You Are (Where You) Eat (It) ?

With about 340 new students and 2 classes to plan and teach entirely on my own, the work has finally returned. And I'm happy about it. Feeling needed, productive, creative, and useful makes me feel GOOD. Spring vacation is nice and all, but feeling purposeless with no kids to teach is not much fun. Now the students are back! And I love them!

I can't stand American Diet Coke. Recent newspaper articles have acknowledged what is fairly obvious: all "global" products are not created equal. Some people were upset when they discovered that the fat content of McDonald's fries varies from country to country. As you globe-trot and see the same golden arches, you assume you're getting the same product. But fries are more likely to kill you in some countries than in others. Because of various regulations, costs, etc., there are disparaties between American fries and FRENCH fries and Dutch fries and Japanese fries. And maybe you think this is "unjust," or at least worthy of newspaper report-age.

But how else can companies succeed on a global scale? They survive by adapting their products *just* enough to suit the preferences of the people without having to change the name of their brand. Did you know Haagen Daaz (sp?) makes "red bean" and "green tea" flavored ice cream? Would you ever find "red bean" ice cream in America? No. In Japan? Yes! So of course McDonald's fries will be a little (or very, according to those fat percentage charts) different depending on where you are eating.

Well so is Diet Coke, and this is the main one I care about. It shows how we could potentially become DIFFERENT PEOPLE based on the overall taste preferences of a country. Consumerism taken to the extreme, you say? I think not, considering how much people can be judged by their food preferences. (It's ridiculous!) Consider this example:

American Diet Coke is terrible. French Diet Coke is quite delicious. Japanese Diet Coke is alright. Now pretend I'm out with a bunch of friends on a picnic, and someone else was in charge of the drinks. Say they brought only Diet Coke. In America, I could be labeled the "picky" one, the "spoiled" one, the "difficult" one, because I would choose to drink nothing over a nutra-sweet-after-tasting gross American Diet Coke. It could also exclude me from the "sorority girl" stereotype because I would prefer REGULAR, calorie-laden Coke to the calorie-free kind. So people could make all these judgments about my personality, without even realizing it, because this idea of me becomes an intangible, unchanging FACT in their minds: LAUREN WILL NOT DRINK DIET COKE, therefore she is X. I find this example amusing, and extreme, but I will have trouble believing anyone who tries to dispute the fact that they make assumptions and judgments about people's personalities based on the foods they eat. What if I told you I never drink beer? What if I said don't like "bitch" drinks? The mere TERM "bitch drink" associates a whole stereotype and personality and gender with a food preference. I'm talking about alcohol but it applies to everything. Read these words and think about the images of people that come to your mind, and the personality traits you automatically assume they have: tofu. steak. lentils. Red Bull. cotton candy. meatloaf. grits. pizza. thin-crust pizza. strawberries. I could build entire people on these single words and I bet you could too.

On with my original point. If the exact same picnic situation occurred in France, or in Japan, I would gladly drink the Diet Coke. And all those assumptions or stereotypes or images that people might have made about me in America simply would not have been made in France or Japan. So to my friends, I could seem like a different person. Lauren, picky? What are you talking about?