> are you scared of it? How dangerous is it to get hit with that kind if voltage?

it really depends on what body part touches it, and where the electricity wants to go (ground). the longer the path, the more dangerous it is.

I got hit once, from a broken electric kettle, in fact :) I had accidentally dropped the thing, some plastic bit had broken off and exposed some metal strip that was bent out of shape (in the base part, that the kettle part gets power from). Let's attribute it to not having had my morning coffee yet, when I figured hey let's bend that bit back to where it should be, not realizing the thing was still plugged in.

It hurt. It felt literally as quite a shock. But it was just my arm. A jolt, like when you're holding a stick and someone hits that stick with another stick really hard. Except a bit harder than that. I remember feeling quite shaken afterwards, could be adrenaline, could be my nerves being all agitated, I dunno.

After a few minutes I was fine again.

Guess I was lucky, maybe?

The very same day I got a new electric kettle (the cheapest ones are just €10), because really for me it's in indispensable kitchen tool, like the microwave or a chef's knife.

It helps that European plugs are all better designed - it's impossible to touch live prongs by mistake while plugging a device in (which has happened to me in the US).

Better designed? You can plug an grounded plug into an ungrounded socket and there are many ungrounded plugs that won't go into grounded sockets.

In the UK (exclusively, I think), the sockets have gates - in [1] you'll see that there's a lever in the top hole - that pushes down the plastic covers in the bottom hole allowing the pins to be inserted. The earth plug is longer than the live and neutral plugs, meaning that you cannot electrocute yourself with a plug unless you really try. At the same time, plugs [2] typically have plastic guards around most of the pins, such that no electricity can be flowing through the pins while it's exposed.

Of course, it was all for nothing when as a kid I put a braddle or something in the top hole and then mucked around with the bottom hole. Also, I imagine that the foot injuries you get in the UK are also greater because the plugs typically face up (although I've only seen someone actually impale their foot on a holiday in America). But yes, we have the safest sockets in the world according to my old schoolteacher.

[1] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d4/Uk_13a_d... [2] http://img.diytrade.com/cdimg/533618/3871293/0/1182923133/Br...

The UK is an anomaly when it comes to plugs and sockets - the very fact that almost(?) every plug has to have its own fuse is a tell.

It's not scary in normal use but you don't want to stick you finger on a live wire - the shocks a bit nasty.