A friend of Trish's describes Perth as the "Ass End of The World". Most of the locals I've met like it that way. It is strangely detached from the rest of what is going on. The war in Afghanistan, the anthrax scares, and the rest are not mentioned much and seem so far away.
Very few Australians that I have met have ever been to the US. It cost a lot of money for an Aussie to get state side, plus the visas are hard to get, even for an Aussie. Even the employees at IBM have only been there once, for a day or two. They know very little about it except what they get from the television programs they watch. And we all know how realistic those are.
They few that have been there usually had bad experiences. Martin, the owner the house were I am staying was in LA back in 1975 for 1 day when flying through to Europe. He decided to run up from LAX to see the Sunset Strip before catching his next flight. He tried to catch a bus from the airport. The bus driver went postal on him and started screaming at him because he did not have exact change for the bus fare and left him stranded on a corner in West LA. Most of the stories I hear are of a similar nature.
So it appears what seems perfectly normal and rational to us in the States is overwhelming and confusing to others, even those who speak English.
I do get some very odd reactions when they find out that I'm from the States. They seem to think that I'm glad to be out of there with all that is going on. I try to explain that I'm glad to be here because I want to see Australia, not because I'm running away from the US. Jeeze. I feel like a draft dodger in Canada or something. I think the media here is giving the Aussies the impression that everyone in the US is dropping dead from Anthrax of being killed by terrorist. Most mention that they are afraid to travel to the US or Europe right now and are thankful that they are down here where no one cares about them
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