4 Ways in Which Life is Different in Western and Eastern Europe
From someone who lived on both sides
I’m Portuguese but lived in Budapest, Hungary for 3.5 years. One day, I went to the beautician to get waxed. I’m talking about parts of my body I don’t want to display to the world.
Once I arrived, the beautician told me, in her broken English, to lie on the bed. Exactly as it would have happened in Portugal, except she said the exact same thing to another woman, at the exact same time.
So there we were, lying in beds next to each other, grinning and trying to tell ourselves the situation was not awkward at all.
Hungarians are effective and straight to the point, and I’ve traveled enough in the region to understand this is shared with neighboring countries. A culture is made up of details like this, and you often don’t notice them until you are exposed to a different way of being.
Having lived on both sides of the continent, let me tell you the main differences I noticed between Eastern and Western Europeans.
1. Eastern Europeans Are More Direct
Before Hungary, I lived in the UK for a while. Brits have a reputation for being polite, even if that means tip-toeing around any subject. They never say “This…
