A taste of home...

The other day, I spent some time on the UQ (University of Queensland) campus where I will be studying. I spent the morning searching online for an apartment, calling the phone companies, and enrolling in classes. Pretty average day if I do say so myself. Around noon, I decided to grab some lunch on campus. Surprisingly, the campus has quite a few options, almost like a food court you would find in a mall. I decided to get Subway (yes, my fellow engineers at Madison, you can't avoid Subway for lunch apparently) and it seemed like it was going to be a pretty American experience besides the prices (8 something for a 6 inch! scam). Anyway, I get the usually, chicken teriyaki, and the normal questions come at me: "what type of bread?" "what size?" "toasted?" "what kinda of cheese?" and to the last one I answered like normal: American. Then the person picks up a stack on orange triangles aka cheddar. UHM no, you don't eat cheddar cheese unless it's in Cheez-it form. I corrected her  and pointed to the white triangles like I normally get and then quickly realized that saying "American" in another country is basically asking for the most cheddary cheese you can find. After being totally embarassed I moved along to the veggie station. Hit with yet another surprise, they have like half the good veggies we have in America (AKA no spinach lettuce). Startled by this I tried to continue my requests. I couldn't stop thinking about how Subway was really not giving it to me "my way" as they claim. Lastly, it was time to order a drink. To my surprise, and excitment, they had VANILLA COKE in a bottle. Of course I got it. The closest thing I can get to vanilla coke in the States is when I mix coke and vanilla smirnoff. The total was $10.50. Bullshit

After that traumatic experience (which I expected to be so familir), I found some Wisconsin familiarity somewhere else. I sat down across from some nerdy-ish looking guy playing on his phone. I thought maybe he would want to chat or something or I would just talk at him for the remainder of my lunch. Initially he wasn't to chatty, but I soon realized he did love talking about particular topics, mainly the NFL. He asked where I was from and I said the US, and he said "Oh, which part?". (By the way, all Australians do this, when really the only place they actually know in the US is California). Anyway, I tell him Wisconsin and of course he hasn't got a clue where it is. I use my typical way of clarifying, "Um it's kinda by Canada" (not at all) or "Near the great lakes" and then I tried something totally random that I now know I should be using more often: "Uhm our NFL team won the Superbowl last year" Well, thanks to Aaron Rodgers and the Green Bay Packers, I had an instant friend. This guy seriously loved Aaron Rodgers. He went on and on about how great he was and how he was the best player ever. He also mentioned that Eli Manning is a baby. We talked for probably twenty minutes about the Packers.  I am just saying, people can be relatively clueless about stuff but when it comes to football they will never miss a beat. Props to the Packers for my new found conversation starter!