Two weeks in America

We’ve met the in laws, had a fabulous wedding, Rachel (the groom’s sister not his bride) collapsed during the ceremony with what appeared to be a seizure (we think it’s migraine but will have her tested again), went to an Amish county that looked just like it was a film set, we’ve done Disneyland in four long, well-planned days, put a big done stamp on the Grand Tour of Los Angeles, shopped until the credit cards shed blood and spotted a few (very few) celebs (Kylie Minogue near the fountain at the Farmers’ Markets, Robin Williams (at the first class lounge at LAX) and that doctor from Celebrity Rehab filming with a rent-a-crowd in Los Angeles outside of Barnes and Noble).

We heard the Disney band play the Star Spangled Banner and watched as retired military men saluted their flag and the rest of the park’s guests stood with their hands on their hearts – but most didn’t seem to know the words beyond the first verse.

We learned to order one entree (main) and eat it between three of us. We learned to keep right (while walking, as well as driving). We noted how neat everything is – few weeds, well tended gardens in service (gas) stations, little or no graffiti in Cleveland or Los Angeles and heaven forbid that it would be permitted in Anaheim or Orange County.

Venice Beach seemed grungy with shops advertising ecstasy cigarettes, a tattooed lady walking around with a boa constrictor and lots of people seemingly affected by alcohol or drugs and lots of homeless people including children but Marina del Rey was beautiful with seals in the water and pelicans on the boardwalk.

A word that keeps coming to mind in America is abundance. Our American cousins seem to have abundant opinions, food choices and serving sizes, toilet cisterns that flush GALLONS of water automatically, freeways, car parks (parking lots), morbidly obese people, empty footpaths (sidewalks), cheap clothes of good quality, shopping malls and - regulations.

I’m sure we each committed a Federal offence at least once a day. It’s an offence for a person under the legal drinking age to touch a vessel (cup, glass, can or bottle) that has held alcohol - let alone to pour Dad a glass of wine or get him a stubby from the fridge.

America has abundantly beautiful forests, lakes, blue skies (in Ohio at least), neat suburbs and streets. It is colourful, vibrant with a spark that only the presence of 310 million people in a country can bring. Many Americans appear to be bewildered as to what’s gone wrong and why the country is economically depressed. Obama it seems has little hope of re-election.

The terrorist alert went up while we were there – there seemed to be credible threat that an attack would or could take place on most of the days we were in the US. Security was increased at LAX and CLE. Everyone is used to the airport strip – shoes, belts, jackets, coats, laptops, anything in pockets, anything metal, anything in liquid, gel or aerosol form. Terrorism is real to ordinary people and they mention it casually in conversation.

There are rows of neat houses with pretty gardens that are empty, or houses that have been on the market for months (years) that can’t sell at 40 and 50 per cent discounts in price. There are buildings with boarded up windows in what seems like whole suburbs.

There are well qualified, educated people on the long-term unemployment list. There are people working second jobs earning $4 an hour, which we were told is below the minimum wage. It’s normal for people to work their vacations in a second job – even professionals turn to manual labour in summer holidays.

Yet at the same time there are streets and streets of the most expensive stores with the most expensive stuff in Los Angeles. We were awed in Harry Winstons, we ogled a $1.8million Bugatti that was one Hollywood celeb’s second car (we’d never heard of him and I can’t remember his name). I was amazed at how polished women looked in Hollywood regardless of age. Hair, nails, skin, teeth, shoes, bags – everything was immaculate.

I found (after four days at Disneyland) that I could tell – before they said a word - who were the Americans and which people were from somewhere else in the world. I spent some time trying to work out how I could tell.

Some things were easy. The black people were wearing “cast members’ uniforms” (there were some black families as “guests” during the week but they were mainly from England and most of the black families who attended came on Saturday).

Hispanic people came all through the week and weekend and there were lots of them but they walked just like the other Americans. People of Spanish or Portuguese background from Europe walked like Europeans – don’t ask me what the difference is, I can’t say for sure.

Americans tend to have straight shoulders and they stand closer together than Australians or New Zealanders. We noticed at the wedding ceremony the chairs felt close together and the best man kept asking his non-Australian groomsmen to stand further apart and allow more room for him and the only other Australian [apart from the groom] in the party.

Americans walk where they want and don’t give way (or at least not to us). We found it difficult to navigate streams of people traffic and kept having to wait for long periods or barge and apologise. They didn’t appear to barge into each other except for some pram brangles when the two mothers would apologise to each other profusely on collision.

Americans are verbally very polite and much of the conversation is taken up with please, thank you, pardon me, you’re welcome, have a nice day or a great weekend. They are happy to instruct people on how things are done – from what dusk means and how it falls, to how to get a aeroplane seat into an upright position (the issue was a sleeping child). We were asked several times if we liked living in Australia.

I was asked to get a chocolate stain out of a flower girl’s dress at the wedding and used soda water to remove the mark. The poppet – who must have been all of 10 – said “that’s not how we get stains out in America. We use soap and water”. Her sister, another poppet, recited to me – it seemed at the time verbatim – the entire script of the last series of Bindi The Jungle Girl. Bindi Irwin is a hit in America. Crikey.

We met people who hadn’t been out of the country and others who hadn’t been out of the continent (they’ve been to Canada or Mexico). One person said they couldn’t understand why anyone would want to live in Australia given the limited choices we have in things and how expensive it all seems. I thought afterwards of at least 16 things I could have said.

“O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave o'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?” It seems it does ma’am, you have a nice day.