I grew up in the US and my partner grew up in South Africa. Here are 11 differences that surprise us the most.

I’m a born-and-raised New Jerseyite who met my partner after moving to South Africa at the beginning of 2020. Because we didn’t grow up in the same country, let alone on the same continent, we’ve discovered a lot about each other’s unique upbringings and lifestyles. Based on our experience, here are some of the most surprising differences between life in the US and South Africa.

The first time I paid the bill on one of our dates, my partner’s eyes widened at the sight of the 20% tip I left our waiter. Americans tip between 15% to 20% on average, with the understanding that tips make up a portion of many waiters’ salaries. From what I’ve seen in South Africa, it’s more common for people to add between 10% to 15% to the bill here.

Even though tipping at hair salons and nail parlors isn’t expected in South Africa like it is in the US, I still get uncomfortable paying for a service without including a tip. Most of the time I include a small one, which can then lead to some confusion. The last time I tipped a beautician in South Africa, she asked if I just didn’t want the spare change.

Tipping petrol attendants is common in South Africa, however. In exchange for the extra money, they’ll add on services, like cleaning car windows and checking tire pressure. My partner is a fifth-generation Indian South African .

He and his family have retained a lot of their Indian culture through holidays, foods, and languages, like Hindi and Tamil. I’d visited India twice before meeting my partner, so I was already familiar with a lot of his cultural traditions by the time I visited his family in Chatsworth, a suburb of Durban that has one of the largest Indian populations in the world outside of India. A lot of people in his neighborhood stared at us.

One woman even leaned over her wall to get a look at us in his family’s backyard, which we found hysterical. Maybe they were surprised to see a white person in a predominantly Indian community, or perhaps could have been surprised to see a white person and an Indian man together . Although the apartheid-era ban on interracial marriage was lifted in 1985, relationships between partners of different races still aren’t common in South Africa, nor are they always accepted.

My partner and I can count the number of other interracial couples we know on one hand. My partner and I have realized how many cultural differences there are between South Africa and the US. Megan Gieske From what I’ve seen, there is still some animosity and a lack of understanding between people of different races and backgrounds, which my partner and I attribute to South Africa’s apartheid era.

Some South Africans have told me they wouldn’t date someone of another race because there would be too many differences between them, but my partner and I have the important things in common, like our love of travel and adventure. Since American music, movies, and politics are popular worldwide, my partner already knew a lot about the US despite only visiting once before. It was easy for him to connect to my culture.

In South Africa, I’ve never heard anyone discuss which political candidate they voted for, or even which party they supported. I don’t even know who my partner voted for, and he doesn’t know which political parties and candidates his friends support either. The only time my partner and I have discussed politics publicly in South Africa has been with my American friends.

In the US, being a Democrat or a Republican can feel like as much of a character trait as being funny or charismatic. When I was living there, I often understood and defined other people by their party affiliation. When I last visited home, many of my family and friends had heated arguments over politics at the dinner table.

But the topic seems to be less emotionally charged in South Africa. From what I’ve seen, politics rarely come up in my conversations here. When they do, it’s usually because someone is discussing corruption allegations against South African leaders, such as former President Jacob Zuma and President Cyril Ramaphosa .

I’ve found that many South Africans have roots across the continent and take pride in being African, celebrating Africa Day each May 25. I can’t imagine considering myself North American. At home, the focus is on the US, specifically.

Many homes wave American flags from their windows and porches. Patriotic people wear red, white, and blue on days other than the Fourth of July. Countless songs have lyrics about American pride.

My partner thinks American patriotism is over the top. An American visiting Cape Town once told him that America is the “best country in the world,” a disrespectful sentiment he and I have never heard from tourists of any other nationality. It rarely snows in South Africa.

Sure, my partner has seen artificial snow at a ski resort in Canada, but I think it’s tragic that he’s never seen real snow fall from the sky. It’s certainly on his bucket list, but he doesn’t have the passion for winter that I do. Snow days are something he knows about from movies , but they were one of the greatest joys of my childhood.

Before I moved to Cape Town, I spent Christmas in New Jersey drinking hot cocoa and watching the snow fall by the fire. I was gutted to find out that my favorite holiday isn’t nearly as festive in South Africa as it is in the US. Although I’ve tried to share some of my family’s Christmas traditions with my partner, some of them just aren’t doable in Cape Town, like finding a Christmas tree farm or touring decorated houses on Christmas Eve.

I found that most Christmas trees were small and artificial, a far cry from the 6-foot ceiling scrapers I missed from home. Only one house in our neighborhood was decorated with Christmas lights last year, and the high walls surrounding many South African homes kept me from seeing Christmas trees through living-room windows. Since Christmas falls in South Africa’s summer , fewer people seemed to watch cozy holiday movies.

I was shocked to find that no one I knew had heard of my favorite one: “The Year Without A Santa Clause. ” Even though Christmas in Cape Town has been an adjustment, living here has exposed me to new traditions and holidays that I may never have experienced if I didn’t move. On the first Christmas I spent with my partner, summer was in full effect, and we celebrated with a poolside braai, or a South African barbecue .

My small New Jersey farming community practically worships the changing of the seasons. Summertime pool parties and cookouts eventually lead to fall activities , like drinking Pumpkin Spice Lattes , picking apples, and exploring corn mazes. These iconic fall traditions symbolize the passage of time for Americans, but I’ve never seen any of them in South Africa.

The changing of the seasons isn’t as dramatic here because the weather stays largely consistent throughout the year, except for some windy, rainy winters. Without my familiar seasonal markers, it’s been more difficult for me to realize the year is passing. I think checkbooks are convenient and easy to use, so I was surprised to learn that my partner has never owned one (nor has he ever written a check).

Our friends in Cape Town haven’t used checks either. South Africa officially discontinued the use of checks in 2020, partially in an attempt to discourage fraud. They weren’t really popular or widely used before their official discontinuation, though.

South Africa, especially Cape Town, has a very different work culture than the US. On Fridays, traffic toward more residential neighborhoods starts before 3 p. m.

And when you meet someone for the first time, they rarely ask what you do for a living, a question I often heard in the US. South Africa also has 12 public holidays , whereas the US has a total of 11 . In South Africa, April alone has three public holidays — Good Friday, Family Day, and Freedom Day — and those days off make a big difference when it comes to work-life balance.

However, joblessness in South Africa has been an ongoing issue that worsened during the coronavirus pandemic, and the country’s unemployment rate rose to a record high of 34. 9% in the fourth quarter of 2021. For comparison, the US had an unemployment rate of 3.

9% in December 2021. The first time my partner visited the US, he bought a meal at the airport using cash. When the cashier handed him his change, he counted it and told them they overcharged him.

They then explained that they had factored in taxes . Since prices in South Africa factor in value-added tax , he didn’t know that sales tax isn’t included in US prices. My partner thinks it’s inconvenient to have to calculate the tax before you make purchases, especially if you’re paying in cash.

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