Thursday, January 31, 2008

my presidential hopeful

If a song could be president
We’d hum on Election Day
The gospel choir would start to sway
And we’d all have a part to play

The first lady would free her hips
Pull a microphone to her lips
Break our hearts with Rhythm and Blues
Steve Earle would anchor the news

We’d vote for a melody
Pass it around on an mp3
All our best foreign policy
Would be built on harmony

If a song could be president
We’d fly a jukebox to the moon
All our founding fathers’ 45’s
Lightnin’ Hopkins and Patsy Cline
If a song could be president

If a song could be president
We could all add another verse
Life would teach us to rehearse
Till we found a key change

Break out of this minor key
Half-truths and hypocrisy
We wouldn’t need an underachiever-in-chief
If a song could be president

We’d make Neil Young a Senator
Even though he came from Canada
Emmylou would be Ambassador
World leaders would listen to her

They would show us where our country went wrong
Strum their guitars on the White House lawn
John Prine would run the FBI
All the criminals would laugh and cry
If a song could be president

-If A Song Could Be President by Over The Rhine

If you don't know this band, you should.

Friday, January 11, 2008

American politics from a Brit, er, a European

An interesting conversation took place this week between my new British classmate and myself:

Brit: American politics are so exciting.
American: How so?
B: You stay up all day and night watching the results come in, it’s like this exciting game. And it’s never predictable like it is in England, elections in England are so boring. But it always seems to me that those on the east and west coasts stick together in their choices while all the states in the middle go for the opposite guy. I figure everyone in the middle of the US is either really stupid or really crazy; they always pick the wrong guy.
A: For clarification, what do you mean by ‘the wrong guy’? The guy who loses or the one you don’t like or…?
B: The guy who wins.
.....
B: I don’t like to be called an Englishman.
A: How about British?
B: No, I don’t like that either.
A: Why? You live in England, right? Are you not from there?
B: Sure, I live there. But I don’t feel like an Englishman.
A: Are your parents English? Are they from England?
B: Well yes, they live in England. But they are originally from Lithuania.
A: So would you consider yourself Lithuanian?
B: Hell no. I never want to live in Lithuania.
A: Where do you want to live?
B: Wherever there is ocean and mountains.
A: How about Switzerland? They have mountains and lakes.
B: No, I want to go scuba diving. I want to live near the ocean.
A: How about Egypt?
B: No way! I’d hate everyone there.
A: How about Greece?
B: No, I also would hate it.
A: How about somewhere in Asia?
B: No.
A: Well you could come to the States. I’m sure you can find mountains and ocean there.
B: Not in the same city! I’m thinking maybe I’d live in Canada.
A: Really? Have you been to Canada?
B: No.
A: Hmm. Maybe you should stick to England… So what do you want to be called if not English?
B: I’m a European. You can call me a European.

*****

Another interesting occurrence this week at my Russian class. We had a visitor come sit in on our class. He was Turkish. He sat down in a chair next to me, and pulled out his laptop while we were going over some new vocabulary. As I glanced over, I noticed his laptop wasn’t just any laptop… it was a MacBook Pro… in fact, the exact same one as I own. It was my first time seeing someone with a Mac in Belarus besides myself… definitely NOT an everyday occurrence! (After class, I told him he had a very good computer, the same as mine. His question in response was where I am from. When I told him the States, he started talking to me in English. Said he used to live in Chicago.)

*****

I also informed my Russian teacher and classmates today that the forbidden fruit in Genesis was not (necessarily) an apple... because the Biblical account does not specify what type of fruit. My teacher was quite shocked to be debunked of her long-held notion... Once again, culture serves as the preferred foundation of truth.

Saturday, January 05, 2008

the cold.

It is so cold here that the roads and sidewalks have all turned white.

It is so cold here that your face feels frozen as soon as you walk outside, making you think maybe there was still moisture on your face from showering that got icy, but no, it's just that cold.

It is so cold here that you sometimes forget you are wearing gloves, because the air goes right through them.

It is so cold here that my iPod earbuds get stiff and fall out of my ears over and over again.

It is so cold here that there is not only fog and frost on the windows of vehicles, but yes, even a layer of ice that coats the insides of all the windows of the buses, completely obscuring your view to the outside... and even though buses should have heaters, most of them are not operational or are neglected to be turned on.

It is so cold here that the only warm places I have found are 1. the metro and 2. my bedroom. Ironically, since they turned the heat on in my building, it has become like a sauna in my room. I have to sleep in shorts and a t-shirt and leave my door open to get cooler air from the rest of the apartment, or the little heater in my small bedroom will make it stuffy real fast.

Ah, winter. And it has only just begun. Temperatures were -16 degrees Celsius yesterday. Oh, it will get much worse... MUCH worse...