Where Are You From?

So, you're at college for the first time, just chilling on campus, getting to know people when someone asks THE QUESTION.  THE DREADED QUESTION.  The question that you can't thoroughly answer in the same two or three words everyone else in hearing distance can.  You want to change the subject, but you have a feeling that won't fly.  Oh, why did they have to ask it?

"Where are you from?"

"Where am I from"

Oh, four simple words that any normal American can answer succinctly.   Oh, maybe they'll have to take a few extra sentences to explain where it is in relation to other major cities, but you...there is no escape.  There is no good way to answer this one in short form.  To answer in short form is to tell a partial truth, so you make your decision.

"Union Grove, Wisconsin."

Your mouth for some reason gives this person the half-truth.  Yet it is completely true.  You are from Union Grove, Wisconsin, and right now, you don't have time to explain all about Japan.  You're not in the mood, so you just claim to be from America and explain you live about an hour from Milwaukee.  Case closed.

A few hours later, you're hanging out with other people, just getting to know them, when someone else turns to you.

"Where are you from?"

This time, though, you feel a bit more relaxed.  Maybe you don't care about this person oodling over you in awe as they discover the full truth.

"Japan."

It's still not the full truth, though, you think as you start answering the inevitable questions (including possibly the one about if you speak Chinese).  You are a proud Wisconsinite, supporter of the Green Bay Packers and the Milwaukee Brewers.  You don't mind being called a Cheesehead and believe dairy farms are normal, everyday sights.  You hate the Illinois and Minnesota teams with an instinctive passion, and Michigan stinks pretty bad too.

Finally, the whole story spills out.  "Well, really in America, I'm from Union Grove, Wisconsin.  It's about an hour away from Milwaukee...No, I live about six hundred miles north of Tokyo...Okinawa is not really Japan...Okay, cool, your uncle was in the navy...Well, actually I was born in Iron Mountain, Michigan.  Hey, who wants to play Foosball?"

Ugh...THE EXPLANATION.  I haven't met a single missionary kid who likes giving THE EXPLANATION over and over.  It is a truth universally acknowledged that a missionary kid meeting someone must be in want of a place to call "home."

"Home" is such a strange term.  The country our parents hail from is deemed our "home country," even if we have spent less than half our childhoods there.  We talk about "going home" for furlough, but when the time is over and we head back to the passport country, we also call this "going home."  Do not be surprised to hear an MK call a hotel room or the house where he is spending the night "home."  We are a group who has lost what that term means, other than a place we spend the night not strapped in by seat belts.  In short, everything but planes, cars, boats, buses, and trains is "home."

Examples of "not home"

A missionary kid is someone destined to feel like a foreigner no matter which country he is in.  Even if he lives in another English speaking country (the United Kingdom, for example), his family constantly speaks of family back in America.  Even if he exterminates all traces of his American accent and assimilates to the British culture, he will still find himself with some obligations to America.

WE ARE SORRY WE MADE THAT DOCTOR WHO REFERENCE!

American relatives will question why he has that accent, and if he can just turn it off while he's in America.  Would you ask your cousin from Texas to lose the accent while visiting you in Minnesota?  The MK will be told he is a 'MERICAN!  Yet he feels British, but because of American relatives, he can never fully be one.

MKs in countries where their native languages and/or skin colors don't match face even greater difficulties.  It is more than adapting an accent.  An MK in Germany will go to public school and speak German all day, but at home that night, she must lay aside her German language to speak English among her family.  She may look perfectly German on the outside, allowing her to physically blend in, but culturally she does not fit in here.  After returning to America for college, she discovers that this "homeland" is foreign to her.  She marries a missionary guy and they go and serve in Germany together, but they are still Americans, speaking English at home to their children.
Or perhaps, jump over to Peru, where an MK of Hispanic descent is home schooled and, for whatever reason speaks little Spanish (Okay, highly unlikely situation, but I'm trying to cover a lot of geographical regions here.).  Perhaps she can once again blend in physically, but as soon as she struggles to communicate, she is discovered to be an American.  Yet returning to America, she sometimes finds little in common with her "countrymen" and doesn't know where to go.  Yet she remains in America after graduation because this place just seems more "home" than Peru ever did, even though neither is ideal.

Now, let's take it to the Philippines.  Yes, let's do this about a red haired, green eyed MK in the Philippines.  He will never look like them, no matter how perfect his accent is, no matter how Filipino he acts--he will always stick out like a sore thumb.  Whether he chooses to settle in America or the Philippines or even a third country as an adult, he will always be a foreigner.

My passport says I am an American, and I am glad to be one.  But I am not an American.  But neither am I Japanese.  Where am I from?  What is the right answer?  Why can't this be simple?  I just want to say where I'm from without feeling like I'm lying or giving the longest answer in the history of mankind.

Perhaps this is the reason why the book "You Know You're an MK When..." starts out with, "You can't answer the question, 'Where are you from?'" and ends at number five hundred with, "Heaven is the only place you can call home."

MKs are a homeless, but not house-less, lot.  And maybe, just maybe, that's why we deem every place and no place as "home."

The Next Doctor

If you could see my mind at work, cleaning, it's this crazed thing that goes at about a million miles per hour.  It composes stories about my book characters and writes blog posts.  Seriously, if I could dictate my blogs while vacuuming, I'd be constantly posting.  I mean, there is SO MUCH I want to post about.

But, really, I mean, considering all that's happening, I think the best topic for me to post about right now is Doctor Who.

Eleven

In case you haven't heard, Matt Smith is leaving his role as the Eleventh Doctor after the Christmas special. So, of course, the Internet has exploded with it's suppositions on who the next Doctor will be, and their opinions on who it should be, and all that sort of good stuff.  Unless they tell us who it's going to be, for the next six and a half months, every Whovian will be posting who they believe the next actor to lead them through all of time and space should be.  So, here we go, my opinions on the Doctor Who change.

Ten

Nine

First of all, I don't want it to be someone from Harry Potter, especially not one of the main characters.  Yes, upon regenerating into Ten and Eleven, the Doctor whined about not being ginger, but just because he whined about that, does not mean it must be Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley).  My number one reason for this is because of the way the fandoms tend to connect roles played by actors and pretend that the characters are all one person.  I mean, if we already get stuff about how David Tennant played both Barty Crouch, Jr. and the Doctor, imagine how much worse it would be if someone who was in a larger role in more than one movie.  Yeah, PLEASE, don't use a main character  from Harry Potter.  I mean, if it was someone who was in one tiny scene or one film (I know Britain doesn't have a kajillion actors.), then I won't complain, but please don't use a main character.

Eight

Seven

Actually, you know, preferably, make it be someone who no one really knows.  That way he can seem like the Doctor to me, and not like another actor.  I mean, yes, Benedict Cumberbatch and Tom Hiddleston are amazing and all, but let's face it:  Bumpercrop Cabbagepatch is in Sherlock, and if that show goes on hiatus again, we will go (more) insane, and if Doctor Who has to go on hiatus because Hiddles is filming for Marvel, then the Whovians will probably just curl up into little balls on the couch and replicate everything the Sherlockians have been doing for the past year and a half or whatever.  Sometimes, I wonder how people survived the eighteen month Doctor Who hiatus of the 1980's.  Anyway, please, BBC, in the highly unlikely event you run into my blog, please choose someone who I'm not really aware exists.  I mean, yes, maybe it'll be someone who I've heard of--you know, maybe they played an elf in the background of The Lord of the Rings--but for all that's wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey, please don't choose anyone that a ton of people know.

Six

Five

I don't know what the ratio of opinions are on the Doctor regenerating into a girl for the first time to him remaining a guy, but I personally want him to remain as a guy.  I mean, yes, we live in a world nowadays where girls can do anything, and, yes, Time Lords can change their gender upon regenerating, but I want us to think for a minute.  How often does the whole girl-doing-adventures-without-a-man-at-her-side happen?  They'd have her pick up a male companion so they can continue the romance theme that's been going on since the days of the Eighth Doctor, and he'd still have to rescue her at times.  I mean, yes, the Doctor is occasionally rescued by his female companions, but rarely does a movie or TV show in which the girl is the action hero and the guy is just the follower actually work.  Even in Mulan, Captain Shang is just as brave as Mulan, and he does a lot of fighting too, right at her side.  To have a female Doctor with a male companion would seriously degrade the manliness of the companion, and since Doctor Who guy companions can typically kick butt anyway, it would just end up being like a time travel Mulan.

Four

Three

I want this Doctor to be older than Matt Smith.  I mean, having the Doctor look so young (Matt was twenty-seven when he took on the role.) has been great for one Doctor, but I want him to regenerate into someone older.  I'm not saying I want someone in their sixties.  Maybe someone in their forties--just someone more mature.  I loved the friendship Ten and Donna, and I think that (although no one can ever be exactly like Catherine Tate) I'd be totally on board with another companion who just want to be friends with the Doctor and travel.  No kissing, no romance--just the companion and the Doctor traveling through time and space, saving planets and races

Two

One

Finally, I want the next Doctor to be someone who's been a fan of the show.  David Tennant's enthusiasm and fanboy-ness will obviously never be equaled by anyone, but knowing that the person playing the Doctor has watched the show, and knows the original run and the current run and is a fan of the show would just make it so much better because you know this person loves playing the Doctor, knows about the Doctor's past, and wants the Doctor he plays to be an obvious continuation of the man he has always been because no matter who the Doctor is played by--no matter what he looks like--no matter what his personality is--he's still the same man.  He's still the madman who stole a time machine and ran away.  He's still lost so much and seen so much than we can ever imagine.  He's still fire and ice; he still burns at the center of time and feels the turn of the universe.  He's still what Daleks and Cyberman and Sontarans fear because of every black day he ever stopped them.  He's the Oncoming Storm, the Destroyer of Worlds.  No matter what, he is the Doctor.  And a true fan will know that and do that.

Actual Ramblings

So, right now I'm kind of procrastinating because I'm going to a wedding tomorrow, and I still don't know what I'm going to wear or if I should wear casual clothes until I find a convenient fast food place closer to there to change in to my nice clothes or just find a nice outfit that's actually comfortable to wear on a four and a half hour trip or what.  So, you know, instead of actually standing in front of my closet wondering what to wear, I'm blogging.

So, let's see...I've been reading The Complete Works of Sherlock Holmes lately.  It's due on Monday, but I'm going to have to renew it because I've got, like, 570 pages to go, and with the wedding tomorrow and church on Sunday, I doubt I'm going to get that many pages in during that time span.  Unless, I somehow perfect the art of reading and driving at the same time or read Sherlock Holmes during the wedding...and I don't think the bride and groom would like that.  Especially since I actually care about these people.  I mean, the guy is like a little brother to me.  You know, as if I didn't already have two younger brothers, I went to college and picked up more brothers.  I should blog about that sometime.  Because, honestly, having guy friends is really important.  The thing is, I can't give you any tips on how to make it happen, because it just happens.  I don't have any magical formula I follow.  It just kind of happens, and next thing you know, we're eating Oreos and singing songs and everyone's happy.

Yes, my dear readership, that does say Triple Double Oreo.  It is the king of Oreos.  The ultimate of ultimates.  Three cookies and two layers of frosting all merging together into the greatest party your taste buds have known.  Unless, of course, you've had Four Cheese Cheez-Its.

Literally, I went to a church with a guy who the first time he had Four Cheese Cheez-Its was like, "It's like a party in your mouth!"  So, yeah, you know, if you were really wondering what snack foods you should go out and buy next, I recommend Triple Double Oreos and Four Cheese Cheez-Its.

This post is definitely a lesson in not blogging instead of having supper because you don't feel like walking across the apartment and throwing some fish sticks in the oven or whatever it is I'll be doing.  I'm not exactly in a fish fingers and custard mood.

Obligatory Doctor Who reference

I'm more in a I-just-want-to-read-Sherlock-Holmes-why-do-I-have-to-eat-he-never-seems-to-need-to-eat sort of mood.

Honestly, though, I actually cried today from reading Sherlock Holmes.  No, not when he and Moriarty went over the Reichenbach Falls.  The part where he comes back.  I spent half of "The Adventure of the Empty House" in tears, which means I will probably be in tears when Season Three of Sherlock finally airs.

I mean, I haven't even been waiting as long as some people, and I still want to know how Moffat is bringing Sherlock back.  I mean, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle did a fantastic job of bringing Sherlock Holmes back, but the way it happened in the TV show, it's just not going to be feasible to do that.  I read through theories upon theories, but none of them seem just right.  I can't wait until we find out what actually happened.

You know, considering the wedding is on the UP, maybe I should just, you know, wear this:

Just Kidding!

Yeah, the story behind that picture is that I needed to wear something to protect my dress while roomie did my hair, and since it was the end of the school year and everything needed to be in boxes, I just grabbed the first button up shirt I could find...which happened to be plaid and flannel and stuff.  I would never actually go out in public like that.  Well, yes, go out in public in the flannel, but not over a nice dress.  I'm not that much of a hick!

"But you're a nerd!"
Well, yes, but hick and nerd aren't too COMPLETEY incompatible ways of life.  I mean, have you ever watched The Red Green Show?

It's Canadian.

Ugh...okay, stomach I shall feed you since you're whining so much.  And, yes, Sherlock Holmes, I will read you.  And, clothes...we'll throw something together in the morning.  Before I leave bright an early at eight thirty in the morning!

Intergalactic Star Wars Day

Oh, yes!  The day has arrived.  The holiday that every American school child should be let off for every year, not just the years it happens to fall on Saturday or Sunday (like this year and next year.)

IT'S INTERGALACTIC STAR WARS DAY!

Get it?  Because fourth sounds like force.  Yeah, I really hope you didn't need that explanation.

I mean, in Japan, kids get off school for Intergalactic Star Wars Day.  Or, actually, they get off for a national holiday that falls on the same day, but we should just pretend Japan is actually cool enough to let all their kids off because of George Lucas's epic masterpiece.

Also, side note:  this is our first Intergalactic Star Wars Day in which the franchise is owned by the Evil Empire... Disney.  I just hope Disney isn't the movies' own Order 66.

Disney Order 66:  Execute all canon the Star Wars fans have ever known.

Ah, I still remember the first time I ever watched Star Wars.  I was seven years old.  It was the 20th Anniversary Special Edition in 1997.  Yes, this means I grew up with Greedo shooting first.

No matter what, at least he dies.

My dad sat down in the living room to watch them with us kids.  At first, nothing really tipped me off that what I was about to experience was going to be life changing.  I mean, our family had some movies that we just had to watch with the parents.  Maybe the fact Mom wasn't watching this movie with us should have tipped us off.  I mean, normally with a new movie everyone watched.  But, no, the actual case was that my mom isn't a Star Wars fan.

Anyway, we sat down in the living room to watch the video tape.  And I was BLOWN away.  Almost everything in my body instantly knew it was amazing.  My bladder didn't even tell me how badly it needed to pee until the whole film was over.  Same thing happened the next two days as I watched The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.  My poor dad had to read off all those opening crawl for years until the youngest of us three kids was able to read fast enough to keep up.

*epic theme music*

Naturally, I wondered where I-III were, but I was told they didn't exist.  Like I said, it was 1997.  I figured they had to happen eventually.

Awesomeness for seven-year-olds

So, of course, as soon as I'd seen all the movies, and I was in love, and fortunately, the other missionaries we were working with at the time had a son two years older than me who also liked Star Wars, and my brother who's two years younger than me also loves Star Wars, so it's not like I was alone in this thing.  No girls were around who really, really liked Star Wars, but I didn't care.  I had people who liked Star Wars.  Naturally, my younger brother got a lightsaber.  Actually, I think for all my growing up years from 1997 on, there was only once a time span when there wasn't a single lightsaber or lightsaber knock-off in the household.

We actually owned the knock-off double blade, not the real one.

Actually, when I think about it, Star Wars was probably the first time I followed all the steps of being part of a fandom.
#1:  Become introduced.
#2:  Fall in love.
#3:  Find others that share your love.
#4:  Buy merchandise.  Or, rather, have your brother get merchandise, in my case.

This person is naturally awesome.

Only one of the most frustrating Lego structures ever.

Just as good as regular Monopoly

#5:  Have one minor fault that makes you feel slightly out of place in the fandom.

I confess!  I don't hate Jar Jar Binks, like I'm supposed to!

#6:  Have lengthy discussions about everything.
#7:  Learn lots of information about stuff that isn't in the films and feel superior by correcting others who don't know as much.

I will admit, though, I've never actually read a Star Wars book and most of my information concerning the Extended Universe comes from Wookieepedia.  Also, my friends are on average WAY bigger Star Wars fans than me and can correct me at every turn.

If this isn't considered normal behavior, then I don't know what is.

So, yeah, that's my Star Wars story.  Well, at least so far.  In two years' time, it will pick up again when Star Wars VII airs.

Do us good, Mickey!  Follow the canon.

Anyway, Happy Intergalactic Star Wars Day, and may the fourth be with you always.

Sorry, the Doctor Who reference had to happen.