American Pie?

So in my last meeting with Sina, we discussed the stereotypes that people had about Germany and America. We met where we usually meet (Union Grounds) and chatted about the usual things first, almost like a ritual humans like to perform before we actually start talking: "How was your day?" "How are classes going?" "Any fun plans for the rest of the evening?"

Even though I felt like we were going through the motions with these questions I knew that we were probably just going to sit for an awkwardly long time if we didn't do them. I was pleased to find that Sina was having a good day, doing pretty well in her classes, and found out she was going out with some friends that evening. I also told her about my day, saying little because my mind was on some other matters that had absorbed my entire week that I wasn't allowed to talk about except with a small group of people. I noticed I was quickly making her do all the conversation and realized I needed to pick it up.

We started talking about her going back to Germany over the summer and what plans she had. The conversation quickly turned to general impressions of Germany. We recalled from our last conversation that I generally thought of Germans as more serious people than Americans and that I thought they were all pretty devoted to their work due to their different scholastic system and their cultural differences when compared to America. Sina corrected me on some of my assumptions, pointing out that while I was mostly right there were some areas that she wanted to clarify to me. She then turned to me and said, "Honestly, just from the movies, most Germans, well my friends and I, thought America was just like the movie American Pie."

Wait, what? I looked at her, she looked at me, and we both started laughing out loud right in the middle of Union Grounds. I'm sure we got some looks from other boring people trying to study there and kill our fun, but we didn't care. When we could finally breathe again she looked at me and said, "I'm serious! I got here with the impression that every house had a party going on all the time!" I asked her what gave her that impression and if she thought TCU lived up to that perception. She just said she got the impression from movies, and that it wasn't quite like American Pie, but in some respects it was.

We eventually moved away from that and finished out our conversation time. As we were getting ready to leave, she told me I had to put her quotes into the blog for the rest of the class to see and enjoy as well. I told her I definitely would, and that she didn't have a thing to worry about.