Easter

Talking to one of the customers at J&J and was telling her how I thought it strange that we get Easter day off but not New Year's Day. She seemed slightly offended. She exclaimed "Well, it's Easter." Pardon, but I didn't know that it was such a big deal--it is after all a religious holiday. I thought the U.S proposed the separation of state and religion a long time ago--Everytime I study history, it seem to suggest that all that high sounding documentation in the past is always far from the reality on the ground level. Living here for the past --what--three a half years has convinced me that the U.S is at heart very religious--still extremely protestant centered in its view. The history of isolationism and the long history of cowboys riding out to the untamed West still lives on in how the people in this country thinks this place should be run. And this obnoxious self-centered, self important view can really get on my nerves. Many people here are still so ignorant; the problem though is that they don't think they are ignorant about the rest of the world, while they go around with this out-dated view of the rest of the world. "Asia is backward in its outlook" "Europe is feudalistic" --still colour many people's opinion. Strange isn't it--for the supposedly leftist, forward, modern city of S.F, the company I work for that is stationed right here in the city still deems Easter one of its major holidays. So we get Christmas, Thanksgiving and Easter off. Holidays say a lot about what a country, or in this case, a company see as important, not only in that it is what they celebrate but where they stand and who they see themselves as. I think this says a lot, and I am surprised at what this tells me. Or maybe it is my reaction I should be surprised at. America is basically conservative and religious. That really is the heart of this country and God forbids anyone challenge that tradition, and not to mention the fact that they see themselves as having the god given right to go around meddling in other people's affairs. Self-righteous and self important still seems to be the view of the day. And Easter is just the tip of the surface condition hiding all that molten hormone raging under this proclaimed great nation.