Author: Jacques René Zammit

There’s this company and its put a new product on the market. Over the last 80 days it has averaged a sale of 37,500 units per day. There’s this mayor who is doing all he can to tackle the problems of pollution and dust in the air that are threatening to rack up huge fines from the EU. There’s this politician who took a decision to sack a senior institutional member in less than three hours – that particular member had publicly misbehaved and given away signs of disunity among the leadership of the nation. There’s this immigrant woman who suddenly finds herself at the helm of an entire continent. There’s this tiny nation where democracy has been on hold for a while. And then there are the French and the Italians…

Entrées

And we’re back. A thousand apologies for last week’s hiccup – it’s my first since I began writing this column. Unfortunately, a combination of technological glitches (hotel WiFi was not what it promised to be and laptop started to play up) and the usual inability to deal with temporary shifts in the time-space continuum (coping with a change in time zone) led to one last desperate attempt to submit the weekly fare from onboard a sleepy Greyhound bus headed towards Washington DC in the early hours of the morning. The absence of any J’accuse fare last week is ample proof that this mission failed miserably. Hence esteemed readers were given a break from the usual disquisitions.

I was in America, the US of A – land of the free and home of the big – and I had a whale of a time. The danger of visiting a country obsessed with size is that you soon get the hang of it and before you know it the “whale of a time” becomes a “whale having a good time”. Not that I have assumed the proportions of our cetaceous giant cousins of the ocean, but let us just say that when reviewing the holiday photos I did not feel very comfortable about what seemed to be incontrovertible proof of a double-chin. It’s impossible not to eat in America. Like their cousins across the ocean (with whom they have shared many a battle – for or against – and a World Cup draw) the ’mericans are not particularly famous for their cuisine. Which is unfair. There are burgers in your average American eatery that provide the kind of satisfaction that would make El Bulli’s Ferran Adria cringe with jealousy.

And they love their entrées. It takes some getting used to this “entrée” business. You needn’t have been living on the fringe of frogland to know that an entrée is normally a smaller course that precedes the main course. In the US, the heading on the menu normally reserved for the main course is “Entrée”, which can catch you off guard if only for the few hours needed to consume the average bacon-cheese-Swiss edam-egg triple burger. Food is an art form worthy of a hall in the MOMA or Guggenheim. Every swish of ketchup, every hot dog and falafel stand on 42nd St, every Mr Softy lurking next to the ubiquitous post-boxes yell “Murder by Cholesterol”, but it’s only then that you begin to appreciate the “I’m lovin’ it” slogan.

Restrooms

It’s easy to understand why whole books have been written taking note of the cultural differences in the land of the large (Bill Bryson sticks out as the obvious example). From the libraries to the drugstores to the restaurants the evidence is all over. The obsession with large is fantastic – I was berated for using a wrong (smaller) cup for a beverage (drink – a “soda” actually is a “soft-drink”) and they look at you quizzically when you refuse to avail yourself of cheap upgrades for your meal. At the B.B. King Sunday Gospel Brunch with the “World Famous” (what would American lingo be without epithets?) Harlem Gospel Choir, I sat timidly watching the spectacle surrounded by hundreds of hippos and rhinoceroses swinging to the music and chewing on an eat-all-you-can buffet. I can’t. Eat all of that, that is. You know what? Screw political correctness. Big, fat American people are all over the place. Then comes the cherry on the cake (if you still have space): New York City has a campaign running to “reduce the amount of sodium” in foods. Apparently it’s bad for your health.

One last thing before this column becomes a running commentary of the Bryson kind. The lingo. They do not speak English in the US. I am not referring to Spanish soon becoming the national vernacular but rather to the complete, absolute and unequivocal rape of the language of Shakespeare. Not that it is not the right of the people across the pond to develop their own queer way of speaking English but I was not aware of how many simple words we use daily have been replaced. It’s not the “kerb v pavement” kind of thing.

It’s signs like “Restrooms One Flight Up” that get to me in a funny way. At first glance there is nothing abnormal with that is there? Think again. How many times have you seen that sign recently? What you may have seen is this one: “Toilets Upstairs”. There’s loads more where that came from and I am not complaining – it’s just part of the fun while staying in the US and in the city that never sleeps.

Jelly

NYC mayor Bloomberg has just announced that, despite the recession and the retreating power of the euro, the Big Apple has set its sights on reaching a record of 50 million tourists annually by 2013. They’re not far off that record, seeing as how they will probably hit 47 million this year. That’s 47 million potential gym clients in Europe by December 2010 – there must be a few easy bucks to be made somewhere. Speaking of bucks, another Big Apple that is on a roll is Steve Job’s ship. iPads have been on sale for about 80 days now and over 30 million units have been sold. Pastizzi anyone?

If selling iPads is a bit like selling cheesecakes in Hamrun High Street, then selling the new iPhone 4 is like giving out free pastizzi at City Gate on a Monday morning. We’ve stopped getting as excited as when the advent of the first iPhone was with us, plus the rapid development of Android might mean that Apple’s competitors might be catching up faster than Steve thought, but in any case, the iPhone and iPad will give us a reason to flex our digits and surf the net like never before.

One new development to look out for is Google’s Chrome OS. It might redefine what computers mean and do for us. Essentially, it takes all the advantages of cloud computing and uses them to eliminate start up time and hardware and software problems on your PC. Lost? Just sit back and wait… it will all happen to you as inevitably as the sun will rise tomorrow morning.

Cap it all

Washington DC’s mall must be one of the most incredible feats of democratic architecture ever. I do not mean the buildings themselves that surround the vast expanse centred around Washington’s monument (which looks like, and is inspired by, a phallus but which tends to cause no fuss at all in the US). What I mean is the use of symbols and space to immediately convey the meanings and principles upon which the American Dream was originally built. Remembrance, respect and aspiration. They are all there. From the magnificent Capitol, to the war memorials, to the Lincoln and Jefferson memorials to the White House. Standing under the Washington Monument on a clear night with the temperature hitting the nineties, you take a deep breath and an incredible head rush of history immediately assaults your brain. You see it all, from Leif Eriksson to Columbus to 1776 and beyond. It is hard not to feel awed and envious of the American Dream.

There were moments when my pride to be European kicked in though. None were more obvious than the “little” perks brought about by the EU. Take being “delayed” on a flight thanks to some bumptious handling by the Delta ground crew (half the commuters had been delayed to the airport by an extraordinary amount of traffic). No vouchers for food. No vouchers to phone home. No hotel in case of an overnight delay. Upon landing in Amsterdam for my connect flight, the wonderful people at KLM issued me a new ticket at no extra cost, handed me both food and phone vouchers as well as a smile that went along with the service. Thank you European Directives and Regulations. Damn you Delta Airlines and the insufferable desk clerk with monosyllabic vocabulary (i.e. NO).

The worst two things about a stay in the States though are both money related. First of all is the hopeless system of not including tax on prices. Whether in a supermarket or booking your hotel the price you see is not the price you pay. A $4.99 plug becomes something ridiculous like $5.13, which only means that your pockets will be loaded with pennies, dimes and quarters. Also, there seems to be a staunch resistance to using the practical one-dollar coins as against the filthy one-dollar bills – not to mention the irritating fact that all dollar bills are the same colour.

I could bother you with my grievances about the concept of “gratuity” at US tables (it’s a tip but sounds nicer when it is called a gratuity). I witnessed a waitress chase after a couple who dared leave a pittance on the table in tips and was also lectured to by a Russian taxi driver about the dangers of not tipping (the previous occupants had dispensed with the idea of a tip altogether) but the time has come for me to conclude.

Johnny Rockets

The blog is entering the summer phase and I have chosen “the Banana Republic” as the main theme. I will not discuss the merits and demerits of the World Cup performances as yet out of superstition. Brazil is still in it and looking good so that is fine for me. The Banana Republic will deal with the global village, with the local democracy put on hold by two parties who can only gain from the status quo and with the latest thrills from the technological development.

Congrats to the competition (MaltaToday) for the spanking new portal on the web – as I have long been saying, this step is an inevitable one for newspapers of today (hint and nudge to the Eds). The original battleground for online news seems to be gravitating around a more settled feel. The latest step is for papers to take back control of their comment board. Expect local papers to oblige users to register and sign comments in their own name sometime soon. That might lead to less comments and more quality.

The company in the intro was Apple of course. The mayor is Boris Johnson tackling London’s new levels of pollution. It was President Obama sacking General McChrystal after reading some remarks made by the general an interview with Rolling Stone magazine. It took President Obama a reading of the first few paragraphs to reach a decision to fire a general who had hitherto been thought to be indispensable to the efforts in Afghanistan (it’s not the war it’s the counterinsurgency, stupid). Julia Gillard, a Welsh immigrant in 1966, became Australia’s first woman Prime Minister when Labour leader Rudd stepped down following an inside revolt. There are no surprises in guessing that our democracy is still on hold following Labour’s walkout from the House Committee for the strengthening of democracy. Finally, there’s the French and the Italians. I guess some things are best left unsaid.

www.akkuza.com found a link between Inter’s pre-world cup championship victories and early exits (with dismal performances) by Italy. Four times out of five this has been the case –- the only exception being Mussolini’s Champions in 1938. Maybe there is more to it than just superstition.