Wistful Musings of a Kiwi Au Pair in America: The American Experience!

This week I have been doing some distinctly American things!! Haha. I realised the other day that I have not eaten fast food since I have arrived here in the States! So I decided to go out for lunch to a well recommended Seattle burger place called Dick's Burgers (http://www.ddir.com/), it's the old-style drive up burger joint that you see in the old movies! You just drive up, park, go to the window and they give you the meal - there is nowhere to sit at all, you have to eat in your car! I didn't realise that they would not have a place to sit to "eat-in" so I walked awkwardly back to my car with my milkshake and little bag with my burger and fries. I had high expectations of the burger, since even the banker when I set up my bank account had raved about the burgers! I ate it and it was nice, nothing particularly special! In fact, it didn't have any tomato sauce, and I kind of missed the tomato sauce! However, to their credit the fries and milkshake were very nice!

Then, later that night I went to my first college basketball game!! I went with a couple of the other au pairs from our cluster. It was the Washington Huskies vs. the Arizona State Sun Devils. As it was a home game for the Washington Huskies, the fans, locals, and University of Washington students were out in force! The stadium was huge and pretty much packed! Everyone was decked out in the team colour - purple! The national anthem was sung, the cheerleaders were performing, the band were playing, the television crews were busily running their cameras around, there were young boys who were given the honour of polishing the floor every time there was a pause in the game. The atmosphere was alive and vocal, but in a very welcoming and positive way. The Huskies won, whoohoo!

I was very impressed with the high turn out of people, I like the way that the Americans stay interested and involved in their local high schools and colleges by attending games and supporting teams like this. It is something that fosters community and celebration, which is great! I can't say I paid much attention to the game itself, but I know that the Huskies won and that's all that matters!