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We have arrived! A few minutes ago. Because we landed mid-afternoon, had to get through Customs and Immigration, then pick up car, then get food - real food dear God not some weird stuff on a tray that you pick out the edible parts of then give up on - we went to In-N-Out and got omg gluten-free "protein style" burgers (no bun, it's wrapped in lettuce, it works surprisingly well) and chips and went OM NOM NOM FOOOOD and then we had to drive here, and we hit LA rush hour traffic (rush two hours or so, at least, imo) and then the route the GpS decided would be "fastest" was a super, super-twisty road that was basically one endless switchback.
so my further thoughts on Arriving In America (and also, possibly, Passing Through Japan) can wait until tomorrow.Current Mood:  tired
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So, today!
Last night I talked ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png) velithya into staying here two nights, so we could recuperate a bit from the journey here. We more-or-less slept until noon, and then were sort of dozy and slack about getting showered and dressed etc, so we finally wandered over to the restaurant for breakfast at about, oh, 2pm.
We'd last eaten at 5pm in LA. I'm currently running, foodwise, on a schedule where every meal starts out with OOOH, FOOD and then halfway through I have a moment where my body is like, wait, food? and I have to take a moment while it remembers that yes, eating actual food is something that we do.
We had a nice chat with the waitress, since it was quite quiet there - between it being mid-afternoon and the distinct dropoff in visitors to the area due to the closure of the parks, things are pretty quiet around here generally right now, I gather.
Not to mess up the chronology of this account in any way, but when we went to Groveland a bit later, and stopped to look around the antique store there, the lady in the shop was thanking customers very effusively for shopping there, and pretty much *everyone* around here seems to be really very distressed about the shutdown.
They're only just recovering from the fires, and now... this. It's pretty bad for them.
I think that's part of what some people seem to miss in the idea that closures that stop tourists doing their fun, touristy things aren't important - after all, it's just tourists doing holiday stuff, it's not a big deal, right?
Except that it is. Sometimes because the tourists are doing something that's incredibly important to them, that they've planned or worked for for a really long time, but also because those tourists are the livelihoods of real Americans, as well. The people in this area I've talked to - they love this place, they love Yosemite, they love the forests and the land here, and this is really hurting them.
Not just financially. After lunch, as you may have gathered, we went to Groveland, where we poked around the antique/gifts/home decor store, then we went to the Information Centre. The woman there was rather lovely.
First, because this: We walked in, and she swung around from the desk she was at, and asked if she could give us information about anything.
Me: "Hm. Astrophysics?"
... at which point she told us about how once she attended a lecture by Carl Sagan.
I like it when people can roll with my sassypants moments.
We did then get more pertinent information, and I tell you, that woman is passionate about working at the Groveland Yosemite Information Centre. She gets the brochures, and marks them up, highlighting important places to go to, and the tips she can offer, and telling you all the things. One place she pointed out to us she described as an "oasis of green" because it's in an area which was badly hit by the fires, and she told us about how the thousands of firefighters converged to save every business, every home, and every life in this area.
She got choked up. I for one don't blame her.
There are signs all over the place - mostly quite home-made-looking - all dedicated to thanking the firefighters. It's rather touching.
Partly it's a cultural thing, I think. One of the things that I suspect Americans don't realise is that they are an incredibly demonstrative people. It might be what's behind a lot of the ways in which Americans don't tend to understand other nations and nationalities as well as they might - I suspect Americans assume that certain feelings aren't present in other peoples because they're not expressed, and certainly not expressed as visibly and as vocally as they are here.
Because things like putting signs all over the town with gushing, heartfelt gratitude to the firefighters who saved so many people's lives and livelihood, and so much of the forest, too - it's not something I can imagine being done in Australia. It doesn't mean that we don't appreciate our fireys, and especially appreciate the work they do in bushfire season. We are grateful for their work and we acknowledge their heroism.
Just... not like that.
So I wonder if a lot of cultural misunderstanding, and especially a lot of the assumption some Americans seem to make that America is the best country ever and the rest of us are just jealous because we don't love our homelands like they love America, and all that - whether that might actually, in part, stem from the fact that in America, declaring your love for America, displaying American flags everywhere, all of that stuff is a thing that happens, a thing that people do, that truly heartfelt sentiment is something you proclaim to the world.
And for much of the rest of the world, it isn't. In some ways, the strongest feelings are the ones you don't express, because it's sort of, I don't know, gauche or tacky or something, the same way it would be to start a long, public speech about just how much you're in love with your wife, how you adore the way her nose wrinkles up when she laughs and how cute she is when she first wakes up and all the intimate, private emotions that you feel that you wouldn't talk about with strangers because it's too personal, too real, too important.
Love of country, love of homeland, the gratitude and awe we, too, feel for our heroes, our firefighters and our soldiers, the people who make themselves the line between us and destruction and pain and chaos - these are feelings too powerful to proclaim.
And it's odd, because I don't know how I really feel about this, in general. I think Americans' declarations of patriotism and love of country, especially those of American politicians, are kind of cringe-inducing. They trigger sympathetic embarrassment.
But the expressions of thankfulness to the work of the firefighters? I'm a little bit in love with that.Current Location: Buck Meadows, California
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