I might as well have the United States flag tattooed on my forehead because 99% of the time people correctly guess right off the bat that I’m American. I always ask how they know this and I’m told it’s because of the way I dress (bedazzled stretch pants?), my accent (strong pronunciation of the letter R) and/or choice of vocabulary (use of the word ‘totally,’ etc). Otherwise, if I’m just asked “where are you from?” in general, I always reply with, “I’m from the US; from California.” There are specific reasons I have chosen this particular wording, based on a series of trial and error:
A) I do not just say “I’m from America” due to the fact that I will open myself up to getting shit from people who will say, “well, there are a lot of Americas – North, Central, South – do you think the United States encompasses all of the Americas?” To which I would like to respond by Stooge-poking them in the eyeballs.
B) I do not just say, “I’m from the US.” This will then elicit a knowing eye-roll and a “no-shit” expression being that this is apparently obvious. They will then follow this up with the comment, “right, but what state?”
C) I do not just say, “I’m from California.” This invites more shit-lashing in that people from the US are apparently so proud that they don’t even need to specify their country of origin before jumping right to their state.
Hence, I avoid all of the above by detailing my birthplace as previously described. However, I have gotten shit for this as well in that I’m being overly descriptive. So if the international community could please come up with a non-offensive way to describe where we “United States of Americaners” are from, I would love to know so that I may comply with your standards.
Actually, scratch that. I'm going to revert back to "I'm from America." You clearly know which America I'm talking about. Deal with it.
Didn't someone in Tanz say female Canadians all wear skirts w/ backpacks?
ReplyDeleteoh yeah. it might've been americans who wear that, actually...whatever, same diff.
ReplyDelete