Tuesday, May 17, 2005

Frequent flyer smiles



I was commenting on one of the Appalachian Gun Trash's posts over at his site when I realized this ought to be a post in and of itself. Since I wrote it I don't guess it's stealing. And if it is, aren't I stealing from myself? And if I am...well, what if I am? I think I'm a decent enough fellow (bloke, to those of you across the pond) to overlook it. Once.

So Gunner, thanks for getting me started. Lord knows I can use all the help I can get. And say hi to Ashley Judd for me. She's hot.

This may or may not be embellished as I go along. My mind is revving but I don't know yet if it's actually in gear. Although by the length of this pre-ramble, I'm betting it is.

I live overseas and have for years. With the exception of a few (stress on few) German and French tourists, and one drunk Englishman (and I believe in his case it was more the Guiness Stout talking), I have had predominantly pleasant encounters in my travels.

Contrary to what many people would have you believe, my experience has been that being an American is most definately a plus. I get asked all the time if I'm American. I never hide it. I say yes and they usually respond with a smile. Now, I'm not loud and overbearing, I don't dress outlandishly, and the only reason people home in on my nationality is becuase of my accent. It's southern twang a little bit of coon ass thrown in for flavor.

People seem to want to have American friends. I don't know why, but I think it has a lot to do with us, for the most part, being more friendly and humble as a people than gets reported. We love to laugh and often have a self-deprieciating style of humor. We say please and we say thank you. Usually we mean it, and people pick up on that. Trust me, a smile is usually repaid with just as big a smile.

Also, we respect others more than we get credit for. Especially women. While we have our share of neandrethal wife beaters and trash talkers, the average American male has not grown up believing that a woman is inherently inferior, unworthy of education, and definately was disabused early on of any notion that she might be his property. That is not true everywhere else. I travel in a lot of male dominated societies and I tell you this...it's no mystery to me why an American man abroad has a fairly easy time of finding a girlfriend. They know we treat them nicer. We can't help it.

And we're a pretty inclusive people. After all, we are basically a nation made up of "others". My foreign born wife noticed it on her first trip stateside. She got her ideas of the US from TV. Americans are white or black. Occasionally, we're Hispanic, but not very often. I tried to tell her different but she had no experience other than TV and US tourists in Thailand (mostly young, mostly white, mostly back packers).


She was worried that everybody would stare or treat her different because she was Asian. Then she got to Florida and saw that NO ONE CARES about your nationality. Really. Her comment to me, once she realized why she felt comfortable here was that it seemed that everybody was different, which made everybody the same. (OK, that actually does make sense, you just gotta think about it.)

Want an example? Break down in anyplace other than downtown in a big city and ask for help. It'll come by the truckload. Maybe you haven't noticed it lately. But we're good people. I can't help it. I like me. And I like you, too.

OK, I'm off the soap box now.

Suslik, out
Travelin' Ed

6 comments:

Blogger Gun Trash said...

Everybody's different, so everybody's the same. Tell your beautiful wife that was a very asute observation, I like it.

The Judds? They're the next county over, in Boyd. Thought highly of around here. Pulled themselves up out of some hard circumstances and made it big. They still come back occasionally and perform gratis for the locals. The grandma is still here in the area.

But this county's star is Billy Ray Cyrus, yep Achy-Breaky Heart. Who, BTW, played little league and high school ball with some of the wife's younger kin. And who, while slogging it out in the honky-tonks in OH and WV (dry county here) always told his old chums that when he hit the bigtime, he'd never forget his pals and all their support. He'd be back and everyone would get to ride on the Brand New tour bus. Sheeit-Hot!

15 yrs later and they're still waiting on that bus. :-)

Oh well, fame and fortune...

8:27 AM  
Blogger Ramblin' Ed said...

1. Yeah, but is Grandma Judd hot?

2. I actually like Billy Ray, haircut and homemade outfits not withstanding, and bought 3 of his albums. You really gotta give him credit for re-making Harper Valley PTA. And he did Some Gave All long before 9/11 and the pro-military bandwagon. I worked with a boy who went to school with him, so he says. Got ny Ratliffs out that way?

3. I grew up in a dry county in NC. When people ask me if it sucked I say no. Boze was a little pricier, but the bootlegger man didn't care what time or what day it was or how old you were. Only that he knew who you were and that your money was good.

Travelin' Ed

1:07 PM  
Blogger Ramblin' Ed said...

After reading the above post I can see that I have grammatical errors. I shirk back in horror! NOT.

Mostly, it looks like, missing letters. Still, any fool can figure out "ny" is "any" and "boze" is "booze". You ain't no fool, is you?

But seriously, if I wasn't dead set against proofreading and his evil brother, revising, this would be a lot more professional. But then, I'd have to call it Nit-pickin' Ed. Why? Because everybody knows Travelin' Ed don't care about that crap.

Ed, Travelin', not nit-pickin'

4:03 PM  
Blogger Gun Trash said...

From about day 1 when I got out of uniform and became a double-dipping civilian I wrote government documents, very large documents and eventually was editing other folks' documents. So, it comes to me second nature. But I pay no attention to others nowadays, only my own stuff and that's from years of habit.
------------------------
Ratliff? There's about 15 of 'em in the phone book, I don't know any personally, but spouse says she went to grade school with several, many years ago.
--------------------
Criterium? Closed bicycle race I see. I didn't know that until I looked it up. A new word, I like that.
--------------------
I'm growing real fond of my new profile pic, I might keep it for awhile.

11:23 PM  
Blogger Ramblin' Ed said...

Gunner,
You are definately a fountian of knowledge.And I ain't fooling with you.

I wasn't directing the grammer comment towards you, by the way. I don't think you took it as such, but just in case...

Maybe Ratliff wasn't lying. I always figured he might be telling the truth because Billy Ray seemed an odd choice of celebrities to glom on to if you were lying.

Oh Yeah, I also have the Billy Ray movie "Radical Jack" on DVD, but to be fair I only bought it because it was 100 Baht (What, about $2.25?)

Lastly, have you noticed that on first glance your profile pic looks like a guy in a cowboy hat and a ballerina dress? At least it does on muy monitor. Huh? Have ya?

Ed

11:58 PM  
Blogger Gun Trash said...

That's known as a tutu.

7:43 AM  

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