Presentation

Today, a man from El Salvador played my banjo like an electric guitar and a Japanese girl told me that she worked at Kentucky Fried Chicken for two years.

It's amazing what reactions an exposition on Tennessee can elicit.

Each Wednesday, different students from different parts of the world must do a presentation about their daily lives. (This was started because we have a four hour class on Wednesday and we are all completely dead by the last hour.) Since I volunteered to go first, all the other U.S. students were scheduled for today as well. There are only 3 of us, and Stephen decided to stay home.

I talked about laws for driving, smoking, and drinking and also outlined the education system. (They all knew what Harvard was.) I explained our "weird" units of measurement and that, regrettably, most of the American stereotypes are true.

For some reason, many found it bizarre that each city did not have a flag of its own when I drew the Tennessee flag. It also seemed incomprehensible that the Mississippi River was not included somehow in the flag. I tried to explain that it is simply a border or boundary and that it is more important to the gulf states than Tennessee.

To finish, I decided to say how Nashville is "la ville de musique aux Etats-Unis". To display this, I used a banjo. I played a few tunes and began answering some questions.

* Did Kentucky Fried Chicken start in Kentucky?
* At what age do you start learning your other languages? (Yes, plural...We Suck.)
* What is the speed limit?
* What is the traditional dish of Tennessee? (I really had no response for this. I could have tried to describe grits or some other nonsense, but I refrained. I simply stated [translated] "A big breakfast - eggs, bacon, etc.")
* Does everybody play banjo in Tennessee? (I smiled.)
* How does everybody get where they want to go? (My explanation that only the lower-middle class and poor use public transportation was astonishing.)
* Are there many Islamic mosques? (I refrained from going into religion or politics...except for one Bush remark. ;) I simply said I did not know because I am not religious.)

I believe that next week is China's turn. It should be interesting.