Things That Shocked Me When I Moved From New York To London

In December, I relocated from New York to London to work for Business Insider's

I had never set foot in Europe before moving here, so it has been an adjustment.

The differences between London and New York might not faze a seasoned traveler. But for an American who hasn't spent much time in other countries, it has been a little tough getting used to daily life in the UK.

I've lived here for only a month, so this isn't a comprehensive list, but these are the things that have surprised me so far:

Some of my favorite apps don't work in the UK

The UK's grocery stores don't pay for the extra employees to stand at the end of checkout lines and bag groceries, and I guess that makes sense because customers can do that themselves.

But I was still flustered on my first trip to the store because I didn't realize I was supposed to bag my stuff until the cashier had already rung everything up. I was that annoying foreigner who made everyone else in line behind me wait.

Also, most grocery stores I've been to don't play music. I got a really uneasy feeling the first time I visited the UK, and it took me a minute to realize that it was because the store was completely silent.

Nearly every lunch spot I've been to so far has the setup pictured here. The sandwiches and salads are all pre-made pretty early in the day, and they sit out in the open until people buy them. This is unlike most places in the US, where food seems to be made to order. This has taken some getting used to, as I'm someone who is known for making substitutions on nearly everything I order.

I got a shock at my first English breakfast when I ordered bacon and got this limp ham-type thing in return. The sausage was much better than American breakfast sausage, but I was not a fan of the bacon. Some places do offer what's called "streaky bacon," which is more similar to the American variety.

The first time I went to a movie theater (or "cinema," as the Brits say), I asked where the butter was when the concession guy handed me my popcorn. His response: "You're American, aren't you?"

My British colleague laughed and informed me that people in the UK do not dump liquid butter on their popcorn. This keeps with my general impression that the British are a lot less excessive and much healthier than many Americans.

The downside is that liquid butter is delicious; the upside is that you're less likely to leave the theater with a stomach ache.

When I picked up this box, I couldn't comprehend the nutrition label. I just want to know how much sugar is in the cereal bar! I recruited the help of my British colleagues in decoding this nutrition label (five grams of sugar seemed too low for a cereal bar with a bunch of chocolate in it), and now I think I've got the hang of it. Most of the same information seems to be here, but it's organized differently, which is jarring to see at first.

This one is obvious. Thanks to our retail vertical, I was aware before I moved here that McDonald's, But I am a big fan of American McDonald's — so much so that when I told a friend I was moving to London, the first thing he said was, "You know McDonald's is different there, right? Like they don't have the same stuff."

I laughed it off, thinking, "How different could it be?"

Since the whole idea behind chain restaurants is offering a similar or identical menu at each place, I assumed there might be a few UK-specific additions but that everything else would remain mostly the same.

Wrong. The food is actually very different. The burgers don't taste as good, and a lot of what is offered on the American menu is not available in the UK.

The same goes for KFC. I stopped there once to pick up dinner on my way home from work and was surprised to find out it didn't have mashed potatoes. KFC without mashed potatoes is pointless.

More evidence that Europeans are generally healthier comes from the portion sizes. Another thing I noticed when I went to a British McDonald's was that its medium soda was the equivalent of a "small" in the US.

Smaller portion sizes are found elsewhere, too. Plastic soda bottles are taller and thinner, and even shampoo comes in smaller bottles.

Although I do miss being able to stock up on bulk items (like shampoo) to save money, I don't miss the giant food portions that have become standard at American restaurants. These meals are usually too big for one person to eat in one sitting anyway, and the American trend toward larger food portions

Countless Americans warned me before I moved here about the terrible food in London. I haven't found that to be true of most places (I've been to a few great restaurants so far), but my one experience with Chinese takeout made me never want to order Chinese here again.

I heard the Chinese food was especially unappealing in Britain, so I decided one night to find out whether that was true. This is what I got. Fried rice (which didn't appear to be actually fried) that had no flavor whatsoever and a giant "egg roll" that was basically just limp bean sprouts inside a greasy wrapping.

New York is very much a takeout culture, but I've been cooking a lot more since I moved here because the "takeaway" food that I've tried in the UK isn't nearly as good. It's probably better for me in the long run

This was an exciting discovery. If I wanted to buy cider in the US, the only options available in most stores were a six-pack of glass bottles or a 40-ounce bottle. Some brands offered cider in cans, but those were often more expensive. Hard cider has just started catching on in the US, but it has been big in the UK for a while. Grocery stores here offer inexpensive cider in a variety of different containers.

I was confused when I saw the kitchen of the first apartment I stayed in. We booked the place on Airbnb, and when I was looking through the photos online, it occurred to me that the "stove" looked as if it had only two burners. There seemed to be a microwave underneath but no oven. I asked the owner about this, and she told me the microwave oven doubled as a convection oven.

A colleague's studio flat has a similar setup, and she told me that when she turns her microwave on "convection" mode, it browns whatever is in there. But there isn't much space, so cooking large dishes is out of the question.

I've found that while tiny kitchens without proper ovens and stoves seem to be common in studio apartments, many larger flats have big kitchens.