Go to Europe?

Question

Why is it beneficial to go to Europe to study their Culture, and history?

Answer 1

Basically, there is no better education than travel. You get to see, smell, touch and taste another culture and another country. It broadens your horizons and opens your mind.

As a previous answer stated, European history is linked to American history and it is beneficial to see it. It is also good as a comparison to our culture, to see how the "other half" lives. If you are respectful of the people, you get respect in return.

Since Europe is small, there are many diverse cultures clustered together. People drive small cars, eat smaller portions and live closer together. Public transportation is very good and you can travel almost anywhere without a car. I loved every minute I have spent in Europe and even a "bad" experience was enlightening, and in retrospect, sort of fun. (Hubby almost got pickpocketed on the Metro in Paris.)

Answer 2

The same reason it is beneficial to go to any other place on the planet. For the experience. Sure you can read about it, see pictures and hear stories, but until you are there you can not be a part of it. All life is are different experiences. Being a kid, going to school, getting married, having children, to bury someone you love etc. You see other people do it, but until you actually do it, you don't really know what it is like.

This is what I tell my children. You can read a book about bikes and learn a fair amount. You can look at bikes, touch them feel them, maybe even build one. But until you straddle it and peddle you don't know what it is like to ride a bike. To fall a couple of time, learn your balance and finally feel the speed, the wind on your skin and feel the sensation.

You can read all about Europe, see pictures, movies, learn the history and even cook and eat European food. But until you have the experience of being there it is only "text book knowledge".

So my question to you is.... Do you want to read about life, or experience it?

Answer 3

You just can't get beer and wine like theirs here! Travelling in Europe or anywhere else in the world teaches you a lot about how different people are, but even more about how we're all pretty much the same. The latter doesn't get talked about much in classrooms, but is the single most important key to everyone getting along. I have a kid in High School who hasn't been further out of the U.S. than Niagra Falls, yet he can tell me all about what people in the UK, Spain, Italy, France and Germany are like. It doesn't matter that I've been to those countries and interacted with their people on numerous occasions, I know nothing, his teacher told him so! One interesting "classroom" story that comes to mind is the "different menus they have at McDonald's over there". I've heard that one a lot, yet it doesn't matter whether I've said "Number one please", "Uno por favor", "Ein bitte", or "Un si vous plait", I always got a Big Mac, Fries, and a Coke!

Answer 4

European Culture is completely different from American Culture. It can be beneficial to experience a thriving, well-established, solid culture with different points of view and ways of doing things. It will expand your culture, common sense, view of the world, view of life in general...

Answer 5

First of all, their culture and history is inextricably linked to your own. Their history is your history.

Secondly, Europeans have a completely diametric view of society's role in individual's lives than Americans do. You may not agree with some of their premises, but it benefits you to know what those premises are and in what they are founded. Even more so in a global economy, where culture clash is an ever-present reality of multinational corporations.

If you favor European views on the world, society, etc, then you benefit from first-hand contact with its proponents. If you disagree with Europeans, then you would benefit from the same first-hand contact with the 'enemy'. After all, every great leader from history has expounded on the value of knowing one's enemy better than he knows himself.

Either way, ignorance may be bliss, but the blissful never succeed.

Answer 6

To become more world-minded and appreciate a different way of life.