People hated us... I mean realllllly hated us.
I would try to be on my best behavior. I tried to convince myself that I was a mini ambassador and that my actions would have an effect one person at a time. I tried different approaches to change people's disgust. I would say "but I didn't vote for him!" or "we actually do have different types of cuisine in America!" but people wouldn't budge. It's not like I could actually prove anything.
When our soccer team was playing in the world cup in 2006, various Dublin pubs would have the flags of the teams participating hung on the walls. I never saw an American one. The fact that they didn't want to hang or even see our flag says a lot. England's flag was hanging up and Irish people hate the English more than anyone!
The Europeans drank the Kool Aid. Before my three week Christmas trip this past December I packed clothes that didn't look too "American." I gave myself pep talks to get ready for the haters. The only problem was that from the moment I arrived, people were excited to ask me questions about Obama. They wanted to know if I voted, where I was from, if I had ever been to Washington, when the inauguration would be, etc. I wasn't ready for this.
It was actually kind of cool and a relief. I didn't have to pretend I was Canadian or Italian anymore. It's not like I started wearing flag pins but I didn't try to hide when the news started talking about the US or keep my passport hidden in the airports to avoid glares.
The salesmen at Harrods even said he was thinking about visiting New York and had asked me what city I liked better, Washington DC or London (obvi I picked London).
All I can say is that I hope our government doesn't do anything stupid. People's views about us in the world really have changed (well, at least the Italians' and British views).
I'll try not to get arrogant about it but it was kind of fun to travel and swap food, geographic and cultural information with Europeans. I had never experienced it at such a widespread level before and I feel like people opened up to me more than in the past.
