Europe's Thoughts on America and Stuff

So, I'm afraid this post is going to be kind of disjointed since there are a couple random things going on.

First of all, I changed the comments section because I just figured out that you have to sign up to make a comment. Who knows if that has anything to do with the zero comments, but anyway, you can comment now if you ever want to.

So, class is going forward. We've been getting a crash course in statistics the last two days. The best part was when the professor said, offhand, that 75% of Americans think they have a book in them, but only 20% of Americans have read a book in the last year. I'm the only American in the class. After class, I was told that everyone was checking out my reaction (stone faced). I couldn't think of anyone I knew who hadn't read a book in the last year. I guess because I'm in school, and so are most people I know.

That's not the only time I've gotten the vibe that the UK, and the rest of the world, is sort of amazed (horrified?) at America. One of the guys we met at Fitzwilliam asked a lot about this show he had seen that explored American subcultures: UFO's, survivalists, porn industry, etc. I was talking to another guy, in my Economics class, about how in America, I think there's a sort of crisis about the truth's importance (think about it - "A Million Little Pieces," teaching intelligent design side by side with evolution and letting students decide their own truth, the whole history of why we invaded Iraq and how the war is going, Fox news, etc). His response was, "Yeah, the rest of the world is sort of watching you guys in horror."

And another question I got asked that was really wierd. Apparently in UK cinemas there are these public service announcements before the movie starts. They're about how pirating movies is bad and how it ruins the experience of the movie. For that part, they show an American film audience stand up at the end of a movie and applaud. This guy wanted to know if Americans really did that. I said sure, sometimes at openings, or if the movie was really good, or if it was something like "Snakes on a Plane." No one could understand why we did this - they kept asking, who are you clapping for? Somebody even said it seemed like a waste of emotion.

Well, who cares?! America #1!

So, earlier I talked about how things take a long time in Europe. Over a week ago I applied online for an international student bank account. I had gone to the branch earlier, but you can only apply for a new account online. Yesterday I got the documents I need in the mail. I went to the branch with the documents and the proof I need that I am who I said I was online. Everything moved smoothly (after I got redirected to another branch, which I couldn't find for 20 minutes). The banker photocopied my documents and told me I was done! My account would be opened up in . . . 7 days. Then I could come in and make my first deposit. Since our deposits are Foriegn Drafts (the only way to move money internationally without carrying cash or wiring it electronically) they'll take five business days to clear when we deposit them. So, in two weeks, I should have some money! To pay for college, which is asking for the money in a week! I have to talk to them about that.

New topic. Here's an observation about moving to a new city, particularly a tourist-ey city, like Cambridge or DC. Both times I've done so, I've had a similar experience. After you're in the new place for a few weeks, you start to feel really cocky, particularly when you see tourists. You think, "these guys are just passing through - but I live here!" I had the same feeling on the DC subways after I had been there a month or so. Anyway, by the eighth month I had been in DC, I didn't have that feeling at all anymore. I did have a newfound fear for my safety at night though. I think the reason I felt so confident in DC, and now in Cambridge, is because I haven't been here long enough to really think of this as the place I live. I'm much more like a super tourist - the kind of person who takes a year off to travel, and so can spend a whole month exploring Paris, instead of breezing through it in a week. But, on top of that, I can say to myself, "I LIVE here," which is another feather in my cap. After you've been in a place long enough though, you lose the tourist feeling and you're just a guy living in a place. But for now, I'm a super tourist, who has really explored Cambridge to an extent the day tripper can not.

One more new topic. We're getting a lot of talk about how difficult this year is going to be. Some of it is pretty ridiculous actually. The mild warning came in the official handbook about the course. It reads, "At the end of the acadmeic year, Diploma students are assessed using the same criteria as those taking the degree in economics. . . to achieve this end, Diploma students need to (and are expected to) work very hard - significantly harder than the average undergraduate student."

The hysterical, hyperbolic warning, comes from our statisics professor. He said something like this:

"Basically, taking the course is like hanging onto the back of a speedboat. As the boat goes farther and farther, it get harder and harder to hang on, and eventually, you won't be able to bear it and you'll let go, say in March or so, and you'll see the boat just take off and leave you in the dust. At that point you'll be totally lost. Fortunately, then you can just review a lot and make it through the exam. Because remember, you don't actually have to know the material - you just have to answer the test questions in such a way that the examiner believes you understand the material. And you can do that by practicing a lot of old test questions, since they're bound to be similar. I mean, examiners only have a limited amount of creativity."

Or today:

"The key is, you have to work hard to keep up with the lectures. Once you fall behind, you can never catch up. You'll just show up to lecture and you won't understand a word of it, and you'll collect the notes and try to work through them after class, but the class will just keep charging ahead. If that happens to you, you'll be in trouble."

So, now everyone in the course is gathering around to frighten each other even more, by saying how worried they are, and how much they're going to have to study - which is better than everyone pretending it's going to be a breeze - but it still annoys me. I always kind of liked it when the prof tells you you're going to have a monstrous amount of work ahead of you. When I think I can do it, I feel like George Bush in the early days of the Iraq war - "Bring it on."

Anyway, tonight there's a pub crawl. Hopefully it won't rain too bad.