...contd. When it comes to family...US is all screwed up...

As I was saying, its just different here. People here are very courteous to strangers. When you walk past a total stranger, he might just ask you, 'hey buddy how are you doing?' or he will smile at you for the least. So its very surprising for me when people here are not that nice to their own family members.

Let me now go to the second incident I mentioned earlier. This happened a few days ago. This time again, a girl came to my store and asked to buy beer. She didn't at all looked like she was 21, so I asked her to show her ID. She told me that she didn't had ID on her, but the beer was for her mother. I told her that I couldn't sell her beer unless she showed me her ID and told her to go.

She came in after few minutes with who appeared to be her mother. The mother looked irritated and asked me why I didn't give beer to her daughter. The girl stood by her with the 'I told you so' face. As i was explaining the mother that I couldn't possibly sell beer to the underage, no matter who it was for, a guy stormed into the store.

He was dead drunk and stinking like hell. He began cursing me for not allowing the girl to buy the beer. 'You *&%*,...you never check the *#&*ing high school kids for their ID, but ask her for ID....!' I knew it was useless talking with that guy, but I asked the girl if he was her father. She made a face and said, 'Ew! no! He is just her boyfriend.' So you might be thinking he was shouting at me because he loved the girl, but he was just trying to impress her mother.

Now I thought they would leave and I wouldn't have to smell the stinking guy, but there was a twist coming up. The guy heard the girl's 'Ew!' and was offended. He now turned towards the girl and began cursing her. 'So you don't think I am good enough to be your father, you bitch...if you were my daughter, I would give you poison'. If he was her real father, she would have probably drunk that poison, but thats not my real problem. All the time he was cursing her girl, the mom was just smiling. And when I looked at her, she just shrugged her shoulder like she was saying, 'Look at that! My boyfriend is shouting at my little girl again. What can I do?'

As I said earlier, I do realize that I cannot generalize some people's behavior to all the US families. But to me, these people do provide some insight to the degrading values in the American families.

When it comes to family...US is all screwed up...

America may be about many things, but family value is not one of it. I am not saying Americans do not love their family. But the customs are definitely different here. Once the child becomes 18, parents have no legal right over them. So they can do whatever they wish and the presence of parent barely makes a difference.

As usual, my observations are based on the people I meet at the stores where I work. Father and son come together in the store and buy food separately. A girl breaks up with her fiance, because he stole one cigarette from her purse. I do realize however, that with this very limited exposure with Americans as a family, my observations may be exceptions rather than a rule. But let me share two different incidents which has just added to my belief.

Last Friday, a girl came to the store and asked for cigarettes. I asked for her ID, even though I knew she was 18. She hadn't brought it with her. I told her I couldn't sell cigarette to her if she didnt had ID. So she turned towards her mother, who had just bought a pack of cigarettes from me and asked her to buy a pack for her. Thankfully her mother refused. However her mother didn't refuse because it was ethically (and legally) wrong to buy cigarettes for minor. This is what she said, "No, no. i am not buying any cigarettes for you. You never do anything for me. You never help around the house, you don't work, you don't go to school. You are just a pain in my ass. I am not doing anything for you...".

Now after hearing all that, I thought that girl would leave the store, but she kept pleading. "please mama, I need the smoke.". So now the mother blew the cigarette she was smoking in the girl's face and said, "You need a smoke, here it is." As the smoke blew past her face, I could see the anger rising up in the girl's face.

"You are such a bitch...thats why dad left you...", she cried.

The mother has obviously heard these word before, because she wasn't as upset as i thought she would be. She was angry nevertheless. She began, "Don't you dare...I will burn you with the cigarette you need so much..."

At this point, I could take it no more and other customers were also getting irritated, so I told them to get the hell out of my store.

Now whats wrong with this whole picture? First of all, the girl had guts to ask her mother to but cigarettes for her. Secondly, the mother, instead of upsetting over her daughter's smoking habit, is more concerned that she doesn't help her.

to be continued...

I am out of blue days now. I am trying to enjoy here in any ways I can. With this good spirit i went to the temple yesterday. I just want to share some photos with you all. This temple is the only temple in Oklahoma.

about classes...

I almost fell asleep during my classes today. Even though it was Economics(for which I have developed special interest) class, I had hard time trying to keep myself awake. Well what do you expect? Last night I slept at 4:00am then woke up at 7:30am to go to work. I came back from work at 4:30 and went to class at 6:00pm. I was exhausted, starving and sleepy... and the professor was talking about price of money.

Anyways...it will be the same story tomorrow. And I even have an exam tomorrow...Welcome to the American life...

BTW can anyone tell me what is the price of money :) ?

Happy New year 2064

I think I am finally out of at least 3 weeks long 'great depression' period.

I didn't realize that today was new year's eve according to Nepali calender until my friends from Nepal told me. We haven't make any plans here. But lets see what happens tomorrow.

Happy New Year 2064 to everyone. May this new year bring you samyak happiness.