Life in America: Where are all the insects?

They say people never appreciate what is around them until it is taken away from them. Living in Madison, I can say that the statement has some truth in it. The family, friends, food, and all the other things I did back in Malaysia, yeah I miss them all.

But there is one more thing that I think we should appreciate, and that is the rich ecosystem we have in Malaysia. Yes, it is true, Malaysia is a country blessed with many species of animals and plants. And it is a stark contrast compared to Madison, Wisconsin.

Let me tell you how many species of natural occurring insects I had encountered since I came to Madison. Oh you are going to be surprised. It is less than 5. LESS THAN 5!!!

We have the common house fly, which is not common at all. And it is relatively smaller than the Malaysian counterparts ('cos our government welfare system very good ma, can even afford to feed the insects till they are fat). And they are less sensitive to movements around them, which means I can move my finger to almost an inch to the fly and it still won't fly away. These flies won't survive long in Malaysia, the entire population will get flattened under the flyswatters.

And then I've seen one grasshopper, smaller than my fingernail. One mosquito, so feathery that I suspect it wasn't if it didn't have those long legs. And... That's it! I do not remember seeing any more insects than these.

There has got to be this sign somewhere in Madison

Why do they have so little insects here? I'm not sure. But my theory is because the climate is colder here. If you read one of my previous posts Size Does Matter, it has quite an explanation on why insects does not stay in cold climate.

Either that, or this guy here has been real busy.

Because they have less insects here, consequently, they have a simpler local ecosystem. The other animals I've encountered are one or two species of squirrels, some small sparrows, ducks down at the lakes, and rabbits. Those are just about the animals that live appears in Madison. Dogs are all owned by people, so that doesn't count as natural occurring.

Speaking of which, the dogs here are so much friendlier. Of all the dogs I've seen, only one ever barked. I guess there's no need for guard dogs in Madison, that is why dogs are generally tamed. Oh tell you what, tame dogs just appear to be a bit smarter too. But that is just appearance lah.



Oh well. Till next time, cheers.

Life in America: Honest life

Honest Abe, every child's story book.

People here in Madison are generally nicer than back in Malaysia, you can't argue about that. When you walk up to a counter (let it be whatever counter you want), someone will greet you with a big smile and ask "Hi how are you?" Because you know what, they are paid to attend customers, and they are expected to greet the customers. Back in Malaysia though, and I am not saying everyone does this, but you know there are many times when a shop employee just wouldn't be bothered to give you any attention.

"Hey, may I ask where can I find X and Y and Z?"

You will get two typical responses:

1.) "Harh? I don't know la," and then the conversation ended, the person continues to do what they were initially doing.
2.) "Harh? I don't know la, let me ask my supervisor," and then the person leaves and disappear until you get tired of waiting.

So naturally, I didn't know how to respond the first few times I went into a shop when all the sudden the person at the counter asked," Hi how are you today? But I got used to it. The standard response would be "Pretty good, you?" And then the person would reply," Good, so what can I do for you?"

Somehow though, it is a very scripted line, nobody expects you to tell your grandmother story when they ask you how are you. Just say "Good" or "I'm fine" and you will do alright.


Speaking of being nice, the people here are so used to being nice to each other, they think everyone is honest and sincere. Which they are, most of the time. Several incidents led me to this discovery, such as when I wanted to buy a stack of paper from a bookstore a few weeks ago, the cashier simply asked," How many papers are there in this stack?" without even counting it. Being the honest guy I am (don't doubt, ok!) I told the person I took 10. Then he charged me the price of 10 papers, without again counting the stack.

There was also once at Walmart, during the first week I arrived at Madison, my friends and I bought some buckets and a whole chicken and many other items. Due to the difficulty or carrying everything, we put the chicken in the bucket and loaded it onto the payment counter. We forgot about the chicken in the bucket, and the cashier checked out the bucket with the scanner without checking if we put anything inside. So we got the US$5 chicken for free for dinner that day. Oh well, "Wasn't our fault," we thought.

Sometimes we feel so bad trying to take advantage of their honesty. What to do lah. Try not to do it intentionally lor. But wouldn't it be good to live in a place where everyone is just honest to each other? Then we don't have to waste so much energy trying to find out if people are cheating. Baik kan?



Till next time, cheers~

Life in America: How you walk

So a lot of things surprised me when I arrived here in the US, like people driving on the wrong side of the road (that's what they say about us too haha), or how the houses weren't fenced (I knew about this, just that seeing it is another feeling altogether). It was a little bit of a culture shock. But today, I'm going to talk about one of the most notable thing - at least to me - about the people in Madison when I arrived.

And that is the way people walk here.

No, it is not that they walk in a weird way or something. But they walk real fast!

Some of you might have had an opportunity to hang out with me and do a little bit of walking together. You may have noticed that I walk very fast most of the time. But here in Madison, the speed I walk in is just the average speed.

How I walk in the streets of Malaysia

I first noticed this when I was walking in the streets of Madison. Then all these people kept overtaking me from behind, which immediately caught my attention. Back in Malaysia, noone overtakes me while I walk, usually anyway. Which is kind of weird when we consider that the world's fastest walkers are Singaporeans, our neighbor in the south.

There are probably a couple of reasons why they walk so fast here though:

1.) Just because they can - Well, most people here are taller than me, and thus have longer legs. Makes perfect sense.

2.) People here are more time conscious - I do not mean to generalize, but overall time is seen as something valuable here. People tends to walk faster because it saves time.

There might be more reasons. But I will try figure that out on another day. Meanwhile, more homework!



Till next time, Cheers~


p.s. Like the post on facebook if you want to see more mini-posts about the life here. Greatly appreciated!

Life in America: Not your reality TV show

Oh hi! Sorry for taking an extended break from blogging. In case you haven't know. I AM NOW IN AMERICA!

I am currently studying at University of Wisconsin-Madison, as you may recall from this post. Anyway, I am now 3 weeks into my first semester in this awesome university, and I want to say this: This is not a place for you to fool around. Classes here means business, you pay for education, it is education you get. And I have been super busy with studies, which explains my lack of presence here on this blog since I came to US. To explain why I had not been blogging while I was in Malaysia before I came to US, well, let's just say I needed some time to contemplate about my life before I fly. It was a time when I was really uncertain about what lies ahead. But more of that later!

So, today (and for most days of the coming weeks I hope), I will take some time to talk about what is it like to be here in US. This is a short entry, as will most of my future blog posts be. What I hope is to give you a glimpse of the real US from the perspective of a boy from Malaysia.

So one of the most common thing before people arrive to US is to think that they know what is it like to be in the US (or at least I did). You thought you know what is it like from the books you've read, the TV show you've seen, etc. But that is wrong. Way wrong.

There is no one unifying culture in US. None. Your idea of US culture is not applicable to every part of the country, and there is a reason why. THIS IS A BLOODY HUGE COUNTRY!

If you do not know how huge is US, let me show you what is it like when you compare it with Europe:

That's right, the country itself is larger than Europe. So we are talking about thousands of miles from the West Pacific coast to the East Atlantic coast here.

Think this, can a TV show from England tell you what is it like in France, which is just across a strait? Absolutely not, right? So it is actually unreasonable to generalize Americans into one culture.

There is an appreciable difference between people of different states, much like the differences between the people from different parts of Europe. The only thing that is keeping these many states from having distinct differences like European countries is federal governance (which means they are under one government), while every country in Europe is an own and self-governing entity.

Also there is the historical factor. Europe had a longer time for development of distinct cultures, while US was only discovered and colonized about 500 years ago. So there wasn't a lot of time for the first settlers in America to go separate cultural pathways before it was unified into one country.

That is one thing to keep in mind: do not generalize Americans although they may be somewhat similar. People differs from region to region. One good practice when arriving to US for the first time is to keep an open mind and expect the unexpected (as cliche as it may sound lah).

That is all for this time. Next time, I will talk more about the people here, especially in this city of Madison a.k.a. Madtown.



Till next time. Cheers~