Parental visit

There comes a time in every expat’s life when he gets a visit from across the ocean from his parents.  My time was this Christmas. 

My wife and I spent most of October, November, and December preparing the house – doing all the various DIY, obscure cleaning, and upgrade jobs that we’d been putting off.

Our place is small, so my mother and her partner stayed at a local hotel.  We picked them up and took them to the hotel on their first day to find that my mother had been made “Guest of the day”, which was a source of amusement for us.

Many of the things that my mother and her partner noticed about North Central Florida, I remembered noticing myself when I first visited several years ago, but they’ve since become my everyday normality, so I barely notice them anymore. They seemed surprised by how neat and tidy everything was.  Parts of Britain do certainly have severe litter problems, although like in  the USA, it can vary quite a bit from from place to place.

My mother and her partner are less flexible than me – although I moan about some things in the US, I am essentially a go-with-the-flow sort who likes to explore things.  When it comes to food, for instance, although I am lukewarm on certain elements of mainstream American eating, I do like many things about the Floridian diet, such as the fresh seafood, as well as Mexican and Cajun dishes (plus Chinese, Indian, Thai, Caribbean, and Italian).  My mother’s partner is much more conservative with his eating habits, however, so we ended up eating at places that served food such as “British Fish and Chips” (which is never quite like the real thing in the USA, anyway), rather than at the places where they serve a more local menu.

In a cafe in St Augustine

All in all the trip was a success, however.  We did start running out of touristy things to do with my parents towards the end, but that was kind of inevitable - Gainesville is essentially a working college town, not a holiday resort, so there are only so many sights to see.  We did manage to find some alligators for them to photograph, however, and take them on day trips to both the Gulf and Atlantic coasts, including a visit to America’s oldest continuously occupied settlement, St Augustine.

Religion in America

I normally try to avoid religion and politics in my blog, but from time to time, I enjoy the challenge of trying to sail it through choppier, more unpredictable waters.

The power and influence of religion in America was certainly a jolt to the system when I arrived here from the UK.  I already knew that the US was a much more religious place than the UK of course, but even so, it is still quite a culture shock.  I am not sure how much the shock is compounded by the fact that I am not at all religious myself (I would generally describe myself as an atheist).  It was certainly fascinating to read (British expat) Iota’s blog on the subject of encountering US religion, and it made me appreciate that aspects of the experience of coming here may well be quite different for those who are Christian, as she is.

Religion generally plays a very quiet and low key role in the UK, but here in the USA, religion is big and brassy and most American people are very up front about telling you all about their religion and beliefs.  I know that Iota found this approach refreshing, but for me, I must confess that I can find it awkward and I can easily end up smiling and nodding vaguely, as people tell me at length about Jesus and their experience of being saved, or whatever.

The language here is different too - in the USA, if someone is having problems, say they are sick or something, people will talk about praying for them, or ask people to pray for them.  It some circumstances, it can just be a turn of phrase, of course, but even so, it is one example of how the American language contains more religious overtones.

Another difference for me is that religion in the USA nearly always means Christianity, certainly down here in the South, anyway.  Back in Britain, where I was working and living in the inner cities most of my adult life, Christianity was just one of many belief systems: Islam, Sikhism, Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism etc.  But here in the US, there is a general sense that Christianity is the big one, certainly down here in the Deep South (although there are multiple different Christian denominations and sects, of course).   

As a non-believer, I often get the sense that being Christian is perceived as the “norm” here and that many Americans generally see atheism (and to some extent some of the other religions aswell, such as Islam) as being more than a little bit suspect.

There is a social respectability that is accorded to those who attend church and pronounce their faith  and values here too, which hasn’t really existed in England for a long time.  What I mean is that you are perceived as being more upstanding and moral by some if you publicly subscribe to being a Christian.  I guess that is why politicians and public figures here pretty much always have to play up their Christian credentials, which is almost the opposite to the UK, where Tony Blair was constantly trying to play down his Catholicism.

One of the peculiar paradoxes about religion and politics in the USA is that essentially it is a secular country (enshrined in the constitution) with a very religious population, whereas Britain (also paradoxically) is officially a Christian country (The Queen is head of state and head of the Church of England) but the population aren’t particularly religious.

I guess I should point out in conclusion that despite me not generally being a big fan of religion, I do strongly believe that people have the right to believe whatever they want.  I am generally a live and live kind of person.  Some of the more conservative Christians here in the US seem less tolerant than me, however.  I have developed a lot of compassion for the plight of gay Americans since I’ve been here, especially those who live outside of the big coastal cities, who can have a particularly difficult time, it seems.