After a transitory lay over at a third country, I found myself in one of the entry points, in this case, Atlanta:
Southern hospitality, chicken recipe, and of course, airport price tagd. Ten bucks, with no drink. Welcome back, Mr Nguyen.
I prepare my breakfast now. No longer a Saigon sitting down on a low stool, ordering broken rice and pork chops (with fish sauce and hot chili pepper over it).
Instead, breakfast consists of oatmeal, coffee and grapefruit juice. All the supposedly healthy diet for sterilized living.
The news said we were pulling out of Iraq, but no we don’t. Thousands will be staying behind until next year.
Blair is still the un-appointed spoke person on the subject, and even foreshadowing the next war.
This long holiday will bring back workers who are exhausted, consumers who are burned out and soldiers who face labor-surplus economy.
Even the Web is purported to be dead (Chris Anderson of Wired Magazine). In its wake, we found thousand of offsprings aka apps.
In telecom, we thought caller ID was an intrusion. Wait until call centers crawlers pulled up every bits of credit info about you and I before we got a “hello, may I help you”.
It will be caller FICO.
It wouldn’t be strange if the fast food industry started to size their serving according to customer’s profile the way Coke added sugar according to regional preferences:
larger burgers in the South, trimmer ones for NY City, for instance. BK was sold for a whopping 3.3 B yesterday. Location, location, location. Instant access to thousands of location worldwide, near McDonald’s. K Mart, even during bankruptcy, still made a profit on prime real estate.
Back to reverse culture shock. I got up early, way early this Labor Day weekend. In the dark, I wondered where I was. Then I realized things haven’t changed a bit. All those awful stats such as 4% unemployment back in 2000, now nearing 10 in 2010 etc… Land of the free. There are tons of work to be accomplished, but Congress is not going to take on serious tasks before going home. So they say. I went to a Metro PCS store just to be sent home at 9:15 AM. Sorry, HQ won’t open until another hour (KS).
I understood Metro to be a MVNO, hence no instant access to Sprint central computer. I understood America original design of checks and balances. I understood the victimized mentality of citizens facing big bureaucracy. Speed of change varies according to institutions. But it is still a shock to come back to a place where services are not up to standard, but pricing remains at yesterday’s high. We are trapped in a time warp, thinking we are still in post-war period, when the GI bills will make everything OK for returnees i.e. a Chevy in the driveway, and a chicken in the pot. Well, look at car sales figures. GM predicts worse sales, and of course, BK was sold. It is the equivalent of Pepsi on the chopping block. Give me a few more days. I hate it, but will have to get used to it. Remember 2000 and Y2K? Every decade comes with its own black eyes.
Thang Nguyen 555 