Hi Tessah! :)
Interesting topic.

I'm not very familiar with these kind of society things etc, but I know people can make abortion in Finland if they want, I just don't know what is a common opinion about it. There are some teen pregnancies but I don't really know about those either :D

And pre-marital sex, yeah people do that and I guess it's acceptable. There's right now going this Big Brother -reality tv-show in Finland and at least three couples have had sex there. I guess that tells a lot. :D

Tell how conservative your country is? :)

That is very interesting, Seth. I did not know that about Finland! Also, Finland is the first country to have fast internet as a legal right, which is VERY AWESOME!

Here in the U.S.A, everything is like a free-for-all. Almost no one waits until marriage to
have sex. We have a lot of teen pregnancy. We have a lot of abortion. We also have a lot of rape. A lot of the time, I find that when speaking to people from the middle east they are very surprised by this. As far as I know, the middle east is very strict about sex and all of that, which I really respect.

Another huge thing that happens here is marijuana, drugs and alcohol. Marijuana is literally everywhere. My older brother smoked so much marijuana that it gave him mental health problems. Now he hits his wife and children sometimes. After seeing that happen to my older brother, I promised myself I would never ever do marijuana or drugs. And I never have.

I would like to mention that although teen pregnancy is very common here these days, it is frowned upon.

Hi
I came US about two moths ago. and I am really surprised because everything is different here. I feel myself as if I was born two months ago. water, weather, people anyway everything is different. I am trying to understand what is going on around me. I am listening radio and watching TV so as to understand what people do in US. I can obviously say that US is very beautiful country to live but there are really major conserns about tessah mentioned before but I thik that almost in every country people experiences all the issues you mentioned. Because Information and Communication Technologies are in everywhere so people can learn good or bad things very quickly from each other. I really appreciate you Tessah because of not to take drugs. I have never used drugs, alchol, even cigarette. It makes me vey happy because I feel life better I enjoy every moment that I lived. I dont want to talk to you in a way that as if I am your father or older brother who wants to give you advises but if you want to master your life stay out of the drugs. to keep up with the problems is make you powerfull. In our country unfortunately there are same conserns but not as much as in US for example There are teen pregnancy. but they are also married in other words a woman can marry in 16, 17, 18. I dont know about pre-marital sex because I am not sure they have statistics about this issue. but if a girl had pre marital sex. she could hardly got marry another man. this not formal law but this is almost an informal law. anyway sorry about my poor English. see you...

Hi Portilina!

Where did you come to the US from? I hope that the adjustment has not been too difficult for you. Are you making friends and learning your way around okay? We are glad to
have you here in the states!
I agree with you, parts of the US are beautiful but we do have problems. I feel like most
americans don't take the time to learn about other cultures, all they care about is themselves, and i try not to be that way. I want to travel and learn about the rest of the world as much as possible.

I am glad that you also do not do drugs! All of that stuff is bad and shortens your life. I appreciate your advice.
By the way, your english was pretty good! I understood very well everything that you
said. :)

Hi again!

I didn't know Finland is the first country to have fast internet as a legal right, haha. Maybe I should start getting interested what's going on here.

I'm sorry to hear your brother uses drugs. We don't have such a huge drug problem here, but Finns do drink alcohol a lot and smoke. People are starting to drink and smoke more and more earlier - in my old high school about age 12. That's why cancers, diabetes and cardiovascular diseases are coming more common these days. Still I guess drinking beer after sauna and everything is part of Finnish culture, but getting wasted is not.

Hi
I came from Turkey. I am not supposed that I made a lot of friends. hower I had a few friends but they are all Turkish like me. actually I would like to become friends from other countries especially americans. because I came here to learn about the culture and language. I thik I am not good at making friends. Eventhough my writing skills not to be supposed so bad my speaking is terrible. yes absulately terrible so people can easily be bored. so making friend become a huge issue. I have to say that here in US people are afraid of each other. they do not rely on somone especially whom does not know. so they usally make friends if they have to. otherwise they try to keep current network. I live in an apertment I do not know my neighbors.I do not know it maybe my fault. but once I tried to meet one of them but it did not work. Anyway... life is going on. OTOH I got everything that I want. I should praise God that he gived such good things to me. Mevlana, an important Turkish Leader says "come! come! whatever or whoever you are it does not matter". hopefully everything will be okey. see you...

Hmmm...About my country (Egypt)..things vary alot as there different social "layers" and attitudes in the society and it is changing. About pre-marital sex, it is prohibited in Islam and of course it is very unacceptable by the society. But that doesn't mean it doesn't happen, it happens! but it is not something people share.
To be more specific...most of those who have sex before marriage have it for fun but most of the people don't end up marrying those they had sex with!

About how conservative Egypt is, it is not THAT conservative compared to other Arab countries but of course it is conservative if you compare it to the U.S.

Egypt is turning less conservative though, which isn't all good and not all bad (as you said, you respect being conservative about teen marriage and sex, I hope we don't become less conservative about that).

What about the U.S....should all girls have sex before the age of 20 or it is just the movies? (they show us that girls who stay virgins until that age suffer from psychological troubles!)

Hi Tessah!
I think that people in Ukraine do abortion if they want. And pre-marital sex I think it's normal for a non-religious people. About drugs.. hm, I think that we don't have big problem with dtugs, beacause it's forbidden, and our laws(policemen) watching of people who sells drugs, and this kind of job in police department is highestly paid, but if you want stuff like a marijuana it's not a problem to get it(if you know "people", of course). But I hear that deseases like AIDS and hepatitis is a problem, 'cause unprotected sex, and teenage alcoholism, almost every teenager can buy alcohol and smokes(When I was in school I can bought, and I bought any of alcohol drinks and smokes, without problems). In our country people don't like to live in law. They love to evade laws, or just break laws. And if you have money for a bribe, you can buy anything such as diploma in every university and pay for every bad thing you can do, even that you killed people.

well , hello Tessah:))
first about abortion system ,well it does exist illegally of course ,and here in egypt i guess yeah we have a fine number of teen pregnancy ,sadly they go for abortion ,but sometimes it leads them to death during this operations . and pre-marital sex is something so unacceptable here , because 99% it ends the girl chances to get married someday.so sometimes they go for abortion in case of pregnancy ,and some virginity surgeries .well ,to some up they are unacceptable but well a lot of people still doing it.here all of these are against to our religion,tradition and law.but some people think laws are made to be broken i guess :S