Friday, December 01, 2006

When a Discourse Becomes Stereotyped ...



I had the opportunity to go to the European Commission last night as a friend invited me to a forum on the status of Roma/"Gypsies" in the EU ... with the recent additions of Bulgaria and Romania, there are now an estimated 10 million Roma in the EU (more than the entire popuation of Belgium) facing important issues such as discrimination and challenges integrating into the global economy ... once again I got to (this time honestly) play the part of the ignorant American (even to all of the stereotypes that they were trying to dispel) ... it was very informative ... I met a Lithuanian girl interning in the EC who had never met an American before in Europe ... so I evidently dispelled some stereotypes of my own ...





I ended up going out for drinks with some of the participants (at an Irish pub ... so much for stereotypes), and missing the last train back to Leuven ... leaving me to explore Brussels (once again ...) until the first train at 5AM ...



The train back was beset by a group of loud and obnoxious Loyola College students (appropriately enough) ... and I understood much clearer some of the stereotypes against Americans ... the worst ones are those rare ones that you can't escape because they end up to be occasionally true ... I apologized to all on the train for them once they had left (but that didn't make me feel any better about it all)

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I think I would struggle there... I'd be loud and obnoxious and yet I'd probably dislike all the loud obnoxious americans...


Good thing there are big blue shiny christmas trees to make everything better!

Because thats what christmas is all about-- illuminated foliage.



... I've suddenly been inspired to buy a small tree and 5,000 leds.

--b.j.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, the Americans are always so loud and annoying for some reason.