Unfiltered Story #369782

I grew up and went to university in Germany, studying English. One of my lecturers, who had recently been hired, is from new jersey and has not been in Germany longer than a month or two. During the first “getting to know each other” session, the class and the lecturer talk about cultural differences between the usa and Germany, such as his country’s inability to include tax in the price tag, or our country’s inability to deal with more than two centimetres of snow. We finally ask what he had not expected to be shocked by when he came to Germany.
Lecturer: “I’ve seen so many Dads on their own here. Not single fathers, mind, just… Men out with their kids in strollers and stuff, and without the mothers anywhere. In the USA, this is extremely uncommon; it’s kind of suspicious to see a man and a child without a woman’s supervision, as it were.”
Ever since then, I can’t help noticing this, too! I never dreamed that it could be perceived as unusual!