A Curious Girl: Your words reveal you

Hiya.

Well, I'm back home now - uni term ended, and I have to get a job (the Italian Deli caved on me. Grr. They had too many people already). I applied to McDonald's. I figured they'd probably take me :)

Since I've been back, I've made a shoulder bag out of duct tape (I love it - I'll post pictures when I have them). Kristen made one and put the pictures on her diary, and then I knew I had to do one myself. I really want a duct tape dress but I am too poor (well, too prospectively poor - I have to survive my new job about a month before my first pay, and pay the rent) to buy enough duct tape to do so and also too inexperienced with duct tape.

Being home has provided me with the opportunity to watch daytime television. I watched Family Xchange the other day. Not sure why they felt the need to misspell 'exchange'. I thought it was a documentary about fair trade at first, because a woman with a fair trade t-shirt was telling someone they had an obligation to help others. But actually it was about a quite rich, normal family (the Halsey-Halls) swapping houses and lifestyles with a Green Fair-Trade loving back-to-nature family (the Eliases) for a week. Surprisingly, I found it rather enlightening, if disturbing.

The Halsey-Halls disliked their deal, especially Steve, the father of the family, who fantasized about crushing the Elias father, Piers's head when he had to go break up some rocks. He did work very hard, and you had to sympathise with him, but it was interesting how they viewed each other. The Eliases were terribly polite about the Halsey-Halls but plainly thought they were wasters and ridiculous. At the end, the mother of the Eliases, Claire, told the Halsey-Halls, "I'm not criticising the way you live, but I feel that if everyone lived like that, the world might explode..." It was intriguing to see an adult version of the childhood etiquette "I'm not being horrible or anything, but..." to precede a horrible remark. They plainly did think it was wrong, and they were judging, as could be demonstrated by Claire's remark afterwards that "Well, she might buy fair trade coffee, but it won't change them. A week's not enough to change a life." So yes, they did think that the other family should live differently, they were 'judging' them to an extent, but they were denying it! Yet they even gave the Halsey-Halls a recycling bin and a compost bin, and stuck the universal declaration of human rights on their wall!

But the Halsey-Halls' attitudes were similarly complex. Sharon Halsey-Hall enjoyed an opportunity to teach school children about fair trade - she told them all about it, and why it was good, and then gave them free chocolate. But here was the catch - she gave them the option of fair trade or generic. Because she wanted them to understand they had the choice. Although she gave the rough impression that there is only one type of fair trade chocolate ("Which of you preferred the fair trade chocolate?" she asked, as if it came all in one brand), her technique was a very smart one, because she allowed the children to decide rather than telling them that enjoying their normal chocolate bar was wrong, or something.

Afterwards, she did a fair trade promotion in a supermarket, and decided to try the same technique - Steve stood outside the supermarket offering people generic chocolate. No one took it, possibly because unlike Sharon, who had a stall and looked all official, he looked like a random weirdo who was offering unwrapped chocolate that could have been anything. He, however, decided to conclude that "It proves that when you force things on people, they don't take it."

Part of the deal was to renovate some of the other family's house. The Halsey-Halls did a very good job of this - they fixed some fences, and bought the other family a pig and a pig pen, which they loved. They also got the Elias kids a Playstation, which seemed very sweet since it was the thing the Elias children liked most about the Halsey-Halls' house. It actually rather distressed me that the Elias parents decided they were going to get rid of it (I'm not sure why... too expensive, maybe).

The Eliases didn't manage to thrill the Halsey-Halls nearly as much, who took exception to the pro-environmental, pro-human rights stance to the renovations. Claire Elias did confess that she had wanted to just put in the things that they liked, rather than the things that the other family liked, and they had in fact decided to try and put in things more to the Halsey-Halls' taste. Even so, they weren't impressed. Steve Halsey-Hall had a big rant about them at the end, with their Greenie ways. It was funny how they, especially Steve, claimed they felt judged by the Eliases and their friends, when the Halsey-Halls spent a lot of time judging the Eliases.

"Piers will be boring. And the children will be well-behaved because they'll be too scared not to be," he speculated in the car on the way to finally meet them. At the end, disappointed with the renovations, he made a melodramatic plea for sympathy on behalf on his children. "Look at their faces!" The whole appeal seemed ridiculous - the poor little rich kids who had to spend a week with no Playstation? Was it really the Eliases' fault that the Halsey-Halls didn't like their life? He finally decided what was most important was that he had decided to gon on Family Xchange for a bit of fun, not to promote any cause. Well, isn't that judging?

So yes, all in all, I found that most enlightening. I think it highlighted how much we love to think we're on the moral highground. There were also some cute moments, like when Steve broke the rules and took his kids out bowling. They looked like such a happy family :) But it was funny how they judged all the time but wouldn't call it judging...

Random word for today: boracic

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