American Dream Part I
It was surprising for me that friends in Spain asked me if I planned or wished to stay in the United States forever, when I told them I was coming here on an exchange program for one school year. My Spanish friends are so naïve… as they know, thousands of European students spend a year or a semester in a foreign University as part of what we call the Erasmus Program. No one I know has ever asked an Erasmus scholar if they wish to stay in their destination countries; certainly, no one ever asked me back then. Europe is not glamorous enough.
I guess the main difference between my friends and me is that they think of some vague idea of America, something to do with places like Chicago or New York, while my America is a university town. It’s weird how everything in a University town except the tenured professors and the weather is temporary. My guess is that 80% of the Cornell (I don’t mean Ithaca) population will not be here in five years’ time. And of course there is only one thing to do: University life. That’s it. I have lived here for four months and I have not met maybe five people who were not directly connected to the Uni, not including shop-assistants.
I have two answers to my friends who wonder why I don’t dream the American dream. The first one is: how would you feel if Seville University had all the services of a small town and you lived in it? The answer is always a shudder. The second one is: Universities are estaciones de paso, interesting waiting rooms. Being pregnant is, I guess, a wonderful experience, but would you ask a pregnant woman if she was to stay like that forever?
I guess the main difference between my friends and me is that they think of some vague idea of America, something to do with places like Chicago or New York, while my America is a university town. It’s weird how everything in a University town except the tenured professors and the weather is temporary. My guess is that 80% of the Cornell (I don’t mean Ithaca) population will not be here in five years’ time. And of course there is only one thing to do: University life. That’s it. I have lived here for four months and I have not met maybe five people who were not directly connected to the Uni, not including shop-assistants.
I have two answers to my friends who wonder why I don’t dream the American dream. The first one is: how would you feel if Seville University had all the services of a small town and you lived in it? The answer is always a shudder. The second one is: Universities are estaciones de paso, interesting waiting rooms. Being pregnant is, I guess, a wonderful experience, but would you ask a pregnant woman if she was to stay like that forever?