Lauren Drewes Daniels
Audio By Carbonatix
The World Cup, happening in the U.S., feels like one large global slumber party that everyone received an invitation for.
Football fans from Scotland, Japan, Germany and countless other countries are going viral online for sharing what is to us, regular everyday life in America: Big Gulps, oversized everything, bottomless chips and salsa and the allure of the Costco hot dog.
What could be the most interesting part of all these videos sweeping the internet is that visitors aren’t sharing big travel moments like seeing Times Square for the first time; they’re gushing over free refills, the yellow school buses from the movies and Waffle House at 1 a.m.
Ranch Dressing
The TSA issued a PSA on social media that began “One World. One Ranch.” It warned travelers that if you’re flying home with the “king of condiments,” make sure to keep your carry-on sauce to 3.4 ounces or less. Larger vessels will have to ride in checked baggage. Honestly, homemade ranch is superior anyway and fairly easy to make.
Taco Bell, Waffle House and Buc-ee’s
A German soccer fan who goes by @FreddyLA7 on X has gone viral for sharing his World Cup road trip beginning in Tennessee and ending in Houston, with almost every American experience imaginable.
One of the main reasons he came to the U.S. for the World Cup was to visit Taco Bell, which he captioned ‘the holy land’ with two images on X: one of the exterior of the fast-food taco chain and another of a full tray of food, including a Baja Blast.
His experiences at Walmart, Buc-ee’s, Wendy’s, eating “American breakfast,” which is a bowl of cereal and a cup of juice, and going to a Waffle House in Georgia at 1 a.m. have amassed him over 200,000 followers since he started sharing his trip and raving about America.
But he isn’t the only one loving regular life in America.
Big beef ribs
Another football fan who traveled to Texas from Japan for the World Cup tried Texas barbecue for the first time, and his first bite into a beef rib at Terry Black’s got over 4 million views:
Now, the video does start with him drizzling the entire rib in barbecue sauce, which we won’t talk about, but for him, it was love at first bite. “Amazing! I love it,” he said with a mouth full of ribs.
He also sank Buzz Ball in a 7-Eleven parking lot, went to his first shrimp boil and tried quesabirria, wearing a cowboy hat, with “California Girls” by Katy Perry playing in the background.
Bottomless chips and salsa
More visitors from Japan discovered the art of bottomless chips and salsa. User @japan_nobunaga wrote a Twitter-sized monologue about his experience.
All of that doesn’t begin to cover the celebration of everyday American life happening across the country. In case you missed it, the Scots have been in Boston, draining the bars of every last drop of beer.
And that’s only in the first week the World Cup has been hosted in North America. Games will continue into mid-July, when more visitors will partake in our country-wide patriotism, gluttony and free refills.
And if we end up playing England on Saturday, July 4, there will be chaos. Culinary and otherwise. We can’t wait.
