Welcome back! It's nice to see you again.

Luckily this place isn't Misc. We're not going to bash you for your political views, let alone for describing your country's political structure. But you're not forced to talk about anything you don't want to.

Has Roar left TPM for good? He's no longer a mod, but I was thinking that he might return at some point. Suzie said she would watch over TCG, and so far there's been no trouble there.

OK, new question, back to the old topic of misconceptions.

Have you ever realized you had a misconception about another country? If so, why, and how did you find out you were wrong? What other common misconceptions from other countries have you heard of?
There was a time when I used to think everyone in the USA was loaded with money. I thought their concept of poverty was what we call middle class here, and that the average family lived in luxury. That matches the general idea mjost people here have of the US, and it was reinforced by my first 2 visits to the country, where I stayed with wealthy families. Then one day, when I was 18 and got started with ICQ, I started talking to a guy from the US he who used the nickname Buckshot. After we'd met online a few times, he asked me what my home was like. I thought he wanted to brag, so I told him every detail about the size of my house, the number of rooms, TV sets and everything I could think of that could show him that my home was almost as comfortable as his was and that I was happy with it. Then he told me he lived in a trailer. I wanted the earth to swallow me. I couldn't understand how he could live in a trailer and have Internet access, which was a luxury here, but then I learned that libraries in the US provided free Internet access. So there.

As for other common/ridiculous misconceptions, I've heard people say that all Germans and Chileans are evil, that all British are pirates and/or invaders, that all Galicians are stupid, that all Swiss live a happy and trouble-free life, that the Chinese eat only rice - or that they steal dogs to eat them, that Bolivians and Peruvians never study or do legal jobs... and I'm sure there are others, but these are the ones that I can recall now, mostly because of how stupid they are.