[davidw]

> Most people ate lunch together; often at a restaurant.

This was such a big letdown when I moved back to the US from Italy. Over there, at the company I worked at, there were two big groups that mostly ate lunch together - those who brought something from home, and those who walked over to the local cafe to have some pasta or a salad or something.

People in Italy are pretty good at just kind of coexisting... like we weren't best friends or anything, but everyone was pretty friendly and cordial and we talked about stuff outside of work, and it was just a pleasant experience.

I'd forgotten about US work culture by the time we moved back here and in my new job, I asked a few people if anyone went to lunch regularly and got blank looks, and then I remembered what things are like here and had kind of a sad moment.

[bradlys]

This is extremely variable upon where you live and the culture of your workplace. For me, most of the places I've worked in SV have had a very active lunch culture where we go out for group lunches and have a nice time and shit talk about our bosses being idiots and where we're all gonna go work next.

I could see it being non-existent in some places though but be the change you want to see. Some people are just waiting for someone else to start it.