Miranda
I figured out one of the things that irks me about this country. It's crazy. Literally. Like the whole country is bi-polar. When you meet someone here, you don't know if you're meeting the meek little "mustn't grumble" British person, or if you're meeting a raging violent drunk who will punch strangers in the head for little or no reason.
Actually, it reminds me of my favorite movie, Serenity. (Spoilers follow, but the movie came out 2 years ago, so you should have seen it by now.) In that movie, there is a planet called Miranda where there is a gas pumped into the atmosphere to make people calm and peaceful, but it made 10% of them become cannibal rapist monsters. That's what living here is like.
Most British people automatically, without thinking, do whatever they're asked. I've heard stories of British muggers being foiled because their victim asks them to "please give me the knife", and they do. They can't help it. Most of them are meek little sheep who have never asked the question "why" in their entire life.
"That's not true!" a bunch of you are yelling. In my office, they have told us that we have to have everything done within 6 weeks. Who made this rule? Why 6 weeks? To what end? No one has ever asked. Except me. And when I did, people looked at me like the building might blow up if I asked one more "why". I asked for special leave for my immigration stuff, and I was told that I'd have to use vacation time instead. When I asked why I couldn't have special leave, the reaction was like I had just opened fire with an AK-47 in the file library. No one asks why! You just do what you're told, and adopt the proper British "mustn't grumble" attitude.
Then there's the other 10%. They're nutbags. I was standing at the bus stop yesterday and some idiot on a cell phone rear-ended a #8 bus. I'm not sure how he possibly could have missed the bright red double decker bus right in front of him, but he managed to. There is no doubt that he was an idiot and an awful driver. He got out, and so did the bus driver and they calmly exchanged information like normal people. Then the Raging Lunatic showed up. A skinny woman from the top deck of the bus ran into the street and started screaming at the driver of the car about how she had 2 kids on that bus and where did he get off endangering them. She has to be subdued and dragged back onto the bus. Let's think about this logically a moment. This guy's tiny French car hits a DOUBLE DECKER BUS and she's worried about him hurting anyone in the bus. She even had to ask the driver if the car behind had hit them before she went on her tirade, that's how little damage he did. It wasn't her bus. It wasn't her car. Yet she felt a need to attack a complete stranger with a big screaming hissy fit. She is one of the 10% for whom the chemical in the British atmosphere has had the opposite effect, and now she's a raging lunatic Reaver.
I don't think I'll ever get the British. And I'm not sure I want to.
Alana
