CT from a CA perspective

I grew up in California. Currently, I live in Connecticut. I'm starting to "pass" as a Nutmegger or New Englander. Yes, the people who are from Connecticut or live in Connecticut are called Nutmeggers. In the winter, I seem to notice the particular differences between CA and CT.
One of the first thing I noticed was the hooks and coat racks. When people are out dinning, they can either leave their coats at the door or they put them on hooks conveniently located around the place. I've seen this and had to do this at bars and restaurants. Since the winters in the Bay Area and on the coast of Southern California are mild compared to the East Coast so, these hooks are not required.

I lived with roommates and during the fall, they started making comments about the weather and the leaves. This is part of the culture of a East Coaster. As kids are growing up, they watch the news as they comment on how the weather is going to effect the color of the leaves. My crazy roommates were saying that it was too dry and the leaves were going to turn brown. I didn't care much for this. I didn't see the big deal. As I drove my 30 minutes to work, I noticed the trees along the side of the freeway were in various states of green, yellow, orange, red, and brown. There are some great undulating roads, perfect for seeing the foliage.

During Spring, the showers of rain are really heavy. They're almost torrential. And people know how to drive in this. They even drive fast. They do not worry about oil on the roads. Sometimes it floods, yet, CT is mostly flat so they don't have to worry so much about the mudslides or flash floods. The hilly areas aren't around the coastal areas and the coastal areas are the places that flood. Also, people know how to drive in the snow.

People know if they have gas, electric, or oil heating. This becomes a debate. Which one is more expensive? I've had mostly electric heating. So, my electricity bill goes up about 100 to 200 dollars during the winter months. I lived in one place with oil heating. The shower was cold for about 15 minutes before it was scorching and then went back and forth between scorching and lukewarm. This did not make for a happy me. When the oil went out, I didn't really notice. The water didn't heat up for about 25 minutes and then was lukewarm. I didn't get the heater to work in my room so, I didn't know it was colder than usual. When it was fixed and I had to learn more about oil and the machinery in the basement that I had formally ignored, it was complicated and weird. It was all pipes, levers, and doodads. "And if it gets cold again, quickly switch this on and off to release the water, it'll be hot." I moved out about a month later. It was around $400 up front for the oil. My coworker recently had problems with his oil and it was $150 up front to get someone to come out to even look at the thing. Some places have free heating. It's definitely a selling point.

"Do you have front wheel or rear wheel drive?" I didn't know this was something important until I moved and was asked about it for the first time. My Toyota was a rear wheel drive. This is good for the snow. I also have drum breaks. This is also good because they don't have as much issues as cars with break pads. The drum breaks also help during the snow as long as snow doesn't get stuck in there. I spun out about three times (one in 2008 and two in 2009 on the same day). The first time, there was damage to my car. I hit the center divide. My coworker had the suggestion to follow trucks because they'll set the pace for what's safe to drive during the snow. The other two times, I was able to remember to take the hands off the wheel and the brake so I wouldn't try to overcompensate and fishtail. Yes, a person basically does nothing when they are sliding on snow and really, it's less scary that way. With front wheel drive, it's difficult to drive in snow.

I bought a car. Now, in California, you shop, you pick, you buy, and you drive away that day. You get a sticker to put in your window and go on your way. The title is on colorful paper with an embossed seal on it. CT is very different. You shop, pick, and then sign. You wait three days before driving off the lot. If you want to drive the car before then, you get to put on "Dealer Plates" with a piece of paper giving you permission to have those plates. Then, you sign, sign, sign, and then you get new plates for the car, they send back the old plates, and you get print out. That is title to the car. I think it's weird to have new plates every time you buy a car. If CT wanted to save money, they could get rid of that whole process and keep old plates on the cars.

The attitudes of people are very different between New Haven and the Bay Area. This was expected. When I lived in the Bay Area, my friends would easily cut me out of their life if I did something they didn't like. It was if they didn't have to worry about having other friends because there were millions of people to choose from anyway. New Haven is a small city. I think New Havenites understand psychology better. Although, they are not always smiling and welcoming as people in CA, they are friends for the long haul-- not superficially. If you mess up, they throw back a beer, either they tell you you f**ked up or they say that things need to change or don't do something and they continue being your friend. My friends and I joke that there are only 10 people in New Haven and you'll run into them at some point. And sometimes, there are only 5 people, it's just that they have different masks that they wear. There have been many a times when I was walking somewhere with a friend only to hear my name being called from a friend to join in on festivities.

I don't know how many people have told me that they either think I'm crazy for moving from San Diego to New Haven because everyone wants to live in San Diego. My thought is, "Yeah? You move there." Many people say they'd rather have tornadoes and hurricane winds than earthquakes. People are afraid of earthquakes. I say, "They're not that bad." I talk about being in the 1989 Loma Prieta Earthquake and some other earthquakes, including one while shopping near the beach in San Diego. There were lots in the middle of the night-- the bed shakes and then it's over. I think it's funny. I can't believe how many people say the same thing-- "They have earthquakes out there."

I don't know where this little gem came from but for a long time, I heard people talk about how California has "that free education." People apparently go out to CA and they have a free college education. I wish I would have known about this because I would have liked to have a free education. However, my education cost significantly less than even the community colleges here. My undergraduate work at San Diego State cost around $1,000 for the first semester (with 17 units) and around $1,300 by the time I was a senior. My graduate courses cost around $3,000 for two classes. Community colleges cost around $300 per UNIT, one class is around $1,000. In San Diego, one class is around $300 for a community college.

I thoroughly enjoy driving around 3 hours and being in a different state (if not two states), which is way different than CA. The whole length of CA is more than a 12 hour drive.

As my experiences grow, I will be able to write about more differences.

The Travelings of Middle Class White Women portrayed in Pop Culture

I've been reading the book Tales of a Female Nomad. I've been thinking about the culture of traveling to "exotic" places and it's role lately in popular culture. With movies such as "Eat, Pray, Love," "Sex and The City 2," or popular books like Medicine Woman. It seems that women, on the brink of divorce or with nothing better to do, go traveling to foreign (non-Western) countries or to visit non-Western cultures. With the exception of Tales of a Female Nomad, these books and movies include predictions from the very wise non-Western people from these "exotic" cultures. It gives the impression that every older non-Western person must have psychic abilities.
When I think about it, I think that's it's not only rude to the "exotic" culture, it's rude to the people in United States. Where are the movies about the men going on adventures in foreign places, the ones that don't include guns? Where are the movies or reality TV shows about letting a poor person of any race go on a grand vacation to some place they would never dream of or to those hard hit areas where assistance is needed? Where are the documentaries about the countless church goes who are building houses, going to orphanages, and who are assisting people in countries outside the United States? Are there good documentaries about cultures outside the United States, maybe ones where you just observe, no narration about what outside cultures who don't speak the language think that these other cultures are doing? I would rather see those and hear about those than to have these ideals about women in foreign countries and how safe, amazing and bourgeois it is.