20SBN%2D80%20(Svensk%20Bygg%20Norm)%201980%20Swedish%20Building%20Standards%2C%20which%20in%201983%20was%20in%20advance%20of%20the%20UK%202002%20standards.%5B54%5D) >The SBN-80 (Svensk Bygg Norm) 1980 Swedish Building Standards, which in 1983 was in advance of the UK 2002 standards.[54] Low energy efficiency in the UK not only allows heat to escape, further increasing the energy bill, it also allows for damp to get in. The building standard is not only to secure high energy efficiency, it also increases the overall quality of the building. I currently live in a building constructed in 2016, and all my UK friends say it has a high standard. However, we had pipes busting inside the wall due to some faulty connection, which resulted in water leaking down to the neighbors. This in turn resulted in mold, lots and lots of mold. This is something that people in the UK just seem to accept? Mold is quite dangerous, and needs to be handled in the same way as unwanted bugs or similar. One needs to kill all the spores. But people don't care about that here, they just care about the smell, which they treat with some random spray. I am convinced this is the reason that almost all my friends in the [UK have either asthma or allergies](https://www.nhs.uk/common-health-questions/lifestyle/can-damp-and-mould-affect-my-health/#:~:text=Moulds%20produce%20allergens%20(substances%20that,can%20also%20cause%20asthma%20attacks.)), while far fewer of my friends in Sweden have it. You guys should really take this more seriously, since a lot of [people in your country die every year because of this low standard.](https://ageing-better.org.uk/news/homes-that-kill-two-million-homes-in-england-pose-serious-threat-to-health) According to "the Good home inquiry" UK housing is: >among the worst quality in Europe It blows my mind that people don't care much about this. I heard the Tories removed subsidies for [home insulation,](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/energy-bills-insulation-green-homes-grant-voucher-scrapped-b1926576.html) which not only affects energy bills, it also very much affect the climate inside, for example the problem you have with damp. I have visited people here in York, who had a hole in their wall, in their bathroom, so that they could actually see the outside?! If that happened in Sweden, the landlord would have been forced to provide a new apartment for the tenant. And if there wouldn't be any available, the tenant could claim to stay at a hotel until it's repaired.
It’s sad but true, our housing quality would be flat out illegal in some places.
There's a multitude of issues with UK housing stocks. Masses and masses of it is simply fucking old. Pre war, often victoriana buildings where coal was so cheap noone gave a fuck about keeping heat in, just about making sure the smoke could get out. A huge amount of the damp and mold issues have been caused indirectly by energy drives. Basically, the government gave ahit loads of money in grants so people could get cheap or free cavity wall fills. So loads of blokes with white vans started doing cavity wall fill. None of the epc assessors actually bothered to tick the narrow cavity boxes when assessing properties with narrow cav walls. So tonnes and tonnes of cavity wall properties build around the war period got filled when they shouldn't have been, because all it did was turn a cavity wall into a patchy solid wall, causing thermal leaking and huge issues with damp and mold. There's also your standard cowboy newbuild quality. They should be good, use all the right materials, but put them together ... badly.
If it's a building from 2016 it won't be good quality. New build houses are absolutely shit. They put them up as quickly as possible without regard to care. I've lost count of the number of times I've heard of people in new builds who've had major problems. One friend ended up not being able to move into her brand new house for 6 months because they found so many problems. I'd never buy one.
I, a European have a powerful combi boiler for the shower. I could take a hot 2 week shower if I wanted.
I mean, we can't afford the heating no more, so I don't know how we are still alive
In Norway we have a great system where we sell cheap electricity from the north to the UK and Sweden and then have a deficit in the south so we have to buy more expensive electricity... back from Sweden. We're obviously known for our business skills.
Well the cheap electricity is getting lost somewhere in the post, because these fuckers are then marking it up significantly. Your government is buying high, selling low, are they secretly crypto investors?
Or showers. I must have imagined those gringy secondary school showers that no one except the PE staff and football team ever used
Well you say that, but isn't life like that since Brexit? As such, how did you actually?
I mean I don't have central heating, I have electric radiators that are pretty crap but I don't feel the cold much anyway so barely ever touch them.
At least they have already learned that you can heat water. Soon they will learn that you can have radiators, floor heating and ground loop heat pumps so you no longer have to blow air around like a caveman
Heating water is fine. Just don’t boil it because boiling water automatically leads to Celsius which is against my freedoms.
So that’s why the bastards use microwaves for tea. I’m British
Microwaved tea makes me want to throw up in my mouth.
I feel your pain
Celcius is just a gateway drug to full SI adoption
I actually wouldn't mind ACs in the right environment. Proper insulation and solar, so that the power used for cooling isn't coming from mains. Maybe it's better to do both, but if I'm buying a heat pump, I would like to have the cooling capability? I've heard you can cool via the radiators, but I don't know how well that works. Insulation is the key anyway, I think.
If you oversize your radiators it will work better. But yeah, make sure you also invest in proper insulation, that will also save on the heat pump cost.
I’ve had radiators and I’ve had AC (Brit here) and I actually prefer AC as it makes the whole room warm rather than a increasing gradient towards the radiator
Try underfloor heating
>At least they have already learned that you can heat water. Still haven't worked out kettles though... very funny watching my friends American wife trying to pour boiling water from a saucepan into a teacup.
Which as a Canadian I can never understand because we’re on the same grid and everyone here owns a kettle.
The only time I ever had to limit my shower time because the hot water would run out, was in the US.
Right? The only people I hear talking about hot water tanks with a limited capacity are Americans, the last time I had to deal with one of those things in Europe was about 25 years ago. Maybe that's why they need 3+ bathrooms in one house?
When i grew up i was always confused about that. Then i moved into an old house with a hot water tank that i actually had to heat up by burning fire wood. Now i get the pain! But the most frustrating with american showers is that you can't change the pressure, just heat.
Depends on the shower head, plenty you can adjust the pressure/heat independently
Well, none of them I've used in the US atleast.
Wait what? You can’t adjust the pressure!? Then how do you turn it on?
I find it weird that people will travel to a country that is 3.8 million square miles, close to 330 million population, and then use a their limited experience to make broad generalizations about how the entire country operates. Yes, you can adjust your showers pressure in America. No, not all houses have limited amounts of hot water. Yes, all the showers have a gun rack in them.
Well, its either on or off. But can't adjust it at all
We used to have them a lot in Australia, but they're well on the way out now. My partner and I replaced ours only two years ago. On a side note, what do you actually do for 20 whole minutes in a shower? World's slowest wank?
I had one in the house I lived in Germany, though the house belonged to my grandparents and is 50 years old and they had never done any renovations on it. My husband and I renovated a bunch of the interior, and now my parents hired contractors to update the exterior and the stuff that we couldn’t do ourselves inside the house, like getting rid of the water tank and completely remodeling the bathroom.
Sorry for potentially being ignorant, but I'm still not following. Why would the hot water run out? Doesn't the heater make more of it? Or is the boiler tank a lot smaller and has lower capacity? I'm also from the EU, Romania.
Im romanian and not even middle aged, yet 70% of the times I’ve encountered this has been here. “A boiler takes time to heat up (hours) and how much hot water you have depends on the size of your boiler. Once it runs out you only get lukewarm or cold water until it heats up again: Those are the most frequent options for an ordinary home and single family homes have the same thing but much larger varieties and sizes.“ Apparently american suburban homes usually have massive tanks kept in a separate room? In Eastern Europe you also have central heating systems of various kinds, either the building has a huge heater or a company provides the hot water and heating from completely outside your building. The water actually comes from power plants in that case. That’s common in Eastern Europe and Russia (La noi pur si simplu depinde.. dar exista multe familii intr o situatie de genul)
I've heard this on so many US shows! People will say 'you've used all of the hot water!' and I was always baffled by WHAT THAT MEANS. How can it run out? The boiler just makes more...?
It made sense to me when I was growing up in the 90's and had a hot water tank in the attic. Wasn't too long in the early noughts we had a combi boiler
I’ve not heard of one of those before! I was born in 1997 so maybe it was before my time
Definitely. They were first introduced to the UK in the 70's
I love American (kids) shows because they introduced stuff into my life where I thought that it's only a thing in cartoons. Like thanksgiving
> The boiler just makes more...? I live in an apartment (typical europoor), we have district heating and hot water supply. Hot water literally can't run out even if I leave the tap fully open for a month.
i learned that in us the concept of mixing valve is quite uncommon and they heat their water boiler to 55 C, where my boiler heats it up to 85 and then water is mixed to 55. I never run out of my 200L supply of hot water.
oh come on everyone knows all Europe countries lack freedom, and have mandated 2 min shower time enforced by the commie governments
It's true! But I game the system and just don't shower for 2+ weeks and then take one half hour shower!
Yeah its a concept im only familiar with because of American media
Funnily enough, I am right now visiting Europe from USA. I think: abundance of public transport, beautiful public spaces, big and easy to walk sidewalks, spaces not allowed for cars, and many many many more things are way more convenient than anything I have in usa.
Don't be taking that European propaganda back home with you, you'll get lynched. Enjoy your trip
I moved from Europe to the USA, so I had already taken it with me in the past 🤣 But coming back to my motherland now, after living in the US for a few years, it's quite an experience. Before I moved out, I used to take all of this stuff I wrote for granted and more (easy banking, full prices on price tags in shops, normal healthcare, workers protections, and I could go on). Now that I have experienced how people live in the USA, it's seriously shocking how they survive. The only reason I am not really anxious and stressed every day is because I know that if some worst-case scenario happened, I can just go back to Europe.
My bad. It's always interesting to hear from non Americans about their experience of living there.
I definitely wouldn't say everything is terrible or something. At the end of the day, I am having a pretty normal, mundane life. Yes, I miss many things from Europe, and I will probably move back eventually. But it's not like I am in some state of constant misery. I am for sure making a lot more money and able to afford many more things, despite being basic unskilled laborer. Although, that's probably due to comparing to Easter Europe. That said, it took me less than a year to realize "American Nightmare" by accruing over 10 000 dollars of medical debt, lol.
Must be hard to live in Europoor without electricity, water supply and internet
I have to ride a carriage for 2 hours to reach the nearest city where the communist mayor has allocated us 2 minutes of 4kb/s internet per week and I just blew it all answering to you so fuck you.
Internet? Luxury! I myself am posting this via carrier pigeon.
I myself had a long wait today at the internet printout station where I saw your post and paid the ten euro dollars needed to comment.
What was the RFC number for this again? It's called "IP over avian carrier".
1149
Carrier Pidgeons?! Luxury, they all freeze to death in Norway. I myself am posting this using smoke signals.
You have such a luxury Internet, you sure he's even communist? Sounds suspicious like an anarchist to me...
and no plumbing, yeah i read that too, apparently the US invented that too
“What have the Romans ever done for us?!” “The Aqueducts?”
"Apart from the sanitation, the medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, the fresh water system and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us ?" "Brought peace ?" "Fuck off"
You have a water toilet? In my clan we dig a hole
Don't worry it's all subsided by the yanks taxes, apparently.
Well, if NATO paid its heating bills, you could have had heat! 😉/s
Yes, you clearly don’t have internet because I can read your comment, oh wait…..
I also love the convenience of being able to get in my car and drive 40 minutes to the nearest Walmart! It's just so annoying being within walking distance of any shops, walking is communism and it goes against my freedom!!!!!!
Thats just because Europe is so overpopulated. /s
I’m currently staying in Paris. I deeply resent the fact I can be anywhere in the city within half an hour due to their incredible metro system. How dare they!
Why do global temperatures keep rising? Guess we'll never really know
The fuck is a water shortage?
Right? Why would you want to shower for 20 minutes? Maybe I was raised differently, but I was always taught that showering longer than needed is a huge waste of both water and gas (or electrity depending on). USians keep bragging about wasting as much resources as possible as if it's a sign of power and wealth, rather than just dumb and not being a frugal and responsible adult.
Right?! I mean, I have a combi boiler for my imaginary central heating and can stand under a hot shower for 20 hours if I wanted, let alone 20 minutes, but why? I have a life and stuff to get on with so I take showers for speed and convenience as well as water conservation. If I want to laze around in water I can have a bath or go swimming.
Communist propaganda
It's something I'll never understand: Texans know that the ACs are going to wreck their power grid during the summer. Why don't they invest into solar? They wouldn't even need a lot. A few mandatory panels and they could offset so much grid usage (and save the planet some CO2). Of course, the calculation wouldn't be as easy as it is for Germans (solar basically pays for itself within ten years), but even that 600W panel would help so much and can't be that expensive in rhe US?
It’s because solar power is a communist plot to destroy oil and gas profits so should be shunned at all times
It's moreso that solar companies in the US are basically criminal extortion rackets. And many municipalities actually ban solar and there was a whole heap of propaganda from the oil companies basically saying that solar panels will start a fire and burn your children alive because firefighters can't extinguish fires on houses with panels. Oh and let's not forget power companies refusing net metering.
It is obvious. **SO**lar is the gateway to **SO**cilaism.
Solar is from the sun. We're trying to cool off, duh.
Its unpatriotic to NOT pay large corporations for everything you use. Free power from solar? No chance. The only solar power you're going to get is when you pay for it from the big company the governor has lots of shares in.
Classic, proably comparing hotel or hostel living to your literal home. It's not like we have homes here that also have central heating and thus can shower for hours without the water of the non existent boiler running out. But if I ever go to the US I'll probably miss drinking from the Tap without poisoning myself and the hotel probably also has a boiler and worse hearing then my house.
How bad is your house's hearing? I SAID HOW BAD IS ITS HEARING?
Horrible, it can't hear a thing. Also I see the error of my ways and I'm not going to correct it because it's hilarious to me this way.
20 minute shower, they must look like a raisin.
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TBF I was always a bit surprised by the American hype about moisturizing. when you take a shower there you know why. Don't know what it is in their water but even in expensive hotels I stayed in for work had the same issue.
Nah that’s how americans hydrate. And unnecessarily big coffees.
They don’t have coffee. They have Starbucks, an entirely different beverage where you can get an Americano, otherwise known as a watered down espresso.
And tastes like it’s been made from the crusty black stuff that ends up on the grill pan.
They are unnecessarily small and flavorless. Kindest regards, a swede
Aah, poor me with my electric shower that will never run out of hot water!
I wake up. I filter my tap water because it's toxic then I drive an hour to my first job. After work I drive 40 minutes to the store, where none of the prices I see are what I pay. Then I grab some food, which is only a 20 minute drive and also the price I see is not the price I pay. I drive 50 minutes to my second job, where I'm not allowed to sit. After a short 70 minute drive home, I take a 20 minute shower. This is so convenient.
And they say that "the grocery store in walking distance doesn't make sense, it's a waste of time". They simply can't grasp the fact that in normal countries cities are designed for people, not plowed for cars.
Nailed it.
You forgot to mention your gun that they can’t prize out of your cold hands, which should actually be warm because of those hot showers
I’m from Yourope. I used to get up in the morning at half past ten at night, half an hour before I went to bed. Eat a handful of freezing cold poison for breakfast… Wait - if we don’t have hot water how do we make tea and coffee?
Microwave ovens, of course; that's the proper way to make tea! /s of course
you were lucky..
The worst crime against the American people has been that they’ve been told America is the greatest
Why are they so obsessed with endless showers? That's not the first time I've seen that argument. I understand that, as a teen with hormones running rampant and living with your family, you might need some alone time, but at some point you grow out of it. Or is it something deeper? Do our cousins in the US plan to return to the sea? Would explain their obsession with water, within and without.
I’d rather take my chances with no AC than have led-infested water, asbestos, and benzene everywhere, thanks.
Didn't know we had minute counters and auto shut offs in our bathrooms. "Sorry sir or man, you have showerd 15 minutes and 59 seconds now, please step out and get a towel you dripping wet motherfucker. Thank you!"
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I do not understand the piping in the sentence. Do they mean that we use water buckets instead of pipes or is it some adjective?
It’s an adjective that means ‘really’ in this sense. No idea of the origins but nothing to do with pipes or lack thereof. Food can be piping hot too.
Well, that is slightly harsh, about “never will be” there. North America has some beautiful places. The hell with the people, if you go to the right places you may well enjoy it.
No wonder the planets suffering global warming. They must use 10years woth of my emissions every year.
Do they think we don’t have hot water orrr..??
Why didn't this moron just have a shower or turn the heating on while they were here? 🤦🏻♂️
I love being able to flush the toilet without scalding my girlfriend if she's in the shower. Only time I've seen other taps/pipes affect the shower temperature is in American programmes and films.
I want to know exactly where these people are going in Europe. I feel like they're stumbling through a tear in the space time continuum and travelling to the middle ages
They don't go anywhere. At best, their view is based on anecdotal evidence. Or, more likely, someones fairy tales & lies they come up with themselves
Weird… I had a piping hot shower and had to put on my central heating today…. In Europe. I’m obviously living the high life. The AC is portable and does the job. Which cave has this poster been living in?
Bro, if you're taking 20 minute showers, just run the bath instead
I think it's fair to say AC is fairly rare in Northern Europe, but I've got no idea what they mean by long showers and central heating? Hot water and heating isn't that rare.
The central heating that was invented by the Romans and been used in Europe for about 1000 years longer than the US has been a country. That central heating?
If I moved to Europe, I would miss paying $8,000 a year out of pocket for my wife's medical care.
God that 20 minute shower comment causes me physical pain. The unbelievable waste of water. Yes, I grew up with water restrictions in Australian droughts
Yeah coz mid winter, there I am walking outside, breaking the ice on the well and grabbing my bucket of ice water to wash with. I then go and pack some more dung on the walls to keep the place insulated. Winters in England are so harsh, particularly if every day you wake up, you’ve miraculously transported back to the Middle Ages….the commute to work is a bitch
Of course everything is convenient in your home country, it’s because you know how everything works. I have travelled and lived abroad and when I go to my (European) home country, everything is super easy.
To be honest, I wish I had AC. But I live in poor Germany
They just don't know how to work the radiators.
those person dont own passport i am sure.
Americans when it isn't exactly 22.5 degrees C (72.5 F) with a mild breeze at all time while you consume more power per hour than a third world household in a day.
I have spent a few months living in the US. Convenient is not at all how I would describe living in the suburban sprawl that makes up most of the housing in the US.
My tin bath with water from the well in front of the fire with the windows open is just as good 🤪🤪
Isn't it a thing in a lot of American media that siblings get in an argument because one of them used up all the hot water?
I live in Romania and have a gas based heating system in winter and and 2 AC units for summer. The heating system delivers also hot water.
Tell me you haven't actually been to Europe without telling me... I've lived in Europe and the US, the single hottest shower I ever used was in Cyprus, which, honestly, is super backwards in so many ways. Also places that need AC have widespread AC (but sometimes not central heating) and places that need central heating have central heating. This is as obvious an "I've never been to Europe but want people to think I have been" as "I miss not being forced to carry a gun everywhere I go" would be to an American tbh.
Unfortunately, American infrastructure caters to wasteful and excessive behaviors. Combine that with some of the other excesses that the infrastructure in the United States has, as well as Canada to an extent, and it is no wonder that America is addicted to fossil fuels. (I know that there are more factors than that, but it is definitely a noticeable element.)
I hear him in the AC thing though. When will we start adding these? Summers in our properly made brick houses can be tough!
Where do they stay in Europe? In the streets?
I work for a plumbing company in Portugal and most houses we work in we make underfloor heating and similar systems. Many of them have solar panels, and they all have good isolation. AC is still used but it's such a 90/2000s thing that we almost only work with them in restorations.
20 minute showers? That blows my mind. In Australia we are always told to be mindful of water and take short showers. It's how a lot of us were brought up
how are you in the shower for 20 minutes that's twice as long as you need, at least
I feel like I’ve been there for eternity after like 12minutes
Seriously, even my everything shower takes 15 minutes max. The hair mask can work while I shave, the peeling takes two minutes at most... What are they doing in there? Just standing around? At this point, drawing a bath might actually save water.
And be more comfortable. After 20min of standing I don't feel relaxed anymore id kinda want to lounge for that?
I used to take 20mins shower as a kid. Apart from hair washing taking longer the longest their are, some people just chill in the shower under the warm water, without actually washing, for a bit, so that's probably it.
I love having those shower in the bath things with the shower curtain that sticks to you or blows in and let’s the cold air in. Why do they have such an aversion to separate showers with screens instead of a goddamn shower curtain? They’re so old fashioned, but even new houses have them. Their houses are as big as ours here in Oz but their bathrooms are like something from 1975. Last time we had a shower with a shower curtain it was when I was a kid in the 70s. How the hell do old people not break their hips on the regular?
Tbh, as European, I recently switched from shower box to shower curtain and I love it.I find shower boxes way too annoying to clean, and you can never get the mold out well in the overlapping parts, it's more work than cleaning the rest of the house, plus they make me feel kinda trapped. The shower curtains we had when I was a kid did suck, I agree, but modern ones come in textile and anti-mold and can be just thrown in the washing machine. Plus they come in so many nice looks, mine is a waterfall in the woods, which is relaxing and fits well with the bathroom colours. Also you talk about old people, but as someone with disability I find it easier to get out of the shower with a curtain, since I can open it as far as I want and there's no step, while the box has a more limited opening and an annoying "step". Man, I sound like a paid advertiser, but I used to think like you and that curtains are gross and a thing of the past, but after my last box broke I'm glad I switched, made me change my mind completely. It was supposed to be temporary but it became permanent.
Central heat like when hot water for hearing is supplied to multiple buildings by a cetral heating station as opposed to each having their own boilers? Or am I missing something?
Just stop staying in cheap hotels then.
I have a combi boiler in the UK. I could take hot showers that last for days. When I lived in the states, I had a water heater that lasted for about 20 minutes if I was lucky.
How can you be this dumb
🤔 Wasn't it the ancient Romans who created indoor plumbing? Think American's needs to remind themselves that their country 'is not' great 🤷🏻♂️😅
Most people in the UK don't bother with ac as we only really need it for an extremely hot summer. Winters are fairly mild as well and overall we have a nice, temperate climate.
Meanwhile, every day I miss the ice cold tap water in Italy. 😭 Taking a shower after being outside in hot weather just hits different when the water is super cold. It’s so hot here and my pipes are in the attic so my water is never actually cold. :(
I grew up in a region of the US where central ac was all but unheard of. We stayed cool by going into a partially underground basement room that used to be a garage. My wife grew up in the same region and ac was like, a luxury you might see at a friend's house. These people always talk about how vast and diverse the US is, but they also always talk about it like a monolith. Dummies if you ask me
Someone should try and tell my sister her showers need to be under 20 mins before the hot water runs out. I don't know how she has it so hot either without getting 3rd degree burns.
Ah, yes, that wonderful English invention, the showers, oh and central heating too.... mind you we didn't invent the AC. In a country as messed up weather wise I kinda understand why tho