Confusing Things About American Elections

In case you've been living under a rock for the past year or so, you may have noticed that the US election finally took place on Tuesday. I'm sure those of you overseas heard less than me, but likely still more than you really wanted to. It was all really rather baffling, and made me much more appreciative of our own electoral system, which certainly has its problems, but not nearly to the same degree.

I'll try to stay out of the politics of the whole thing, as much as is possible, and more add my general thoughts on the overall process. Perhaps a list?

Things that baffle me about the US elections:

How long they take. I know it's a much bigger country, and thus requires a more complicated system, and more time, but good lord this thing seemed to drag on forever! The campaigning for the Republican primaries started well over a year ago, with the first Republican debate being held in August 2011, and the constant media coverage hasn't ceased since. In late April Mitt Romney was finally declared as the Republican candidate (yes, I am looking this stuff up on Wikipedia), and the full out campaigning from both sides started.
For those Americans following along, in New Zealand we don't really have big competitions on who is going to lead each party, whoever is the current head of the party is the person who will eventually become prime minister, should their party get elected. We always know when it's an election year, but the general advertising and media coverage generally starts a month or two beforehand, rather than a year or two.

The amount of money spent. Again, I know it's a bigger country, and thus more money is going to be spent, but goodness those numbers look big. According to the New York Times, the Democrats spent $852.9 million, and the Republicans $752.3 million. And that's just the party spending. Outside corporations also spent a hell of a lot. The estimate of total spending by everyone on this election is somewhere around $6 billion! There's no limit on the amount of money they're allowed to spend, and big companies are allowed to donate huge amounts of money to candidates, thus giving corporate giants a fair amount more control in these elections than I think they should have.
In comparison, National was the only party in the 2011 New Zealand election to spend over $2 million, and there are limits on the amount of money each party is allowed to spend.

The electoral collage. This is the system they use for counting the votes, and deciding who gets to be president. (The fact that there is even a separate vote just for the role of president kind of confuses me, too) Basically, there are 50 states, and because each state has varying numbers of people, they get varying amounts of seats in the house, and are worth different numbers of elector votes. There's 538 electors all together, so a candidate needs 270 of them to win the presidency. California, for example, is worth 55 electors, because there are so many people living here, whereas somewhere like North Dakota, a state with very few people, is only worth 3. The thing that I find odd, is that each state works as a kind of lump sum. So even if 51% of California voted Democrat, and 49% voted Republican, all 55 of those electors would go to the Democrats, regardless of the fact that nearly half of them did not vote that way. This means that occasionally the person who becomes president may not be the person that the most people voted for. It's happened four times so far, I think. Last time being Gore vs Bush Jr. Gore had the popular vote, but Bush won the electoral college, and so got the presidency.

The parties involved. There really aren't any minor parties hugely involved in the US elections. That's not entirely true, but with the system the way it is, they really aren't given the time of day. The candidates from the smaller parties are pretty much dismissed by most people. Including the two main candidates, who don't even allow them into the presidential debates. There was a debate with the leaders of the minor parties, but very little was said about it, and I don't know of anyone who watched it. A vote for any minor party is essentially a vote wasted, as it's highly unlikely any of them will win any position in government, which I think is rather sad, as some of them have some very good points. Some of them are also a little horrifying, mind.

How few people vote. In the election on Tuesday, approximately 57.5% of all eligible voters actually went to the polls and voted. It kind of astounds me that so few people don't read up on the issues and cast a ballot. If that remaining 42.5% of people did vote, I imagine the results of the elections would be vastly different. I understand that some people may not feel like any candidate represents their views, or that their vote really won't matter, because they don't live in a swing state (Many states are always going to go one way. For example, California is going to turn out Democrat, and Texas will pretty much always go Republican, whereas somewhere like Florida or Ohio could go either way. These are called swing states.), but there are still a lot of other issues on the ballot that are much more local, and the individual votes count on much more. Contrasting that, the turnout in NZ has been steadily decreasing (sad, that), and was at a record low last year, at 74.21%.

How difficult it is made for voters. Maybe I'm less surprised by how few people vote when I hear about how difficult it can be made for them. In Florida on Tuesday, there were people who had to wait in line for seven hours to complete their ballot. I'm not even joking. Seven hours. To vote. I really have no words to convey how appalling I find that. And while that's the most extreme, it still is not at all uncommon for people to have to wait well over an hour to be able to vote. What the actual fuck? (Sorry Mum) Considering the fact that a large percentage of the population doesn't even vote, the fact that this has not been sorted seems completely ridiculous to me. I know that some of the ballots have a lot of various local issues on them that need to be voted on, and it can take people a little while, but still. Kind of makes you think that someone doesn't want people voting, but I'll bite my tongue, and spare you the extended rant. There's several other laws and various bullshit (again, sorry Mum) around voting that make it harder for some people to vote, and I'm sure skew the system a fair bit, but I'm not well enough educated on the issues, and I'm sure doing my research will just make me angry, so we'll leave it there.

Which issues are considered important. I know everyone has different opinions on things like this, and once again, big country has different priorities, but there were a few things I was saddened to find are still considered fairly controversial, and a few things that I noted were missing altogether from the coverage I saw of election shenanigans. For example, employers being able to decide if their employees can have affordable access to birth control or not should, in my opinion, not even be up for debate. Ditto a fair few issues to do with healthcare and so called women's issues (Because clearly men don't care. Only these silly women who want such ridiculous things like equal pay, or *gasp* the ability to decide what happens to their own bodies), but I'll try to keep my personal opinions at bay, for the most part. I do, however, find the people who vowed to move to another country if Obama won fairly amusing. If they don't want universal health care, I reckon this map can help them find a country to move to.
There was much more debate on foreign policy than I expected, although I guess that shouldn't surprise me, considering the global superpower that America is. Plenty of talk on the economy, a bit on education, but something that I don't remember hearing anything about was the environment, which kind of surprised me. Maybe things like that shouldn't surprise me, but I still would have thought there'd be some kind of talk about clean energy, reducing emissions, and all of that good stuff. I like to think that America in general cares about that sort of thing, but maybe I'm just being too hopeful.
I also find the amount of time spent on portraying the other guy as a terrible person rather sad. Surely if your argument is the best, then you can stand on your merits, rather than the other guy's weaknesses. I know this happens across the board in politics, but the amount of hatred for the other candidate, from the general campaigns, and just people you talk to, is higher than I can ever remember it being back home. Nobody is inherently evil, and everyone wants the best for their country, and solidly believes that they are doing the right thing. We may not always agree on the best ways to make this world a better place, but just because someone disagrees with you, does not mean they are an awful person. It's a pity our political leaders don't always set a particularly good example in that regard.

So yes. Elections are weird, and I am very much looking forward to not hearing about them as much in a few weeks' time. A few great things did come from this election. Four states legalised gay marriage, and another three said no to measures that would ban it, and the first disabled woman, the first Asian-American woman, and the first gay woman were all voted into the house. Good job to America!

Thoughts On Halloween

This past Wednesday happened to be Halloween, a holiday that is apparently second only to Christmas in consumerism levels in the US. Something of a big deal, apparently. The average person supposedly spends $80 on decorations, candy and costumes! Per person! Crazy.

Last year I got off fairly lightly, as the kids were staying with their dad, and doing the whole trick-or-treating thing there, while I was off at OpenCircle for the night. This year I got to experience the full thing. As far as the being put in costume and going house to house asking for candy side of things go, at any rate.

Monday was a teacher only day, so my costume was crafted for me that day, out of a pair of my old jeans that had torn in an unfortunate place and been rendered unwearable, and a top we picked up for ten bucks from Target. It was decided that I was to be a zombie, a role which I took very seriously, and spent the evening stumbling towards unsuspecting victims, with my arms outstretched, and calling for their delicious, delicious brains. I also reminded myself why I avoid make up, and do not tease my hair on a regular basis.

This is what I ended up looking like,

after they were finished with me.

Then came the actual trick-or-treating part of the evening, which I found entirely odd. Having never been before, and feeling like I was not exactly in the same demographic of usual trick-or-treaters, I was fairly uncomfortable with the general idea of going up to a stranger's house and asking them to give me free candy. I went a few times when dragged, but mostly held back and watched the kids have their fun, once I had enough to be snacking on.

Goodness did they get a lot of candy, too! The three not-so-blind mice and eighties punk-rocker each had a pillowcase, that was at least a quarter-filled with sugar by the end of it. When we got back to the house and they all poured out their haul, the mounds of chocolates and lollies were astounding. I had enough of a sugar crash on the small amount that I had!

My host mum stayed back and held down fort at the house, and from the sounds of things, we gave out possibly more candy than we brought in! Nearly two hundred kids came to our house! Two hundred! This country continues to baffle me.

I think one of the things that I find most strange about the whole thing is that on any other day of the year, kids are explicitly told that they should never go up to strange houses, and especially not to take candy from strangers. They have this whole thing about not letting kids eat anything that wasn't pre-wrapped in a factory, too. Fear of roofies and razor blades and all. I guess it's good to be safe, and I'm sure the paranoia comes from actual instances of this happening, but it still seems a little much to me. A ploy from the big candy companies to make more money by stopping people from making cookies or their own confectionery.

Maybe I'm just a killjoy. I will admit that it did seem like a kind of interesting way to get to know your neighbourhood a little better, and the level at which some people get into it is kind of amazing. Houses had graveyards on their lawns, fancy lighting, spider webs everywhere, and many, many carved pumpkins. Including a pumpkin that I carved! Something that I did find incredibly fun, and will one day master the art of doing something really awesome. Mine ended up turning into a rabbit, for reasons still unknown to me. 

 They did look rather cool all lit up at night.

A Weekend Away

This Friday, in celebration of our one-year anniversary thingamywhatsit (A year? How did that happen?) David and I took a trip down to the incredible National Parks of King's Canyon and Sequoia.

Having visited around ten of America's National Parks, I must say that each and every one of them is truly spectacular, in their own unique way. I'm very definitely of the opinion that if you visit the US, the big famous cities are nice, but it's the National Parks that you really have to see. These two are no exception.

We were camping in King's Canyon, and arrived a little later than planned, thanks to the ineptitude of Apple maps, and some of the thickest fog I've ever seen. There is definitely something quite fun about setting up camp in the dark, and then emerging from your tent in the morning, to discover the true wonder of where you are staying. There were trees well over a hundred feet tall and insanely wide, and the loos weren't nearly as far away as they had seemed in the unfamiliar darkness.

We started with a wander to see the second largest tree in the world, the General Grant Tree, which is by no means the tallest in the world, but the second largest by volume. Its trunk is estimated to have a volume of around 1,320 m³!

This doesn't really capture the scale.

Along the trail, we also walked through a massive fallen tree trunk.

 Having David stand in there puts it in perspective a bit, doesn't it?

One of the coolest things we got to see, was the view from above the clouds we'd driven through on our way up the previous night. We took a walk up Moro Rock, to get an absolutely stunning view of the clouds flooding the valley below.

Bit of a climb it was, too!

The view from the top was truly one of the most spectacular things I've seen. I'm sure the normal view of the valley is pretty awesome too, but with the clouds, the blue sky, and the mountains, it was truly awe-inspiring.

A giant basin of clouds.

 Kind of makes you feel like you're on top of

the whole world, it does.

 Sunglasses reflections are cool.

That afternoon we took a tour of the Crystal Caves, of which I took no photos, because it was dark, and I would not have been able to get very good photos, so decided to simply enjoy myself and not worry about documenting things for later enjoyment. They were, however, utterly gorgeous, and much cheaper to tour than any New Zealand cave I've ever visited. The absence of weta was made up for by the threat of possible rattlesnakes on the path down to the caves. What with all the bears, cougars, and snakes I am continually warned about, I'm beginning to like camping in my safe little Aotearoa more and more. Fortunately none were encountered, only a few squirrels and chipmunks.

After the tour we went to see the General Sherman Tree, the largest in the world, and goodness it was massive!

Again, not capturing the immense scale.

One of the things about these giant sequoias is not just the size of them, but the sheer amount of impressively large trees there are in one place. Not only do the parks contain the biggest in the world, and the notable trees that you can walk through, drive through, park a car on, or build a house from, but everywhere there are huge trees, just hanging around on the side of the road, or along a path, that nobody really pays any attention to, because in this place there are just so many of them. Giant trees are everywhere here!

Sunday, after packing up camp, we took a drive to get a better look at King's Canyon. Once again I was blown away by how stunning America's national parks are.

Once again, not capturing the scale of incredible.

We didn't actually get the chance to go all the way down into the canyon, which was a bit of a shame, but what we did see was incredibly gorgeous. Guess that just gives me an excuse to go back another day!

Last stop before we left for home was a grove of giant tree stumps. Apparently I didn't actually take a photo of the whole thing, but here's two pictures of one stump, with David to put it in perspective. Keep in mind that I was also standing on the same stump when I took them.

 Insanely giant tree stump! Fun to climb on, they are.

Camping in America is a little different to camping in New Zealand, I've discovered. I've been several times, and some of the differences are minor, some more notable. I think the biggest one is the bears. Fortunately I haven't seen one yet (other than running across a field in Yosemite in June), but needing to be wary of them, and store all food and scented items in these big metal bear boxes is definitely a bit different. Camping where the worst thing you might encounter is a weta* or a possum certainly has its advantages. I'm not overly fond of having to guard my food from bears, raccoons, and mountain lions. Keeping an eye out for snakes along the path isn't much fun either.

 

Overall, it was a very awesome weekend, and I'm already looking forward to planning my next trip to far away exciting lands, wherever they may be.

 

*Side note. I just showed David a picture of a weta, and he is no longer so keen on the idea of New Zealand outdoors. For any Americans reading, this is what a weta looks like. And yes, they can jump.

The Past Nine Months

It's been rather a while since I wrote something here, huh? I've honestly no real idea were to start, or if it's even worth trying to do an update on what's been going on for the past almost-year. Maybe whenever I get around to updating this thing, I'll just ramble about whatever I feel like, instead of feeling like I need to keep it updated on every single thing I've been doing, which is quite clearly not possible, as staying up to date on things like this is just not something I'm good at. We'll go month by month, for this time.

January:

That was the last time I wrote anything, wasn't it? Goodness, I can hardly remember what I was doing then. Went to Oklahoma for a long weekend, which was very lovely. Oklahoma City National Memorial and Museum was incredibly well done and very moving. I remember Oklahoma as very flat, which made going up what I was told was a mountain rather awesome, as we could see out for ever and ever.

Pretty awesome view, yes?

February:

David got back from Oklahoma in mid-February, which did wonders for my sanity levels. I also took a trip out to Tahoe with my host family, which almost ended in an attempt to put me in skis, but fortunately for us all, my arm was still not recovered from my last incident with strange things strapped to my feet in cold stuff, so I escaped unscathed. I did get a day to take a bit of a look around some of Nevada as well, including a look at the State's capital, Carson City, and an old little touristy mining town, on the way to pick Hannah up from a friend's house.

Tahoe is really rather pretty.

March:

I don't think I did all that much travelling in March. Had an Open Circle retreat out in Santa Cruz one weekend, which was very awesome. Met a ton of awesome people, and had a great time. I also had my first ever manicure, which was an interesting experience. I got them done in what I decided to call "TARDIS Blue", because I am a nerd like that.

April:

April was a busy, and incredibly exciting month. My dear Susan came to visit me, and we had many fantastic adventures around the place, seeing some of San Francisco and Monterey, and generally getting up to all sorts of mischief. I also took a four day trip to Vancouver with David, which was definitely a highlight of my travels thus far. Very beautiful, it is, and one of the only places I've been on my travels in North America that I could actually see myself living for a while. April was also the month that I decided to stay in the US for another year, which was a fairly huge decision, and one that I'm still very happy with. I miss home hugely, but the opportunity for travel (not to mention the bribery on part of my host mum) was just too much to pass up. I'm not quite finished with America yet, and I need a little longer to get as much out of it as I can.

May:

In May David and I took a roadtrip. The plan was to go a few hours south to Big Sur and camp for a night, but upon discovering that all the campsites were booked up we ended up driving south along Highway 1 for quite a bit further than we'd originally planned. We ended up spending the night in Santa Barbara, and making it all the way to Los Angeles the next day.

Well over a thousand seals, chilling out on a

beach we found along Highway 1.

June:

June was another very busy month. My mum and dad came to visit, and I took two weeks off work to go travelling around with them. We did Yosemite, Death Valley (Maximum temperature of 49°C/120°F was a bit too hot for me...), Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon, The Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, and the Hoover Dam. America really does have some absolutely incredible national parks. I also turned 21 in June, which was a little interesting, as they don't really do it the same way here. In America, turning 21 just means that you're allowed to go to a pub, rather than the whole big party that it is back home. It made me miss home and all the people I have there a fair bit, but was also plenty of fun. Twas also interesting to have my parents meet some of the people in my life over here.

July:

In July I went on one of the most incredible trips of my life thus far. As part of her bribery to have me stay another year, my host mum took me to Africa with her and the kids. I highly doubt I will ever be able to travel in the way  that we did ever again. We flew business class, and stayed in some of the most amazing places I've ever seen. We flew into Johannesburg, then went up to Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe, spend four days at two different camps in the Okavango Delta, in Botswana, two more nights in Botswana at Chobe National Park, then to Windhoek, Namibia, where we rented a car and drove down to Sossusvlei, the world's largest sand dunes. We spent the last five days on the beach of a little island resort just off the coast of Mozambique. And yes, I am fully aware of how insanely lucky I am.

August:

I spent the first ten days of August in Europe, where I took an extended stopover on my ways back to the States, in order to sort out the renewal of my visa. My travel went a little less smoothly after leaving Judy and the kids, what with a fair bit of running around in Frankfurt to sort out some hidden costs of my visa, a confusion with airports that had me taking the fastest taxi ride of my life (180km/h on the autobahn anyone?), the friend I was meeting in England being seven hours late to meet me after being hit by a car on his way to the station, and a nasty case of food poisoning while camping. But that's the stuff that makes life more interesting, right? I got to stay with my grandparents for a few nights, which was really wonderful, as it had been a good five years since I last saw them, and also catch up with my dear Anastasia. On my way back to Frankfurt to fly out I spent a couple of nights in Brussels, staying in a little hostel down a little alleyway leading to La Grande Place. Fantastic city, is Brussels.
The rest of August was pretty much just getting back into the swing of school and general life after having been away for so long.

En Manneken Pis. Much

smaller than you'd expect.

September:

At the beginning of September, David and I took a trip up the coast for Labour Weekend. Labour Weekend is in September here. Very strange. It's generally my favourite thing about October. Most of the rest of the year, too, for that matter. I'm incredibly gutted to be missing my Wellyfest two years in a row. We drove all the way up Highway 1 to Portland, Oregon, and back home past Crater Lake. It was rather a lot of driving for four days, but fully worth it. Highway 1 really is incredibly gorgeous. It goes all the way up the West Coast of the USA, from San Diego to Seattle, and there are many portions of it that are just stunning.

A river we camped beside on the way home.

That about brings us up to date, I'm reckoning. I've got various plans for the rest of the year, including a trip to King's Canyon/Sequoia National Parks next weekend, a few days off over Thanksgiving that I am yet to figure out what to do with, and three weeks back home over Christmas and New Year's. All much excitingness.

If you're interested in photos, I've been rather slack at organising whole albums for facebook, but I have been managing to put up one every day or so over at a tumblr I was coerced into getting, which you can find here.

A Summary of the Past Few Months

Been a while, hasn't it? Sorry about that. I got caught up in other things, and have mostly been focusing on keeping my backlog of emails somewhat up to date, and the packages that I wanted to send by Christmas, and the photos for facebook, and everything else. This thing kind of fell by the wayside a little. I figure it's about time to rectify that with a (somewhat) brief update on how things are going. I think I'm going to try bullet-pointing the main things of interest, for fear of rambling on forever and ever, which I do not really have time for. As always, I do (eventually) respond to my emails, so if you have questions, want specifics, or just want to say hi, I would absolutely love to hear from you and hear how you're doing and fill you in on things a bit better.

So! Happenings since September:

• I had visitors! Was incredibly nice to have friends and people my own age, at a time where I'd been somewhat lacking in company. Was my first really good look at San Francisco, and was lots of fun to go around doing all the touristy stuff. Golden Gate Bridge, Pier 39, Chinatown, Haight-Ashbury, Alcatraz, all that fun stuff. Didn't really get all that much sleep, but it was a lot of fun.

• Joined Open Circle, a young adult group connected to one of the local churches. They are highly awesome people, and it has been a great way for me to get my butt out of the house on a regular basis. Many aspects of the group rather remins me of my own Ink community back home.

• Went to Chicago! Spent three days there, staying with a friend of mine, who showed me all about the place. Took many photos, some of which can be seen on facebook (still have a few to sort through...), along with a few little stories of what we got up to.

• Acquired a boyfriend (Yes, such things are acquisitions). He was promptly summoned off to Oklahoma for three months to complete some very important training.

• Did an American Halloween. Didn't end up dressing up, due to a few problems with a haunted house mission, and didn't go trick or treating, but I did carve a pumpkin!
  

• Lost a toenail. I was accidentally kicked in a rather unfortunate way, and the toenail on my left big toe was brutally separated from the toe. It hurt. A lot. Also meant that I was hobbling around and unable to wear anything but jandals for quite some time. Less than ideal, especially as that was just before the next one...

• Went to Yosemite. Yosemite is gorgeous. It's also a little cold for camping, when there's snow on the ground and you are stuck in jandals for the first day. It was also an interesting experience, camping in place where you had to store everything in a big, metal, bear-proof box. I have never had to worry about bears while camping before. That and the mountain lions.

• Had an American Thanksgiving. Family, good food, and none of the mass consumerism that comes with Christmas. I rather enjoyed it. That weekend we also went back to Yosemite, so more incredible gorgeousness. Seriously, words cannot possible describe the sheer awe-inspiring wonder that is Yosemite.

• Broke my arm. Apparently people with my coordination should not be allowed to ice-skate, as I went and fractured the elbow in two places. My right arm, too, so I was rather incapacitated, and am still not completely recovered. It really was quite a downer, as it took me five times as long to do all my work, meaning I had less time to do all my personal things, which also too twice as long, at a time where all I had energy for was sleeping, because having your arm at a funny angle makes sleeping comfortably and well a whole heap trickier, even though you really need it. Needless to say I got very behind on all my letters, postcards, emails and the like. I'm working on catching up now, but it's taking time. It was a stable fracture, so I had it in a splint for just over a week, and was then into just the sling, which I have now almost done away with, except for sometimes in public, mostly so that other people are aware of it and don't accidentally make it worse again. I can straighten it out pretty much all the way, bend it however I like, and turn my wrist over without insane amounts of pain, now. Currently I'm just not able to do any heavy lifting, or physical activities, which is a bit of a pain at times, but nowhere near as bad as it could be.

• Went to Dallas. Flying with a broken arm is a bit of a pain, but also handy for getting pushed through lines faster. Dallas itself was not all that interesting, Fort Worth was nicer, what with all the cowboy stuff and the history, but the company definitely made the trip absolutely fantastic.

• Christmas! We had family staying with us for the week leading up to Christmas. Was a rather nice time, but also quite strange for me, this being my first Christmas away from home and all. Being a day behind everyone else was also a little strange, although it did mean that I was able to Skype home for a bit, which was really nice.

• Went on a roadtrip. After Christmas, my host mum went to Mexico, and my kids went to stay with family in Illinois. This tragically meant that there was no work for me to do, so I got a week off over New Years. I took this opportunity to book a ticket to Albuquerque, New Mexico, to see my friend Steph, who I took on a roadtrip around New Zealand at the beginning of last year. This time I got to see her part of the world. We started in her hometown of Gallup, New Mexico, where we spent a couple of nights, then drove up through Arizona, stopping at Canyon De Chelley, to Durango, Colorado, where we spent the night with her aunt and uncle. We did a loop through the Rockies, staying a night in Ouray, before going back down to Durango via the lovely little ski town of Telluride. After New Year's Eve in Durango, we drove down to Santa Fe, the capital on New Mexico, and then back to Albuquerque, where I had to fly out. Very awesome week, and I'll do my best to write more about it at some point soon. Maybe just with the many photos I plan to put up sometime soon.

• Going to Oklahoma this weekend! And potentially tripping out to Arkansas, too. Hugely looking forward to it.
  

And that's just about it for the main stuff. Consider yourself up to date with what I've been up to! Sorry I couldn't go more in-depth on more of the details. Maybe next time, when I have less stuff to cover. Hopefully it won't be quite as long to the next one.