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[taerowyn]

My coworker Neil is from England, and we often get into discussions about cultural perceptions etc. Today's conversation got started because he and his girlfriend watched "Gone with the Wind" and he mentioned that it was interesting from his point of view of not knowing anything about the Civil War. So that set us off on discussions of history and how "history" in America is so short vs anywhere in Europe etc.

Anyway, I asked him if it got annoying getting all these kinds of questions all the time.

Neil: No, I only mind the stupid questions.
Me: Like what?
N: Well, I once got asked if there were any African Americans in England. I said, "Well, not exactly..." Hoping that maybe they'd clue in to the stupidity and general non-sensibility of that question, but no, they said, "You mean the whole country is white?!?"

Hee, hee, people are dumb.

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[taerowyn.livejournal.com]

Well, my coworker was discussing the book Captain Corelli's Mandolin (Good God, not the movie...the book) and there's a guy from Greece in there, arguably the country with one of the longest histories of civilization. This character points out that America as a nation doesn't have the history of war and conflict that older countries have. It's almost like we're in the adolescent "You think you can take me? Huh? Huh?" stage where as other countries, with a longer history and experience with conflict aren't as quick to get all uppity or some such.