I was thinking about that when I was dropping my 6 year old off at some hobbies earlier - it’s pretty much expected to have learned how to ride a bicycle before starting school, and it massively expands the area you can go to by yourself. When she went to school by bicycle she can easily make a detour via a shop to spend some pocket money before coming home, while by foot that’d be rather time consuming.

Quite a lot of friends from outside of Europe either can’t ride a bicycle, or were learning it as adult after moving here, though.

edit: the high number of replies mentioning “swimming” made me realize that I had that filed as a basic skill pretty much everybody has - probably due to swimming lessons being a mandatory part of school education here.

    • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Nah. BiC lighters are where it’s at. Clipper lighters always run out of flint before fluid. I have a Zippo, and still carry a BiC for specific situations like opening beer bottles, or hitting a bowl.

    • kava@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I thought these were popular for pulling out the little stick to pack a joint with. Never seen anyone open a beer with them.

      I’ve seen people open beers in a lot of different ways though. I had an alcoholic friend in my early 20s who could do it with anything. Even his teeth. He chipped his tooth once and stopped doing it with his teeth though, lol.