Considering that my first encounter with an American school bus included making a dent in it just by leaning on it (the driver fixed it by leaning on the dent from the other side), I just can’t get the words “safe” and “American school bus” to stick together.
Spanish school buses are regular buses, with regular safety features (which at the moment include things like a belt in each seat), thicker walls than a regular car and a sign on the back that says “school transportation”. There’s no rule about “you can’t pass a school bus that’s stopped”, because there’s a more general rule about when and how you can pass any stopped vehicle. And kids are taught not to cross the street while the bus is there. The teacher that goes with the bus makes sure that each kid that must be “hand delivered” is; kids below a certain age have to be “hand delivered”. The buses stop in specific spots (US buses seem to stop every three steps). A bus that picks kids from 8 villages to bring them to school in a 9th will have a single stop in each village.
Combine the two - the following of high school football which astorian describes is very similar to that for a team from a town such as Crewe, Doncaster or Dundee. And such teams tend to hover around the same leagues, with occassional promotions or relegations. It’s not like a semi-pro outfit is suddenly going to find themselves in the Premiership.
I actually found those examples by just googling Germany or Florida, and it came up with an okcupid.com test. Go take the test for yourself, there were even some wilder ones (boy gets penis bit off by snapping turtle?).
One other point about high school football in Texas…
While people in many parts of Texas remain fanatical about high school football, many of the most outrageous practices seen in “Friday Night Lights” no longer occur. That’s not because fans have gotten saner, but because the Texas oil economy isn’t what it once was.
Odessa used to be the center of the Texas oil business, and so it used to have loads of very, very rich oil executives who thought nothing of shelling out money to support the football team. Buzz Bissinger wrote the book about the Odessa Permian teams of the 1980s, when the Texas oil business was starting to decline. And it was precisely BECAUSE the economy in Odessa was starting to decline that outrageous spending on the football program started to seem ridiculous.
Of course, some people just didn’t get the message that things were changing. Bissinger wrote about one dedicated teacher at Permian who tried to make the cheerleaders understand that, in just a few short years, they’d be adults who had to support themselves and would need to be well educated. Many of those girls just couldn’t grasp that consept- they figured they’d just marry some rich oil man after school.
The Odessa kids are growing up in now HAS to be very different from the Odessa Bissinger described, because wasteful spending that was feasible then just isn’t now.
Sevastopol, I think that’s because so many US placenames are sufficiently common that it is customary to refer to the State as well as the town to avoid confusion.
I believe two things about the US confection mallomars: 1. That they are like Wagon Wheels - that is sweet biscuits with jam and marshmallow in the middle, covered with chocolate; 2. They are seasonal. Clearly both these things can’t be right.
The University sport thing I don’t get either. Large numbers of intelligent young adults are interested in “college spirit”? Former students care? University educated people need or tolerate being told when to cheer? Women are a cock-teasing side-show to the sporting contest and this is seen by university educated people as OK and the women who do it regard it as a respectable thing to do? The first few times I saw it depicted in popular entertainment I thought it must be some crude attempt at portraying medium sized US colleges as quasi-fascist conformity mills. Now I just don’t get it. It’s as foreign to me as dipping your underdungers in the Ganges.
Another one: calling former Presidents “President X”. Didn’t they just do a job? Isn’t your system against honorifics? Why are they ennobled rather than reverting to being just an ordinary citizen upon leaving office?
I know of the mallomar. Sir, I am a fan of the marshmallow. I have yet to see…let alone taste…a mallomar. They sound like I’d adore them. I hear they’re seasonal (this is the season) yet I don’t see them. I’ve also heard that there’s been a semi-recent breakthrough in mallomar engineering to enable the company that makes the mallomar to have them year 'round.
College spirit? I dun get it. I have preferences, and I might go see a college football game once every 5 years or so, but that’s about it.
I agree with your assessment of former presidents. However, especially in the cases of former presidents Carter and Clinton, the figureheads still wield much power, sometimes moreso in their political aftermath. How about we call them “Citizen” afterwards, just to make a point of not calling them “president”?
Jam?! Sir, a Mallomar is nothing but a sweetish biscuit, marshmallow, and a perfect dark chocolate coating with a texture that the Irish imitations I’ve tried look like wimps. It is Nature’s perfect food.
It’s still mostly seasonal and even regional–I’m going to include a box with my brother’s Xmas present to Southern California, because he just can’t get them. They also travel in the luggage of any family member or friend going out to see him if it’s cold weather back East.
It’s also American political etiquette to call an ex-politician in certain situations by the highest title he or she achieved, and in a way it’s paying tribute to the importance of the office rather than them. So Mike Dukakis, if you’re not calling him “Professor”, is still Gov. Dukakis at first reference, then “Mr. Dukakis” for the rest of the article.
And of course, the college spirit thing is more than just about sports. My folks are both active in their respective alummi associations, which raise money not for football but for new buildings, equipment, and especially scholarships for poorer students. Maybe it’s because in most U.S. colleges people tend to gather from many different parts of the country or state, cut off from their old ties, and live in dorms instead of commuting?
> A Twinkie is a mass-produced junk-food snack. It consists of a tube of yellow
> cake filled with white frosting and preservatives. I think Twinkies were the first
> junk food, and there was a famous murder case where the defense argued that
> the murder’s mental capabilities were impared by his consumption of junk food;
> this was nicknamed “the Twinkie defense” and was (and is) the subject of much
> mockery.
The Twinkie Defense is usually misunderstood. The defense lawyer was not arguing that the impairment of mental facilities was caused by the Twinkies. He was arguing that eating Twinkies was just one more symptom of his diminished mental capacity. This is explained more fully in this article:
I can attest to the virtual deification of football in places outside of Texas. In my high school in rural northwest Ohio, being so good a football player that you were chosen first-team all-state, won a football scholarship to some college, and went on to play in the NFL would have been the ultimate dream. No one ever did such a thing over the entire history of my high school, of course. A fair number did get college athletic scholarships. Those were mostly at smaller local colleges. I doubt if anyone was ever good enough to get an athletic scholarship at Ohio State, for instance.
On the other hand, if you were academically good, well, who cares? You had better not let anyone know how smart you were. Academically, the best they could ever imagine that anyone could ever do was to go to a second-rate local college or state university and come back and teach high school. When I announced that I wanted to get into some first-rate college to study math and perhaps eventually get a Ph.D., their reaction was that I was a snob and a traitor. Wanting to succeed in some way other than what they imagined was wrong as far as they were concerned.
The Town of Kansas, Missouri, was named before there was a State of Kansas, even before there was a Kansas Territory (maybe). When it became large, Kansas Town was renamed Kansas City. Kansas Territory was named after the same tribe that Kansas Town was named after. Part of it later became the State of Kansas.
Yes, if there will be a sports-related event that day (a game or a, ugh, “pep rally”). Pep rallies are Nuremberg-style rallies at which the student body is forced to pay ecstatic homage to the school’s team.
Often, yes. It can vary by school. At some schools, the altar of worship is the basketball team.
Professional sports has always been a business first in the United States. It started with private athletic clubs, not with civic unions. If the market is large enough, then more than one business can thrive in an area (does your town have more than one tailor, launderer, snack bar?).
The club hopes that fans (supporters) will come from the populace of its new location.
The important difference between American professional sports and, for example, English professional sports, is that for each sport, the top level, the “major league” gets virtually all the attention. If you like baseball, you follow the nearest major league club. If you are a baseball fan, then you want a major-league baseball club in your area; it doesn’t matter if there are half-dozen minor league clubs nearby – nobody cares about them. So if somone is willing to move a major-league club into your city, then you’ll take it.
In fact, most minor-league teams are controlled by the major leagues, and they can pluck out their best players at any point during the season. So there’s no point in being a follower of a minor league club, because at any point in the season (even during the championships), your best players can just disappear.
Teams are businesses, players are employees under contract. They must report to work where their supervisors tell them to. They’re paid enough to keep off-season residences wherever they wish, even in nearby Latin American countries or in Japan, as is often the case these days.
I think the OP is from Malaysia, not England.
In a colloquial sense, “college” means exactly the same thing as “university.” When speaking generically, people refer to “college” – “I’m in college”, “I went to college in New York” – not to “university.”
In an official sense, there is no set definition of either “university” or “college,” except that they both mean tertiary or higher (post-high school) education. Boston College and Boston University both offer graduate (bachelor’s) and post-graduate (master’s and doctorate) degrees. Their use of the terms “college” and “university” are merely accidents of history.
Many small, bachelor’s-degree-only, institutions are changing their names from X college to X university.
A “college” or “school” can also be an operating unit within a university, usually by subject, such as “College of Liberal Arts,” “School of Medicine,” etc. Note that these are not distinct institutions such as the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge; they are merely administrative divisions of the university.
[qutoe]Here, school buses are just regular buses hired by the school from the local bus company. They’re not yellow or anything. What’s with that classic design?
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Schools are legally liable for anything that happens to students while under their charge. Local and state laws often set certain standards for school bus service – the drivers must have specific training, the buses must be configured in a particular way (painted yellow, special “stop” signs and gates). This is considered a matter of safety. The yellow bus indicates to other vehicles on the road that special traffic laws apply (no overtaking a stopped bus, for example).
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Yes. A school system (comprising education for those aged 5 to 18) usually has its own fleet of buses.
Who else is going to supply them? A private bus company would not find it profitable to have such a large portion of its fleet tied up in serving a school. Note that bus transportation is provided free of charge to students.
No. Part-time employees with special certification.
Railroads
Why do long distance stations never seem to have platforms? People always seem to have to climb down to track level. You’re the richest nation on the planet, so why not a slab of concrete or something?
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Long-distance rail service in the United States is primarily for freight. Passenger service is an afterthought – it’s unprofitable, very expensive for travelers, not widely available, and rarely used.
No rude connotations so far as I know. “Twinkie” is sometimes used as a mild derogatory term for homosexuals, but that meaning doesn’t really affect the snack cake.
Or, these days, “My opponent is not Christian enough.”
That’s right. The cultural bias here is that a city name will be modified with another specifying location, whether a state or a foreign country. There are dozens of places in the United States called “London,” “Paris,” “Vienna,” etc. When speaking, you have to specify.
I don’t get it either. Perhaps it grew out of the sporting tradition of Eton and Oxbridge. Before professional sports became widely popular, I think most sports fans played on their own or followed high school teams. The small number of people associted with colleges were fans of their college sides. The popularity of college and high school athletics has parallelled the popularity of professional sports. In fact, college athletics now has a wider fan-base among the populace than would be reflected by the actual proportion of people who have some kind of affiliation with the college. College sports is now a big business, in the same way professional sports are.
Again, here is where I would agree with you. In a democratic, egalitarian society, our political leaders are our employees and should be given no more deference than anyone else. “Mr.” is more than good enough for anyone, including an ex-president.
However, there is a strong strain in American culture that seems to look for a substitute to the nobility and royalty of Europe. So, there you have it. Completely irrational, but undeniable.
One bit about colleges vs. universities. Two-year colleges are ofen called ‘community colleges’. They offer college prep courses and cousework that will allow students to go on to a full college and get a regular degree, generally for poorer students who need help, or for economically poorer students who are mediocre students and can save money by spending two of their college years living at home.
Interestingly, tech school degrees in things like electronics and engineering can be much more lucrative in terms of future salary than four-year degrees in relatively useless fields like philosophy or english (unless you are planning to teach).
Oh, yes. Here’s a note to everyone who wants to make it big in America. You want to make money, be your own boss? Go into skilled trades – plumbers, electricians, auto mechanics – they’re the ones who rule our lives on a day-to-day basis.
Why is ratting on someone such a no-no? I see this on movies, TV shows, books etc. My American friends confirm this as well. I don’t see why someone who did something wrong should not be reported at once.
I think you’ll find this more in school rather than the real world. For students, it’s more of an “us against them” (them being teachers) mentality, and there’s a sense you’re trying to brown nose the teacher.
However, once you get into the workforce, there isn’t much of a stigma attached. I had a co-worker go to our manager when it was discovered a fellow waiter was changing credit card receipts to give himself a bigger tip. The consensus was she’d done the right thing.
Now, when you get into the Mafia, then you go back to the “us against them” (them being the police, FBI, etc) situation.
This still puzzles me and I’ve been here 20 years.
The whole ‘You’re Welcome’ thing after performing a polite act like opening a door.
Me: Here let me get the door for you nice old lady
Nice Old Lady: Thank-you young man
Me: You’re Welcome.
I never say ‘you’re welcome’ and my 9 year old daughter chastises me every time. Maybe I wuz brung up wrong but it seems so redundant. After all, I opened the door for you you old bag :).
Do Brits do that? Can’t remember.
Also, as someone who now sees both sides, eating and drinking in cars is alien to Brits. I remember when I first came here and was picked up at the airport, I was amused to no end by the Big Gulp sitting between the front seats of the old Minivan.
Fire Hydrants - I took photos of many.
The numbering of TV Channels (non cable). In the UK, you tune your TV until you get the channel and then save it as a preset. Here, Channel 2 is always on channel 2 no matter what TV you buy.
Local calls are free. Using the phone in my house growing up (1970s) required permission. If my Mum was shopping and required my father to pick her up in the car, she would call and let it ring three times, hang up and repeat. Then my Dad would trudge out to the garage. I’m sure that has changed now.
Really tough to find a kettle when I first came here. No so much now.
Lay-a-way - I had to ask what that was.
Packaged goods - could never figure out why I would want to buy a bag of spuds at the local bar.
Probably have many more but alas, I must pretend to work.
I checked your location when I read this one. I’ve only ever seen that phrase used in Baltimore, and it took me a little while to figure out what it meant, too.