The Nomads have arrived in Hot Springs, Arkansas. Home of Bill Clinton and jewel of the Natural State. We originally planned to stay in Little Rock, a couple of hours from Memphis. The city's name appealed to me because of it's place in the history of the USA's civil rights struggle. But the ride went smoothly and Arkansas is actually just a bridge over the Mississippi river away from Memphis, Tennessee. Our energy levels were still up by the time we reached Little Rock, so we decided to drive on to Hot Springs and... take the scenic route.
A good choice as it turned out. The state of Arkansas is indeed a real natural beauty and every little stop you make or side road you take brings you to someplace pretty. Once we rode into town just a quick browse through our 'Lonely Planet USA' book convinced us which motel to look for. When we arrived at the Alpine Inn motel the owners greeting us did not sound very Southern. In fact they sounded surprisingly Scottish.
Once we made our acquaintance with Lesley and her husband Eric, the Scottish couple now (a little over a year) running the motel, we checked into the comfortable, spacious and newly refurnished room and were invited to take a dive in the motels pool. Floating in the pool and gazing at the star lit Arkansas sky it did not seem too far fetched that a Scottish couple decided to cut out their own little slice of heaven here.
As it turned out they have lived in the USA (Texas) for many years and their daughter in fact grew up here. She has now returned to Scotland to attend the University of Glasgow. Although the USA is quite broad minded about citizens having dual nationalities (while back home our country's drift to the political right wing has made the issue of having 2 passports an increasingly contentious subject), upon her last visit to her parents in the States, American customs officials were puzzled about the fact that a permanent resident of the USA in fact lived abroad.
It was funny to hear that for Europeans, be it permanent residents or visitors like ourselves, the same things 'Americana' still amaze us. Easy gun permits and (openly) carrying weapons being one of those things and widespread fast food obesity being another. Michael Moore, that tenacious critic of America's dark side, would probably agree with Eric's observation that the South's celebrated hospitality and politeness might very well be based on fear for your neighbours' loaded handgun.
On the other hand there are also many attributes to what make up America's cultural and social texture that are rooted in the many European Diasporas that ended up in this famed land of opportunity. The explorers that first went fact finding in Hot Springs, Arkansas were in fact Scottish and to this day you will find considerable German influences in Arkansas as well. Unsurprisingly most noticed in its' kitchen.
Isn't in the Netherlands the kitchen also that one last uniting and most profiled cultural element of that astoundingly well assimilated immigrant group called Indo-Europeans?
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