A lengthy post-mortem.

It has been a while since I left the rain-swept British islands, and even longer since my last blog post. In the months since I've been back in the United States, I've spent a lot of time reflecting on and waxing nostalgic for my year at the College in London. Though I have been through it before, I really must admit, reverse culture shock can be a bitch to deal with. From the use of certain words and expressions, to beer serving sizes (fluid ounces, America, wtf?), to the tenor of national politics - the overall cultural milieu which we spend our lives embedded within can be both a warm blanket of familiarity and a cold bucket of water dumped over one's head. Sure, it's been great spending time with my family and reconnecting with friends, but things that once seemed normal and given now often seem bizarrely contingent and arbitrarily chosen. So I thought I'd attempt to synthesise my thoughts on the matter, those things that bug me most that differ from one United country to another, and hopefully offer a nice period (UK: full stop) for this blog. Excuse the all-over-the-place topics.

First, America needs to get its act together on measurements. I mean it. Fahrenheit and fluid ounces, pounds and inches, are not a sensible way for a modern internationally oriented country to run things. I'll grant the US superiority on the UK when it comes to weighing people, as the antiquarian system of stone and pounds the Brits use is mystifying and silly. At least the US just uses pounds; I think kilograms would probably help seem a little more sophisticated, though. Fluid ounces, on the other hand, definitely need to go. I for one cannot visualise what one fluid ounce looks like, and I think I'm probably not alone. So, why do we insist on measuring canned (tinned) foods and bottles and all matter of fluid and semi-fluid items in fluid ounces? The rest of the world uses millilitres. So should we. Except for beer, in which case the imperial pint is the way to go. The most frustrating thing about going out for a drink in America: a pint never really is. No one seems able to say for certain, but a standard beer in America seems to range between 12 and 16 fluid ounces, depending on the glasses used and whether you're ordering bottled or draft. Sixteen fluid ounces, assumedly the US standard for a pint, is only 473 millilitres - 27 less than a nice Central European half-litre of beer, and nearly 100 less than the imperial pint's lovely 568 mL (or 19.21 US fluid ounces!). Really, beer in the UK (even in London) is hands down a better deal than a beer in any American city. $5 (£3.15) for a 12 fl. oz. (354 mL) bottle of beer is obscene. I'd willingly pay the £2.50 - £3 London price for a middle of the road lager if I can get a proper pint's worth.

Enough of that, I'm beginning to sound like a crazy beer-obsessed alcoholic. Which is untrue, I far prefer a nice glass of red to fuel my nascent alcoholism. Let us now turn to my other favo(u)rite topic: politics! Or, more specifically, the bizarre tenor of American politics and the total inability of our 'progressive'/vaguely-left party to affect much in the way of progressive change despite majorities in both houses of Congress, and the White House.

First, America is just more right-wing on the base-line than the UK. Which is saying something, because the UK isn't an especially left wing country by European standards. Witness: the birthers and their surprisingly wide acceptance in the 'mainstream' right, Lou Dobbs' rampant anti-immigrant rampaging (I don't care that he has a Mexican wife. Thomas Jefferson had black babies, that didn't make him an abolitionist, did it?), and the remarkable propensity of the American working/middle-class to wage class warfare against itself. The health care reform debate demonstrates this phenomenon very well. Senior citizens want the government to keep its hands off their Medicare, people scream and cry at town hall meetings about the public option as if these town halls were meeting to arrange the establishment of worker's councils for some anarcho-syndicalist future. You've seen the videos on youtube and TV, you know what I'm talking about. Still, more than 60% of Americans consistently supported the public option in polling done by various agencies throughout the debate. Yet, in Senate sub-committees led by Democrats, the policy option floundered and disintegrated. Moneyed interests and too little party loyalty dash progressives' hopes in this country every time. I won't even go into how let down I feel about Obama's inaction, and sometimes even veiled antipathy, to gay rights. Or the Afghan situation. Or any number of other areas where change was promised and none can be found. Compare this to the New Deal and the sweeping changes in law and social services that followed the Labour Party under Tony Blair's 1997 victory. No comparison.

And lest we forget, the American people seem eager to conflate Obama (a centrist politician internationally) with both socialism and fascism. Which is pretty remarkable, as these are polar opposite political positions. Americans don't know this, of course, because they've been spoon-fed sugar-coated hyper-nationalism about the unique wonder that is the American story since first grade social studies class. What's more, a huge amount believe it, and see nothing amiss with such nationalism. Europeans, except for the small fringe on the far-right, can't even think in these terms anymore (nationalism kinda killed tens of millions of people between 1914 and 1945..). Here, its part and parcel to the mainstream political and media discourse.

If I believed in Jesus, I'd ask him to take me home now. This isn't to say British politics are perfect either. I have problems with the British-ness push under Blair and Brown, with the incipient ethno-nationalism that devolution seems to have done nothing to sate, top-up fees for university education, and certain types of privatization. But, on the whole, the terms of political debate there seem to be a little more objective, a little more informed, and a little more sane. Ignore the Sun, and the Telegraph and the Tories on Europe, and you have an almost civilised political public debate!

Finally, words and phrases. I use words, phrases, and grammatical constructions that as an American I should not use. I found that I picked up these linguistic habits fairly quickly this time around (I think the year in the UK from 2006/7 softened me up), and I have had trouble shedding them. I'm often confused about a particular usage's American or British origin. People think I'm being snobby or showing off. I am not. My brain is confused, that's all. So what if I use an unnecessary 'do' here and there (ie: Oh, you would do!)? Who cares if, when angry, I become 'fucked off'? Who cares if my voice rises at the wrong point in the sentence from time to time? This is all slowly fading, especially things like voice inflection (except when I talk to UK people on skype, then it comes back a bit). I'll hold on to some of the words and phrases as linguistic souvenirs of my time there, and hopefully will be able to put them to use in their native setting again in the not-too-distant future.

Until then, I emit a high-pitched bye and leave it at that.

TFL - FML

They should consider changing the name from Transport for London, to Transport Against London, as my commute took over one and one half hours today. Normally, this is a forty minute journey. I believe this is now the new normal, as they are tearing up half the road on the way in to college to replace London's 'Victorian water mains' as all the signs remind. As if that makes stand-still traffic any more acceptable. Get someone to direct traffic please!

They don't need no thought control!

I know one isn't supposed to talk about politics or religion in mixed company, which may explain the British ability to talk about the weather in great detail for extended periods of time. But, that doesn't stop me doing so. In the wake of Easter weekend let us consider the curious case of religion, mostly Christianity, in the UK.

America is regularly and accurately described as one of the most religious, or at least religiously observant, countries in the industrialised world. The results of a recent comprehensive survey of religiosity and belief in the United States grabbed headlines when it revealed that a full 15% of Americans now describe themselves as 'non-religious', or unaffiliated with any religion. Of course, only 1.6% call themselves atheist or agnostic (even if 12% are atheist or agnostic based on stated beliefs gathered in the survey). However, this was big news in the USA; a swelling 'non-religious' population challenged many assumptions about Americans' views of themselves and their society, even if the percentages are rather small compared to other countries. However, the media tended to ignore the stats on Christian affiliation, which suggest that more and more people are moving from the liberal/mainline Protestant churches into a 'broad evangelicalism'. This evangelicalism of course lacks the thorough-goingly academic, organised, accountable, and more 'democratic' structure that the Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians, Congregationalists etc. all have. This to me seemed the more worrying finding, but then again I suppose I'm not a 'real American'.

I reflect on that after having just had a four day weekend for Good Friday/Easter here in the United Kingdom, which seemed a tad overblown observance in a country with so few observant Christians. Even if 70% of the population identifies as Christian, only 1 in 10 attend church services with any regularity, and less than half of Britons believe in God. Britain has become, despite its established Church, one of the most thoroughly secular non-believing societies in the industrialised world. Yet, faith schools still receive public money alongside any other state school, and we get a long weekend for Good Friday and 'Easter Monday'. This is to say nothing of my, and other non-British friends', bemusement at people's Easter partying attitude on Good Friday, a traditionally solemn day! It's as if all the trappings of a religious society are still there, with very little of the actual understanding or substance to back up that illusion.

Why is this? I think it has to do with the fact that while religion and politics have largely been divorced in UK political life, church and state never have been. The upkeep of an established church has led to a lot of public money and attention being given not only to Anglican institutions, but to all sorts of religious organisations in order to justify establishment while bowing to the fairness demands of a multicultural society. Unlike in the US, where church and state have at least a theoretical 'wall of separation' which allows both to thrive in their own spheres, British political secularism has been content to stop with PM's 'not doing God' while millions of pounds are funneled to religious organisations as if they are a branch of the state. This to me seems a peculiar, and peculiarly dysfunctional, approach to secularism and respect for religious belief. Like it or not, religion and spirituality still plays a big role in peoples' lives, even if it is in increasingly non-traditional and non-organised ways. Finding an appropriate approach, where peoples' personal beliefs (or lack thereof) are respected and examined for the contributions they can make to public life while keeping the state separate from religious organisations and visa versa, is still something that British society seems to be struggling with. Increasingly nasty public relations clashes between religious and anti-religious groups only highlight the polarisation and increasing mutual incomprehension that results from the British approach to religion and public life.

My home country and this one are very different on these fronts, and I do not claim the US has got it completely right either, far from it in fact. I merely find it amusing that, on 'Easter Monday', the BBC can write with lightly-veiled shock (and horror?) that up to an apparently whopping 55% of Britons believe in Heaven or an afterlife after having observed a long weekend celebrating the salvific death and miraculous resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. Such a survey result in the US would garner shock at the number being so low! Meanwhile, all those puritanical Americans quietly celebrated (or not) the holiday as a religious one with friends and family on the Sunday, having no days off or official public recognition of the holiday, excepting perhaps the annual White House Easter Egg Roll.

In a somewhat related observation: here in the UK, when one says Easter Egg one means chocolate egg, the British sadly lacking the great tradition of dying real eggs in a multitude of colours to celebrate the risen Lord and/or bank holiday.

Amen.

GB = Great Britain, or Gendy Bendy?

First off, I'd like to state that I'm all for the smashing of the gender binary and the liberation of people of all gender identities. However, there are some things about gender norms in Britain that I think are amusing (while making no judgment of them as bad, just remarkable for their difference from my home culture). I'll keep it short, but consider these points about the behaviour of British men:

1. They get drunk and touch each other, a lot. And I mean, noticeably so, to the point where I sometimes feel confused when witnessing the straightest of 'lads' hanging all over their friends while slurring out 'Mateeeeee....' and hugging, and grabbing. Not in a sexual way, but this sort of physical showing of affection between heterosexual males, normally so guarded with any show of emotion, takes some getting used to.

2. Many young males use hair straighteners, as in irons, to get that hyper-straight look before crafting some of the most intensely sculpted do's around. As if the average male of British ethnic background doesn't have fairly straight hair to begin with. Unlike in the United States, this activity is not confined to the more aesthetically interested gay male, but permeates even to the late-teenage football-playing hetero crowd.

3. From personal experience: Friend A (a male) is informed that Friend B (also a male) is gay. Friend A exclaims surprise. I mention to Friend A that, if we are going to use stereotypes about behaviour to assess people's sexuality, Friend B is fairly flaming. Friend A responds, 'Oh, I just thought he was a bit camp, not gay.' Because here, one does not necessarily imply the other, especially among the middling and upper classes. Though, I suppose its sort of like preppy Georgetown types wearing pink pants and half-unbuttoned linen shirts.

C'est la Vie.

Sealed with an 'x'

In the land of the cold stare, where it takes at least three months into any interpersonal relationship to see the pasty white shell of British reserve even give hint of cracking, one would probably expect most textual exchanges to close with a curt, 'Sincerely, Mr. So-and-So.'

You'd be totally wrong, and here's why: British people of all stripes, male and female, young and old, gay and straight (and 'other', which deserves a whole post of its own), tall and short, etc. etc. love ending text messages, facebook messages, and basically any other short correspondence with a sultry 'x' or even a whole string of them at a time. Upon first encountering this during my last stint in the Kingdom, I kind of figured it was mostly a girl phenomenon. Mostly because I was texting and receiving messages primarily from female friends, not because I have no male ones, but that was just how it went. This time around, I realized that men did it too. Shocker: men x'd other men!

No, this wasn't some weird revelatory moment such as many youngsters might have when they kind of hope Holden Caulfield had gone on smooching his teacher at least a little longer or less horrified-ly, or realizing they enjoy 'Men's Health' magazine not only because it gives great tips on how to achieve your optimal physique. Mostly, to me it just seemed a fairly intimate way of ending a text message with your 'mate' to arrange a trip to the pub. I can't say I like hugging most friends, so to end a communique with an even textual kiss seemed a bit much.

At first I thought, maybe it's a gay thing, but I asked around, and apparently even a good number of otherwise 'blokey' straight men will end texts to each other with an 'x'. The same straight-male-British friend I asked for confirmation explained it this way:

We find it a way to express affection without compromising our British sense of reserve. It allows us to show a feeling without all the unpleasantness that might come with an awkwardly forced (or one-sided) hug, or other real-life show of emotion.

This seems as good an explanation as any; generations of repressing outward signs of affection, at least in most situations, begins to leak out in text messages and other less personal and thus safer modes of communication. Rather than having to get pant-wettingly drunk before expressing affection (And by the way, what's up with straight guys groping their friends once they have a few drinks in them, Britain? Something to explore another day, I think!), one need only pick up one's mobile and let your thumb speak volumes of unspoken softness of heart with a solitary virtual kiss.

x

Keep your eyes peeled, as this post has got me thinking about the next one, an examination of the relatively more flexible gender norms, especially for men, in modern Britannia.

Slang the Second

I've clearly got nothing better to do than write random musing blog posts (in the word's of Alicia Silverstone, as if!), so here is another serving of fine London slang for all the folks at home.

'innit - pronounced in-it very quickly - used to emphasise the preceding statement, to imply it as unquestionably true, or to seek an implicit assent from the conversation partner. Also seemingly sometimes used without any real function. Coming at the end of a sentences; ( a contraction of 'isn't it?' but with a broader meaning and usage).
Examples:
Young student 1: That boy is thick as shit 'innit.
Young student 2: Yea, he right dense.
Translation:
YS1: That boy is very stupid.
YS2: I agree, he is very dumb.
or:
London man on phone: Then I went to the shops, innit. I got this pair of trainers for 20 quid, innit. Credit crunch deals, innit.
Translation:
LMoP: Then I went to the store and bough a pair of sneakers for only £20, what a good deal! It's due to the financial crisis, I say.

brethren - pronounced as bred-drin - referring to one's friends, posse, 'crew', or homies, if you like.
Examples:
Threatening young man: You best get runnin' or I'm 'unna get muh bredren on ya'.
Threatened man: runs away.
Translation:
TYM: Leave now or I shall have my friends attack you.
Also:
Teenaged girl: And den he comes in wiv' all his bredren finkin he impressin' me, like I want him so bad. I really could not be bothered.
Translation:
TG: Then he walks in with his friends, thinking that the sight of him leading his group of friends would impress me. Wrong.

Snow what?

OK. So. The United Kingdom, which once ran an Empire upon which the sun never set, surrenders unconditionally as soon as frozen precipitation begins to fall from the sky. The Nazi Luftwaffe bombed London to bits, yet still the buses ran. Monday, a mere six inches of snow brought the network to a halt. Boris Johnson, London mayor and crazy bigoted side-show act, proclaimed that we all needed to pool our resources to get the city through the situation. REALLY? Next week, if it hails, are we going to re-introduce fabric rationing?

Now, I know this was the greatest snowfall in 18 years, and that it would be economically silly to have equipment prepared to deal with such rare events. But, would it really be economically bad sense? Due to the number of people who couldn't get to work on Monday, early estimates suggest the UK economy is down over £1.2 billion just in lost productivity, and that number is seen as likely to rise once final costs are totalled. Meanwhile, snow continues to blanket parts of the country, with more predicted for London tomorrow.

Surely, the cost of a minimal number of snow plows (which can be easily attached to the fronts of pre-existing vehicles) and some planning for outlying weather events would save money in the long-term? That, and reminding people that clearing snow and slush from their walkways early on helps prevent packed snow and ice from forming, which are definite hazards for anyone trying to walk just about anywhere. I slipped and fell three times walking down the road I live on. So great an injustice must not be allowed, lest the natural beauty of my face be imperiled by an icy 'pavement'!

So, therefore, I judge you government and people of the United Kingdom. Government, ensure transportation cannot be brought to its knees by what is in actuality a very manageable amount of snow. People, get out your shovels (brooms will work on slush!) and clear those walkways in front of your houses. If we all do our part we can and will get through these most trying of times.