Vacation Observations

Being back in the US for a few weeks is interesting. I see things differently.

First of all, Wal-mart is totally and completely forgiven for being an evil empire. I know I know, they put people out of business and they are terrible to their employees and their customer service skills leave something to be desired, but have you seen how clean and organized it is in there? There is so much space in there and there are soooo many products to choose from and I can actually return something if I don't like it. No haggling, no emotional blackmail just a shelf full of stuff and price stickers. Beeeea-utiful.

Disney is also forgiven for being an evil empire despite the fact that a large chunk of our vacation money now sits in the Disney wallet. We spent 3 days at Disneyland and not one person asked to take pictures with our kids. You may be mentally pointing out to me that we were Americans in America, so who would want our picture, right? Well nobody was asking any nationality for their pictures. There is something to be said for being in a place where people are largely self absorbed. I also noticed that the lines were orderly and every one stood in them politely (lines generally don't exist in India).

Next on the list, traffic. I just love how people drive in one lane at a time. They use their blinkers a lot more than they use their horns and by and large there are no cattle on the big roads. And guess what people do at the red lights? They stop! It is so cool! I am aware that there are those who break all of the rules, but honestly, it is so much better.

Have I mentioned how lovely America smells? Even LA seemed like clean fresh air to us. Scary, huh?

Of course not all the observations are favorable. America could stand to lose some weight. There are the really fat (I am one of those) and then there are the people that I used to consider thin. Even they could stand to lose 20 pounds. Don't get me wrong, I don't want everyone to be as skinny as your average Indian, but I am surprised at how "well padded" most Americans are. I now believe all the statistics I used to roll my eyes at about how many Americans are overweight.

I remember now why we were always flat broke. Everything is so expensive here! Honestly, I am afraid for when we return in 2010. I forgot just how much it costs to feed 9 people in the US. Two income families have very little to do with equality and a lot more to do with necessity.

I am most surprised by how little I am enjoying the food that I have been looking forward to. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed my first Quarter-Pounder with Cheese an awful lot, but I grew tired of it all very quickly. The one exception has been the root beer. I love root beer. I have been drinking so much root beer I am going to have brown eyes soon. I probably smell like root beer. That stain on my shirt? Root beer. Why, oh why, doesn't India have root beer. They have satellite TV, surely they could work out root beer!

Being here has made me ask myself two interesting questions: 1. How on Earth am I going to make it two more years? 2. Is it time to go home to Noida yet? Vacation is wearing me out!