27 Things People Thought Were The Height Of Class As Kids But That Turned Out To Be Extremely Ordinary
I recently made a post where people shared all the things they thought were fancy when they were kids, only to realize once they grew up that they were not actually that fancy.
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The comments section was full of other people who shared equally hilarious and sometimes touching stories from their own childhoods, and I just had to share them with you.
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So here are even more things people thought were fancy when they were kids but weren't really.
1."Babybel cheese!!!! I begged for it. When I finally got it, I thought I would be the toast of the cafeteria. It was literally nothing special, LOL."
2."As a kid, I thought if you had a bunk bed, you were rich because it would save a lot of room for your toys and such."
3."For me, it was anyone who had a DVD player. And bonus points if you had a video game console in the house. When my family got our first Nintendo from a yard sale, it was like sitting in the actual lap of luxury. I didn't care that my friends had N64 by then, LOL."
4."I'm from a landlocked country, so I thought seafood was extremely fancy. My parents only bought oysters and shrimp for New Year's. Later, I realized seafood isn't that fancy when you live next to the ocean."
—W1W1
5."I thought Lunchables were really fancy, since my mom never let me have them when I was growing up. But I found out later in life that she just didn't let us have them because she didn't think they were healthy."
6."Those long candlelighters. Growing up, we had the paper matches to light. Usually, I saw only the fancy people on TV use them."
7."Anyone who had ever been on a plane was a millionaire in my mind."
8."I got to eat at Sizzler for my birthday. I'm pretty sure kids already ate for a steep discount and possibly free on their birthdays, but it felt like a super-luxurious treat."
"I fondly remember Sizzler and Ponderosa: both the fast food of steak, but they seemed fancy to me as a kid."
9."All-white Christmas lights on your house. My family would drive around looking at Christmas lights, and in fancier areas, they would always use just white lights. I assumed they must be more expensive."
10."People who had waterbeds, and houses that had intercoms in them."
11."Cordless phones."
12."I am Chinese. My family would buy Ferrero Rocher in treasure chest packaging as gifts during Chinese New Year. The host would usually open it for everyone to share. So I could only eat one Ferrero Rocher every year and thought it was really expensive."
13."Preteen and early-teen me definitely dreamed about having a canopy bed when I was a grown-up. I'm almost 40 now and I still don't have one."
"I finally have a canopy bed, but I never actually put any canopy up on it. It's just a giant drying rack for me, LOL."
14."Real milk. When I was younger, my parents had us drinking powdered milk. When we would visit my grandparents a couple of times a year, they actually had regular whole milk. I loved just eating cereal the whole time, haha. Now I rarely drink cow’s milk."
15."Having Chinese takeout. We only ever had it when a certain colleague of my dad came to stay. We had a half-hour drive to get it, so it seemed really special."
16."I always thought if your house had a second story, it meant you were rolling in money."
"Haha! Same, but I live in a two-story house and it’s not that great. Womp!"
17."I always thought those fancy packaged Pepperidge Farms cookies were the fanciest ever. Especially the Sausalito ones. TBH, I still treat them as 'fancy' cookies."
18."Viennetta ice cream. Never did buy it because I wasn’t fancy enough. Also, Grey Poupon mustard."
"Grey Poupon and Viennetta."
"I just had Viennetta for the first time a few weeks ago. Never had it growing up, so I thought we could see if it lived up to the fancy hype. It did not. It is essentially Cool Whip and flakes of chocolate."
19."Definitely Talenti gelato."
20."I only got Easy Cheese once a year as a kid (on New Year's Eve), so I thought of it as a fancy luxury. I also felt fancy when I got to have kiddie cocktails at weddings."
"This made me LOLOL. When I was growing up, we were suuuuper poor, so we would literally have Easy Cheese and crackers for dinner. To me, it's incredibly cheap, so it's interesting to see someone else consider that a sign of wealth!"
"I used to refer to it as 'French' because it was so fancy, LOL. My mother even joined in, and we still call it French with an accent!"
21."When my family got digital cable, I thought, This is it. We made it. Like, you mean to tell me I can see what's playing on each channel without watching the TV guide??? The service also came with caller ID, and I thought that was pretty fancy too. Before that, I thought having an answering machine was fancy."
22."My dad was a firefighter, so he would sometimes work on holidays. I remember one New Year's Eve, he was working, so my mom decided to have a party with us kids. She made Underwood deviled ham sandwiches on small pieces of rye and pumpernickel bread and put them on trays, and we all thought that was super fancy and sophisticated."
23."Stemware. When I was a kid, I called all wine glasses 'goblets,' and I felt super elegant/fancy sipping my milk out of a champagne flute."
24."Definitely Red Lobster for me. Locally, it was the only place that had lobsters in a tank and served whole crab legs. It was relatively attainable for the average person, but because it was expensive for our whole family to go, we saved it for birthdays and holidays, so I thought it was fancy. I go there once in a while as an adult and it’s definitely not fancy, with the paper menus and nautical decor, LOL. I still like the biscuits, though."
25."As an Egyptian kid, I thought waffles were the epitome of luxury. One kid would bring waffles to school every day, and their mom must have been drenching them in honey or syrup, so they tasted extra sweet, and I had no idea how that shape was achieved until I was a teenager. Not sure why I thought they were super fancy."
26."Refrigerators that have the bottom freezer or that open at the top with two doors, LOL."
"I mean, I’m 45 and I got one of those fridges last year when our old fridge died. I *still* feel hella fancy when it beeps at me for leaving the door open too long, LOL."
27."Dannon yogurts. I was jealous of rich kids from my class who could eat those for breakfast every day."
28."When I was a kid, every once in a while we would go to this restaurant where they had candles on the tables and Shirley Temples with cherries on little plastic cocktail swords. I thought it was the height of sophistication and always wanted to get dressed up when we went there. The place is long gone now, but we were reminiscing recently, and my dad referred to it as a 'grease pit.' Apparently, it was just some hole-in-the-wall dive. But I will forever remember it as the most elegant restaurant on Earth."
Did any of these resonate with you? Or do you have any stories you'd like to share? Tell us in the comments!
Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.
