Entry 46: FAQ

Many people seem to be asking me a lot about the States and about me and my lifestyle there, so I thought I'd follow Clinton Kelly's (of TLC's What Not To Wear fame) style and do a Top 5 myself. I don't have that much time.

1) You must be partying really hard over there.

Contrary to popular belief, frat parties are not proper parties. The parties you see in movies, those are illusions. Only strip clubs and good clubs in big cities have such parties. In my context, a proper party is when all of the following conditions are met:
a) Good music. Which means no wannabe hip-hop gangsta music by Li'l Crunk and Li'l Wayne and whatnot. Strictly no rubbish rock, or no rock at all. Rock makes me sick. Rock makes me cringe and wanna have a threesome with Joan Rivers and Cher. This includes songs with really long guitar riffs and sound like a really bad reverb.
b) Good alcohol. Which means no cheap, pussy beers. No beers at all, because beers make people stink and puke. There must at least be whiskey and rock glasses, with rocks of course. No keg stands or beer pong, we'll play down the whiskey instead.
c) Good company. Which means no jocks, no foul-mouthed wannabe drinkers. You don't have to do stupid things to grab my attention, or anybody else's for that matter.

So no, I am not partying hard there.

2) You have winter?! Snow must be beautiful. You are so lucky.

When I was young, some ass told me rain was a higher being's way of "taking the dog for a walk", of fertilising the earth with his piss. Well if rain was his piss, snow is probably his dandruff. Snow is beautiful, snow is white, but don't forget snow is essentially water, and water wets your shoes when you fucking walk to school in the mornings. Snow turns to slush, which dirties your pants. Snow seeps into your socks and your shirt when it flies around like bluebottles to shit. So no, snow is not awesome.

3) The chicks must be hot.

It depends. Some days, when you are really bored, the chicks are hot as hell. Fake tans, bubble boobs, platinum blonde, blue eyes. When you are looking for class, West Lafayette is not the place to be in. You'd probably want to try Romania (refer previous entry), Estonia, or probably Belarus for good measure. But I'm pretty sure the chicks here are hot because they wear really short tank tops in winter. Tightens the skin, methinks.

4) The people are really open-minded.

Once again, the fallacies of movie portrayals. People here are slightly homophobic, slightly racist, slightly rednecked. And of course I am generalising, I have great friends who are white, but I've had more than my fair share of being stereotyped. Like being asked many times over if I know kung fu (to which I always answer, "Yes I learnt to kill with my hands in the army.") If you really want liberal, again, try Europe or one of the big cities. They have LGBT parades and everyone participates just for fun. If you held one here you'd get labelled by the rednecks and stoned to death later. Again, hasty generalisation on my part, but you get my drift.

5) Shopping must be hella fun there.

It takes 20 minutes by car to get to a strip mall with ubiquitous labels like Abercrombie & Fitch, Hollister, Old Navy and balls like that. No Ermenegildo Zegna, no Salvatore Ferragamo, no Commes des Garcons, no Jean Paul Gaultier, no Armani Exchange. Not even Brooks Brothers, nor Banana Republic, Michael Kors, Club Monaco, Sean John, Ben Sherman, John Varvatos. It takes another 3 hours to drive to Chicago, where you can find some of these brands, and petrol costs more than liquor per gallon. So just a heads up, think twice before you ask me to buy anything for you there, because it's not all "Sex And The City" everywhere in the States.

Hope I have answered your questions. Next issue of FAQ, we question the blogger about his personal life.