In recent months, a collection of essays has emerged from my participation in the Kessler Speech Therapy Program. As a general rule, these were travel experiences in various parts of the world. In effect, they were a little like a travelogue. And in nearly every one of those several episodes, the tone was positive and upbeat. Sometimes there were humorous situations that caused the author a pleasant moment or two. But in the end, most countries were shown in a favorable and a humanizing light in the essays.
Now there is an other side of that coin. Sometimes it borders on ugly. Sometimes it makes you shake your head. And sometimes there are moments which bring a smile or two. All this represents a pastiche of recollections. It is a potpourri. The doom sayers may say it is a hodgepodge but that is a down scale word. Better it is a potpourri. Ah yes, it is a genuine pastiche.
The only element that binds this collection of recollections together is the thought that there are places in the world where I would tend to feel At Home. Not that I intend to go move our residence to each of the places where I may tend to feel At Home. Maybe I’d feel at home there for a few days or for a couple of weeks or months. In short, there are places where some of us would feel at home for whatever reasons, be it language or bull fights or other cultural attractions.
This is not an objective analysis. Maybe there is a bit of irrationality in all this. So be it. If I tend to feel at home in some of the towns and countries which follow this preamble, I’ll apply a small amount of logic and objective analysis to support my choice. If I fail to give you a logical reason for my choice of At Home locations, it may mean that there is no rational reason for my choice. That’s the way it is.
And finally, there will be a choice of places where I probably would feel Not At Home. This is not really a put down of those locations at all. It simply is a place for which I am not inclined to say that it is an At Home situation for me. No hard feelings. As we say, as irrational as it may seem, that is the way it is.
Finally, it should be recognized that some of these recollections go back to the World War II years. I know that things have changed over the last few years such as the Russian break up.1 On the other hand, lots of things proceed without much change as in India and the Arab States. So we’ll take it as it comes and if there is doubt about the timeliness of my recollections, we simply mark it off to the more things change, the more they remain the same. And so to —
CANADA
This is an At Home country for me. Roger Doucet was known to millions of Canadians as “Mr. O Canada.” He sang the national anthem before the home games at the Forum in Montreal as well as at other places. Roger Doucet said “Every time I sing it, I think I’m singing to a beautiful woman. I see this country from coast to coast – from Bonavista to Vancouver Island.” It is a magnificent country with a matchless national anthem and no one sang it better than Roger Doucet. Over a period of many years, he must have sung “O Canada” on thousands of occasions. So he must have spent a goodly amount of time singing to those beautiful women. Good for him.
I’ve had the chance to spend some time from Sydney Mines in the farthest reaches of Nova Scotia in the East to Vancouver, British Columbia, the western most limits of Canada. Sydney Mines is the location of the landings for the first Transatlantic Cables laid in 1957 and 1959. On one trip, I drove back to Halifax where the fog was pretty dense. The next morning, I looked out the 10th floor window of the hotel hoping to catch an Air Canada flight to Montreal that day. No luck.
The fog was all the way to the ground and up above me. It stayed that way for three days. I learned a little more about Halifax than I had bargained for.
If I had a vote in Canada, it would be to declare that country a Republic, ending the English government’s ability to send a Governor General to Ottawa. He doesn’t have much to say, but it is an irritant to all the French speaking residents of the country. And after the Governor General is sent on his way, please Canada, take the Queen’s likeness off the coins and currency. That is more than an irritant.2 A good trade would be to replace the Queen with Maurice Richard or Jean Beliveau, two hockey players.
Now that I’ve given my advice on restructuring the government of Canada, my overriding thoughts are the sentiments of John Kennedy. When he visited Ottawa in 1961 to address the Parliament, JFK said: “We are neighbors by chance; but friends by choice.” I think that reflects all my thoughts on the matter.
MEXICO
Mexico is a country where I would feel Not at Home. As time has gone on, Mexico has slipped down the scale toward a more violent society. For starters, there is a chance that by entering a taxi cab, particularly at night, you may wind up a statistic not only as a robbery victim but perhaps, as a homicide as well.3 That’s why we always rented cars with reputable drivers.
About the last thing any of us would do is to drive a car ourselves in Mexico. An accident always seems to attract the Federales and where they go, payoffs are demanded. The word is “morbida” – a bite. And if there are no payoffs, the prospect of jail is always a consideration. Not an American jail; a Mexican jail.
Finally, I am very fond of many people in Mexico City. They are well educated people. Many of them have studied in the United States. And they are upscale people who have one or more servants in their homes. But I am stupefied to see them ignore and overlook the poverty around them. When there is no choice but to avoid peasants trying to sell fruit on the side walk, for example, they step over them. And usually, we are on our way to a fancy restaurant for a fancy meal. I often lose interest in eating.
A child’s play pen is an open fruit box. The sidewalk is filthy so the child stays in the box for as long as its parents take to sell the fruit. That may be 10 hours.
There simply is no recognition of the poverty which surrounds the well-to-do class in Mexican cities. Maybe they can’t fix it. But they don’t seem to be addressing the issue. In the meantime, they literally step over or around the problem. Someday, there may a reckoning south of the border.
A final thought. On the day that Spiro Agnew called it quits as Vice President of the US, I was scheduled to return from Mexico City on an Eastern Air Lines flight. When I checked in, my interest was in the English language newspaper accounts of Agnew’s resignation. When I was asked a question or two, I replied “Si Senor” to the agent and sat down. That was my undoing. In first class, there were only a total of two or three passengers going to New York City – all Spanish speaking – and because he had heard me reply “Si” to his question, he assumed that I too spoke Spanish. When the call of the Eastern flight was made, it was done only in Spanish. I had my head in the news about Agnew’s problems, so I never heard him. I did not growl at him because he complimented me on my Spanish. Nonetheless, he spoke to me in English to praise my Spanish.
THE REST OF THE AMERICAS
As a general proposition, I’m inclined to rule it as a Not at Home location. Throughout the Caribbean states and then into Venezuela and Brazil and most of the rest of the South American countries, one problem jumps out from the rest. That problem is throw-away children.
Let’s take just Brazil. It is a lovely country. The people are warm and usually friendly. But they produce children who are often left alone without education or guidance. They are usually the product of “Favelas,” the slums surrounding Rio de Janeiro. Near the large hotels on Copacabana or Ipenema Beach, the children demand money. If they fail to get it, mustard or ketchup or ink is sprayed on the tourist. While he is concerned about his clothing, the rest of the pack of vandals try to lift his wallet. From the front door of the hotel to a taxi stand, the traveler must run a gauntlet.4 So most of us simply stayed in the hotels.
When I first flew between Natal and Belem to Ascension Island in 1944 and 1945, the problem was kids trying to peddle things – Ungentine, nylons and the like. And of course, prostitution was rampant. In the intervening years, time has not made the problem any better. On the contrary, the problems of throw-away kids is growing worse.
If I had a conditional choice of being At Home, I might award it to Argentina and Chile. They seem to do better in Buenos Aires and Santiago. There is a certain elegance in those two towns. Well, at any rate, we found something to applaud in our examination of Latin America. But not in the throw-away kids.
FOUR NORDIC COUNTRIES
They are Norge (Norway), Danmark (Denmark), Sverige (Sweden) and Suomi (Finland). Enough of the negative stuff from South America. These are all AT HOME countries – with an exclamation point at the end. From Jean Sibelius’ “Finlandia” in the east to the Grieg’s Peer Gynt Suite in the west, there is music in the air. Think about as many as four soloists and orchestras simultaneously performing in Tivoli Garden.
I spent two Fourth of July celebrations in Copenhagen listening to that music. In the summer, the Castle of the Swedish King is set aside for concerts.
And then there is the heroism in the Second World War. Finland took on its powerful neighbor, Russia. She lost that war after a fierce and prolonged struggle.5 The Norwegians stood up to German troops, often paying the price of execution on Parliament Hill. And the Danes, one way or another, concealed their Jewish neighbors from the concentration camps.
And remember old Paavo Nuurmi, the Finnish long distance runner from the 1932 Olympic Games. He won everything in sight. And don’t forget that at the end of World War II, Finland was the only country to repay its loan to the United States. They did that on top of heavy reparations to the Soviet Union.
In all these Nordic countries, they speak English with American accents. As my old friend Sven Lernevall says, he is always glad to see us and I believe him. And I’m glad to see our Nordic cousins who have an At Home sign in the window.
IRELAND
So much has been said about Ireland, that there is not much more to be added. Obviously, almost every Irishman would seem to find an At Home in the Emerald Isle. I’m not unlike those other Irishmen with one exception. That is the pervasive influence of Roman Catholic teaching in Irish schooling, politics and laws. Sooner rather than later, that influence will diminish as young people tend to grow to accept the culture of other European and American norms. And until that time, I lean toward a conditional At Home vote for the Republic of Ireland.
ENGLAND
Like so many people, I have enjoyed the civility of the English people. Their food may not come close to Paris but taking one thing with another, they are a decent lot. And who can forget that they stood in the way of the Nazi juggernaut long after the French threw in the towel. There is a sign in Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris that says that more than two million English men lost their lives in France during the First World War alone. In the Second World War, perhaps another million men of English citizenship died. As Jumbo Wilson, an English General said about American troops, “Brave Men.” We return that salute.
Now after all that, we are going to give England a conditional AT HOME vote. It has to do with the Saxe-Coburg family, now known as the Windsor family. I have no trouble with Winston Churchill, obviously. I like Tony Blair. But I have trouble swallowing the principal of a royal family – and this one has fewer recommendations than most. Let Margaret marry Captain Peter Townsend. Let Charles plight his troth with Camille Parker-Bowles. Let Elizabeth out to pasture. And as an American-Irishman, I’d say this charade has run long enough.6 Enough already.
FRANCE
During my life time, the French have repeatedly gone their own way insisting that they are guided by “The Grandeur of France.” As a former Army Sergeant, my reply is “Horsefeathers” or something quite worse. Those people lost World War I and II because they did not take the steps to rearm. They followed it with the loss of Algeria. And after all that, Charles De Gaulle came to Quebec to proclaim that Province should be called “Quebec Libre,” free of Canada. I need some time to digest all this “Grandeur” and I’m not doing too well at it.
There is much to recommend in France, particularly their food, wine and cheese. But to live there for more than a few days, I have to call it one of my lower At Home ratings.
SPAIN AND PORTUGAL
Spain is by far the richer country. And poor old Portugal is down there doubting itself. If I lived in Spain, it would most likely be in Barcelona. In Portugal, it might be in the Algarve.
When Franco was alive, there was little crime in Spain. Now there seems to be quite a bit of it directed at tourists. In Portugal, people returning from Angola had become a problem as they had no jobs and some turned to crime.
With all the problems, these are two civilized places to live so I’d say my vote would go to an At Home rating.
THE FORMER IRON CURTAIN COUNTRIES
After Vaclav Havel came to power, the Czechs have made their orientation to the West quite clear. Their food may be tough to take with its emphasis on beef, pork and wild game. But that’s all right. I still probably say, give them an At Home rating.
For the rest of those old Iron Curtain countries such as Bulgaria, Rumania and Slovakia, I’m not inclined to say that I have much in common with them. And so I’d probably vote NOT AT HOME for them as well as for all the Russian republics. Nyet, nyet.
HUNGARY AND POLAND
I’ve already stated my thoughts on these two countries in an earlier piece. It was most favorable. When the Russians cracked down harder, it was the Poles and the Hungarians who fought back. Remember the 1956 uprising in Hungary? Remember the remark that we are like radishes. We may be red on the outside, but white all the rest of the way.
They would have my vote as an At Home place.
HOLLAND AND BELGIUM
In Holland, most Americans are genuinely accepted. I can’t think of a place that welcomes us more than Holland. So we’ll say simply, give that place an At Home sign.
In Belgium, there is more of a stand off problem. Brussels is home to many foreign business men and diplomats. There is much less of a welcoming atmosphere in Belgium and then there is the difference in language between the Flemish from the North and the French from the South. They don’t trust each other. Making friends here is tougher than in Holland. But all things considered, I say let’s give them a conditional At Home rating.
When mussels are in season, which it is most all year, the average man seems to consume about three to four dozen of those mollusks. I can handle a dozen or even a few more, but then I want nothing else to eat. I can’t explain why the Belgians are mussel eaters – so I won’t even try.
And one last thought. At Malmedy a group of 110 U.S. soldiers had surrendered during the Battle of the Bulge. German SS troops killed every one of those unarmed men. There is a tank at Bastogne near Malmedy which memorializes the Battle of the Bulge. You may recall that when General McAuliffe was told that his troops were surrounded by German forces at Bastogne, his answer in the American newspapers was quoted as “Nuts.” Don’t let them kid you. He gave them a better answer than that. If you are ever in Bastogne, it would be nice to visit the memorial to the Battle of the Bulge.
GERMANY AND BERLIN
The war is over. Fifty or more years is a long time to ponder what happened between 1941 and 1945. I’ve saved these thoughts until toward the end because I’m not sure how I’ll respond even at this late date in 1998.
If there was a favorable turning point for me, it occurred in the late 1970’s. My friend, Howard Davis the N. W. Ayer advertising executive who accompanied me, insisted on a beer and a sausage in a place near the center of Munich. The sausage was “Weiss Wurst,” a veal sausage. So I sat there munching on a sausage with a beer that I don’t usually drink. Howard must have paid for it, because I felt some obligation to act as though I enjoyed the repast.
In the midst of the food, a German man came to our table. It was not reserved for us at all. Quite to the contrary, it was out in the open where as many as six to eight customers might find seats at the table. Before long he asked me politely in passable English, if I was of a “certain age” who served in World War II. He made it clear that he understood that he was addressing a former American soldier. I believe that he stated that he was taken prisoner by the British and wound up in Scotland where he learned the English language. As Howard and I talked to him, he had no bone to pick with us at all. For him, as it happened to most Europeans of that age, events simply controlled him. He was a small cog who did what he was told. If he had been told to kill us back then, he would have done it. Such is the way of wars. In the final analysis, I learned from this old German soldier that he did what he had to do and we did what we had to do. Sometimes it was ugly.
Europeans don’t carry hard feelings as much as we do, I believe. When their wars are over, they go back to trading with one another after an appropriate period of reflection. After a generation or two, some of their children intermarry. They’ve been at it many more years than we have so who’s to say that they have it wrong. Well in any case, the former German soldier and the two old American soldiers shook hands and parted as friends.
Yes, I think I’ll award them an At Home rating. But I’m still not buying a Mercedes automobile or a carton of Beck’s beer.
Now two thoughts intrude, both from a Sunday in Berlin. It may be recalled that when it came to adding surcharges to a telephone bill, the Germans were champs.7 Sometimes they loaded 300% on top of the cost of a call. AT&T had developed a plan asking that all hoteliers limit their surcharges in which case we would advertise to American travelers that such hotels would treat customers fairly.
In the meeting on the fateful Sunday morning there were hoteliers from many Western German hotels. This was their only day off. We were pretty sure that we weren’t making much progress when during the later stages of the meeting, one hotelier actually accused us – the Allied Forces – of starting the surcharge practice after the war. It was as if Eisenhower didn’t have enough to do after the war and so he forced German hotel keepers to pump up their surcharges by some 300%.8 In the end, German hoteliers wanted the telephone surcharge as a profit center and they weren’t going to give it up. For myself, I had nothing to do as a member of the Allied Forces with imposing the surcharge problem on the helpless German hotel keepers. They invented that fraud all by themselves.
That afternoon we rented a car and drove over to East Berlin, that is, behind the Berlin Wall. That was not our best idea for the day. Jim Hurley drove the car and Sully Clark sat in front with him. I wedged myself across the rear seat. This was a very small car.
When we entered East Germany, the authorities took our passports away, which was a very bad move. They issued us a currency declaration and made it clear that unless we returned that declaration at the end of our allotted four hours, there would be no return of the passports. We would be stateless persons in a Communist controlled country. And so Jim Hurley thought he put the currency declaration in a pocket on his shirt. Only he did not, as it turns out.
Shortly before the end of the trip in East Berlin, Jim came to a stop outside the Passport Control Office. The East German guards looked into and raised the hood of this tiny car to see if a man was hiding under the hood attempting to escape the good life in East Berlin. There was no man under the hood. Next came a look at the trunk. No man in the trunk. Finally, a long mirror on a pole which was shoved under the car. Again, the Germans had in mind that this small car, smaller than a Beetle, could carry an escapee under the frame. No one was found.
While all this was going on, Jim Hurley did NOT have the Currency Declaration in the pocket of his shirt. Or in any other pocket. When Jim went through his shirt and trousers, he could rightly be called the Fastest Man in East Berlin. But there was no one laughing. After all, the cops were going through the hood and trunk and under the car and even they could see that something was amiss in the car. The end of the story came when Jim said he had actually put the Currency Declaration with his wallet right out there by the speedometer where he would find it right away. Well, we got our passports back from a sullen clerk who said as we finished our transaction, “Raus.” I think that means have a good day.
VIENNA
This is a good place for about everything. The music is good and the food is first class. By all means mark this one down as an AT HOME arrangement.
While we were meeting with the Austrian Administration, the talk veered away into an interesting episode for me. As I had experienced in Berlin where the former German soldier asked me about my service in the American Army, two Austrians asked me the same question. It turned out that both had been drafted by the German Army and were taken as Prisoners of War by Americans. They spent some two years ironing sheets and pajamas at the Memphis General Hospital in Tennessee. And they said they ate the same as the rest of the hospital staff. They came out on top.
We enjoyed Vienna staying at the Bristol Hotel where Richard Karger entertained with his piano. The Dri Husaren served some of the best food around. Finally as we were leaving, our host, whose name I have forgotten, asked us where our next stop would be. This was in a taxi. When we said Zurich, he pointed to the enormous Central Cemetery in Vienna nearby and said, “Zurich is twice as big —- and half as gay.” He had something there.
SWITZERLAND
Every thing in Switzerland works. The national airline is a jewel. The trains run on time. The raclette is great on new potatoes and Roosti is a delicious dinner for me. The Swiss are not long on schmoozing with people but nonetheless I say they are an At Home place.
GREECE AND ITALY
These places exude Mediterranean charm. The food and the hospitality are worthwhile. Yes, I’d go first to Italy and maybe a little later to Greece. In both cases, they are At Home locations.
JAPAN AND CHINA
Japan is clearly the favorite for an At Home rating. And China finishes in the lower ranks of the Not At Home classification.
In Japan, it is like Switzerland. Every thing works there. And they play baseball there. In China, I wanted to leave long before the two weeks were out. It is sort of uncontrolled chaos.9
There is not much choice when it comes to Japan and China. It’s Japan all the way.
ALL THE NORTH AFRICAN COUNTRIES
Forget about them. They are a tough sell. The idea is to get into them, avoid trouble and get out. Of all the places in North Africa, Cairo is about the only one to even suggest an At Home rating. The rest, Morocco, Algeria, Tunis and Libya are not to worry about. Don’t go there.
ISRAEL
Israel is in turmoil these days with the religious right holding positions in the Netanyahu government. This is a bad arrangement but most recent Israel governments have given the religious parties a prominent position in national policy. As far as I know, the national airline, El Al, does not fly on the Sabbath. There really is no answer that makes sense. Swiss Air simply loads up for the Sabbath in Israel. I suspect that ban still applies. There is much to be said for a division in church – state relations.
And as for a rating, I’d have to say a conditional At Home rating because there are so many Israelis I like.
INDIA
There are so many people here and many have nothing to do. Take a cab to the airport. Before the cab comes to rest, dozens of men are fighting for the small tip that goes with carrying the suitcase into the terminal. If there is a Malthusian dynamic at work, it will have to happen to India first. Such great swarms of people. I’m not really comfortable in Bombay or New Delhi and so I’d say it is a Not At Home sort of place.
As a soldier I made one trip through India to Assam. At Agra I picked up a book that had advertisements in the back. One that caught my eye said it cured earaches and enlarged the bust. And I didn’t have an ear ache.
SOUTH AFRICA
The climate is wonderful, but there is not much more than that. Before Mandela was released, my experience with apartheid was appalling. A man in a hotel rest room told the black attendant to tie his shoe. And he did it. The man acted as though this happened every day. It probably did. The cruelties aimed at defenseless black people were unconscionable and they had the backing of the government in Pretoria. Remember the effort to drive black people to what were called their “homelands.” One was called Bophuthatswana. The capitol was called “Sun City” and had a casino and a Las Vagas type of show where the South Africans could let their hair down. Well I’m not inclined to give Sun City or Johannesburg or much else a rating of At Home. Maybe it is better now, but I’m not going to go back soon. Rate South Africa Not At Home.
ATAR, TINDOUF, EL GENINA, EL FASHER AND ASCENSION ISLAND
These were all part of my military adventures. There is no reason ever to consider laying your head down in these places unless it is a case of duress.
Ascension Island is a very important piece of real estate in the South Atlantic. It is the midway point between South America and Africa. In the military it was said that if you missed Ascension, your wife could collect her pension. It was a mighty small place with only one runway cut through rocks on either side. If you found Ascension and hit those rocks, you still came out a loser. Luckily, Ascension had very few cloudy days so it was possible to get out of there almost every day. Ascension Island should not be high on your to-do lists.
At El Fasher and El Genina in the Sudan, I was amazed to see as we taxied up to the terminal, that Army mechanics wore white coveralls. Nobody wore white coveralls in the U. S. Army. Well they were white but they used to be green. The sun on a line outside had made them white. That tells you a little bit about Fasher and Genina. Don’t rest your head here if it can be avoided.
We’ll close now with a word or two about Atar and Tindouf. These are about the loneliest places in the world. They may be worse than El Fasher and El Genina.
Tindouf is in a corner of Western Algeria near Morocco where the boundary is marked “Undetermined.” Atar is in Mauritania and there are no nearby towns. The Air Force maintained fields and radio gear at these two locations. The wind blew at a brisk pace all the time and carried grit with it from the desert. Lots of grit. It was in the mess hall and in the barracks and in machine gun barrels. If a man who chewed tobacco wanted to expectorate, he had a choice. If he spit with the wind, he could expect to cover 20 to 30 feet. If he made a mistake by spitting into the wind, his tobacco would be all over his face. I didn’t chew tobacco but I learned to work with the wind. And one night in each place, told me that is was time to go. And not to go back.
SUMMARY
In the beginning of this piece, I said that this was a pastiche. Maybe it is a potpourri. It is an attempt to define where I might tend to feel At Home and it is an attempt to state where I would feel something less than an At Home sort of arrangement. As I said earlier, don’t try to read any sort of logic into all this. There are some prejudices and some irrationality at work here. I suppose that is the way it has always been.
Also don’t read my overlooking some countries in this grand survey. Australia and New Zealand have been covered in earlier essays. Singapore, the Philippines, Korea, Yugoslavia, Saudi Arabia and a few others I have failed to deal with. I think you’ll understand that this essay has gone on long enough. Maybe next time I’ll gather the strays and try a piece on them. We’ll see.
And so this is the pastiche. If it does nothing else it makes me feel good that I got it off my chest. Right or wrong, prejudices or no prejudices, rational or irrational – that’s the way it is.
This pastiche has become too serious. Therefore, I will close with a paean of praise for the old capital of Pakistan – Karachi. The British soldier who recited this little quatrain to me pronounced the capital KE-RA’-CHI. It warns:
When you go to Ke-ra’-chi
keep your money in your shoes,
Because the Ke-ra’-chi women
sing the Ke-ra’-chi blues.
I don’t know what it all means, but again, it must count for something.
E. Carr
January 9, 1998
~~~
1. Since “break up” used most often to describe the end of a couple’s relationship, the wording here makes me think that the Soviet Union and Russia just hit a rough spot, emotionally. Also, this essay is so long that I need footnotes to keep track of commentary, because without them it’d be rather hard to follow. I actually like the footnote style better than the just “paragraph of response” style, but the former is less amenable to the blind using screen readers, so I tended to stay away from it. In the spirit of the site I’ll probably use it sparingly going forward. But exceptions ought to be made when an essay clears 5,000 words.
2. I have no idea what problem Pop had with the Queen of England on Canadian currency. I’d have loved to hear more on that.
3. Channeling his inner Trump here a bit. But seriously, Mexico had and has huge cartel problems. A friend of mine has done some reporting in and around Juarez — he’s certainly got some stories to tell.
4. Brazilian robbers are incredibly bold and work in huge packs sometimes. I had to study up before I went there twice last year. Crazy country.
5. Pre-WW2 proper, the Winter War between Finland and Russia was remarkable. The statistics are almost unbelievable — for instance, there were 26,000 deaths on the Finnish side, but around 150,000 on the Russian side. Lesson learned: invading Finland, even with a vastly superior force, is a terrible idea. Come to think of it, invading Russia is an equally bad idea. Trying to do so during winter is perhaps the rookiest of rookie mistakes that a military commander can make. Just say no.
6. Ah.
7. I honestly get a huge kick out of the toggling back and forth between war-mode and phone-mode that Pop makes throughout some of these essays. Both sent him around the world, but the way that he reflects on the two different periods predictably couldn’t be more different.
8. Fun fact, this was actually the real reason for the war.
9. I actually love this about China. Sadly I think it’s starting to calm itself down in more ways than one; I’ll take chaos over the state’s more authoritarian leanings any day. Also surprising to hear Pop speak so highly of Japan, given essays like this one.