Folks Southern Style

I've had two particularly interesting encounters in the past week with people I, as a French, would characterize as authentic Southern folks...
I drove to Home Depot on Saturday to buy giant plastic containers for my clothes. Shirts, jeans, socks, and other pieces of underwear have been lying around my room for weeks, and something needed to be done about that. There's no way I could have brought anyone home with such a gargantuan mess. To my defence, I live on campus, and university's have always been particularly greedy when allocating furniture for housing. This translates into scarce resources to hide the mess.
To cut the long story short, I've walked into the store, picked up half a dozen ugly grey boxes, paid my due, and within minutes was back on the parking lot. Now given the size of the tiny trunk of my Mustang, one could certainly think I haven't thought the purchase through. And you'd be damn right. Like a fool, I'd look at my Stang and wonder how in hell I would get those pieces of sh** back to campus.
I'd just stand there like a retarded dude, startled by my colossal dumbness, alternatively looking at my trunk and at the containers. Now one could see from a distance that there was no way any one container would fit into the trunk, let alone six. But as we all know, human stupidity is infinite. So I picked up the containers, and tried hard to stuff them right in there. I squeezed and cursed, but the trunk wouldn't get any bigger.
After some time, an eldery lady came along. You know, the kind of woman you'd see in TV ads for cookies. She must have been in her sixties, with white hair, and a massive stature. She looked at me for a second, smiled brightly, and with a good-natured voice said: "Sweet Heart, I see you run into some trouble here. Let me give you a hand." And there she went, throwing her handbag to the ground, grabbing the (really heavy) containers, and trying to shove them into the car. She wouldn't manage it any better than I did, but mind you she'd give up. She eventually had a look at my messy trunk, and with an even brighter smile she'd say something like: "Now there's really a lot of liquor in there." I would blush like a teenager. Eventually, she'd wink and tell me it's alright, "it's college time, darlin', have fun."
She grabbed the boxes once more, walked over to the passenger door, pulled it open, and after some squeezing, managed to get them on the rear seats. I'd turn pale, afraid she'd tear open my beautiful leather seats. With some satisfaction, she gave me a "there you are sweet heart", grabbed her bag, and walked away. Her husband had been patiently waiting in their truck, watching the whole scene with not much of amusement. Minutes after she took off, I'd still stand there, amazed and thankful for her helping hand, wondering how many months I would have waited on that same parking lot somewhere in France before anyone would have asked me if I might need some help.

A few days earlier, I've been for an interview at a local mentoring program for kids. There was that really nice lady asking me tons of questions about my past and my motivations. And, at some point in time, she raised the question of religion. 'Yey, there it comes,' I thought. "I've got none, ma'am." Mind you that was the wrong answer. She gave me that look - that gran'ma-cookie look - sincerly concerned. But she didn't voice any concern.
I was intrigued, though, and asked her if something was wrong. "No, there's nothing wrong honey, it's okay." I wouldn't let loose, though.
"I am fearing for your soul, she finally said. You are a good kid, but no matter how much good you do, if you don't accept Christ in your heart, you will not go to heaven." And off she went for a twenty minute discourse about heaven and hell, about her church and all the lovely people there. She did very well believe all she was saying, and she was genuinely concerned for my soul. I admired that woman for all the length and trouble she went through just to "save" a stranger's soul - my imminent dimise.

And there's a pretty little thing, waiting for the King

And I got one step closer in understanding one of the most intricate aspects of American culture: Dating.
There's a thing about American dating. We (the remaining part of the Northern hemnisphere, excluding Delaware, this is yours too) see it as an abstruse monstruosity of human egocentrism. It's kind of a myth we can't really believe in, but started to consider real since having first seen American Pie. Dating "à la American" is like a funny game you played with your cousins back when you were eight, the highlight of which was showing off your butt. But having grown older, wiser, and more potent, we just don't understand its workings any longer. Our American friends, though, seem to still practice it widely and with not much consideration for its collateral damages.
Let me be straightforward on what we believe to be the biggest gaming scandal in human history:
First and foremost, dating "Made in the US" is NOT exclusive. It's a no risk-diversification strategy. If you ask a dozen girls out, the chances you bring one home are proportionally higher. In business, we call such a bet "diversification": if one goes sour, you still have plenty of other opportunities waiting. That man accept this rule is no surprise (I am myself all excited about making use of it), but that women go for such a sex-bonanza is an oddity. I mean, you give us a blank check to make out and break away. Why should we stick around if we can get a cookie at every door we knock at?
Second, there is no commitment whatsoever. To use a friend's language, "you're just testing waters". The "no commitment rule" results in many dating pretty much anyone that meets a certin standard (another acquaintance admitted she's dating well below her ...). But not only that, if we don't have to commit to get where we want to go (and you very well know what I mean, you dirty little self), than why should we wait? And why should we stick around once we got it? And why put effort into it? I mean, who climbs the stairs if there's an elevator, huh? Girls, by requesting no commitment from the onset, you get none once you delivered!
From a French perspective, this form of dating is like a loophole in the men-women code of conduct. It's like a free lunch, better, like an all-time-free-lunch. Let me explain, once more. Forestalling risks lowers what I would call the "dare factor". "Dare you ask her out". "Do you have the guts". It takes much more courage to approach a woman when there is some form of commitment in it. Because you have to build an argument, a case, to defend your qualities as opposed to the ones of other mates. We call it seduction. You have to court her, sometimes over a longer period of time, before you ask her out. You minimize the risk of a "no" by taking more time and more care in preparing your "demand". It requires patience, ingenuity, patience, commitment to the task, patience, and a good portion of luck. But it is so much more rewarding when you finally got your "yes". And it is an indication of mutual interest, serious mutual interest. When you go on a date in France, exclusivity is a given for the entire length of the dating period. It is implied, mutually understood, a rule not to break. You therefore take more time to get to know the person of your covetousness.
Whatever system you prefer, it doesn't really matter. Because once you're in a country, you have to go by its rules, explicit or simply implied.
I have been asking tons of questions to figure out the rules of the game. And I'll further investigate the topic, and, of course, keep my fellow citizens updated on any progress I make. In the mean time, I might as well experiment with the system in real life. For the good of clarification, of course (I am such an altruist).

Curse, common', curse, you can do it!

I love this place, for its people are certainly among the nicest folks I have met so far. But too nice can get too much, too. Decoding the social behavior of people that are nice all the time, no matter what, can be quite a complex task - especially as a foreigner (a smart-panty-ass would call it a conundrum - a word I learned thanx to the funky GRE).
With the NC folk, you are clueless as to where you stand. "Buttface - Thank you Sir", ""Ratass - It is my pleasure". Whatever one says or does, they'll smile and kiss your butt. Sure thing, it's quite cool to be around seemingly happy folks - but they abuse my goddamn patience! For I'm a French, f*ck, and I like it that way, "merde alors". I curse, it's part of my cultural heritage, and I like to tell people "in your face" how I feel about them. Don't waste his Hollyness' precious time (the Hollyness in this context is your devoted author).
Now, I certainly do believe that natives have an inner compass, a sort of affinity to understand the nuances in the way people are being pleasant, but as a French, I do lack the most rudimentary skills in this art. For in my country, people who dislike you will make you feel so. The same accounts if you're appreciated; you won't have an ounce of doubt about that (take your hands off my girl friend's ass - this goes too far).
I guess it will take some time to develop this art, but I do hope it comes rather sooner than later. I mean, is this hot thing smiling at me because I'm so charmingly French - or would she even smile with mine having half an ounce of salad between my teeth?

No Car, No Life - Or a fool's journey to the pharmacy

The duck s*cks. We are in America man, and you're a fullblown man only once you own a car. Forgetting this very principle translates into immediate physical pain. And I felt it - right into my face. But to my defence, the distance looked tiny on GoogleMaps, just a few blocks.
Well, a few blocks it might have been, but those few blocks, my friend, taken off the map and down to the street, was clearly a distance equal to the one from the campus to the moon. No kidding. No joking. No nothing. 'Cause I certainly wasn't kidding when I realized how little progress I had made when I walked towards my destination (the Cargods are laughing right now - harhar, there's a human being stupid enough to walk in America).
But let me just go a few steps back. The reason for my sudden wandering in and around Durham county was very much down-to-earth. I needed some pain killers for my headache and wanted to find a pharmacy. A friend told me that I could get some around Hillsdale Rd (or something that very much sounded like Hillsdale). The assiduous observer would have noted the word "around". Because "around" here means a lot of things. Around is no problem when you have a car and can make turns and stuff lie that. Around, however, is a seriously different thing when you are WALKING - you know, the art of setting a foot in front of the other. Felt like some sick game out of a SAW movie. I mean seriously sick. Between two buildings here in industrial Durham are vaste noman's lands larger than Texas. So approximations are simply not acceptable.
Once I scribbled down the address, I checked out Google and took the campus transit as far off-campus limit as it would take me (which is not very far). From then on, I walked. And walked. And walked. It first took me to a highway junction, then below a bridge, and a further few miles in the wrong direction. And here the "around" comes into play. Because indeed, the pharmacy was "around" the said area, but a friendly passerby would eventually confess that I should have taken a left some one mile earlier. So back I went, back towards that highway junction and that big empty nothing, and that bridge to somewhere. The horizon was just crazy far away, and there was literally nothing between me and the horizon.
The odyssey ended three and a half hours later, at a bus stop that took me from the pharmacy... back to campus.
Below the picture-book of my odyssey: