Five things that aren't really that bad in the U.S. -- Part 1
As an unofficial ambassador of the United States, I frequently find myself on the receiving end of some distinctly anti-American opinions. As most of them comes from people who have never been to the United States, or have only visited briefly, it's fair to say that the reflect fairly widespread (and mild) stereotypes about the United States and its fine citizens. In the interest of providing a cultural defense of my occasionally indefensible country, I present here what I consider to be the 5 most under-rated (or unfairly beleaguered, at least) things about the red, white, and blue.
1. Politics
Yes, we elected W. Twice. No one is proud of this, but it happened. Blame the media for his initial victory in 2000, blame the culture of post-9/11 fear mongering for his re-election in 2004. Or, just blame the electorate for being so easily bought and sold (most people got "rebate" checks for about $600 after his first election). The two terms of George W Bush will no doubt mark a low point in the not particularly glorious history of American presidential politics, and there's really nothing else to say.
Thus, if I want to defend American politics, really the only thing I can say is: look who's talking! Currently, Nicolas "Bling Bling" Sarkozy is President of France, and Silvio Berlusconi is Prime Minister of Italy. Sarkozy is known for his total lack of civility, right-wing populism, and for dumping his wife and marrying a billionaire heiress-model-chanteuse. Berlusconi is the wealthiest man in Italy, owns many of the television channels and newspapers and represents, therefore, probably the single-worst possible choice for prime minister one could ever imagine. Given his track record of corruption (there is a wikipedia entry for "Trials involving Silvio Berlusconi"), bribery and poor judgment (he has the sense of humor of a 5 year old and frequently makes cracks about Female politicians "assets"), it is hard to defend the fact that he's been elected prime minister on THREE different occasions. At least our president can travel to Spain without fearing being arrested, and hey, at least we didn't elect Bush 3 times. God knows we're trying our damnedest to do the next best thing, but it hasn't happened yet!
Fig. 1: I saw this political poster in Milan, back in April. It says: "They suffered their immigration, now they live on reservations! Think about it!"
Every country in Europe has skeletons in its closet. Switzerland has Christophe Blocher, France has Jean-Marie Le Pen, Austria has Jorg Haider, England had Margaret Thatcher, etc. The point is: every country has terrible politicians and every country elects a bunch of idiots every once in a while. While it's true that the idiots the Americans elect have the disturbing habit of interfering with/bombing other countries, they're hardly alone in these actions and they usually have the implicit (or at least tacit) support of a large portion of the world. As bad as things are in the US, it's really difficult to argue that they are significantly better anywhere else.
2. Coffee
Next to American politics, I probably spend the most time defending American coffee. Thus, I will start on the offensive: coffee in Switzerland is bad. There, I said it. Why is it bad? One word: ROBOTS. When the glorious robot revolution finally comes and we are all enslaved by our diode-based overlords, the first people without coffee of any sort will be the Swiss. Here is a picture of the coffee robot at the cafeteria near my building at EPFL:
Fig. 2: Whizz! Brrr! Squirt! Your coffee is ready.
One simply presses a button, puts a cup underneath, and waits. Unless you like things that taste awful, I would not recommend pressing the café button. What you'll get is watered-down espresso. And not "watered-down" like a "café americano" -- which is an espresso with water -- no, it's "watered-down" as in the machine just runs a bunch of water through the beans thus ensuring that it picks up all the worst flavors that a good, short pull is supposed to avoid. Stick with espresso (called express here en Français) or a ristretto, which use much less water and is therefore not as bad. At any rate, after watching the automaton squirt out your drink through one (or two) of its orifices, you then go to the cashier and drop 1.70 CHF. Not a great price, considering that this is a University campus and the food is allegedly somewhat subsidized.
You are probably saying, "well, that's what you get at the university cafeteria." True. But, do you know what you get at a fancy coffee shop downtown? The same damn thing! Except, for the luxury of having someone else press the espresso button, you get to pay 3.00 CHF. In all the places I've been in Lausanne, I've only seen one single cafe that actually allowed humans to make the coffee (the fantastic Satelite, at EPFL). The Swiss are so enamored with coffee producing robots that there even exists a "Nespresso" Cafe in Lausanne. For those of you not in the know, Nespresso is a capsule-based home-espresso system designed by Nestle. By using pretty clever technology, it allows you to make a decent espresso with a $150 machine -- if you buy the capsules from Nespresso at about $0.40 each. So, the idea of having a cafe that serves Nespresso is kind of like having a "Pizzeria" that sells Hot Pockets. Wow! Tastes just like I made it at home!
So, to summarize, coffee here stinks and you're beter off making it yourself at home. Every morning I make a small pot in my Bialetti stove-top coffee machine, pictured below. I only mention this because I really wanted to show a picture of my Bialetti since I have a sort of sentimental attachment to it; it was the very first household item that I bought in Switzerland and thus exists as a kind of physical manifestation of my residence in Switzerland. Undoubtedly, I'll know it's time to leave this country when it finally falls apart.
Fig. 3: This is allegedly a "six-cup" machine. I find that it's just about enough to fill my small mug twice, and therefore perfect for my morning routine.
Compared to this, coffee in America is great. Even if you don't enjoy a mug of classic drip coffee, reasonable quality espresso is available on virtually every corner of most big cities. This, I think, is typical of America. It is true that one can purchase some truly awful coffee (just go to 7/11), but one can also get some really great coffee, and usually, one doesn't have to pay an arm and a leg. On the other hand, if you want some American style coffee here, your only option is to go to the Starbucks at Place St. Francois. For only 3.90 CHF you can get a Grande drip coffee, but it's worth every penny.
It's getting late for me, so I think I'll continue this later. So, stay tuned for part 2.
1. Politics
Yes, we elected W. Twice. No one is proud of this, but it happened. Blame the media for his initial victory in 2000, blame the culture of post-9/11 fear mongering for his re-election in 2004. Or, just blame the electorate for being so easily bought and sold (most people got "rebate" checks for about $600 after his first election). The two terms of George W Bush will no doubt mark a low point in the not particularly glorious history of American presidential politics, and there's really nothing else to say.
Thus, if I want to defend American politics, really the only thing I can say is: look who's talking! Currently, Nicolas "Bling Bling" Sarkozy is President of France, and Silvio Berlusconi is Prime Minister of Italy. Sarkozy is known for his total lack of civility, right-wing populism, and for dumping his wife and marrying a billionaire heiress-model-chanteuse. Berlusconi is the wealthiest man in Italy, owns many of the television channels and newspapers and represents, therefore, probably the single-worst possible choice for prime minister one could ever imagine. Given his track record of corruption (there is a wikipedia entry for "Trials involving Silvio Berlusconi"), bribery and poor judgment (he has the sense of humor of a 5 year old and frequently makes cracks about Female politicians "assets"), it is hard to defend the fact that he's been elected prime minister on THREE different occasions. At least our president can travel to Spain without fearing being arrested, and hey, at least we didn't elect Bush 3 times. God knows we're trying our damnedest to do the next best thing, but it hasn't happened yet!
Fig. 1: I saw this political poster in Milan, back in April. It says: "They suffered their immigration, now they live on reservations! Think about it!"Every country in Europe has skeletons in its closet. Switzerland has Christophe Blocher, France has Jean-Marie Le Pen, Austria has Jorg Haider, England had Margaret Thatcher, etc. The point is: every country has terrible politicians and every country elects a bunch of idiots every once in a while. While it's true that the idiots the Americans elect have the disturbing habit of interfering with/bombing other countries, they're hardly alone in these actions and they usually have the implicit (or at least tacit) support of a large portion of the world. As bad as things are in the US, it's really difficult to argue that they are significantly better anywhere else.
2. Coffee
Next to American politics, I probably spend the most time defending American coffee. Thus, I will start on the offensive: coffee in Switzerland is bad. There, I said it. Why is it bad? One word: ROBOTS. When the glorious robot revolution finally comes and we are all enslaved by our diode-based overlords, the first people without coffee of any sort will be the Swiss. Here is a picture of the coffee robot at the cafeteria near my building at EPFL:
Fig. 2: Whizz! Brrr! Squirt! Your coffee is ready.One simply presses a button, puts a cup underneath, and waits. Unless you like things that taste awful, I would not recommend pressing the café button. What you'll get is watered-down espresso. And not "watered-down" like a "café americano" -- which is an espresso with water -- no, it's "watered-down" as in the machine just runs a bunch of water through the beans thus ensuring that it picks up all the worst flavors that a good, short pull is supposed to avoid. Stick with espresso (called express here en Français) or a ristretto, which use much less water and is therefore not as bad. At any rate, after watching the automaton squirt out your drink through one (or two) of its orifices, you then go to the cashier and drop 1.70 CHF. Not a great price, considering that this is a University campus and the food is allegedly somewhat subsidized.
You are probably saying, "well, that's what you get at the university cafeteria." True. But, do you know what you get at a fancy coffee shop downtown? The same damn thing! Except, for the luxury of having someone else press the espresso button, you get to pay 3.00 CHF. In all the places I've been in Lausanne, I've only seen one single cafe that actually allowed humans to make the coffee (the fantastic Satelite, at EPFL). The Swiss are so enamored with coffee producing robots that there even exists a "Nespresso" Cafe in Lausanne. For those of you not in the know, Nespresso is a capsule-based home-espresso system designed by Nestle. By using pretty clever technology, it allows you to make a decent espresso with a $150 machine -- if you buy the capsules from Nespresso at about $0.40 each. So, the idea of having a cafe that serves Nespresso is kind of like having a "Pizzeria" that sells Hot Pockets. Wow! Tastes just like I made it at home!
So, to summarize, coffee here stinks and you're beter off making it yourself at home. Every morning I make a small pot in my Bialetti stove-top coffee machine, pictured below. I only mention this because I really wanted to show a picture of my Bialetti since I have a sort of sentimental attachment to it; it was the very first household item that I bought in Switzerland and thus exists as a kind of physical manifestation of my residence in Switzerland. Undoubtedly, I'll know it's time to leave this country when it finally falls apart.
Fig. 3: This is allegedly a "six-cup" machine. I find that it's just about enough to fill my small mug twice, and therefore perfect for my morning routine.Compared to this, coffee in America is great. Even if you don't enjoy a mug of classic drip coffee, reasonable quality espresso is available on virtually every corner of most big cities. This, I think, is typical of America. It is true that one can purchase some truly awful coffee (just go to 7/11), but one can also get some really great coffee, and usually, one doesn't have to pay an arm and a leg. On the other hand, if you want some American style coffee here, your only option is to go to the Starbucks at Place St. Francois. For only 3.90 CHF you can get a Grande drip coffee, but it's worth every penny.
It's getting late for me, so I think I'll continue this later. So, stay tuned for part 2.
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