People Who Live In Vacation Destinations Dispel Common Misconceptions About Their Town

Viva

I live in Las Vegas. Listen. What happens in Vegas stays on the internet and also in the stories of every local who saw you do it. Don't do stupid stuff.

kyothinks

Came to say this. Many also think that there aren't any rules/laws in Vegas. Sorry but you can ruin your vacation very quickly. I know of one guy who didn't make it out of the airport before he was arrested.

2muchyarn

Crowded Misery

Not all of New York City is as crowded as the touristy areas. The vast majority of us aren't navigating through Times Square as part of our daily commutes (but mad sympathy to those who actually have to).

gambalore

Japanese Culture Is Not For Fetishizing

Tokyo here. I could name a few, but the one that always gets me is the misconception that people are going to accept (or even respond politely to) outrageous weebishness. If you roll up in Shibuya with a Naruto headband and a Hello Kitty backpack, trying to communicate through a handful of anime catchphrases while creepily leering at schoolgirls, people are rightly going to give you a wide berth.

csulasiris

The Most Expensive State

I only lived there for a little while, but it's a common misconception that Hawaii is a great place to live. Don't get me wrong - it might be the most beautiful place on earth and there are many, many exceptional things about living there. But it's terribly expensive just to grocery shop, let alone try to buy a house. Many people just live with their parents and grandparents because no one can afford to move out. So many houses and apartments/condos are bought as vacation properties, which drives up the price. Then, houses/apartments in residential neighborhoods have a revolving door of vacationers coming in and out, which is disruptive to normal life. (People on vacation care very little about how much noise they're making, etc.) It's a catch-22 because so much of Hawaii's money comes from tourism, but tourism is making it impossible for locals to buy homes.

Reamund

An Australia Mood

Australia is big, varied, and safe. There are dangers here, but your biggest risk is yourself. Just read the signs (not a metaphor - there's signs about every danger everywhere) and use common sense.

Honestly, I've seen Americans and Canadians, who have been near grizzlies, freak out over a lizard. Just relax man, it's nice here.

JackofScarlets

I Have A Life Independently Of My City

I lived in Amsterdam for five years. I realized pretty quick for the rest of my life saying you lived in Amsterdam means people assume you're really into weed, illicit drugs, crazy parties, hookers, or a combination of all that. In actuality, most of my going out was for drinks with colleagues, I don't like pot, and only ever went to the red light district when someone visiting me was curious enough to see it.

Andromeda321

LA Is A Very Different City

Los Angeles, specifically Hollywood. Literally everything about it is underwhelming. The Walk of Fame is cool for 2 seconds, Grauman's Chinese Theatre is smaller than you'd think, the Hollywood sign is just a big sign, and no, you're not going to run into a celebrities walking around. All the while it's incredibly crowded, smells terrible, and you have to dodge costumed street performers in droves.

scottman586

New South Wales

Australian here.

Sydney and stuff are expensive. But the one thing that people underestimate about our country is the sheer size of it, people go to the hotspots like Uluru, GBR, Sydney and Melbourne but they forget that it is a country nearly the size of USA. It's not small and you will meet people who have never left their state before.

peepeetrain

Yet They Still Vote Republican

Alaska. Where to begin?? It's not always dark. In fact, in the summer it's quite light. Hence some difficulty viewing northern lights in summer months. Ditto cold — we do have summer. In Fairbanks we regularly hit 80° in the summer, sometimes hotter. But also our state is HUGE. So what's true of Fairbanks isn't necessarily true of Anchorage. Or Juneau. In fact southeast (Juneau, Ketchikan, etc - the cruise ship circuit) is almost like a separate state. They're more like Seattle than the rest of AK.

People don't ride around all day on dog sleds. We don't live in igloos. We are Americans. Our Indigenous cultures are diverse and are not all Eskimo. Oh, and most of us can't see Russia from our back yards.

inchworm907

A City Ahead And Behind

I live in Seoul but moved here from the UK, so I'd probably say it's how everyone expects it to be super high-tech, convenient, and modern because South Korea managed to get that reputation due to having (at the time) crazy fast internet. The super high-tech/convenient stuff (in my opinion) would be:

• Constant wifi, even in the subways.
• Almost every PC Bang (essentially gaming cafes) I've been to allows you to order food and drink FROM your computer and people will bring it over for you. I thought it was really interesting that they had their system for ordering food and drink without leaving your chair.
• In the 5 or so years I've lived here, I've never lived in or been in apartment that still uses physical keys. Usually it's an electronic number lock and you will usually get a card that unlocks it as well.

The less than modern / inconvenient things would be:

• Doing almost anything online requires you to have a phone contract that's bound to the ID card you're legally required to carry at all times.
• Banks charge fees for EVERYTHING. Even my own bank charge me like 50c to withdraw cash.
• Online banking usually requires you to use third party security software, which is starting to get better but still an issue. I literally just use my phone to do all my banking because it's soo much easier.
• Korea websites usually look like a 2005 forum, like the whole website is made using tables.
• If you live in an older part of Seoul or in a less modern city in general, you'll probably have terrible sewage systems that require you to put used tissue in a bin, rather than flushing it down the toilet.

Torturia

Sunshine State?

"Florida here."

"It's called the 'Sunshine State' but it rains every single day in the spring and summer. Tourists always seem surprised by that."

"No there is no dome over Disney to control the weather or the bugs - though Disney does have a great mosquito control program."

"Also, Miami is nowhere near as sexy as they make it seem on TV. That's like 2 streets by the beach and that's it, not that you want to be in that area because everything is more expensive and also sinking into the ocean so things keep collapsing."

"The wealth disparity is disgustingly clear."

"The REST of Miami is full of poverty, construction that gets abandoned, and tons of homelessness because of the batsh*t housing prices. Florida is only fun for the rich-rich. Don't come here if you're not, you WILL struggle."

- [Reddit]

"I live in Florida between Disney and Universal."

"Everyone things we live and breathe theme parks and that neon signs are everywhere. We have regular neighborhoods just like everyone else and we have working days just like everyone else."

"And we know better than to go to the parks on weekends, holidays, etc."

- pentops65

"I live in Miami."

"Everyone thinks all of Miami is like in the movies: beaches, parties, clubs, tropics. Yes, we are part of a tropical climate. But the party lifestyle is only a small fraction of Miami (Brickell, SoBe, Miami Beach, Wynwood)....everywhere else is basically...tropical suburbs."

"Lots of immigrant/latino & hatian working class neighborhoods."

"Yet there’s an influx of gentrification because people from other states/other countries are buying cheap/urban areas and making them hip. People from other states fall in love with 'X hip new neighborhood' and buy a condo/luxury apartment."

"That neighborhood slowly gets eroded and becomes 'hipster hood #3' or so and now those working class families can't afford to live there anymore."

"It sucks. Everyone is hating how expensive it is, more people are forced into homelessness daily, but it doesn’t seem like it’s gonna get better anytime soon."

- _Schadenfreudian

Not Paradise

"A little late, but I grew up and live in Hawaii and the most common misconception is that it's paradise."

"The scenery is amazing with the unique mountains and actual beaches, but the cost of living is extremely bad. In my house hold getting a month or 2 worth of groceries cost easily a minimum of $600 for 3 people."

"A small 3 bedroom house goes for half a mil."

"Being a local the food, family, and friends are really the only reasons why I would keep living here... that's if I can afford it."

- Russt8

Sex Work Isn't The Only Job

"I used to live in Bangkok, Thailand."

"Not all Thai women are prostitutes and easy. In fact, they're pretty conservative and preserved."

"Most of female millennials are educated white collar workers. And we're more into Korean or Japanese culture/people than the western. Everyday BKK women won't approach men first because it's a big NO NO unless they're from certain areas."

"Those who work in sex industry come from the poor parts of Thailand or near by countries where there're not many job opportunities."

- drinkmypotion

Spoken Like A True New Yorker

"Time Square is garabage."

"If I even have to go into the 42nd street train station my day is just ruined. Also on new years or any holiday I can't even go into the city because the trains are so backed up."

"Speaking of the trains, unless you live in Manhattan or a really gentrified part of BK or Queens the trains dont even work half the time."

"They claim that they are fixing the mta but the trains from the 6 line are the same as they where I'm the 90s. But yeah screw Time Square."

- LibbyUghh

Only Hillbilly Is a Hillbilly

"Appalachian tourist destinations."

"Unless stuff in the giftshops is advertised as locally made, you can get it in bulk for cheaper off the Internet, because that's totally where the boss did. And the locally made stuff is sometimes nice, sometimes makes you miss Regretsy."

"The food stuff, check the labels."

"No, the locals do not like to be called hillbillies, except Hillbilly who owns Hillbilly's Junkyard, and he is a character, let me tell you."

"Yes, we genuinely are this friendly and really do like to talk with strangers this much, but it comes from either the terrifying isolation of deeply insular small towns where everyone knows everyone else's business or being a transplant who has to drive three solid hours to so much as a decent-sized Costco."

"Some of the kids get backpacks full of food every Friday from volunteers at the schools because even if their folks had the money for groceries, they might not also have the hour and back's worth of gas to get them that week from the nearest store."

"No, we are not paid a living wage at this tourist site. Incidentally; management is a family and doesn't understand why $8/hr isn't enough to live on."

"When I lived there, I had four jobs and the two that were tourism-related were purely to stave off the boredom and have an excuse to see people."

"But if you go about four, maybe five hours that way, depending on the traffic, it's our nation's capital, so...yeah."

- spiderqueendemon

Only Good Thing About Mardi Gras

"New Orleans.Is.Way.More.Than.Bourbon.Street."

"Also, it’s never really okay to puke and piss all over a place. Stop doing it! No respect."

"The only good thing about Mardi Gras is all the tourists congregate around Bourbon and leave the wonderful traditions to the rest of us."

- bloodybutunbowed

"New Orleans."

"Seriously, just visit us outside of Mardi Gras."

"It's a crowded cesspool during Mardi Gras season. We know how to entertain you all year, but the city isn't a nonstop drunk party all year long."

"The cajuns don't really live in New Orleans...many of the accents in the city sound closer to a Jersey/Brooklyn accent."

"Also, the people working in tourism use 'Nawlins' because you're expecting it. None of us refer to the city that way...a thick accent pulls off maybe a 'Nu'ahlehns' at the worst."

- ghintziest

Don't Make My Job Harder

"Banff, Canada"

"The bears aren't friendly, if you feed them, they will come back."

"All deer are not Bambi, they will hurt you."

"Cougars are not kitty cats, you look like a nice steak dinner to them."

"Don't go hiking or skiing in the back country if you aren't prepared. You make my job as a search & rescuer hard when you make stupid decisions like that."

"Yes snow may be fun for 2 or 3 days of your trip, but from September to July, it gets dull fast."

"Am I salty about tourists? You bet."

- masterroadtripper

Sipping Coconuts

"I live in the Caribbean and a lot of people (foreigners) seem to think in my island we live by the sea sipping coconuts all day."

"In reality my country is struggling."

"We had a hurricane like 3 yrs ago and people still live in sh*t (the government has helped a lot of people with housing to be fair) The man in power may or may not have stole like 1.5 billion dollars, this led to a major protest the other day and election is coming soon so yay more drama."

"In other words the Caribbean is not a heavenly get away where nothing bad happens."

"Speaking of bad things, as a random side note" if you take a trip to any Caribbean island rape, robbery especially of white tourists (not really a race thing but a lot of people falsely think they are rich cus white skin) and human trafficking are a very real problem stay safe guys."

- [Reddit]

No Tacos

"I used to live in Madrid, Spain."

"I usually avoided tourists in the city because of how loud they are."

"The most irritating thing I find is how they think that taking high school Spanish is equivalent to the Spanish we speak in Spain. (Just of everyone to know we speak Castilian Spanish)."

"Another thing, we don't eat tacos and burritos; that's Mexican food. Sorry to disappoint but Mexico and Spain are two different countries with two different dialects and cultures."

- SWAGalaga1

It's one thing to visit a tourist hotspot and quite another to live there year round. These are some eyeopening experiences.