The Ignorant American

number 43

theignorantamerican — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 11:27:39 +0000

I’ve gotten used to living at Number 43. It’s a brisk 25 minute bus ride to school, and an even brisker 20 minute walk to Golders Green, which is the closest tube station. It’s a nice walk – I did it yesterday because Golders Green is the neighbortown where the closest internet cafe lives. That’s also where Blockbuster (you can rent an entire TV season at one time!), Tesco’s (I have to learn the metric system so I know what quantities to buy), and other such places live.

Stacey and I rearranged the common areas. We moved the sofa and armchairs and moved the dining room table. She brought placemats, potpourri, and “wall canvases” (basically, small designs that you can hang on the walls for decorations) for the place to give it a more lived-in look. We also agreed that we three should take a picture of us trashed out of our minds and hang it on the wall in the living room. Just for scuz.

Now that I have a better source for internet (I’ve been stealing Stacey’s internet USB modem stick), I learn that the world is going to hell in a handbasket, especially back home. It’s a little worrisome, but at least for the moment, Mom and Dad and Daniel are okay, financially. Dad had to move his and my mom’s retirement funds into a government secure fund, but that’s better than watching the 401k get destroyed.

We also now have an illegal black box at our flat, and I’ve been watching British TV for the morning. The BBC News isn’t as entertainingly packaged as the US News, but it is more informative (all on the news is the world’s economic meltdown). US imports don’t bleep out the swearing, all the Disney commercials here aren’t for Disneyland or Disney World, but for Disneyland Paris, and Weight Watchers has been replaced by LighterWeight.

Those Brits, eh?

things to remember

theignorantamerican — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 13:22:00 +0000

Things that I’ve learned in my first week (or so) in London:

1. While The Tube is a wonderful system that you can get anywhere with, I do not recommend taking it while carrying a bunch of luggage, especially luggage that is cheaply made and breaks while you’re traveling from Heathrow to your new flat. Each Tube station is NOT like the BART stations back home, where every train passes on one platform. There are multiple platforms in Tube stations, which means lugging your bags up and down multiple flights of stairs, since it’s rare for a Tube station to have an elevator. On the day I arrived, I think I took my bags up a total of about six flights of stairs.

2. Going to see theatre is wonderfully cheap. In the West End, there aren’t a whole lot of cheap “buy 5 t-shirts for $5.00” stands, but there are a whole lot of “buy cheap theatre tickets” stands. On Thursday night, Matt was all, “What do you want to do?” And I suggested going to Central London to have a look-see, which ended up with us seeing Neil LaBute’s “Fat Pig” for cheap (we sat in the tenth row. It was awesome!)

3. Bacon as we know it back home is called “streaky bacon” here because it has streaks of fat running through it. Bacon here is 95% meat, and it is absolutely delicious.

4. No matter where I am in the world, spics of all shapes and sizes recognize me as being one and talk to me in Spanish. I was waiting at the Golders Green station with Stacey on the day I arrived when a gentleman comes up to me and starts jabbering to me, asking if I speak Spanish. I should have pretended I didn’t since he was a Jehovah’s Witness and was trying to get me to convert. He also gave me a lot of literature.

5. My DVDs are worthless here, unless I use them on a computer.

6. The British love Barack Obama. They don’t care for John McCain, and Sarah Palin doesn’t mean shit.

7. Domino’s and Pizza Hut, which do exist here, do not carry Hawaiian style pizzas. They do, however, have such fun varieties as “American Hot” (pepperoni, jalapenos, onions) and “Tandoori Hot” (tandoori chicken, jalapenos, onions, peppers).

8. My American accent makes people suspicious of things. Matt and I went to Central so that I could ask about my loan and stuff (I can’t get my loan check until after registration, which is on Thursday). We then went to the Student Union to get our wristbands for the Freshers Week (which is basically a week-long drinkathon for first years), and the guy there was totally suspicious of me.

Cesar: Can I have a wristband?
Guy: Why?
Cesar: Because…?
Guy: Are you even a student?
Cesar: I am indeed.
Guy: Which course?
Cesar: MA Writing for Stage and Broadcast Media.
Guy: Hmmmm. Okay…

9. London is split into a hundred million (or so) boroughs, and each borough is split into a hundred million neighborhoods or towns. My town/neighborhood, Temple Fortune, which is in the borough of Barnet, is heavily Jewish, so I won’t ever want for bagels or challah. However, since it isn’t US Jewish, but Orthodox Jewish, everything is closed on Saturday for the Sabbath (or “Shabbas,” depending on how Jewish you want to sound). It might make it difficult to get a Christmas tree around here.

10. Right before I left, someone told me that I should act like I’ve been in London before. Not actin like an ignorant American and pretend to know where everything is, but to not be intimidated when I’m here. Take everything in stride. I have to remember most importantly to do this, and not be so timid to ask people things or cross the street. Though this whole other-side-of-the-road thing still freaks me out. I think it’ll be some time before I get used to that.

i guess this is goodbye

theignorantamerican — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 18:04:10 +0000

It didn’t really hit me until the morning that I was leaving. I had been pushing it off my mind for the last few weeks, my imminent departure to London, that it had to rear its ugly head at some point, and a few hours before being shuttled off to the airport was just as good a time as any. I had been running around like a chicken sans head because, let’s not lie, you know me, I procrastinate until I can’r procrastinate anymore, so packing my life away for a year into two bags the morning of made a lot of sense to me, and there I am, walking into Daniel’s room where I had been sleeping fo the last few weeks, and then I feel it. My chin trembles, my eyes water, and this immense sadness and melancholy rises in me. I can’t cry, I can’t. I don’t want them to see me cry.

The preceding week had been full of goodbyes. A goodbye to aunts and uncles amidst the sitcom-y setting of apple farms in nothern California. Scott and I had our long and sad goodbye on Thursday, over a drunken game of bowling at Presidio Bowl, and I had my “adios drinkathon” (which only six or so people went to, thanks a lot, so-called friends!) on Saturday after seeing “The History Boys” at NCTC. I was really upset that I couldn ‘t go to LA to say goodbye to Courtney and Liza, but my finances were down the drain, and the fact of the matter is that I’m paying for almost everything myself. I couldn’t afford it. Part of growing up, I guess, is learning to prioritize, and sometimes you have to sacrifice the things you want to do the most for the sake of what you have to do. Wait a minute. Does this mean that I’m a grown-up now? Scary thought, and I fear for the world because of it.

I didn’t have as proper a farewell to San Francisco as I would have liked. I didn’t get a chance to have a cheap shrimp roll on the wharf. And my last meal was a bit disappointing; it was my idea, I wanted to go to Chili’s because I don’t think there are many of those in England, and thank you to my parents for indulging my request, but the waiter was forgetful, some things arrived late. Alas. I guess not everything can be perfect. I told my mom that when I get back to the States, the first meal I want is Hamburger Helper.

I can’t even recount leaving my parents at the airport. It was pretty tough, which is what I thought it would be. But I eventually felt better once I was on the plane leaving for the UK. But then I felt worse on the plane. But that was a different reason altogether.

commence the freaking out

theignorantamerican — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 09:49:31 +0000

We now have a flat, a fairly swanky (yet fairly cheap-ish) flat remeniscent of the Maxi Pad at Roebling, on Finchley Road, one tube stop away from school. I now have my plane ticket. I am leaving in a little over a week.

I am going to start to cry. Really.

chokin’ and tokin’

theignorantamerican — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 19:56:31 +0000

It’s really easy to forget why I’m going to London in the first place. Dealing with all the logistics of loans and flatmates and airfare and such, I sometimes lose sight of school and, more importantly, of the writing. I can be ignorant sometimes. (HA! See what I did there? I may still have a drop of talent in me)

Liza came to visit a few weeks ago, and I went over to see her at Zarah’s apartment. We all got high and decided to watch Freaks and Geeks, and I realized something in my intoxicated mind: This is what I should be writing. Not the show per se, but I think a big problem with me has been trying to find my voice as a writer. I’m really good (read: bad) at mimicing other people’s voices. In high school, I became a Tennessee Williams freak and decided to start writing bad gothic poetic plays. Even though I was well aware of the adage of “You write what you know,” as a teenaged writer, you can’t really grasp that fully. Even the depressed cliched goth poets take their style from Emily Dickinson or Sylvia Plath or some other suicidal sexually ambiguous person who killed themselves. At UCLA, I think I was close to finding my voice, but I still stole from other people – from Neil LaBute, from Patrick Marber, even slightly from Sarah Kane. I think I knew what my voice was, but I still peppered it with flakes from other people. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, that’s actually what most writers do, I think.

But, sitting there, stoned, watching this show that elicited so much feeling from me in general (Daniel and I had a marathon of the show in the weeks before he left for school), and I thought about something. I’m a dialogue freak – unique dialogue in shows, movies, plays gets me all hard. Metaphorically speaking, of course. I always wanted to have this flashy witty dialogue in my stuff because I wanted to be known for that, but I realized something kinda profound while I was high and emmersed in this show.

Write natural.

When I wrote my entrance essay for the UCs, I wrote about a bunch of stories that happened to me when I was at CSSSA: cutting Connor’s hair and messing it up, my own hair being dyed red, my endlessly geeky infatuation with Rachel 1. And I wrote it like I was telling it to anyone, and I remember my then-best friend saying that it sounded like I was talking to him. At UCLA, I wrote some stuff and showed it to Courtney and she told me that I was like Ibsen (we had studied in class how Ibsen was so great at making dialogue sound completely natural and how it was such hard work to do so).

But I think that somewhere, that got lost for me. I started falling in love with stylized writing, with Rob Thomas’ pop-culture-laced witticisms, with Joss Whedon’s love of deconstructing and reconstructing sentences, with Diablo Cody and her making up new slang, and even Sarah Kane and Charles Mee with their absurdity showing true emotions behind the weirdness. I started emulating that, sometimes to great effect. I think some of my more experimental stuff (which can never be too experimental since I am a stickler for realism) is really good. I used a lot of that stuff in my writing samples.

But, my old habit of getting high and watching TV sparked in my mind something that had been a little lost. Freaks and Geeks is one of the greatest shows ever written, and why is that? It isn’t overwritten, full of zingers and cleverly constructed sentences. It is simple. Hence, it is real. I have to remember to write things the way people speak, not the way that people should speak or how cool it would sound. I’m sure there will be opportunities to play with sound and structure and write that way. But I have to get back to the basics. And I’m glad I was able to remember that before I left.

Thank you, weed. And thank you, Freaks and Geeks.

certification in process

theignorantamerican — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 05:59:05 +0000

The post wasn’t nearly as charming as I thought it would be, judging from the fact that there are still no bites. But then again, the other recent posts that are begging for somewhere to stay have gotten either no bites or a nibble by an incoming fifty-year-old French student. I think having two foreign students in the flat could create chaos, especially considering the fact that I will probably behave like an infant once I get over there. As I told Matt, I’m going to be one of those needy roommates (at the beginning, anyways) who’ll be all “Oh, you’re going to Tesco’s*! I want to go, too! Please, please, pleeeeeeeeeeeeease!” It will be annoying, but even the most basic of things will seem bright and shiny in London, I’m sure. The roommies will think me ridiculous. Oh! Speaking of, we have a new one. Since Sarah and Jeanne dumped us, Matt found a future classmate of his, Stacey, who was in a similar predicament as us, and he asked if she wanted in with us. (That sounds so totally dirty, which it isn’t, I swear). So, now, the delightful Stacey is one of my future flatmates.

Now, the issues of money and funding and loans and shit are really boring to read about, so I’ll be brief. But I have a feeling that it’s going to be a major thread during the TV show that will be my life in London, so… Basically, I applied for a Graduate Plus Loan with SallieMae, and I figured that since I hadn’t been delinquent in paying my regular undergrad loans in the last few months that I had a good shot in getting the amount approved. Well, it was approved, I sent in all the appropriate paperwork, and it was just a matter of waiting for the Registry at Central to certify the amount with SallieMae, who would then let me know when the money would be distributed.

I kept checking back on SallieMae’s site, and I kept being told: “Certification in process.” What did that mean? But, ultimately, since I am terrible when it comes to issues of money, I figured that it was all out of my hands (in fact, it was, since the definition of “certification in process” is that I don’t have to do diddly since I already did my part. Then, here comes an email from the Registry, saying that they are unable to certify because my information was not on the website and could I please call SallieMae? A lot of back-and-forth led to me calling Central myself on Sunday/Monday to find out that I need to send the entire SAR over to them, as opposed to the summary I did. So, there goes another $40 in sending that out to get there in two days. Hopefully, I will home-free financially after that.

God, this money shit is so fucking boring, I almost fell asleep writing it.

* Tesco’s: the British Wal-Mart, but with a much-cooler name. Apparently, Lily Allen sang about it in one of her songs. But I really don’t like that bitch.

two cool guys in need of a home

theignorantamerican — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 19:22:58 +0000

Matt approved the flatshare ad. He said it was awesome, and accompanied his brief response email with an emoticon. Awwwww. If the situation wasn’t kinda dire, I’d probably muse a lot more on that. Because I spend my time focusing so much on ridiculous minutae like that. This is one of the things that make me me, I suppose; I can barely get anything done because I tend to focus on one little detail to the point of major distraction. I think he will be a fun roommate.

So, I posted it on the CSSD Flatshare site. Now, it’s just a matter of waiting to see who bites. There are a lot of “Student Accomodation Wanted” posts on there, so it’s not like mine’s the only one. The only thing I can hope is that my prose gives a hard-on to anyone who reads it and they’ll just need to live with us. But, let’s not lie – the odds of my words bringing a person to a sexual frenzy are a bit on the slim side. (Well… there was that period of time when I was really good at sending naughty texts, but that boat has sailed away long ago, gone the way of such other extinct creatures as childhood and Bigfoot… though, if you didn’t hear, he was found in North Georgia. But it was really a rubber suit in a cooler, so no dice on that one.)

The orgasm-inducing post: “Hello, CSSD-ers. We are two cool guys over here looking for a place to stay. My name is Cesar, and I’m starting the MA Writing for Stage and Broadcast Media course, and Matt is starting the Drama, Applied Theatre and Education course. We’re both really cool, have a quirky sense of humor, and would be awesome roommates/flatmates. Our original flatshare plan fell through, so we are a bit desperate to get settled. If living with two funny, fun-loving, clean dudes is your idea of really cool, then definitely drop me a line. I’m in the US (I’m American), but don’t let that freak you out in terms of figuring out a place to live; Matt’s in Berkshire, so that’s closer to London than the US is. Anyways, if you want an awesome household this upcoming year, email me. Talk to you soon!“

Like I said, just a matter of waiting and seeing. In the meantime, I need to start looking for properties myself over the site. Hopefully, someone will find us adorable.

Is it wrong that even though I’m kinda homeless, I’m not worried at all?

obviously, this means i hate you

theignorantamerican — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 09:17:51 +0000

People say that there’s nothing tackier than breaking up with someone over the phone. Luckily, in our postmodern times, there are indeed tackier ways -email, text message; Carrie got dumped by Berger via Post-It on “Sex and the City.” Today, I was dumped in such a way – kinda. Because I’ve become increasingly enslaved to my computer over the last few months, years, whatever, I absolutely have to check my Facebook right after I check my email (I find it really funny, incidentally, that my social-network-site addiction flip-flops between MySpace and Facebook – obviously, the Book is my current choice; oh, remember when it was simple and it was Friendster or bust?). But because Facebook emails me any messages that I get on Facebook, I was treated to a “Sarah Sent You a Message on Facebook.” Sarah is one of the three Londoners I plan on living with when I am at school. In fact, Matt told me that Sarah and our other roommate Jeanne were planning on house-hunting today.

The message I get from Sarah: “sorry to mess u about but me and jeanne are gonna stay with someone else or find a two bedroom tomorrow because we can’t find anything 4 bed in camden and need somewhere now. sorry to be a shit.”

Well. That’s interesting. Luckily, Facebook’s stalking abilities tell me that she’s left a similar message on Matt’s wall. I email him that it looks like we both got dumped. I decide that it’s time to be proactive and write an amazing as fuck post for the CSSD Flatshare site that will attract roommates and such. I write one up and email it to Matt; I’m not going to post it until I get his approval since the ad is for both of us.

It’s a shitty situation to be dumped by a future roommate with the little time before I get there, but in the end, it was obviously for some important reason that Sarah and Jeanne needed to find the place ASAP, even though to this day, I’m not exactly sure that Sarah understood the details in how this was going to work. She initially thought that we were going to start house-hunting once I arrive in London, which is really a stupid thought now that I really think about it. Alas. This just means that we’ll either have better roommates to fit the situation, or it’ll just be the two of us. All I know is that I hope to get my own room since I can get distracted as hell by myself, so another person would mean I’d never get any writing done.

I was going to not respond at all to Sarah’s dumping me, but I decided to, just so she knew I got it. I was originally going to write “Obviously, this means I hate you.” But I chickened out and added “Just kidding.” I really need to grow some balls. I’m not saying that I need to start being mean to people, but I need to stop being scared to insult someone if I need to. Obviously, this wasn’t the proper situation, but I did start thinking about that. When I’m in London, no one will know me. No one will know who I am here. I can reinvent myself completely if I wanted to. Would I reinvent myself into a cynical asshole who just didn’t give a fuck?

I have to think on that one.