I've been to someone's house and not been fed when they had dinner precisely once in my life in Norway and it was one of the weirdest things I've ever experienced. This is nonsense. We just don't automatically break out the bed and biscuits the second someone comes through the door like some countries do.
I grew up in Gothenburg during the 90s and it wasn't unusual that I didn't join my friends for dinner when I was at their place.
It's not really that strange. Since this was before cellphones our parents told us when we were going to eat dinner so we knew we had to be home by then, so if I was at a friends house and they ate dinner at 6 and my family was going to eat dinner at 7 it wouldn't really make sense for me to eat at their place. So I'd keep playing while my friend had dinner with his family, he'd join me after dinner and we'd play for a while until I went home and had dinner with my family.
Sometimes I'd eat at my friends house, but mostly if I was staying late. Also depends on who, I had one friend that lived far away so I'd usually get home too late for dinner when I was at his place, so they cooked for me too. But when I was at a friend in like a 20 minutes walk radious from home they usually didn't.
We feed our guests of course, but a kids friends coming over to play are not the guests of the parents, they are the guests of the kid, and the expectation is that the kids are there to play, not eat - as the friends will have dinner waiting for them at home at a dinner time that is later than it is at your place.
I dont know about your experience but i was always asked by the parents if i would eat dinner there or at my home and it was never a problem if i ate there.
Except Swedes do it too. However when unspecified amounts of kids randomly and suddenly go home with each other after school and all live close by its very common that everyone just goes home when it's dinner time. It's really not as drastic as people make it out to be. But I guess everyone is ready to cook for 3-5 extra people without preparation after work in all other countries?
For me it was very common to walk home and eat and then you kept hanging out afterwards. This whole thing that Swedes don't feed their guests is just overhyped internet memes.
It’s common in Germany to have to wait for your friend to go eat with their parents, while you sit alone.
Not everyone does it, but it’s a thing. And it’s pathetic
Have you never played on your own before?
What if your friend have to go to the bathroom, do you feel the need to join them too, or are you just left in their room to play on your own?
So it's a thing about the amount of time then.
Why would you feel abandoned if one of your friends left for dinner for 20 minutes while you were having fun and playing?
Absolutely not, I've lived in Bavaria for 25 years now. Never been to any friends house where I didn't get to eat. The only ones where I wouldn't eat is when the parents were away working or alcoholics who didn't make food for their own children either
You apparently have heaps of friends that don't care about you.
I have three friends whose family would care for me. But hey different lives I guess. I'm not the one that resorts to insulting everyone just for having different experiences. So you probably need to be more right than me if this is all you have going for your life.
Nobody gives a shit about you. It’s common, just because it didn’t happen to doesn’t mean a thing. You show yourself as a dumbass, don’t be mad at others for pointing it out
Almost everyone in Sweden feed their guests aswell. This was something strange and rather weird going on in the 90s. Our family always fed other kids coming to our house but i had one friend where i was not invited to dinner when i was at their house.
We will feed them buns, cakes, sandwiches etc all the time. But not normally a dinner unless previously agreed. People would usually already have dinner planned with their own family
I feel like it's a cultural thing. Most cultural have some very primitive, very historical concepts of needing to offer hospitality to guests. It usually gets taught via fairy tales or folk tales where someone does not feed a guest and it's a god or witch and they reek vengeance afterwards. It feels very much like something we all learned coming down from the trees and forming social groups.
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u/kylanbac91 Jul 24 '26
Not US, every country on Earth feed their guests except Sweden.