In that night, as part of the American marathon trip my friend Idan and I took that included seeing some thirty odd states in some two and a half months, we drove our way through Florida to get to Miami. Now, even the ‘See Florida’ campaign doesn’t include the area we were at that night. It was Florida, and yet – nothing to see. No mouse, no girls in Bikini (and sometimes without) on the beach, no space shuttles, not even elderly Jewish people who can’t figure out a voting ballot. Actually, there is probably a fairly good chance we were the first and only Jewish people in that town who didn’t rush through the town to get to Bingo night. It was November 1996.
We just got there driving straight from Atlanta the whole night. You see, we thought we came up with the genius plan of actually driving all night, checking into a motel in about 7am, get a night sleep, wake up, stroll around whatever town we were in, and get another night’s sleep for the price of one. So we were able to very Israelically-like ‘screw the system’ and get more out of it. Of course, we risked our lives by driving straight for some 14 hours throughout the night, but man – saving some $27 for a motel night was really worth it (it wasn’t that bad really – no cockroaches – even they had standards).
After the much recommended 4 hour sleep in the morning (after which, the plan didn’t look that appealing anymore, so we did this only about 5 more times that trip) and a stroll around town, we decided to do our laundry in the local Laundromat. Already, quite a foreign idea to us (we grew up where laundry came from cloth lines in the window or the yard – you know, like movies about the 30s in New York…); we walked in quite confused.
After much figuring things out and after sacrificing a couple of white socks to the pink gods, we put in another batch when a woman that seems around very early 20s with some 3 children started talking to us. Now, it’s not that I want to pre-judge, but it’s been some 8 years now, so I’ll post-judge. Feeling like walking into a movie, this woman (I want to say Charlynn here), seemed to be a Jerry Springer refuge. I could have sworn that there was a Yee-haw waiting to come out with any sentence. She was the deputy sheriff’s wife – I mean, you can’t make that up nor can it get better than that. One of her first questions to us was our religion, which I already found odd. You meet someone new and your first question is – ‘so… Muslim eyh?’ Or ‘so do you do the whole Vishnu thing?’
Anyway, my friend quickly responded we were Jewish. That triggered a response that I would recognize again in the future – a complete awe as if we just mentioned we were actually Leprechauns. In an amazing combination of a subtle and yet rude retreat she disappeared to another side of the Laundromat.
Idan and I sat waiting for the machine, watching the woman chasing what seemed to be continuously multiplying number of children. Much like Mickey Mouse in the Sorcerer’s Apprentice, each time she was able catch one child and stop him from wrecking havoc, the other two seemed to multiply and create even more chaos.
For two full load cycles, she was running around the place, passing us a few times, until she gave up on her trying, her children and her racism, sitting next to us hard of breath.”So… where are you from exactly, boys?” she asked as she was looking at her rascals running around.
“From Israel” I replied. This created a 180 degrees u-turn in her attitude. I don’t believe that in her mind there was any correlation between being Jewish and being from being Israel. At that point, her attention completely switched from her children to us.
“No kidding” she said thrilled. “Were you in the army?”
Part confused, part proud Idan said: “Yes. We were both in the army for three years”.
“So you had guns and shot A-rabs and all?” If this was a movie, it would have been too unbelievable and over-the-top.
She continued asking us questions about the army, manifesting an alarming knowledge of guns for a person who had never been in the armed forces herself.
After covering the army, she summarized it all with an enthusiastic “Wow, the army, huh?” We nodded quietly. “And when you go back to Israel will you be working not in the army?”
“That’s right”, I said.
And then, after this whole conversation, she asked a question that would in some ways define many future interactions I had in the United States. “So, do you use camels to go to work?”
Idan and I were both speechless. A first for Israelis anywhere. Idan tried to patiently explain to her for the next 15 minutes that Israel is very modern with highways, and Internet and financial markets and high-tech industry (and yet, the chosen people never mastered the Laundromat thing). But that was the equivalent of convincing her that us leprechauns were actually pink and tall.
Indeed, I witnessed different sophistication levels in different areas of the U.S. and with different people, but this experience - the disconnect in her mind between being Jewish and being from Israel, as well as her question, repeated itself in a surprising amount of times in different variations. Just the overall concept of it is enough to amaze – she did think we ‘go to work’. She didn’t ask if we work in the fields, or if we hunt Zebras in the wild. She did have the concept of some kind of Western-like work, but that we used camels to get there. And camels. Not horses, or even bicycles. Camels.
For the record – Idan tried to explain to her that both of us actually never rode a camel in our lives. Now that I think about it, it wouldn’t be so bad – probably take care of a lot of traffic problems and the west’s dependence on oil. You think maybe this is the secret of Saudi Arabia and all – using Camels instead of cars and selling all that extra oil to the west?
We eventually left the Laundromat and had some crazy / interesting story to tell back home. But that whole experience was the first in a long sequence of such encounters. In many ways, this is how many Americans – sophisticated and ‘sophisticated-challenged’ still see myself and others – camel-riding foreigners.
Riding camels to work? A few years later in Israel I ended up driving an old Subaru to my University and to work. Kind of ironic...
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Voting In America - OR The Chaos Theory
So we’re deep into 2008 and America is going through the most something primary season elections in history. Exciting, close, long, frustrating. You pick.
As I’m writing this, the race, definitely on the Democratic side, is still quite open that the media coronate winners only infrequently. That said, Obama seems like he has a big chance of winning.
Part of what is being said is that him being elected is going to be ‘good for America’s perception around the world’, as he’s African-American. How should I say this? America, no one cares about your president’s skin color other than you, ok? Russians – not really going to mind much that he’s black. Chinese – probably never saw a black man in their lives. African-non-Americans? (as in people in Africa) – I’m sure that as Mikalo runs away from Cheetahs, rebels and flesh-eating-locus, he would do this with a smile on his face as he is reassured that the president of that country over the ocean that wouldn’t cut any of the mounting debt has the same skin color as him. At least until the locus gets him. So no – no impact whatsoever. The American president launching wars or not would probably have a slightly stronger impact on the way the world perceives America than his skin color.
The trend right now is that Americans love Obama. He’s truly like a rock star – in his speeches the audience screams uncontrollably and obnoxiously – ‘I love you, Barack’, and he responds without flinching ‘and you know I love you too’. He is very much like U2’s Bono. Only Bono has a bit more political experience than him. Don’t get me wrong – I’m very inspired by the guy. Half way through him 2004 speech, I said that one day he’ll run for presidency. But I’m a bit concerned that when he gets into the oval office, he’ll need to google for ‘best agriculture secretary’ and ‘best energy secretary’ to set up his new administration. His rolodex has two entries total, and both under O – Obama, Michelle, and Oprah.
Clinton and Obama offer very different things. Skin color aside, the outcome of these elections that seem likely to go to the Democratic side, will impact the entire world. And how is this being decided? By the perfect Democratic process in America, where people make rational and practical decisions about the future for their families and communities.
‘No, but seriously’ you must say. And you’d be right. So here’s the first couple of paragraphs that came out on Time magazine’s cover story a week before the historic Super-Tuesday or the politically sensitive term Americans of course used: ‘Tsunami Tuesday’. And that Americans equate the political primaries in a single Tuesday to the sudden tragic death of hundreds of thousands of people in numerous countries only two years earlier, caused by nature’s cruelest force, is not one of the reasons people don’t like Americans. Oh no – they hate us for our freedom.
But here goes:
Oh yes – there’s something about an 18-year-old. Only Time magazine can be so diplomatic and define that certain something as ‘can’t abide careful hedging and cautious steps’. Or as anyone who knows 18-year-olds would call it – lack of coherent thought process at best, and stupidity at worst. And the fact that Obama is attracting ‘the youth’ is supposed to be a positive factor for me. Obama getting the retarded voter is supposed to make me want to vote for him? I’m sorry - that’s not nice. Some retarded people vote very rationally.
But back to the article. So in the great tradition of the great American princess, Maddie is affecting the faith of the world, and her mother – a U.S. senator mind you, of course bended to the whims of her threatening bitchy daughter. The article focused throughout on the higher political activism in these primaries. It didn’t mention in any way or form the fact that Maddie has single-handedly changed the course of the world by doing what a classic teenage girl in America is doing to her hard-working parents – throwing a tantrum that can be associated with a 3-year-old and threatening her parents in a way that if it would be a character in a Hollywood movie would be discounted as over-the-top.
At this point, you might say that I am hard on our little Maddie. After all, she just threatened not to talk to her mother. Not nice, but she could have done worse, you would defend her with futility. So let me tell you the next chapter in this Jerry Springer story. A couple of weeks later, our mother-of-the-year senator was a guest on Real Time with Bill Maher on HBO. They spoke specifically about her daughter’s influence on her endorsing Obama. McCaskill responded to that by saying “it wasn’t ‘mommy, please’, it was Maddie in my face saying, ‘how can you look yourself in the mirror, you’re a slut’…” (don’t believe me? here’s the video: http://bradhaller.blogspot.com/2008/02/mccaskill-on-maher.html). And this is what the senator is disclosing for the national media. I wonder what the little princess said when she was hungry and tired that she’s afraid to mention now…
Two quite different candidates – different gender, race, age, experience, plans for the American education, health care and war. The Missouri senator wanted to be neutral. But Maddie said ‘You have to do it, or I’m never talking to you again, you slut’, so Senator McCaskill endorsed Obama. And the world will never be the same again. This is just one state battle in the overall 2008 democratic war. But want to know how this ended? It’s not that this had no effect, and that either Clinton or Obama would have won big anyway. Oh no. Obama ended up winning Missouri by 1.2%, or 10,200 votes out of more than 800,000 cast. And would one state's results change everything? Both sides agreed that Obama's momentum started on the super-Tuesday that the Missouri elections happened.
Hey senator! A couple of tips for you. One more slut-like comment, and Maddie’s credit cards are cut. Next time Maddie is in your face? Maddie now pays for her own tuition. And next time Maddie gives you thought-out political advice that you act upon? As a punishment for both, you need to take an ambassadorship mission to a place your behavior can’t hurt America so you can cool off that urge-to-endorse, like Antarctica. And even if Maddie falls in love with the cutest, most adorable, most charismatic creature, you still can’t endorse any penguin.
As I’m writing this, the race, definitely on the Democratic side, is still quite open that the media coronate winners only infrequently. That said, Obama seems like he has a big chance of winning.
Part of what is being said is that him being elected is going to be ‘good for America’s perception around the world’, as he’s African-American. How should I say this? America, no one cares about your president’s skin color other than you, ok? Russians – not really going to mind much that he’s black. Chinese – probably never saw a black man in their lives. African-non-Americans? (as in people in Africa) – I’m sure that as Mikalo runs away from Cheetahs, rebels and flesh-eating-locus, he would do this with a smile on his face as he is reassured that the president of that country over the ocean that wouldn’t cut any of the mounting debt has the same skin color as him. At least until the locus gets him. So no – no impact whatsoever. The American president launching wars or not would probably have a slightly stronger impact on the way the world perceives America than his skin color.
The trend right now is that Americans love Obama. He’s truly like a rock star – in his speeches the audience screams uncontrollably and obnoxiously – ‘I love you, Barack’, and he responds without flinching ‘and you know I love you too’. He is very much like U2’s Bono. Only Bono has a bit more political experience than him. Don’t get me wrong – I’m very inspired by the guy. Half way through him 2004 speech, I said that one day he’ll run for presidency. But I’m a bit concerned that when he gets into the oval office, he’ll need to google for ‘best agriculture secretary’ and ‘best energy secretary’ to set up his new administration. His rolodex has two entries total, and both under O – Obama, Michelle, and Oprah.
Clinton and Obama offer very different things. Skin color aside, the outcome of these elections that seem likely to go to the Democratic side, will impact the entire world. And how is this being decided? By the perfect Democratic process in America, where people make rational and practical decisions about the future for their families and communities.
‘No, but seriously’ you must say. And you’d be right. So here’s the first couple of paragraphs that came out on Time magazine’s cover story a week before the historic Super-Tuesday or the politically sensitive term Americans of course used: ‘Tsunami Tuesday’. And that Americans equate the political primaries in a single Tuesday to the sudden tragic death of hundreds of thousands of people in numerous countries only two years earlier, caused by nature’s cruelest force, is not one of the reasons people don’t like Americans. Oh no – they hate us for our freedom.
But here goes:
Senator Claire McCaskill is the highest-ranking Democrat in Missouri, and
Missouri picks Presidents. The Show-Me State has voted for the winner in 25 of
the past 26 elections. This is why the contenders for the Democratic
presidential nomination fought so hard for McCaskill's endorsement. As her wary
advisers helped her weigh the risks and rewards of siding with powerful Hillary
Clinton or charismatic Barack Obama, neutrality began to look appealingly
safe.
But there's something about an 18-year-old that can't abide careful
hedging and cautious steps. The Senator's daughter Maddie Esposito had seen the
way her mother teared up whenever she heard Obama speak. And now it was
happening again as mother and daughter sat side by side on the family-room sofa
in a suburb of St. Louis, watching the results of the Iowa caucuses on TV. "You
know you believe in him," Maddie admonished her damp-eyed mother. "It's time to
step up." The next morning, Maddie, a college freshman home for the holidays,
added a threat: "You have to do it, or I'm never talking to you
again."
McCaskill endorsed Obama — a big boost in an important Super Tuesday
primary state. And the story of that endorsement is the Democratic-nomination
battle etched in miniature. Kids like Maddie Esposito are the muscle of Obama's
army. (Time Magazine 1/31/08)
Oh yes – there’s something about an 18-year-old. Only Time magazine can be so diplomatic and define that certain something as ‘can’t abide careful hedging and cautious steps’. Or as anyone who knows 18-year-olds would call it – lack of coherent thought process at best, and stupidity at worst. And the fact that Obama is attracting ‘the youth’ is supposed to be a positive factor for me. Obama getting the retarded voter is supposed to make me want to vote for him? I’m sorry - that’s not nice. Some retarded people vote very rationally.
But back to the article. So in the great tradition of the great American princess, Maddie is affecting the faith of the world, and her mother – a U.S. senator mind you, of course bended to the whims of her threatening bitchy daughter. The article focused throughout on the higher political activism in these primaries. It didn’t mention in any way or form the fact that Maddie has single-handedly changed the course of the world by doing what a classic teenage girl in America is doing to her hard-working parents – throwing a tantrum that can be associated with a 3-year-old and threatening her parents in a way that if it would be a character in a Hollywood movie would be discounted as over-the-top.
At this point, you might say that I am hard on our little Maddie. After all, she just threatened not to talk to her mother. Not nice, but she could have done worse, you would defend her with futility. So let me tell you the next chapter in this Jerry Springer story. A couple of weeks later, our mother-of-the-year senator was a guest on Real Time with Bill Maher on HBO. They spoke specifically about her daughter’s influence on her endorsing Obama. McCaskill responded to that by saying “it wasn’t ‘mommy, please’, it was Maddie in my face saying, ‘how can you look yourself in the mirror, you’re a slut’…” (don’t believe me? here’s the video: http://bradhaller.blogspot.com/2008/02/mccaskill-on-maher.html). And this is what the senator is disclosing for the national media. I wonder what the little princess said when she was hungry and tired that she’s afraid to mention now…
Two quite different candidates – different gender, race, age, experience, plans for the American education, health care and war. The Missouri senator wanted to be neutral. But Maddie said ‘You have to do it, or I’m never talking to you again, you slut’, so Senator McCaskill endorsed Obama. And the world will never be the same again. This is just one state battle in the overall 2008 democratic war. But want to know how this ended? It’s not that this had no effect, and that either Clinton or Obama would have won big anyway. Oh no. Obama ended up winning Missouri by 1.2%, or 10,200 votes out of more than 800,000 cast. And would one state's results change everything? Both sides agreed that Obama's momentum started on the super-Tuesday that the Missouri elections happened.
So here you go America and world. Whatever happens next – good or bad – thank Maddie who threatened her mother by not talking to her. It is not much known that many world events happened in much of the same way. It is little known for example that Henry VIII made an important decision after Elizabeth I was willing to get out of her room only after daddy promised he’d unite England and Wales into one unified nation.
Hey senator! A couple of tips for you. One more slut-like comment, and Maddie’s credit cards are cut. Next time Maddie is in your face? Maddie now pays for her own tuition. And next time Maddie gives you thought-out political advice that you act upon? As a punishment for both, you need to take an ambassadorship mission to a place your behavior can’t hurt America so you can cool off that urge-to-endorse, like Antarctica. And even if Maddie falls in love with the cutest, most adorable, most charismatic creature, you still can’t endorse any penguin.
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Naturally Blogging in America – OR, Why?
From as far back as I remember, which is weird as I’m not sure what I had to eat for lunch today, I had the impression that I would fit in in America – I felt closer to the philosophy, the liberal values, the chances, the sky (and therefore the limit). I’m not sure why – who does? And yet, I didn’t really become American by just landing in Boston. Not even close. I wasn’t exactly Israeli either - an immigrant, a foreigner; that floating existence between here and there. Locked between one world and another – just like Patrick Swayze in Ghost (only I still have a career).
That’s also the treatment I got. Unlike most Israelis, somehow when I speak English it doesn’t sound like I have marbles in my mouth. I do have an accent, but just not enough for anyone to recognize where I’m from. So I’m usually placed by Americans in that highly specific geographic region of the world – ‘the rest of the world’, or ‘not here’. In the past eight years I’ve been a Mexican, an Iraqi, a Russian, an Arab and many others - a true citizen of the world. A mild accent and not being completely white will do that to you. But thank God, or congress, my wife is a U.S. citizen and therefore I had the privilege of starting the process of becoming formally an American, what the powers call - naturalization. I don’t want to over stretch this now, but this is a process that puts the ‘tic’ in bureaucratic (one that is attached to one’s neck and sucks the blood directly and efficiently from the vein). This is a process that puts the preparation for the Apollo 11 mission to shame. Columbus reached America without a steamboat faster than this process. There’s a good chance that Haitians and Cubans who try to swim to the U.S. shore actually choose that option instead of going through this experience.
In the citizenship test, as part of the trial by fire initiation to become an American, the correct answers to the question: ‘Name some benefits of becoming an American’ are: ‘Travel with a U.S. passport’, ‘Obtaining government jobs’ and the ‘Ability to petition close family members to become U.S. citizens’. Well, I already had a passport, I never planned on ever becoming a cop or secretary of agriculture, and my mom is here a lot anyway. Conspicuously enough, voting and affecting the government is not listed as one of those benefits. Maybe this has to do with the 2000 elections – voting is not a benefit for any American.
There I was thinking: would that day of becoming formally a citizen make everything different? Would I become an average American all of a sudden? Would I start saying wrong things to my wife and buy flowers and jewelry to apologize for that? Would I feel different? Would I leave the swearing-in ceremony some 30 pounds heavier? Would I forget all geography? Or would baseball look so much better? All signs pointed to no. So the whole official process didn’t look promising – a passport wouldn’t have done it.
For years, I went through this vicious circle of hell of the formal naturalization. Fast forward (in warp speed), and finally in 2005 I became a formally naturalized U.S. citizen. But do I really feel natural here now? Is there another way to be part of it all? Do I need a secret password? Can I ever belong here? How do I get there? Can I get there from here? What’s with all the questions? And if Mickey’s a mouse and Pluto’s a dog, what is Goofy?
So why am I writing this? There were a few million other immigrants coming to the U.S. in the past few years, a few of them actually legal. Some of them not through tunnels, and a full dozen without bullets zooming over their ears by Southern Arizona self-proclaimed vigilantes. Couldn’t all they have written a blog about being in America? Why do I need the narcissistic potential attention of people peeking into my life? Well, for one, I am formally an American now, and as I don’t drive an SUV that sucks the life out of Earth itself, I need to do something to keep my natural citizen status alive. And secondly, I write this mostly for me, (considering the off-chance that anyone other than me actually ever reads this). Maybe I’ll never feel really totally natural. Maybe no person living outside the caves does. But maybe I’ll figure out if that’s possible at all.
So come with me on a magical journey across America (relax and don’t contact me about that - I don’t have any drugs!). In this journey we’ll explore the innate and learned cultural, psychological and anthropological differences between people around the world and how they compare to Americans. We will peel the layers of these differences to get closer to the core of the truth - that with all these differences, all people are the same – all people everywhere are hilariously ridiculous.
That’s also the treatment I got. Unlike most Israelis, somehow when I speak English it doesn’t sound like I have marbles in my mouth. I do have an accent, but just not enough for anyone to recognize where I’m from. So I’m usually placed by Americans in that highly specific geographic region of the world – ‘the rest of the world’, or ‘not here’. In the past eight years I’ve been a Mexican, an Iraqi, a Russian, an Arab and many others - a true citizen of the world. A mild accent and not being completely white will do that to you. But thank God, or congress, my wife is a U.S. citizen and therefore I had the privilege of starting the process of becoming formally an American, what the powers call - naturalization. I don’t want to over stretch this now, but this is a process that puts the ‘tic’ in bureaucratic (one that is attached to one’s neck and sucks the blood directly and efficiently from the vein). This is a process that puts the preparation for the Apollo 11 mission to shame. Columbus reached America without a steamboat faster than this process. There’s a good chance that Haitians and Cubans who try to swim to the U.S. shore actually choose that option instead of going through this experience.
In the citizenship test, as part of the trial by fire initiation to become an American, the correct answers to the question: ‘Name some benefits of becoming an American’ are: ‘Travel with a U.S. passport’, ‘Obtaining government jobs’ and the ‘Ability to petition close family members to become U.S. citizens’. Well, I already had a passport, I never planned on ever becoming a cop or secretary of agriculture, and my mom is here a lot anyway. Conspicuously enough, voting and affecting the government is not listed as one of those benefits. Maybe this has to do with the 2000 elections – voting is not a benefit for any American.
There I was thinking: would that day of becoming formally a citizen make everything different? Would I become an average American all of a sudden? Would I start saying wrong things to my wife and buy flowers and jewelry to apologize for that? Would I feel different? Would I leave the swearing-in ceremony some 30 pounds heavier? Would I forget all geography? Or would baseball look so much better? All signs pointed to no. So the whole official process didn’t look promising – a passport wouldn’t have done it.
For years, I went through this vicious circle of hell of the formal naturalization. Fast forward (in warp speed), and finally in 2005 I became a formally naturalized U.S. citizen. But do I really feel natural here now? Is there another way to be part of it all? Do I need a secret password? Can I ever belong here? How do I get there? Can I get there from here? What’s with all the questions? And if Mickey’s a mouse and Pluto’s a dog, what is Goofy?
So why am I writing this? There were a few million other immigrants coming to the U.S. in the past few years, a few of them actually legal. Some of them not through tunnels, and a full dozen without bullets zooming over their ears by Southern Arizona self-proclaimed vigilantes. Couldn’t all they have written a blog about being in America? Why do I need the narcissistic potential attention of people peeking into my life? Well, for one, I am formally an American now, and as I don’t drive an SUV that sucks the life out of Earth itself, I need to do something to keep my natural citizen status alive. And secondly, I write this mostly for me, (considering the off-chance that anyone other than me actually ever reads this). Maybe I’ll never feel really totally natural. Maybe no person living outside the caves does. But maybe I’ll figure out if that’s possible at all.
So come with me on a magical journey across America (relax and don’t contact me about that - I don’t have any drugs!). In this journey we’ll explore the innate and learned cultural, psychological and anthropological differences between people around the world and how they compare to Americans. We will peel the layers of these differences to get closer to the core of the truth - that with all these differences, all people are the same – all people everywhere are hilariously ridiculous.
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