Las Vegas

I risk dating myself here but I’ll say it anyway: the last time I visited Las Vegas before this trip was in the early 90s.   I didn’t like it then, but it provided a certain amount of fun and entertainment and it was cheap, which then , traveling on a tight student’s budget was worth something in and by itself.

This place ain’t for me. Pic: discoverthetrip.com

This time I absolutely hated the place and couldn’t wait to get out.  I know I am in the minority on this one, vastly outnumbered by people who love Vegas and everything about it.  But, seriously, what is there about it?

What bothered me most the first time around (just like in Disneyland, btw) is the fakeness of it all.  This is probably my German side – forever seeking for authenticity – that is so strongly reacting to fake Eiffel Towers, fake Venetian canals, fake Statues of Liberty, fake everything.  I remember about 10 years later – I was by then living in California – a colleague of mine taking a long weekend trip to Vegas where she staid at the Venetian coming back to work and marveling about Vegas in general and the hotel in particular “just like Venice, only cleaner” were her words.  The words of somebody, I might add, who had never set foot into Europe.  One thing is true, the streets in Venice are dirtier than the halls of the hotel, but they are streets, not hallways kept spotless by an army of underpaid mostly Mexican cleaners.  But anyway, that was then.

This time I was prepared for the fakeness and willing to try to just go with the flow and enjoy it.  But this time the problem was a different one, it was what Umberto Eco describes in his Travels through Hyperreality so very aptly with the words “behind the facades lurks a sales pitch”.  And that is exactly it, Vegas has become a expensive make-believe luxury destination for those who can’t afford the real thing and unlike before one pays dearly for that illusion.  With the exception of parking and the spectacles some casinos put up, e.g. a fake volcano eruption every half hour starting at 5 pm,  everything in Vegas is expensive and wherever you turn somebody wants to sell you something.  Now maybe there are still cheap lunch buffets in parts of town where one doesn’t want to be, serving food that one does not care to eat, but at our Hotel at the Strip we spent almost $70 for a three Pho soup lunch with tea and a soda – I can get this in Silicon Valley for $25.  The da Vinci exhibition at a hotel was $52 for the three of us – that was after we used a 40% off coupon – and it was okay, not great.  What irked me was that they were trying to upsell us on some cheesy picture of us taken in front of a green wall with brushes in our hand that came out looking like we were painting the Last Supper.   I mean, seriously …

The other thing that disturbed me was the vengeance with which the hordes of people embraced this whole spectacle of conspicuous over-consumption.  Huge alcoholic drinks in silly shaped plastic containers where hauled around on the street (and not just by 21 year olds – that I would understand but by people in their 40s and 50s), as well as  shopping bags (do other cities not have the usual array of clothing stores?), people dressed up (or tried to) walking around in the silliest combinations and I have seen more than a reasonable share of naked legs in sandals at around 0 to 5 degrees Celsius – with other words: freezing temperatures.  I think we were the only people on new Years Eve not wearing a 2013 tiara, other head gear, glasses, necklaces, whatever.  Everything is about consuming more and more, everything needs to be bigger, everybody seems to want to outclass the rest, live the high life, be fake-rich and show it off.

Okay, I am am done now.  I won’t go back if I can at all avoid it.  Maybe somebody who has been to Vegas and liked it can try and explain to me what you see in it.  I can’t wrap my mind around it.

Glass Half Empty

This very typically little story happened to me just the other day and I thought it was, well, very typical of the difference in culture between the US and Germany.  So here it goes.

General German sentiment: things will be worse tomorrow and even worse later.

I am on the LinkedIn Alumni list of my old/first university, the one in Germany.  As you might or might not know alumni relations is rather new to Germany, and in general people graduate and then pretty much forget about their universities.  So when they slowly started building closer relationship with their alumni I felt honor bound to at least sign up and participate.  The group is not very active but every once in a while an interesting post comes along which is worth reading and commenting on.

So the other day I saw that somebody had posted a ranking of “new” universities (those less than 50 years old) and my good old – or should I say new – university secured a spot among the top 15.  Pretty darn good, I thought for a small university in a provincial town in southern Germany.  I commented positively and tweeted the article.  Exactly the behavior that is expected from and commended in every good American.

The reaction I got should not have surprised me but still it did: the next person responding to my comment basically wrote: it ain’t all that great, in 5 years the university will not be “New” anymore and where will that leave us?  On the list of all universities this places is only “whatever not so stellar number) and the German universities in general aren’t doing so well, worse than the Dutch, blablabla, etc.

How very German!  Instead of focusing on the positive, the good ranking now and thinking that we have a few years to improve the overall ranking the focus is on the bad, the negative, the problem.  Maybe the typical American focus on the forever positive outlook, the incessant “everything will be alright” attitude is not realistic and at times outright annoying but the relentless focusing on the negative, the automatic assumption that whatever can go wrong will go wrong and that it is downhill from here is depressing. Why is that the automatic negative reaction, why forever focus on the bad?

I hate to say it, but it seems almost German nature.

Destination Imagination – Or How to Stifle Creativity

I was wondering where to post this one, here or on my other blog called America explained (I admit, I am not lacking ambition), but decided to post it here.  Check out the other blog, though, if you are interested.

My son is a geek, he likes sciences and is good at math.  He is similar to his mom, who likes sciences – and isn’t all that great at math.  This year we signed him up for a program called Destination Imagination (in short DI) which is a nationwide contest in which teams complete a challenge – often engineering-related but for variety there are also plays and more social type challenges.

The not so creative creativity contest. pic: hongkiat.com

We liked the idea of elementary school kids using their imagination and creativity to solve problems.  That is the theory.  The practice is – the opposite.  The team of youngsters has to pick one of five challenges, if it was me the challenge would be something like: “build three small cars propelled by different mechanisms which can go a predetermined distance.”  I might add something like “Don’t use nuclear power to propel them.”

In real life the challenges reads something like: “build three small cars propelled by different mechanisms which can go a predetermined distance.” and then follow about 10 pages (literally) in 8 point print detailing every last aspect of the challenge.  The size of the care down to the quarter inch, how much it can cost, what materials can be used and not used, how much the vehicle can wobble and still be considered running smoothly – a condition.  Also the cars don’t just have to go a predetermined distance, they have to follow some excruciatingly detailed path inside a 20′ x 20′ feet square in which certain areas are marked off.  The ways to propel the cars are spelled out (so much about thinking creatively) and everything that is fun is explicitly forbidden.  Geek mom that I am my first thought was “firecracker tied to car”.  I thought it was brilliant – but, of course, the Safety Rules prohibit that.

Not only spell the rules every aspect of the challenge out , they are also subject to repeated revisions and so the parents will enjoy immensely the opportunity to compare different versions at various times and adjust the project.  Wait, the parents are not supposed to participate at all other than in a facilitator’s role (basically keeping the kid’s from smashing each others’ heads in)  – so the 8 year olds seem to be expected to read the rules, understand them and act accordingly.  No idea in what universe the people who came up with this live.  One thing is sure, thought, they do not have kids and where born middle-aged.

Somehow this whole mess is in some ways indicative of – and here I can’t speak for all of the US but certainly for the engineering driven culture of Silicon Valley – where creativity seem to be to follow very detailed rules and dot all the i’s and cross all the t’s.  The challenges couldn’t be more contrary to their alleged purpose if they tried.   To us it is painful to read the rules and see the kids struggle with trying solve the challenge, have some fun and stay within the narrow confines of the rules of this alleged contest in creativity and imagination.

If it was just my son I would encourage him to use a firecracker and a few more things that sparkle, bang and stink – even if it means he gets disqualified, at least he would have some fun and go out with a bang.  But as a member of a team of little geeks we’ll play by the rules.  Just this year, next year I am thinking of a challenge myself.

Tipping

What is enough and what is too much or too little? pic: people.howstuffworks.com

Tipping is a well-known contentious  issue between Americans and Germans.  Americans tip a lot and find Germans and their tipping habits (or lack thereof) cheap bordering on the offensive and Germans find American tipping habits patronizing and claim that they ruin the prices for everybody (and that, of course, everybody should be paid a decent wage so you don’t have to tip somebody so they can pay their rent).

Now, none of this is new.  If a German planning to visit the US picks up a travel book it will have a section about tipping and it will clearly state a number between 15 and 20% as the expected amount.  Likewise an American traveling to Europe will find cautionary words about over-tipping.  And still Germans under-tip and Americans over-tip.  They just can’t help themselves.  It seems to be such a deeply ingrained cultural norm that it is hard to shake.

I had an experience along this line a few times:

German guest: “how much should I tip?”

Me: “let’s see, the bill comes to $51 …”

Guest: “How about $55?”

Me: “Ehmm, no, that isn’t quite enough, that’s not even 10% , more like $60.”

Guest: “WHAT????”

Me: “Well, I told you15-20% is normal, so okay, $59.”

Guest: “so you really mean it, you have to tip that much, I really didn’t know that …..”

Me (invisible eye-roll): “We did discuss this before, this is just how it is here …”

Guest: “sure, yes, I just didn’t realize that it actually really is the case, I thought is it sort of a suggestion …” (trails off)

I could, of course, relay a bunch of experience where I am leaving a restaurant/bar after my American company has paid the bill and see this huge grin on the face of the waiter. “Oh oh, over-tipped” I think to myself.  “Didn’t I just tell him/her that 35 Euros is good enough if the bill comes to 32?  Did he/she have to make it 40 again? Sigh!”

Just, those encounters are all around less dramatic and antagonizing.

The thing is, I can’t just blame others.  After all these years in the US I still have trouble with tipping, I, of all people know, how much to tip (and have figured out the trick to make the calculation easy: in California to tip twice the amount of tax you pay – that gets you in the right ballpark) but I have to remind and force myself to do it right every time.

Some things just aren’t as easy as they seem.

The Great American Indoors

Me, in a restaurant in California during the summer, pic: http://foodtrainers.blogspot.com/2010/12/shiver-yourself-skinny.html

There is something very strange about the American indoors for a European such as myself and here is what it is:  on a random hot Silicon Valley summer day my family might decide to have dinner in a nearby restaurant.  I am in shorts and sleeveless T-shirt so I go to my closet and get a pair of long pants, a T-shirt with sleeves and a cardigan.  I also pack a jacket for my son and ask him to put on socks.

I am not crazy, I am just going to a restaurant with air-conditioning which will be keeping the room at a nice and steady 60 degrees Fahrenheit which for me, especially when sitting instead of moving, is right around the temperature where my toes start to lose any feeling and any uncovered spot of skin shows a serious case of goose-bumps.

Fast forward to winter – not that dramatic in lovely California – so let’s fast forward to winter in Boston, where I used to live.  It is cold, so you layer: underwear, t-shirt, sweater, maybe cardigan and a down jacket, hat, gloves, two pairs of socks and lined boots.  Then you walk, let’s say to the next T station (subway), enter and proceed more than 10 steps form the entrance where you start ripping the down jacket off.  By the time you get to the platform and then into the train you will have ripped off pretty much every piece of clothing that can be ripped off without getting the police involved and sweat is running down your back.   As you leave the subway the process reverses itself at a frantic pace;  sweater over the head, cardigan on, down jacket on top, sweat running down the back and then the onslaught of cold air.  Five minutes later you enter the office building and start peeling of again in a lovely 80 degree environment.

I have never quite understood why we have to have winter temperatures in summer and summer temperatures in winter.  If I have to sweat, I’d prefer to sweat in summer.  If I have to freeze, then winter would be the time to do so.  It would save a lot of energy and I wouldn’t have to have my entire wardrobe available year around.

Little Things

It’s the little things that end up making live hard when one first leaves the comfort of the world one knows.  With me it was – correction is – bread.  German bread is just awesome, bread making is an art there and the variety and different flavors available there I have never found anywhere else, not even close.

German bread is the best in the world … prove me wrong. pic: http://www.rlv.de

The late 90s on the East Coast was a particularly dire time for bread.  What was served there under this name didn’t deserve it.  It was some white, spongy material that tasted of nothing and could be compressed to about 10% its size and would then spring back to its original shape.  California of the 2010s is a lot better, we even have a German bakery with good bread – if one can afford it.

Chocolate was similar, German chocolate is okay, Swiss chocolate is great and Switzerland is closer to my home town than the next school district for us now. So I grew up on awesome chocolate and found Hershey’s inedible.  I missed bread and chocolate and quark which simply does not exist in the US  (for an explanation of this diary look here).

Banking was another almost insurmountable issue when I moved here.  Back then (as now but less) people wrote checks.  They would go to the drug store, buy a bottle of shampoo and pay with a check.  I had never seen anything like it.  People don’t pay with checks in Germany, they pay with cash (or debit and credit cards, but much less than here, cash rules supreme in your friendly neighborhood supermarket).  When I moved to San Francisco my bank of choice  sent me what must have been several 1000 checks (no kidding).  I moved out of my SF flat 11 years ago and the occasional check I write still shows my SF address – and I am not even half way through the stash.

What I will miss most about California I don’t know yet but I have a suspicion that not being able to go shopping on Sundays will be a biggy, and where will I get those yummy little yellow mangoes from, and the Mexican spices?