Why do people travel to different countries and openly complain? It drives me NUTS! [View All]

[Locut0s]

I'm posting from Xiamen China, was just in Shanghai. I used to live in China from when I was 2 to the time I was 5 years old, still remember some and still speak the language OK.

Anyway my attitude to traveling has always been to try to immerse myself in whatever culture I'm in and take as much as I can for granted as part of that culture and try to understand it. I've run into more than a few foreigners over the years though who only seem to travel to complain. People who talk about how "back home" this and that. People who refuse to eat much of the local food or take in much of the local culture because it's too foreign for them or the people seem to hostile towards them. More often than not these people are conservative right wingers. To me the whole point of traveling is to place yourself outside your comfort zone and experience a different culture. Sure there are going to be things that put you off, things that may even disgust you but this is all part and parcel of experiencing something new. Why travel if all you are going to do is look like Big Rude Whitey who only eats in McDonalds?