I guess I should have know. It's just that out of the two I would have expected Apple to be the one forcing you into their ecosystem, yet on iOS I had no trouble having a great experience in respect to email, contacts and calendars without signing into iCloud.
They're both all about forcing you into their ecosystem. The difference is that Apple's business is (mostly) about their hardware ecosystem, while Google's is (mostly) about their online services ecosystem.
How surprising is it really that Android sucks if you refuse to use Google services? Where have you been the last 3-5 years?