3 More Awesome Things About America

Let’s sing a little (slightly amended) Joni Mitchell:

“Don’t it always seem to go… that you don’t know what you got ’til it’s gone [for nine months]?”

As already discussed, I am newly in love with my natal country after returning home from so many months away! 

So to sing its praises, here are three MORE reasons why the United States, for all its admitted problems, is fabulous.

1.) Bountiful American BRUNCH!

My hands are getting waterlogged with drool as I type this.  How is it that no other country in the world seems to embrace Brunch as well as America?  Ooh, sweet, savory, and steamy dishes, I can smell you now!

Last week I Bolt and Mega-bus-ed it down to Philly and New York to catch up with dear friends and family.  In Philadelphia, my soulmate of ten years, Marleny, arranged a mind-blowing brunch with her fellow female doctors… documented in these photos.

Look at the food!  There was mango-and-banana stuffed french toast.  There was a giant, fluffed-out vegetable frittata.

There were crusty waffles with whipped cream, heaps of crispy bacon, and perfectly pan-fried crunchy hash browns.

There were glistening classes of fresh-squeezed orange juice and silver vats of bottomless coffee.  There was even home-made ketchup!

In short: there, that afternoon, we experienced The Ultimate American Brunch.

I maintain that no other meal besides Brunch can produce such a festive atmosphere in which to bond with fabulous female friends, both new and lifelong!  YUM!

2.) Awesome American Restaurant Service.

Customer service in Japan is world famous for its excellence.  But until my trip around the world, I had never before realized the awesomeness of American waiters and waitresses.

Listen: we love Spain, Portugal, and Ghana, but will you wait forever and a day to order, get, and pay for your food in a restaurant in those countries?  Very possibly.  Will your waiter or waitress be chipper and chatty?  Maybe yes and maybe NO-OH-OH.  Will you leave a meager coin for a tip, as most people do in Europe and Africa?  OOOOH, that explains it!

The whole tip system in America may have its issues, but WOWZA does it produce fast and friendly wait-staff!

3.) Cutting-edge American Technology!

“The reason I can tell we’re not holding this talk in America right now,” said a famous travel blogger in his speech at a Spanish social media conference, “is because if we were in America, this room would be equipped with Wi-fi Internet, and all of you would be Tweeting about me as I talked… and a screen behind me would be projecting the Tweets!”

Maybe I didn’t pay attention to technology in America before I left because I wasn’t a blogger then.  But now I see it: America has surged ahead in the digital media revolution!

I must admit to feeling quite irrationally proud to hear a rich Spanish man say he was flying all the way to New York in May because that was the only way he could get his hands on an iPad so soon after its release!

When you’re in the middle of something, you often take it for granted and don’t realize its power.  But despite America’s flaws, the moment you fly out of it you see: America is at the center of so much.